Strictly Come Dancing - the tour

For a Christmas present, I'd bought Carole tickets to the Strictly show at the MEN Arena in Manchester, and tonight was the big night.

After a little shopping, we enjoyed a bite to eat a Chiquitos in the Printworks, which serves Mexican-themed food. Suitably stuffed on a variety of nachos, tacos and other delights, we headed off to the arena for the highlight of the evening. The arena has a no cameras policy (killjoys - it's not like you could make any money out of your shaky shots from the back row), but despite this I had my little Nikon in my jacket and didn't generate any suspicion. Inside, there were flashes going off galore, so what the heck, let's snap away!

The show was certainly spectacular, and the whole thing was put together exceptionally well. The four judges from the telly were all there, and on form too - Craig typically grumpy most of the time, Bruno totally animated and Len more demure with sprinklings of his sharp wit.

The dancers were familiar too with many of the celebrities from the last series there, plus a few recognisable faces from previous series. The only disappointment being Lilia and Jody Kidd were both down with the dreaded norovirus and couldn't be there, the net result being the show was one couple short.

Was it worth the money? - well, the tickets certainly weren't cheap and even the programmes were a tenner (and Carole accidentally left it behind afterwards), but for an evening's entertainment, we certainly enjoyed it.