Solid Gold

I bought Nanette a birthday gift that entertained the whole of the party: a pocket-sized anthology of pin-up blokes from the 70s and 80s, where the emphasis was on swarthiness and improbably tight pants. An image of Andy Gibb, in a tight pink suit and ruffled blouse, came in for some attention.

Nanette and Dwayne’s Kenyan neighbours were at dinner and the husband asked who Andy Gibb was. None of us could remember a single of his, but I remembered that he’d been a host on Solid Gold. We described the show in detail to our inquirer, who listened for a while and then nodded in recognition when I described the Solid Gold Dancers.

“Ah, I remember now,” he said. “That show was banned in Kenya.”

Was it because of the dancers, or the host’s costumery? None of us could quite decide.