COMMISERATIONS to Scots boxer Ricky Burns.

who lost his world title to Terence Crawford in a spirited bout at the SECC in Glasgow at the weekend. There was a lively crowd to see the match, and as one English visitor commented: "Ricky's the only jock in Scotland fighting on a Saturday night and getting paid for it."

Feathered nests

THE rich south of England can seem a different country at times. Edinburgh writer Ben Verth was in Oxford recently when he heard a chap passing him in the street remark on his mobile phone: "Yeah, he's rich. Megabucks. Probably wipes his bum with pheasants' wings."

How to really scare us

STILL Game writer Greg Hemphill yesterday pondered the latest independence scare story from the Liberal Democrats' Scottish Secretary Alistair Carmichael, and told his fans: "Carmichael saying today 'great British institutions' at risk from yes vote, including the National Lottery. No! Not the scratch cards? Please God!!"

Whit independence?

AND Ian Kidd in Balfron ponders: "Our politicians are currently fighting daily battles to explain the benefits and pitfalls of an independent Scotland but many of the voters seem none the wiser. Perhaps we should seek the views of the workman I overheard in Blythswood Square last week explaining a complicated problem to his superior. 'Look mate, ah cannae tell ye whit's whit wi' whit'."

Say what you plz

A COMMENT many a parent might have sympathy for - a colleague tells us: "One of my kids texted 'plz' because it's shorter than 'please'. I texted back 'no' because it's shorter than 'yes'."

Singing for ginger

WE should end our Alpine lemonade stories with a tale from an actual Alpine man. Andy Jamieson in Bearsden worked a summer hols in the seventies with Alpine and tells us: "I chapped a door in Penilee and the wee girl who answered said they weren't needing any.

"Then a gruff old lady's voice pipes up from the back room: 'Two bottles of lime and a bottle of lemonade'. The wee girl insisted they didn't want any, but again comes the voice: 'Two bottles of lime and a bottle of lemonade'.

"Completely thrown, I said: 'But your granny wants some ginger'. She replied: 'Mister, that's the mynah bird', and slammed the door in my face."

The wetter the better

IAN McIntyre reads in his local paper that the Carluke Baptists' football match was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch, and he thinks to himself: "If anyone could cope with a waterlogged pitch, surely it would be the Baptists?"

Curious about the furious

JOHN Park in Motherwell hears someone comment that anger management classes are now "all the rage".

Quite.

Illuminating answer

MISTRANSLATIONS continued. Says Margaret Phin: "I taught French for a long time and marked many exam papers with howlers of translations. One of my favourites was for 'Une seule bougie étincelait dans le salon' (a single candle was sparkling in the living room). It came back as 'a lonely budgie was singing in the saloon'."