GORDON Ramsay, the oikish omelette flipper, has been accused by the Noos of the Scroos of having an affair with a former squeeze my of old pal, Jeffrey Archer. Mr Ramsay has f****** denied anything untoward happened with the woman, who describes herself as a "professional mistress". Indeed, she is so professional she allegedly bought legal drugs that relax the muscles (but presumably not all the muscles!), two bottles of wine and a packet of crisps. The crisps, of course, are the clincher. How crunchily tacky! You'd never find Jamie Oliver doing that. Would you?

Woolies makes me feel warm inside
TO Woolies, where generations of weans have honed their shoplifting skills. May I immediately say I was not one of the them. I was, however, oblivious to Woolies' financial woes, which may yet result in its disappearance from high streets across this peedie part of the planet.

My quest was for a notepad, the cheaper the better. I spotted my heart's desire in the stationery department. As the late, great Chic Murray might have said, I knew that because nothing was moving. The notepad I had my eye on was marked down from £1.90 to 50p, a bargain in anyone's book, though it obviously had a rough life. The cover was torn and the spine was bashed.

Unabashed, I took it to the checkout, where I asked the girl with a bad Toblerone habit if it really cost 50p. "Aye," she said, scanning the barcode. I handed her a 50p coin. She gave me 10p change. I asked why. "There's 20% off everything," she said. I went on my way, rejoicing.

I shall miss Woolies and not just because of such Socratic dialogues. If it closes, it will mean many more boarded-up shops, driving me further into a pit of aesthetic depression. Our main drag has an increasing number of empty premises decorated in ragged posters. Why the council doesn't do something about them is beyond my ken. Hereabouts, in glorious East Lothian, the big concern is the size of the provost's dress allowance.

Elsewhere, I read that the councils are champing at the bit to raise their taxes. If only they were joking. I learned last week that one of our many charity shops pays the council £25,000 a year in rent and £15,000 a year in council tax. Before the woman in charge can sell a second-hand copy of a Jeffrey Archer novel or pay staff, she has to find £500 a week. A council representative said there was nothing he could do about this, his hands were tied. A question: why?

The Royal Bank has had its chips
NEXT up the Royal Bank of Scotland, of which, apparently, I now own 58%. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever believe that would happen. En route, I purchased potatoes from my neighbourhood greengrocer at a very reasonable price.

Doubting that it could remain so low - according to my dear friend Will Smith, perhaps the greatest-ever allotment holder to come from Tranent, this has been a poor year for tatties - I attempted to deposit them with RBS, certain that if they were properly looked after, they would increase in value, unlike, say, the bank's shares. The kindly tellers looked on me sympathetically, as if I were mad. Another customer inquired if they were good for chips.

Not, I suspect, casino chips. You may laugh, but I am convinced I have found an idea whose time has come.

I have another gilt-edged idea, too, concerning what to do with all those partnerless socks one finds in one's drawers.

Anyone interested in investing in the Sock Exchange?

A fine tribute to the father of the iPod
SOME good news! My dear friend Sandy Stoddart, the sculptor, right, has unveiled his latest creation, a sculpture of James Clerk Maxwell, a pioneer of electromagnetic radiation - which I could explain in layman's terms if only I had space. Among countless other things, Mr Clerk Maxwell is generally believed to be responsible for iPods, mobile phones and digital cameras - virtually everything, in fact, that you can find in Comet.

Fittingly, for such a prodigious talent, Mr Sandy's statue stands in Edinburgh's George Street, one of the world's great classical monument boulevards. Or so my dear, well-travelled friend tells me. Not so long ago we strolled its length, he telling me what I missed when watching for cracks in the pavement.

His sculpture is at the east end of George Street and he has his eye on a vacant spot at the west end, where he is minded to put up a plinth for Shuggie MacDiarmid, the volcanic poet from lovely Langholm.

However, he is open to other suggestions as long as they're not philistine, eg. anyone living. As chance would have it, I bumped into Mr Sandy in the Cafe Royal on the evening of the great unveiling, where he was enjoying a libation with his wife.

While he emptied his pockets at the bar she told me that he was a mite upset by the interview I did with him, in particular a reference to him being "stockily built". What can I say? I was wrong. I must have been thinking of someone else. Will readers who have hung on to the piece please delete "stockily built" and insert "slenderly tall" instead?

Fantasy chef gets fingers burned
AMONG the many nosheries in which I have not eaten is the Wild Sorrel in Embra's Old Fishmarket. Nor will I now. Wild Sorrel closed last week and its chef-cum-owner, James Stocks, did a bunk, leaving behind a trail of debt and a stack of fuming creditors. This is the same Mr Stocks whom the Daily Ranger suggested was a fantasist who said he had stir-fried for Marco Pierre White, sautéed for Gordon Ramsay, below, and made choux for the Rouxs. All of which, it transpired, turned out to be b******s.

Not that Mr Stocks couldn't cook. Give him an apron and a funny hat and he could do wonders with a tin of baked beans and sausage. A dear friend's son may have been one of the last diners at Wild Sorrel. The waiter asked if he and his girlchum had enjoyed their meal. He said yes, the food was very good, though the size of portions left their tummies rumbling like a tumble dryer. The waiter disappeared, only to re-emerge a few minutes later. He had passed on his comments to the chef who had digested them. And? "He wants you to leave."

Having a bad hair day
ANENT - tiresome Scots word! - my wee rant last week about the debacle that is Creative Scotland, I am overjoyed to report that umpteen dear readers feel likewise. One said he had an appointment with Anne Bonnar, the 10,000 quid-a-month director of said figment of the imagination, only for her people to cancel because she had a hairdressing appointment.

Ms Bonnar, though invisible, is in the sights of many. Particularly aggrieved is Simone O'Callaghan, a Dundee-based artist who was flabbergasted to see Ms Bonnar posing "smugly" in front of a triptych of her screenprints. "Who is Anne Bonnar, you may well ask," blogged Ms O'Callaghan. "Until last week I had no idea either, never met the woman, never heard of her and damn well wish I hadn't."

Another set off his squib directly under the door of Meenister for Yoghurt, Linda Fabbydo: "New ministers, but the same civil servants and SNP special advisers whose control-freakery is greater than the last lot."

The arts council has told all moles to stay in their holes lest they be tempted to blab to the press. Ms Bonnar is probably still under the hairdryer. What a pantomime.