In a flap
ONE of the hottest days in Britain yesterday. We liked the marketing savvy of the Waterstone's bookshop branch in Swansea which announced on social media: "Today is going to be HOT. Fortunately, we sell hand fans. They come in the form of sheets of paper glued or sewn together and bound in covers. We have many thousands of them in stock, and as an added bonus they have stories printed on them."
What's in a name?
YES like many others we were struggling to place the new Scottish Secretary Alister Jack. No, we are not going to make any remarks about how can ordinary Scots relate to a privately-educated multi-millionaire landowner. Instead we pass on the musing of journalist Alasdair Clark who says: "Alister Jack proves my rule never to trust a man who spells his own name wrong."
We always thought the rule was never trust a man whose first name is a surname. Any other quaint rules on names?
Low point
BOB Mackie reminds us of the old HMS Carrick which was tied up on the Clyde in Glasgow near the High Court and was used as a club by the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve. It was a bit posh and had quite high standards, evidenced by the fact I was only invited on it once. Anyway, Bob recalls: "A chap in the RNVR who also worked in Yarrows came into work one morning where he was observed pulling at his ears and nose creating something of a scene, and complaining of the bends.
"He was asked what the trouble was and he said he had been diving at the weekend inspecting the hull of HMS Carrick. It was then gently pointed out to him that if he had waited till low tide he could have inspected the hull of the Carrick in his wellies."
Bin there
WELL, if that was a trip down memory lane then Leslie Goskirk in Lairg is hurtling miles further down that road, after our story about noisy bin men, by recalling: "Janey Godley was lucky to be woken as late as 8am by the bin men. When I was growing up in the Woodlands area of the city in the early fifties our middens were emptied in the middle of the night by gangs of noisy 'midgie men' with horse-drawn, iron-wheeled carts. The din of the cart wheels on the cobbled back lanes, the clanging of the bins being emptied and the clatter of the horses' hooves ensured that no residents got any sleep then – especially as, according to one of our neighbours, every horse had 12 hooves."
Testing times
MEANWHILE, back in the present, John Henderson muses on the disastrous start for England in the Test Match and declares: "England all out for 85 in the opening day of the match against Ireland. Apparently England couldn’t organise the backstop! I blame Boris Johnson myself – this never happened with previous Prime Ministers."
An age thing
OUR Glasgow night club story about old men chasing young girls reminds a reader of the city's Savoy disco where the DJ, without really thinking this through, announced that the next record "is for one of our long-term regulars, Jeannie, who is celebrating her 18th birthday tonight".
Busted
MORE on getting golf lessons as Boyd Houston in Dollar tells us: "A sadly-now-late friend and neighbour, a very heavily busted lady, reported after her first golf lesson that the professional told her: 'Mrs McFarlane, you either play over them or under them, you cannot play through them'."
Read more: 1966: Goalless final was ‘as unsatisfactory as tonic without gin’
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here