THE storm down south reminds David McKenzie of Glasgow's great storm of 1968 when his parents lived in the west end.
Says David: "At three in the morning, slates were crashing from the roof. A neighbour decided to see if his new car was safe. Due to the wind, his wife persuaded him to dig out his old air raid warden tin hat from the war and wear it for protection.
"The inspection of the car showed it was parked in a sheltered spot, and no damage had occurred. Satisfied, he started to return to his flat when a gust of wind caught the edge of his tin hat, removed it from his head, and sent it straight through the windscreen of his new car."
That's rich
WE weren't following the storm story in England too closely but do we believe the reader in London who phoned to tell us: "The Coalition Government's advice was that if your home was in the eye of the storm you should head for your second or third home for safety."
Hard act to follow
THE death of hard-living singer/songwriter Lou Reed reminds us of seeing him at the Glasgow Apollo in the early 1970s. Lou looked a bit delicate, and legend had it that he had to be dragged from the car taking him to the Apollo semi-comatose. At one point he sat on the edge of the stage which had a vertiginous drop to the audience. It was the only time we recall the Apollo bouncers turning their backs on the crowd and watching the act instead, in case they had to jump in to save him.
Making a mark
TEACHERS continued. A Modern Studies teacher who commented on a pupil's report that she was inconsistent tells us he was momentarily silenced when she came up to him afterwards and asked: "How come I've got 'inconsistent' for my behaviour when I'm good some of the time?"
In the spirit intended
OUR tale of the TV researchers being mistaken for DSS officials reminds John Morrison in Fife of being with a well-dressed business colleague, both of them over 6ft tall, and going into a Soho pub in London for a drink. A number of the customers promptly left, and the owner came up, said they could have a free drink, but could they leave straight after. Says Jim: "He thought we were police officers. We didn't disabuse him, ordered two large whiskies, and enjoyed them before leaving."
Having a screw loose
WE hear some chaps in a Glasgow pub discussing how pessimistic a mutual friend was. "He's that bad," said one of them, "that if he found a screw on the floor, he's spend the rest of the day worrying what was going to fall apart and kill him."
High hopes
A MILNGAVIE reader recounts: "A friend was telling me recently that his wife had heard on the grapevine that their student son seemed to have an amazingly high sex drive.
"It turned out that the lad's girlfriend lives in Aberdeen."
Enraptored
TEENAGERS can be so cruel. As one was heard telling his pal on a train into Glasgow: "My mum's trying to use Twitter these days. It's like watching the raptors in Jurassic Park trying to figure out how to open the doors."
Just the job
WE don't get many Big Issue stories these days as it has now become less remarkable to see people selling it. However, a reader swears to us that he heard a business chap being asked: "Would you like a Big Issue pal?" He replied: "No thanks. I'm sure my wife will already have one lined up for me when I get home."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article