Surprise surprise

Life is tacitly beautiful. No matter what, or how, balance is always restored. Spells of despair are complemented with stretches of elation, and unless you step off the road once in a while, you fail to see this. Remove yourself from, well, yourself, occasionally, and witness this beauty. I'd Rather Dance With You by Kings of Convenience should take you back enough to see how stepping out of your shoes can throw a beautiful light on everything that is past, from poignant memories to perfect ones.

It was a friend's birthday the other day, and I stopped to pick up some flowers. I was very pleased with my florist. He painstakingly arranged every flower for me, even added frills to the paper he used to wrap them with, by carefully folding the edges over inch by inch. Such earnest. He attempted to fix every pleat in the crinkled paper, and made sure every rose matched the next in height and colour. When I told him not to worry about it, and that sometimes imperfection can be more attractive than exactness, he smiled and asked me if I was from Bombay. I'm still baffled by the question, but secretly basked in it. This one's by a band I stumbled across – and instantly fell in love with – at Covent Garden last year. They're called The Ryan O'Reilly Band, and the song I heard them perform that day is called The Morning. Here they are, as I saw them on that fateful day. I payed £5 for a CD of theirs too, so you know they're worth it.