Love letters

OUR article about spelling difficulties reminds George Pettigrew of the time he wrote a Valentine’s Card. This was years before mobile phones and iPads provided a card-writing Romeo with a handy spellcheck.

George wanted to tell his girlfriend she was "beautiful". He recalled the word had an "e", an "a" and a "u". But for the life of him, he couldn’t remember the order in which they appeared.

He thought of telling his beloved she was gorgeous. Now it was an "e" an "o" and a "u" that were his nemeses.

Eventually our reader compromised by calling the girl of his dreams "nice".

George was chucked soon after. His crime? Lack of romantic fervour. (Spelled f-e-r-v-o-u-r.)

School’s out

EDUCATION used to be that thing that happened in a big building far away. A building called School. Nowadays it happens closer to home. In home, in fact.

Weather presenter Judith Ralston is delighted with this turn of events, explaining that she feels like: “Mary bl**dy MacPoppins.”

Using the Diary’s custom-built sarcasmometer, we ascertain that Judith might not be so delighted after all…

Bedtime story

READER Megan Knight once spotted a spider scuttling under her bedcovers. She was too scared to hunt him down, so ended up sleeping on the couch.

“I wouldn’t have minded so much,” says Megan. “But I was the one paying the mortgage. Yet the spider was getting all the benefits.”

Limp lunch

“A RESTAURANT once served me soggy spaghetti,” says Mike Innes. “So I put in a restraining order.”

Mind your language

A DIARY story reminds Paul Cortopassi from Bonnybridge of a French teacher who sent him to the shops to buy an: "Ai-je tort."

Using his knowledge of the French and Glaswegian languages, our reader figured out what teach’ wanted… a meringue.

Question time

A PARENT should always be optimistic about their child’s future, especially when the youngster exhibits a curious nature. Although sometimes the questions asked lack the profundity of Plato quizzing his tutor Socrates. For example, reader Heidi Scott’s young daughter said: “Mum, what material are plastic bags made out of?”

Film fade-out

CINEMAS have been closed for roughly three months. Film buff Jimmy Simpson wonders if his local movie house will ever reopen. “Perhaps in the future people will go into museums to look at hotdog mustard dispensers and popcorn boxes,” says our reader. “They’ll take the place of dinosaur bones as curios to be studied. The last proof that movie-screening existed before the Netflix era.”

Read more: Those were the days