Bird brain

WE asked for your stories about the Amazon electronic helper Alexa, and a south side reader tells us about meeting a woman on the train who was heading to Aberdeen to house-sit for her son. The woman explained to our reader: "It's really to look after his parrot while he's on holiday. When he's out working the parrot asks Alexa to turn on the music. Sometimes when he comes home it is really blaring so the parrot must ask Alexa to turn it up."

Handy remark

ONE of the big sellers over Christmas was the book This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay who describes his life as a junior doctor. He tells of a woman giving birth who had a cord prolapse and she had to rest on all fours while he wore a glove up to his shoulder so that he could insert his hand to keep the cord in place. Writes Adam: "The midwife lead into the room the husband. 'Jesus Christ!' he says in a heavy Glasgow accent. The midwife remonstrated that she'd warned him I'd be holding the cord out of the way. 'You did,' he says, his eyes like dinner plates. 'You didn't say he'd be wearing her like Sooty though'."

What a circus

THE news that the Scottish Government has banned wild animals in travelling circuses reminds us of the teacher who was explaining to her colleagues that she had been to a circus where an elephant was made to wear a skirt while performing. ''It was a right shame,'' said the teacher. ''The poor thing was peeing all the time.'' ''Was it incontinent?'' asked an anxious colleague.

''No, it was in Stranraer,'' came the reply.

Trumped

"NOW I've something to thank Donald Trump for," a West End woman was telling her pals the other day. They were shocked as she has always been a left-winger when it comes to politics. But then she added: "I stood on the scales after Christmas, felt a bit down, but then I shouted 'Fake news!' and leapt off."

Weighing it up

TALKING of weight gain, a reader in Bearsden email to suggest: "Parents always tell you how much their child weighs when it is born. Just think, if they continued doing that at every birthday we would all be a lot thinner."

Mr Write

LOTS of young folk were keen to find a partner before Christmas. Reader John Mulholland tells us: "A colleague told me about her experience with dating apps. She said that a chap had sent her a message asking if she had a fetish. She replied, ‘Yes, good grammar always does it for me.’ However, she swiftly deleted him when he replied, ‘Your in luck.’"

It kicks off

AMONGST the political news at the weekend was the majority of those elected to the Catalan Parliament being in favour of independence. Muses David McVey in Milton of Campsie: "Lots of renewed discussion about the possibility of Catalan becoming an independent country. Am I the only one worried that the main outcome might be yet another national fitba team that are better than Scotland?"

Making a point

A PARTICK reader who was given a dartboard for Christmas feels the need to tell us: "If you've never worn a blindfold when playing darts before, then you should try it - you don't know what you're missing!"

No words

GOODNESS, am only in the office for five minutes after Christmas when a colleague buttonholes me and announces: "The wife kept staring at me while she was going through all the words beginning with 'S' in the dictionary. I thought to myself, 'She's up to something'."