PERHAPS it was inevitable after an appalling summer when Sod's Law governed the weather, wrecked fixtures and, in some cases, obliterated grounds, last weekend's late impression of an Indian summer coincided with the start of the annual dinner season.

Last Saturday I was guest speaker at the RAF Cricket Umpire and Scorers Association's 60th Annivers-ary bash in that service's holy of holies, the RAF Club in Piccadilly.

It was a great delight to meet the CO of RAF Lyneham there. Although Group Captain Paul Atherton is in charge of one of the busiest transport airfields in Europe, his enthusiasm for cricket ensured he escaped to attend this celebration. The catering was excellent, very different from that once on offer at a major cricket dinner in Southampton.

Even after 30 years it is impossible to forget. I knew it was going to be bad when a coven of elderly waitresses served the minestrone soup from kettles.

This was followed by something reminiscent of the worst in-flight meals. Dominating a sparse main course was some form of meat sliced so thinly it was transparent and could have been beast, bird or plastic.

Clement Freud despaired of mass catering and when attending functions asked his hosts to leave his place empty. He would arrive with a hamper of food, wine, cutlery and condiments and lay out his own feast.

Audiences can vary in size from several hundred to a few dozen - the latter if my appearance as a speaker has been unwisely announced in advance.

One of the smallest awaited me at the Wombwell Cricket Lovers' Society when I drove through a blizzard from London to Barnsley. It was an horrendous journey, with terrible visibility.

I arrived about 20 minutes late to find organiser Jack Sockell standing in the porch looking pointedly at his watch. I apologised and hinted it had not been the easiest five-hour journey I had undertaken.

He led me into the hall where ten members of the Society were seated in a room set for 100. "Oh, I'm not the last to arrive then?" I said with some relief. "Oh, yes you are," replied Jack. "You don't expect folk to drive all the way from Leeds on a night like this, do you?"

I did return about a year later when, on a fine evening, a grand total of 23 turned up. That wasn't my smallest audience.

When I addressed the Western Australian Cricket Society at the WACA Ground in Perth, I brought the total attendance up to eight.

Beware speaking schedules where you follow three club members eager to make an impression. We have all suffered the club captain with 43 pages of script.

Once I followed a chairman who did 20 minutes. Then came 25 minutes from a county fast bowler who couldn't utter a sentence without the f-word.

Finally a barrister did 40 minutes without mentioning cricket at all. He simply strung together a series of sex stories that apparently demanded that the female had a French accent.

I stood up at 11.50pm. After congratulating the club on organising the first function I had attended that would go into a second day, I assured them that it would not venture very far into it. I've not had to go back.

Centenary dinners are a minefield too. Once the fellow who preceded me had researched the entire 100 years of the club's history -83 of which he knew from personal experience.

After 30 minutes he had reached 1925. During the next 20 minutes the audience started drifted out to the bar.

Later the bar staff said that members were escaping the dining room looking as desperate as the cast of Ice Cold In Alex when the crew had just crossed the Sahara.

It was now 11.40pm. I printed your flies are undone'' on a card and slipped it in front of him. He ignored it.

At last he reached the 100th year. Then he said: "I just want to look ahead to the future." I said, perhaps too loudly, "There won't be one unless you sit down."

There was loud applause and cheering from the few remaining listeners.

Oh dear, I have just remembered that this week I am due at Usk Cricket Club's 150th Anniversary Dinner.