THE Diary is sorry. We have prided ourselves on keeping this column free of all references to I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!

But we couldn't hold out against the media blitz any longer. Tonight's column is infested with references to the ITV rainforest torture-thon. You have been warned.

FIRST, news of double standards at a York nightclub. Every Friday night, one party animal requests the same track at Toffs, Toft Green: PJ & Duncan's lamentable Let's Get Ready To Rumble. Most weeks "DJ Shiney" is happy to oblige.

Last Friday, however, the disco queen asked another Toffs DJ for the song, and was rebuffed. "I'm not playing anything that reminds people of I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!" was the firm but fair response. PJ & Duncan are now better known as Ant and Dec, hosts of ITV's jungle game show.

How strange then that the DJ's next choice of track was a song by one of the "celebrities" marooned in darkest Australia - Peter Andre.

MEANWHILE, reader Richard Simon contacts us to say that the show must be a hoax. He has seen Peter Andre in York this week, styling hair in the Classic Cutz salon in Fourth Avenue, York.

In fact the crimper in question is Terry Smith. He is flattered by the comparison.

"I have a bit more gel in my hair, but there could be quite a close resemblance," he said.

And the demon barber says he is man enough to handle pneumatic model Jordan. "I could swing through a few trees with her."

But has Terry, a stalwart at Done Bookmakers in Pavement, got a six-pack under his shirt?

"I'm not in bad condition. I have got a girlfriend who keeps me fit and active. She's into kinky bedroom antics so I don't have to go to a gym."

It's amazing what you can get up to with some fixing mousse and a set of heated curlers.

JOHN Benson-Smith, patron of Hazlewood Castle Hotel near Tadcaster, has been chuckling over the Evening Press report that he had opened two "brassieres" in Manchester - as opposed to two brasseries (January 27).

"I suppose that would have been less hard work, unless the brassieres in question belonged to Jordan," he laughed (before adding swiftly that if he were to open bras in Manchester or anywhere else "I don't think my wife Alison would have been too pleased").

This is not the first time that Benson-Smith has found himself in an embarrassing situation. A couple of years ago he was working in the kitchens of Hazlewood Castle when the phone rang. One of his staff answered it and shouted across: "Hey, chef, there's a bloke on the phone taking the pee and trying to sound like Loyd Grossman".

The unfortunate thing was that it was Loyd Grossman and the member of staff hadn't put her hand over the receiver...

John told this story against himself at the reopening of Hazlewood's Restaurant 1086 at the weekend.

Guests included BBC Look North's Harry Gration and his wife Helen and Emmerdale's Ben Freeman, Amy Nuttall and Julia Mallam (that's Scott, Amy and Dawn to you and me).

And there wasn't an open - or opened - bra in sight.

SO Aviva, parent company of Norwich Union, now shedding 33 York jobs, has awarded its finance director Andrew Moss a near £1 million pay deal. What could have been Mr Moss's response? "You have quoted me happy..."

Write to: The Diary, Chris Titley, The Evening Press, 76-86 Walmgate, York YO1 9YN

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Updated: 09:46 Tuesday, February 03, 2004