The last time we had been at The Wellwood Arms had been back in the summer; we had camped up in Amble and had ended up staying in the pub until well after 1am, and taking forever to wend our drunken way back to the other side of town, so we had a feeling that tonight might well be rather wild and enjoyable – and we weren’t wrong.  We had managed to get B&B this time – much more sensible than camping, especially in December – and were only ten minutes’ walk from the pub.  However, we got there early to make sure of a seat – we knew how busy it had been the last time – so it looked like being another well-watered evening, to say the least.  Steve, Michael and Rach started the evening, and it was a magnificent start – at least we know that whenever we go to see these three we’ll get a great mixture of songs, and it’s one of only a few times we are guaranteed to hear a good selection of Alan Hull songs (McCallum being the only other person I know who will do this – who’s excellent gig we had been to the week previously, but I digress…).  However, as well as Alan’s songs, we had several songs from Troubadour Territory, which is one of the most played CDs in our house, as well as a selection of unusual covers, my favourites being Why Aye Man, and Skin and Bone. (hope they may end up on an album, one day).  After a break, the Happy Cats arrived on the stage, and gave their usual selection of old favourites and newies – the crowd were reminded by the band that those poor unfortunates that hadn’t received a copy of Follow the Moon from Santa were in luck, as they had a couple of copies with them for sale! The evening got more and more hectic, the crowd got more and more appreciative and noisy and lots of people were dancing.  The singing eventually had to come to a stop about 12.15, much to everyone’s disappointment, but the drinking didn’t – the party continued well into the night, and was still going strong when we left at 2am - luckily not too long a walk back this time.  Thanks to Tam, for being such a good host, and it was great to see Eddie again – looking forward to the next time.  Now we’ve discovered lodgings, I’m sure we’ll be back in Amble again – and let’s have another double bill with Steve and the gang please – my only disappointment was that there was no joint singing - it would have been wonderful for you all to have played something together.  Next time, perhaps?