On a roll

WE do like our pensioners on buses stories. Writer Deedee Cuddihy was on the bus from Glasgow to Dundee where she got chatting to a pensioner who told her about her pal who had become obsessed with checking the sell-by dates when doing her shopping.

She told Deedee: “I came across her in the supermarket last week, having an animated conversation with one of the shop assistants. I said, ‘What’s going on Jessie?’ And she said, ‘I’m just telling this young man that I can’t find the sell-by date on this.’ I asked what she was buying and she held up a pack of toilet rolls.”

A prince amongst men

WE mentioned Prince Philip’s imminent retiral, and Sue Forsyth in Bearsden recalls: “When we lived in Windsor in the sixties my father was a part-time fireman. The brigade was called to a fire at Home Farm on the Windsor Castle Estate.

“To prevent it spreading the firemen climbed up and down a ladder removing bales of hay two at a time. Prince Philip came to help. He was then challenged as to why he was only carrying one hay bale instead of two. His reply was ‘because you lot are being paid to do this and I am doing it for fun!’”

Seen the light

A BEARSDEN reader emails: “If you want the traffic lights to change from red to green, simply pick up your phone and try to read a text you’ve been sent.”

Hard to swallow

A READER much enjoyed The Bridgeton Press, a compilation of local stories available in Bridgeton Library.

It includes the newspaper cutting from 1953 of the Bridgeton woman appearing in court, accused of obtaining free drinks in public houses by pretending she was ill.

She started in a pub in Heron Street, where she said she was unwell and in need of a stimulant, and induced the chargehand to give her a brandy. The suspicious barman followed her to two further bars where she did the same trick before he called the police.

Nice try.

Wouldn’t bet on it

TOUGH time for Labour in the forthcoming General Election. Online betting firm Betway says it is offering shorter odds for England winning the World Cup in Russia next year, Prince Harry getting married this year, and even Ukip’s Nigel Farage appearing in the I’m A Celebrity jungle, than Labour winning.

I wonder which event a Labour-supporting Scot would prefer to bet on.

It’s a dog’s life

A READER heard a toper in a Glasgow pub at the weekend tell his pals: “The kids were having a big noisy argument about which one was my favourite.

“The family dog just gave me a knowing look, and I quietly slipped him a biscuit.”

Stretching the truth

TODAY’S daftness comes from Ian Power why declares: “My mate’s been jailed for stealing a nightclub’s courtesy car.

“He got a long stretch.”