John says...

I was famished after the programme last week and I couldn't resist.

What I got was rubber sausages, poached bacon and scrambled eggs, which had been under a heat lamp so long you could cut it into slices. I should have given it back to them but, for a quiet life, I just left it.

Next time, not being as stupid as I look, I avoided the all-day buffet job and went to Dino Ferrari on Sauchiehall Street.

What a difference. It was delicious, freshly cooked, with table service and only about a pound more than my previous disappointing rubber meal.

Imagine my horror then, when I learned that Dino's is to close forever in less than a month; another Glasgow institution gone. What's happened?

There was a time, not long ago, when you could enjoy a classy lunch at Ferguson's in Union Street, served by waitresses in uniforms.

You could be measured for a suit in Henry Burton, no relation to the other Burton, on the corner of Buchanan Street.

You could buy trendy clothes and platform shoes in any number of basement boutiques and you could find your favourite music in an actual record store like Gloria's or 23rd Precinct.

Even in the little town where I grew up, there was Shirlaw, a proper tailor and Mills, a proper music shop. Nowadays, there's nothing.

I can't think of a single store in Glasgow's main shopping area that's owned and run by actual people, rather than some big corporation.

I long for the days of the wee record store, the proper tailor, and only three channels on the television.

AS I get older, there are fewer and fewer things that I'm too young to remember but sadly, I am too young to remember Ferguson's in Union Street.

From what I'm told though, it would have been the perfect place for me as an aspiring lady who lunches.

John tells me that even then, they always had a veggie option and I've always been a sucker for a waitress in uniform.

He says they always asked if they could get you "anything more." Never, "anything else," but, "anything more."

Pure class.

My formative years were the '80s, and when I look back at the things I loved at the time, but which are long since gone, I have to say that the world is probably a better place for their passing.

For example, the shoulder pad. What was the point?

I was never gripped by the desire, they were a bit too dressy for me, but my mother and the mothers of all my friends looked like American footballers.

The Ra-Ra skirt and the leg warmers were more me.

I look at old photographs and we all look like a cross between Cindy Lauper and Toni Basil.

Not a good look now, but it seemed to work for the boys.

Mind you, most of them were dressed like Adam Ant which doesn't say much for their taste.

We've also seen the back of the trend for wearing your Dad's pyjamas to the dancing - what was that all about?

I've just remembered too, that it was considered the height of cool to sport a whistle around your neck.

There was nothing we liked more than giving them a good blast while Wham or Spandau Ballet were on.

Nothing stays the same? Sometimes that's a good thing.