Batty remark
STRANGE are the points folk make about the anniversary of Elvis’s death. A Paul Smith commented on social media: “Elvis Presley died 40 years ago today - just a few days after English cricketer Geoffrey Boycott got his hundredth century. Cultural landmarks both.”
The great Geoffrey himself replied: “I’m glad he saw it before he died then.”
Return to sender
ONE of our favourite stories concerning Elvis was when his statue with the neon halo at Glasgow’s Museum of Modern Art was sent on loan to the National Museums in Edinburgh. After he was carefully crated up and put in a lorry, a member of staff couldn’t resist going on the public address system and announcing: “’Ladies and gentlemen, Elvis has left the building.’’
Mastered the language
SWEET to see all the little ones going off to school for the first time. Says Reader Kenneth Fleck: “My youngest son started school today. I told him that I was very confident that he would be a good boy at school. He assured me that he would indeed be a good boy, because if he were to misbehave he’d be taken up before ‘the head mischief’.”
Food for thought
TODAY’S point to ponder comes from Edinburgh Fringe performer Pierre Novellie who says: “I get so annoyed when people serving me in fast food places are as slow as I would be if I worked there.”
Music to his ears
MUSIC critic Alastair McKay was listening to a programme about the demise of phone boxes when he recalled: “Me and my pals used to entertain ourselves by ringing Dial-a-disc from a phone box in North Berwick. Dial-a-disc was a service where you could ring up and hear a pop record.
“Of course, we didn’t have any money, so we used to ring up and listen until the pips intervened. That way you could hear the intro, a bit of Slade maybe, and get a sense of the way the tune might go. You could sense its promise, then hang up, imagining the chorus.”
Going to be Trumped
SCARED to ask what is happening in America these days, but a reader over there tells us: “Vice President Mike Pence had to state publicly that he was not planning to run for president in 2020.
“What he didn’t add is that he’s pretty certain he’ll be president before then.”
The Glasgow experience
THE AMERICAN news organisation CNBC ran a story this week about how it was often cheaper for American students to study in Scotland than to go to a top college in the States. Their story quoted a university official in Glasgow who said: “The real plus here that we’ve heard from the American students is that they aren’t living and counting the pennies. They are able to experience the culture, they are able to still go to the theatre, and live in a nice flat.”
Yes, that’s what they are doing in Glasgow, going to the theatre.
Stage door pick-up
MAXINE Jones, who qualifies for a bus pass, has her comedy show Never Been 61 Before at the Edinburgh Fringe. Her age though can prove tricky at times. As she tells us: “On the comedy circuit I am an oddity – people think I’m there to collect someone.”
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