Notes from the dancefloor of the Youth Multistake Dance in Kingsbridge, Friday, 8 February:

I'm proud to be the Young Men's president of a much nobler strand of youth than I ever was. 'Why Nobler?' you may ask. I'll tell you why. Because Dillan, Giovanni's cousin on the far left, got his girl's phone number in the first 5 minutes at the dance. And Gio, far right, well, he got his number at the end of the dance, but the girl stuck with him through the last half hour of it all. (I'm proud to say I introduced them). And AJ, in front, well he insisted that there was a girl there that he was interested in and I found that by asking questions like "What's here name?" and "Where is she from?" and "How old is she?" would cause him to run off into the crowd, and then come back to me with the answer. Eventually, he went home with a myspace address as well. I think I managed to get a number at a dance for the first time just a few years ago. Where can you get better training in real life situations than in the Bronx. These boys are on the road to bright futures. Not to mention, they expertly dance merengüe, bachata, salsa, breakdance, and whatever you call the stuff you do to modern rock.