Town Mouse on paparazzi

The party season is warming up now you can tell because all the celebrities are finally turning up to events. In August, of course, they're too busy being snapped on beaches or the red carpet at Cannes. Now the paparazzi have got their targets in sight again. (I can tell you, as much as one scorns the paps, there's nothing like the humiliation of seeing them lower their cameras when they see you coming, looking bored as you pass, even though you did your best to doll yourself up like a film starlet for the night.) At a party this week, Sophie Anderton, model and reality-TV 'star' showed up and spent a few minutes standing in front of the photographers, muttering that she really didn't want to be photographed.

There were so many of the snappers clicking away, that a friend of mine wondered if they were real. As no other celebrities appeared to be showing up to this event, surely they couldn't all be making any money out of it? Were PRs now in the business of hiring fake paps to make the party look more starry than it really was? I don't think it was true on this occasion, but what a fabulous idea.