ATTRACTIVENESS

He's lovin' it.

I hope I wasn't too mean about the students yesterday. They're computer-science guys with a stereotype to live up to. I'm sure they get up to all sorts when they're back on campus, but I appreciate that the rules are slightly different when you also work for a company that expects you to get up and go to work five mornings a week.

Bless 'em.

I got up early today and went to Newbury. I'd booked an appointment with the opticians and I wanted to go and have a look round the town before the sight-test. Newbury is a market town in West Berkshire, about fifteen miles or so from here. It's smaller and arguably nicer than Reading with its dainty streets over the Kennet. It has the feel of a market town with larger aspirations. Unlike Reading, Newbury seems to have somehow resisted the urge to sprawl like a concrete-glass spider, and it's remained much more attractive as a result.

Attractiveness is a difficult quality to define, when you think about it. I thought about this elusive quality when the optician called my name and led me off to get my eyes tested. She had long brown hair tied up in a perfect pony tail, a winning natural smile and lucid green eyes that sparkled in the half-light. She was... beautiful.

"Pop your coat down there, Mr Stubbs," she said with a lilting Northern-Irish accent. Stay focused, I said to myself, ironically.

It was fine. She told me that my eyesight is somehow improving. I told her about my colour-blindness; she tested it with those books of coloured dots with invisible numbers. I told her I wasn't allowed to wire a plug; she told me to press the accelerator only when the lowest light is on. We laughed, then I went off to Costa while they fixed my frames.

Maybe I should have taken some tips from the guy I overheard in Costa. He was chatting up a girl by telling her about his guitar-playing.

"Are you in a band then?" she asked.

"Nah... I used to be but it didn't work er, it didn't work out... I'm solo now. Yeah, it's much better that way, you know, just me and the music. I do all sorts of gigs and people say 'oh you know you're so good, you don't really need a band!' and all that. I think they're right you know - I was at a festival in the summer and it was great because it was all about the music and you could tell people were really loving it..."

I chuckled into my tea. I don't think she was impressed either. A few moments later, he was telling her about some guitar he was going to buy, and she asked him if he'd tried playing it yet.

"Nah - don't need to," he said, decisively. "A good musician can tell the quality just by looking. Anyway, I'm only really interested in the amplifier."

I noticed her raise an eyebrow at that nonsense. He didn't notice though; he was too busy talking about Fenders, pickups and Marshall stacks.

After Costa, I wandered down the high street, looking for lace-up boots. There was a saxophone player outside one of the supermarkets. He was loving it - high trills and super glissandos over the notes, all funking along over a little CD player pumping out karaoke backing tracks. I got the feeling that even if there were nobody listening, he'd still be enjoying standing there, serenading an empty high street with his sax.

Maybe that's a little key to attractiveness - enjoying what you do, doing what you enjoy, but not taking any of it too seriously. Sounds like something to aim for anyway. Attractiveness is almost a helpless thing, I think - rather than beauty which is sort of, well, obvious. Iron filings can't really prevent themselves from the magnet, after all. Moths can't pull themselves anywhere other than the light and lightning always takes the path of least resistance.

Eventually I wandered back through the quiet streets and caught a train back to Theale. Newbury really is quite an attractive place, I thought to myself as the train jolted into life and pulled out of the station. It was time to go home.