It was a sort of guinea-pig convention. Thirty or so generous souls actually paid money so that we could practice our organising, cleaning, cooking, serving, decorating, hosting, entertaining and pool playing skills.

This friendly crowd of visitors, which, I am pleased to say, included three benevolently subversive children, seemed to enjoy their time with us. Perhaps they were only being kind. If so, they role-played their appreciation with thespian expertise.

I think we all enjoyed ourselves as well. There was a dimension of worry, a lot of grindingly hard work, a great deal of laughter, some impressive ingenuity, excellent food, wine and soft drinks, and deep, genuine enjoyment of the fact that Scargill was once more taking the world to its heart.

Well done, team. Well done, visitors. It was well worth the effort.