THE DIARY THURSDAY 17 APRIL 2008
A SLIGHTLY hungover chap in Glasgow, seeking sustenance, entered one of the premises of the fried-chicken emporium KFC for the first time and noted through his bleary eye that they sold something called a "Zinger meal".
Like the McDonald's Big Mac, these American chains like to make up the names of their main items.
"What's a Zinger meal?" he asked the vacant-looking young woman behind the counter.
"It's a Zinger wi' chips an' a Coke," she told him.
Glad she cleared that up then.
Raised on an estate
READER Gerry McDade in Greenock listened to a BBC Radio 4 report on Prince William getting his wings, in which fellow student Kerry Goldsworthy-Trapp commented: "When you get to know him, he's just as ordinary and down-to-earth as the rest of us."
"She'll be one of the Easterhouse Goldsworthy-Trapps, then?" wonders Gerry.
Problems at cheque-in
AND talking of the Beeb, Lennie Herd shares a quote overheard on Radio Scotland's Newsdrive programme. A Royal Bank of Scotland insurance spokesman, talking about whether future policies would cover luggage lost at Terminal 5, explained that claims would be handled "on a case by case basis".
Quite.
- WE overhear a woman telling her pal, when asked about her boyfriend, that he had "issues".
She went on to explain what they were until her pal interrupted: "Issues? Sounds like he's got a year's subscription."
All-nighter
THE tale of radio presenter Steve McKenna being locked aboard a train reminded Allan Mackintosh of his university days, when he celebrated a rugby win by going on to a Glasgow University disco.
He must have celebrated too much, as he woke up at seven the following morning in complete darkness in the now-deserted disco.
He was forlornly looking through the locked glass door when a passing caretaker looked at him and shouted: "You're 12 hours too early for the disco," and walked on.
It was another hour before the cleaners let him out.
What price freedom?
"I DECIDED to boycott Chinese goods because of the treatment of Tibet," an ageing eco-warrior told her pals in the west end of Glasgow. "But I had to give up. I mean, their clothes and electrical goods are just so fantastically cheap, how could you not buy them?"
Mature student
A READER is sent an invitation from Family Mediation Grampian to hear a talk at the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh by Christina McGhee, who is described as an "internationally acclaimed divorce coach".
"Good to know there's still something I'm not too old to be coached in," says our reader.
King of the swingers
OUR bad golf score story reminded Alistair Fraser of a works outing to an Ayrshire course where the organiser, checking the score cards, said to a colleague: "How did you manage a 17 at a par four?"
"I sank a good putt,"
he replied.
Signing off
OUT-of-office messages continued. John Boyd in Glasgow tested his theory that folk don't read all the way through such messages by adding at the bottom of his: "It obviously doesn't matter to you anyway, as you'd have phoned if it was urgent."
No-one complained.
