SOMEONE we know claims to have come across a home-surgery kit in his bathroom cupboard.

The name on the lid? "Suture Self", of course.

Flour of Scotland

ON the M74 last week a beer lorry collided with a lorry carrying a large supply of flour. Reader Jim S says: "I'm glad there were no serious injuries, but I'll bet that every pub and hotel in a 50-mile radius will have beer-battered haddock on their menus for the next 12 months."

Lesson from history

MARGO MacDonald's sad passing reminds Dennis Canavan of her Labour opponent in the 1973 Govan by-election - Harry Selby, "a likeable wee barber, who at one time was an avowed Trotskyite".

Harry lost the by-election but triumphed at the next General Election.

"His most memorable contribution in the Commons was when he produced a lengthy shopping list of the benefits he wanted to deliver for the good people of Govan," says Dennis. "A pompous Tory MP tried to knock him off his stride by asking: 'Will the honourable gentleman tell us where he is going to get the money for all this nonsense?'"

Harry's cutting reply: "After the socialist revolution, there will be no such thing as money." How about that, muses Dennis, for a Currency Plan B?

Lethal weapon

RADIO moments, continued. Malcolm McCalister remembers working with BBC Radio Ulster in the 1970s and there being a spate of road accidents involving young people.

Shortly before his live interview with the chairwoman of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, he asked if she was worried that young men could pass their motorbike test on a 150cc model and weeks later buy a much more powerful and potentially dangerous 500cc machine.

At which point, his editor joined in. "Yeah," he said. "How do you tell a 17-year-old that he has a lethal weapon between his legs?"

Sadly, Malcolm resisted using that line during the live broadcast.

Buddy power

ONCE a Buddy, always a Buddy. At a 70th birthday party in Essex, Alistair Moss met a former work colleague he hadn't seen for 18 years. The talk turned to football and the man said he supported St Mirren and had been at all the home games. Really? asked a baffled Alistair. Turns out the bloke flies easyJet from Standsted, and, even with the taxi fare and admission, it still works out cheaper than going to see Chelsea. Any other far-travelled football fans out there?

Orange baulk

KEN Smith called time on under-age drinking stories, but he's now on holiday so we thought we'd sneak in Gordon Casely's contribution. Gordon never drank under-age but once, at 16, found himself in Glasgow's Corona Bar, Shawlands, and nervously asked the barman for "an orange, please". The man clearly saw right through him. "Aye son," came the reply, "and wid ye like me tae peel it fir ye?"

Holyrood heresy

THE Red Road flats controversy prompts Russell Smith to lament that the 2014 Opening Ceremony takes place in Glasgow with the flats being blown up as entertainment … "and not in Edinburgh where the Scottish Parliament building could have been a candidate".