APOCRYPHAL stories - we love them.

Robin Gilmour was talking to a former police officer, who recalled a family disturbance at a wake that turned into fisticuffs. Called to the scene, he grabbed the main culprit and told fellow officers who arrived to "jail them a'!" Back at the police station he was surprised to see his colleagues arrive with eight folk in handcuffs.

"No, no lads," he told them. "I only meant jail the maw."

Stand-up routine

DO politics and music mix? We only ask after Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson commented on Twitter that rock band James, whom she saw at the Glasgow Hydro, were "completely self indulgent" in not playing their old hit Sit Down. "Not massively impressed," said Ruth. The band merely replied with a fan's comment: "Apparently there's a busker outside playing it over and over, if you're desperate." And a presumably SNP supporter got in on the act by stating: "Don't you understand yet Ruth? Scotland refuses to sit down any more."

Brief encounter

OR what about comedy and politics? The Diary's old chum Tommy Sheppard, who started up Glasgow's great Stand comedy club after losing his job at the Labour Party, is seeking a nomination as an SNP parliamentary candidate. He once told us that over the years seven pairs of pants have been found abandoned in the Stand's toilets, and declared: "That means we can say for sure that at least 0.0014 per cent of our audience have wet themselves laughing."

Union flack

ON the subject of comedy and politics, Al Murray, who appears on stage as the zenophobic Pub Landlord, has a new DVD on sale, One Man, One Guv'nor, in which he covers subjects including the Scottish referendum. As he once told the crowd at an Edinburgh show: "Has Scotland and England's relationship run its course? If you were in a marriage where one of you earned a great deal more money than the other person, and the other person had a problem with cholesterol, alcohol and type 2 diabetes, what would you do?"

Oh how we laughed.

Light and shade

ARE you in the Christmas spirit yet? A reader phones to explain: "Unsure if you live in a rough area? If any of your neighbours put their Christmas tree up at the weekend then you probably are."

Silver service

INCIDENTALLY, sugary drink manufacturers Coca-Cola get in touch to say that their vast red truck with Christmas lights will be on a tour of Scotland. We remember a reader who had a summer job at the old Coca-Cola bottling plant in Thornliebank, asking an older lady why she had a silver Coca-Cola badge on her lapel, and she replied that it was for 25 years' service.

"Would you not have preferred a day in lieu?" asked our smart student, who thought a badge a poor return.

"Why wid ah want tae sit in a lavvie a' day?" asked the confused woman.

Animal magic

TALKING of Coke, a reader hears a chap standing at a display of individually named Coca-Cola bottles in a supermarket exclaim after shaking his head: "So I can find my cat and my dog's names here, but I can't find my ain?"

Z-list

A COLLEAGUE wanders over to interrupt us with: "The American rapper Jay-Z is not as useful as his brother A, author of the best-selling Glasgow Street Atlas."