TORY Minister Michael Gove was mocked for mixing up the names of Scottish fishing ports - referring to Peterborough and Fraserhead rather than Fraserburgh and Peterhead. Tom Kelso in Troon comments: "It reminds me of when a rather prissy relative was recounting her experiences of a cargo-ship voyage to the Mediterranean, to visitors, - the local minister and his wife. Her description of the passage across the Bay of Biscay raised clerical eyebrows when she stated that the 'bitch was poaching the whole way across'."

SCOTTISH publishers Luath have just released "Scotland and the Easter Rising" which is a new collection of essays by writers and academics about the part Scots played in the Irish rebellion. Joint editor Kirsty Lusk tells us: "Edinburgh-born James Connolly’s daughter, Nora, was heavily involved in the preparations for the Easter Rising in Dublin, tricking local officials. Nora helped smuggle key participant Liam Mellows, who was to be deported, back from England by dressing him up as a cleric. No one ever stopped a priest."

WE wrote about the death of comedy writer Victoria Wood, and a reader sends us her favourite gag by Victoria. "My boyfriend had a sex manual but he was dyslexic. I was lying there, and he was looking for my vinegar."

GRANDPARENTS of course are spending a lot of time on child-minding duties these days. An Edinburgh reader did not know whether to be angry or impressed when he picked up his grand-daughter from nursery and asked her what she had done that day.

"A biscuit would help me remember," she replied.

A CLARKSTON reader says the family has just got a new dog. He says it livens up the evening walks when someone stops and asks him what the dog's name is, and he replies: "He won't tell us."

LOVELY people, our readers in Australia. But just occasionally they can't help themselves. We wrote a story about uses for a waterproof mobile phone, and Alan Brown in Perth - the far, far away one - tells us: "Here in Australia, we have to go surfing or canoeing to recognise the value of a waterproof phone.

"In Glasgow, the phone's waterproof properties justified themselves the first time you use it outdoors."

COLD callers continued. Says James Simpson in Erskine: "I received a call which I recognised as a computer scam. The caller explains you have viruses on your computer and he is there to sort them out, while at the same time gathering information from your computer that can do nasty things to your bank account. I kept the caller on the line looking for the information that would allow him access to my computer. Sensing the callers growing frustration at me not being able to find the various icons he was looking for, I said, 'Hang on. Did you say I had to switch the computer on first?' Click."

A POINT to ponder comes from Dougie McNicol in Bridge of Weir who picks up a tub of "Philadelphia Original" soft cream cheese and asks: "Maybe I’m just being tiresomely pedantic here, but if it’s ‘Now even creamier’ as is printed on the label, it can’t still be the ‘Original’, can it? Perhaps I should stay out of supermarkets more."