I’m pleased to say plenty of Christmas orders came my way for copies of We Did Our Homework On The Bus but a combination of postal strikes and weather made distribution from In Omnibus Labora towers slightly challenging.

So we’ve been finding creative ways to get the book into the hands of people who want them. In this case my old mate Phil Hall, one of the most talented musicians to emerge from St Mary’s, wanted copies for his older brothers Jim and Matt.

The Halls, from Erith, are a great St Mary’s family with Jim starting in 1973, followed by Matt in 1976 and Phil in 1977, the same year as myself.

Phil was always a talented musician but his career really took off after leaving the amalgamated St Mary’s and St Joseph’s in 1984 when he went to Lancaster University to study Music.

From there, Phil did a post-graduate orchestral studies course at Goldsmith’s College. He then auditioned for and landed a principal viola role in Jyväskylä, Finland:

While in Finland he met his wife Sandra before returning to the UK in 1990 when Phil joined the BBC Philharmonic in Manchester before joining the BBC Symphony orchestra in December 1991 where he is now sub-principal viola.

We managed to meet under the famous clock at Waterloo Station where Phil had just finished a day’s rehearsals at Maida Vale Studios for a special performance of Hound of the Baskervilles at The Barbican.

Hopefully this won’t spoil the surprise for Jim and Matt and ‘decking’ The Halls would be literally the last thing on my mind – but why let that get in the way of a cheap pun!