AUSTRALIAN cricket legend Shane Warne has been fined £500 after driving near Gretna at more than 100mph.

Rather harshly, a reader tells us: "Having been to Gretna, I understand why he was travelling so quickly."

A cabbie's a cabbie..

IT will soon be Burns Night, which reminds an East Kilbride reader of getting in a cab in New York and noticing from the driver's licence that his name was Robert Burns.

Making conversation, our reader said to him: "That's a famous name you have."

"It should be," the chap replied. "I've been driving a cab here for nearly 40 years."

Chiller writers

FORMER journalist turned crime writer Craig Robertson will be at The Lake of Menteith Hotel on Saturday, signing copies of his novel, Cold Grave, which is about a murder in Scotland during one of the coldest winters in memory when even the Lake of Menteith froze over.

It reminds us of the writing class where a student asked the lecturer why there were so many good Scottish crime writers, and what inspired them.

"Because the weather in Scotland is so bad that people envy the dead," the lecturer replied.

Pizza nonsense

OVERHEARD on a Glasgow bus, continued. A Busby reader heard a student-type tell his pal: "Got a new microwave. It has a setting for pizzas. But no matter what I put in and press the button, it never comes out as a pizza."

Falling to earth

MUSIC legend David Bowie has announced his first single and album for more than 10 years, which has excited the music world.

We remember when Geoff Inker, in Newton Stewart, told us that his beat combo Satellite One in the1960s held auditions for a new vocalist in Soho.

Said Geoff: "A young lad called Jones did his best but we said: 'Sorry David, but your voice isn't strong enough for what we're looking for'." The singer later changed his surname to Bowie.

Romantic interlude

A CHAP in a Glasgow pub was being quizzed by his mates about his use of a popular online dating site.

"I put down that I was looking for a woman who loves long walks on the beach," he told them.

"It'll give her something to do while I watch the fitba."

Bottom line

A FINAL strange name mention as engineer Jim Scott, working in Singapore, tells us about the head of the purchasing department at a Dutch engineering company that he often has to e-mail –koos.aarse@hetnet.nl.