A READER tells us how difficult it has become to order a cup of coffee these days.

He was in a Glasgow cafe when a chap sat down and asked for a coffee. The girl rhymed off all the different types of coffee he could have but he interrupted her with: "Just instant's fine." And she told him: "If you want instant coffee you'll have to wait."

Dram fine time

ARRAN Distillery will again host the island's Malt and Music Festival, a great combination of bands and a dram, over the last weekend in June.

It will probably not have a repeat, alas, of a visit to the distillery by a group of Norwegians who told tour guide Campbell Laing they liked a dip in the water, and stripped off to their birthday suits and plunged into the burn supplying the distillery. Says Campbell: "On return to the visitor centre, where there is an indoor waterfall, they again stripped off and plunged in, joined by a fully clothed female member of staff - who is no longer with us."

As ithers see us

OUR tale of the Barras' spieler selling goods reminds Lesley Falconer: "I watched a street trader on a platform high above the crowd who pushed a net curtain along a pole, holding it out and saying, 'This is what it looks like frae the inside of yer windaes'. He then swung round and with his back to the crowd said, 'And this is what it looks like frae the ootside'. Sadly I never did buy anything there as I was too scared to take my hands out of my pockets where my purse and keys were. Great entertainment though."

A bridge too far

A READER was in dispute with the Scottish Bridge Union over a levy payment. He thought it was highly appropriate that the official arguing over the money in an email he received was SBU president Mike Ash.

Hopping mad

FIFA have announced the slogans that will be on the buses of the World Cup teams, and already a Melbourne newspaper has dubbed the Australian slogan "Socceroos: Hopping our way to history" as the lamest ever. "Can't we let them lose with dignity?" asked the Herald Sun.

Other football fans are uncomfortable that the German slogan "Ein Land, Eine Mannschaft, Ein Traum" has echoes of the old Nazi exhortation "Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer." I know we're not there, but what do readers think would have been an apt slogan for a Scotland team bus?

Saints and sinners

ST MIRREN fan Brian Gibson in East Kilbride received an email from the club yesterday offering fans the chance to appear in a charity match at the club in which they could be in a team managed by Danny Lennon.

"Do they not read their own news?" asks Brian, as St Mirren had already shown poor Danny the door.

Games on

GOOD news that Olympic gold medallist Mo Farah will compete in the Commonwealth Games this summer in Glasgow. Alan Stewart says that if Mo wins a medal he should put the ribbon it was on up for auction as there are plenty of people who would bid for "the sash Mo Farah wore".

Sorry about that.

What a card

A COLLEAGUE wanders over to interrupt us with: "All I got for my birthday last week was a pack of sticky playing cards. I found it really hard to deal with."