What a truly wonderful sight to see fishermen Jim Reid and David Irvine strolling along the harbour at Montrose after being feared drowned.

Communities that make their living from the sea understand that they live at its mercy (the family of Mr Reid and Mr Irvine had already lost one member in this way) but when the knock comes to the door, the pain is still the same.

For their families, the pair's return after the official search had been called off was the realisation of a dream but, as they chuckled in a press conference about how much weight they had lost during their 48-hour ordeal, the entire nation gave a heartfelt exhalation of relief.

Recent weeks have seen a relentless slew of tragic stories involving the loss of life at sea. With every passing day we have had to accept that faces staring out from smiling photographs on screen are never returning home. Ten minutes after Mr Reid and Mr Irvine were rescued their boat sank; their timely rescue really was a much-needed miracle. "We never gave up hope," said Mr Reid.

It can be hard work living under the relentless glare of media scrutiny but, when stressed public figures lash out, the ladies and gentlemen of the press often bear the brunt of the fist-swinging. This week the heir to the throne resorted to a bit of media-jabbing when he let out an evil cackle and aimed a sharpened paper air-plane at journalists in Canada. Charles was evidently beginning to feel a little manic as he contemplated his place in history as being the spark that landed on the Putin powder keg.

Another flare-up of reporter-bashing was the extraordinary scene when Channel 4's Michael Crick was walloped about the head with a brochure by Ukip MEP Godfrey Bloom. In terms of comedy value, however, neither can match Hugh Grant's tub-of-beans lobbing incident in 2007 that saw the star arrested, but not charged, following an alleged incident involving sauce-covered protein and a photographer.

While talking of occupational hazards... phone interviews can lead to some lost-in-translation moments. This week, while interviewing a designer about his choice of paint colour, I had my own Four Candles/Fork Handles moment. I had duly noted that the shade in question was Pail Stench Grey. How edgy, I thought to myself, and yes, I suppose old metal buckets can get whiffy. Hours passed before I succumbed to the nagging doubt and went back to my interviewee to double check the name. Pale French Grey.

Song lyrics are fertile ground for this sort of misinterpretation, so much so that there is a special name for it: mondegreens. Did anyone else bop around to Madonna's nineties hit Erotica singing "Bill Oddie, Bill Oddie, put your hands all over my body"? So Lonely by The Police will forever in my head be "Sue Lawley, Sue Lawley" and, once I discovered that Abba's Dancing Queen contained the boringly logical line "You're in the mood for a dance" and not my opt-repeated homage to Rupert the Bear, "You're in the Rupert gang", it was no longer as intriguing.

The march of unnecessary technology continues unabated with the apparent arrival of drone-delivered pizza. A chain of Italian restaurants in Mumbai aims to get around the city's traffic problems by enlisting flying drones to deliver food after being inspired by similar innovations by US retail giant Amazon. The drones will be commonplace in five years according to Francesco's Pizzeria. Should put an end to the dilemma of whether or not to change out of your pyjamas before answering the door.