Today’s small delight is a vintage (1950s) fun fair, and in particular, the helter skelter.

Wooden and colourful, it was reminiscent of a mediaeval tower, complete with flag atop.

The words ‘helter skelter’ are rather delightful to roll around the tongue. The shorter Oxford dictionary defines the phrase as ‘in disordered haste’ which describes me a lot of the time, so I may start using it as a phrase.

Wikipedia tells me the helter skelter was first seen at Blackpool Pleasure Beach (where else?) in 1906.

The helter skelter no doubt seems tame today when compared to the (to me) instruments of torture which are readily available to turn bodies upside down and round and round at huge speed. But it offers a taste of a simpler and slower age, and a gentler pleasure.

“Don’t forget your mat” said the sign. And I didn’t.