Not long ago, whatever the collective term for a group of publicans, a bunch of sinners?>, got very agitated because it had been bruited abroad that thousands of Travellers were going to descend on Trafalgar Square to protest their rights.

The publicans duly assembled in unholy conclave at the Freemason’s Arms in Long Acre to devise contingency plans. These included banning cash, refusing entry to children, and extra security. My friend, Les, remarked that he was prepared to break his own windows to save the Travellers the trouble.

But when the dreaded day arrived, rather than crowds storming and looting the National Gallery, only 35 people showed up to the demo. That evening, Kristoff, who runs the White Hart in Drury Lane and who had been especially vocal, was passing around a dubious £20 note in my ex-local, the Cross Keys, Endell Street.

Tongue in cheek I told him that Tyson Fury, the heavyweight boxing champion, had been in earlier looking for him to change a £50 note. At first, he was puzzled, then he said, “Oh, you mean the Gypsy King? He was in the Chandos all afternoon behaving himself perfectly.”

A week or so later, I was making my way home from the tube, when I was accosted by a weathered lady selling lucky heather, who held my hand and announced that I was happy with money but unhappy in general. However, good things were coming my way on the 28th of July. I was aware of propitious events on 28th June but allowed for the margin of error inherent in any science. She ordered me to cross her palm with two pieces of folding money, with dark warnings about denying a Gypsy woman. Luckily, I had a couple of fivers! She then offered to tell me my fortune in her crystal ball and when I informed her that I had no more money (although I was holding my emergency £20 note in reserve), she suggested that we walk to a cashpoint. But I was in too much of a hurry to part with any more cash to learn what the future held for me.

I gave the lucky buttonhole to the nice Muslim lady in Tesco.

Every Monday Morning there is an antique/flea market in Covent Garden Piazza. Stalls piled high with junk designed to allure a magpie’s eye and part them from their cash. You can pay thousands or you can pay pennies to take home a new white elephant. But the thrill of the chase for bric a brac is intoxicating and over time the dealers become friends more disposed to yield to haggling.

The Jubilee Market is really where it’s at and where the bargains are to be found (apart, that is, from the rather unappetising covered greasy spoon).

I’ve picked up some delightful objects: a ceramic magpie startling in its verisimilitude and made in the U.S.S.R., an otter holding a fish in it’s mouth, a paper-knife in a leather scabbard with a desert island scene engraved on the hilt, an outrageous pinky ring and a beautiful model yacht executed in sheet tin. I collect elephants as well and found an amazing one made of wire and beads. I have a friend called John who drives up from Worthing for the 5.00 am start with brooches which he sells for £3. I always come back from the market a poorer but a happier man.

I attend services at St Paul’s Covent Garden, I’m even a member of the PCC, but the church is a funny community – albeit a very friendly and welcoming one. Pews are jealously guarded and the rector is married to another man, although the Church of England doesn’t sanction same-sex weddings, yet (a contentious issue from the pulpit). But the coffee rota rolls on reluctantly and everybody rubs along more or less nicely.

There is an amazing Victorian umbrella shop around the corner called James Smith Ltd. with gold lettering advertising Dagger Sticks amongst other fearsome concealed weapons in the window and all manner of wonderful aids to stylish ambulation within.

Ten days ago, being at a loose end, I wandered in and fell in love with a ludicrously expensive shepherd’s crook with a handle of buffalo horn polished to a fine sheen, a collar of camel bone and a stock of Welsh Hazel. It is magical, so after some reflection I bought it as Christmas was approaching, but the shop was unable to furnish me with any sheep. But it has transformed my life as a flanneur.

In pursuit of my folly I went back this morning for an all-weather rubber ferule, as the one protecting my horn tip was slipping on the greasy winter paving. And they gave me three for free to take away and interchange according to pavement conditions, or indeed the open road or ploughed furrow. I wouldn’t have needed to go back if I hadn’t lost the rubber claw that Arnold had originally furnished me with when I parted with my money.

I bought a Patek Philippe watch from an animated Frenchman with a greater regard for the Pre-Raphaelites than the Impressionists and whose hat concealed  a very unforgiving hairloss, for £100. He showed me the original online which retails for £120,000! Clearly, mine is a knock-off but it is a thing of rare beauty. But it is automatic and since I am lethargic it kept stopping, especially at night. I went back to the stall to get satisfaction but they were not there this week and I actually came back from the market ith more money that I took as another timepiece came a cropper at the vendor’s repairing hands.

But I was mustard keen to spend money and I saw a watch in Swatch which ticked some boxes and couldn’t rest that evening until I’d gone back for a second look, when I discovered from the kind assistant (who was gracious about my Patek Phillipe), that you can wind automatic watches and they do not rely on kinetic energy alone, since which discovery my priceless fake has been keeping perfect time.