BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten said on Radio Scotland this week that rumours Scottish telly soap River City was to be axed were "far-fetched".

“Just like the River City plots then,” commented one Diary reader.

Time please

OUR tale of the late notorious politician Sir Nicholas Fairbairn reminds broadcaster Colin Adams of interviewing Sir Nick on Radio Clyde when his autobiography was published. Recalls Colin: “He later signed my copy, adding the dedication, ‘With great thanks for a happy interview – 12 minutes might not be a lot with a woman but it is more than enough with a man’.”

Numbers game

YESTERDAY’S good weather saw a rush for the golf courses as players try to fit in a few last rounds before the winter. One wise old player told us a truism about the game: “If your opponent has trouble remembering whether he took a six or a seven, he probably took eight.”

Sweet tales

SCOTS who work in England have been confessing that they sometimes tell tall tales about Scotland to their more gullible workmates. One chap tells us he was at a dinner down south where shortbread fingers reminded him of the children’s game Jenga where you slowly take blocks from a tower one at a time without making it fall. He immediately announced that the game was invented by a Scot, that “Jenga” was from the Gaelic for shortbread, and promptly built a tower with all the shortbread fingers he collected and had an impromptu game.

Any other tales of preying on the gullible?

Point of reference

AND before anyone reminds us, yes we have heard the claim that the word “gullible” doesn’t actually appear in the Oxford English dictionary, and that we should look it up if we don’t believe it.

Teen angst

SEARCH engine Google is celebrating its 13th birthday. As one weary father remarked: “Does that mean when you type in a search, Google replies, ‘Do I really have to?’ or ‘Get it yourself’.”

Harsh words

WE mentioned Tory MP Greg Knight’s book of parliamentary barbed comments, Dishonourable Insults.

We should perhaps add what one MP said about journalists: “Most journalists I know work eight hours a day and sleep eight hours a day. The trouble is they’re the same eight hours.”

Ouch. And let’s not forget misogynism.

One MP argued: “I’m all in favour of women MPs.

“It’s better having them in the House than outside driving cars.”