American (Steak) Pie

Those of you familiar with Eric's writings will be aware of his love of food.

And it seems that the Straight White Chef is now turning his hand to steak pie, as revered by all true Scots as being amongst the king of foods.

Ever since I can remember, steak pie has been amongst my favourite dishes. There may not be many Michelin-rated restaurants with steak pie on their menus, but it really is the ultimate in simple, hearty, filling fare.

My maternal grandmother made the best steak pie I've ever tasted, always served with perfectly-roasted potatoes and vegetables. She may not be a professional chef, but I'd have taken her steak pie over any meal in any restaurant in the world. Ideally, her steak pie would be followed by a tray of her rock cakes and some of her home-made toffee as well.

I've yet to hear whether Eric's filo-topped effort was a dish fit for a king or a dish fit for the bin. But throwing mushrooms into the gravy? That's just WRONG.....

Buy A Babymop

Kids nowadays don't know what a hard day's work is. Our culture of computer games, lounging in front of the television and instant gratification through ever-increasing debt means that children at the dawn of the 21st century have no idea that they need to work for their keep.


So I'm all for this Japanese invention that teaches children to graft from day one. Bizarrely, I found this photograph a while back whilst searching on the worldwide interweb for "dog mop slippers". A colleague who owns a dog was complaining that her pooch's pawprints were always muddying her floor. It was then that I remembered (or thought I remembered) seeing a photograph somewhere of a dog wearing "mop slippers", which cleaned the floor as the dog wandered around the kitchen.


I never did find any reference on the worldwide interweb to mop slippers for a dog, which makes me think that I either imagined it or dreamt it. In which case, I have seriously strange dreams.


Anyway, if in the future I am blessed with a Jockling or two, I will most certainly be investing in a Babymop. If I'm going to spend 18 or more years looking after kids, they can at least look after the laminate flooring at Dungroanin'.

Good Advice

Tish over at The Kat House has tagged me with this meme, started by Neonscent.

This time it's all about imparting some wisdom to you strange people who wander around the worldwide interweb. I've been asked to give one helpful hint to fellow bloggers, to keep them on the righteous path and make sure that their blogs are suitable places for their fellow man to visit.

Well, I'm no expert - I've only been groanin' online since September, and I don't think for a second that my thoughts are any more worthwhile than anyone else's. And I certainly don't think that I'm in a position to offer advice - whatever your reasons for blogging, do it for yourself, not for anyone else. I can no more offer advice on how to blog than I can on how to think or speak.

But, from a personal point of view, I think my way of thinking is that pissing about on the blogosphere is just that - pissing about. Nobody's paying me for this nonsense, so I'm under no obligation to take it too seriously. Just think of it as the contents of my head popping up as a series of 1s and 0s.

If you think you can change the world by blogging (you poor misguided fool), be my guest, but my one piece of advice is "don't take it all too seriously".

Here's the meme in full for those who want to give it a shot - I'm supposed to tag 10 more people to play along, but I'll let others decide for themselves if they want to add to the Ten Commandments.

(Meme Starts)

It’s very simple. When this is passed on to you, copy the whole thing, skim the list and put a * star beside those that you like. (Check out especially the * starred ones.)

Add the next number (1. 2. 3. 4. 5., etc.) and write your own blogging tip for other bloggers. Try to make your tip general.

After that, tag 10 other people. Link love some friends!

Just think– if 10 people start this, the 10 people pass it onto another 10 people, you have 100 links already!

1. Look, read, and learn. **-http://www.neonscent.com/

2. Be, EXCELLENT to each other. **-http://www.bushmackel.com/

3. Don’t let money change ya! **-http://www.therandomforest.info/

4. Always reply to your comments.-http://chattiekat.com/

5. Don't take it all too seriously. - http://groaninjock.blogspot.com/

(Meme Ends)

Silence

I've been living in a world of silence for the past two days.

It's been hard to bear, but I think I'm starting to see the light now.

The cause of these silent days is that Mrs Wife left me for another man.

Not just any man, but a younger man, practically a boy, but one who is apparently far more exciting than I could ever be.

Despite the fact that she is 27, Mrs Wife spent the hours between 6.30pm on Saturday and 10.30pm on Sunday reading Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows.

And now she's finished it. She's refusing to tell me whether the boy wizard dies. I don't really care, I was only making conversation. And trying to find out so that I can spoil the ending for small children.

But as Mrs Wife can't read when there's music on in the background, I spent most of Sunday watching The Open from Carnoustie with the sound off.

Nonetheless, it is a tad disconcerting when an otherwise rational WOMAN spends two days reading a kids' book.

I've only read the first Harry Potter book, and I only read it because I'd run out of more worthwhile literature whilst touring southern Europe in 2001. It was enjoyable enough I suppose, but it didn't strike me that I just HAD to devour the sequels immediately.

As kids' books go, I think that the Harry Potter series pales in comparison to the works of Roald Dahl. In fact, in some instances, I think that JK Rowling borrowed heavily from Dahl's work, especially the surreal works of Charlie and The Chocolate Factory, The BFG and Matilda. She also obviously drew inspiration from Tolkien and from Tom Brown's School Days.

I'll probably get around to reading the books when I have kids myself, but not before. There are just far too many great books written for adults that I haven't gotten round to yet.

Quick-beaked Thief

It seems my good friend The Tomahawk Kid is ahead of the game.

Yesterday, he reported that he was witness to a robbery at a newsagent in Aberdeen city centre.

A daring seagull has become adept at sneaking into a branch of RS McColl's and pinching packets of crisps straight off the shelves.

Today, the story is featured in The Daily Record and on the BBC News website.

I hate seagulls. I've got a phobia of birds, but I especially hate birds that aren't afraid of humans, and who associate them with food, such as seagulls, pigeons and chickens.

Seagulls really are awful. Montrose is plagued by them, swooping down to steal food practically from people's hands and raking through bins in the search for food.

It strikes me that a seagull's life can't be overly fulfilling. Wake up at 5am, make a hell of a racket, rummage through some bins, try not to get hit by cars.

I think I dislike seagulls more than pigeons because they seem to have a bit of cunning about them, whereas pigeons just look and act dopey.

But if we're now at the stage where seagulls are stealing from shops, I think we should be worried. Maybe Alfred Hitchcock was right after all....

No Force Required

As seen at Alistair's Heart Monitor

Buying A Bitsashitty From Japanese Robbers

In yesterday's post, one of the eight fascinating facts I offered up to you strange people of the worldwide interweb was that I had visited seven of the eight Australian States and Territories, and that I missed out on the Northern Territory because of an exploding car engine.

Ole Blue The Heretic asked me to expand on this story, so I'm publishing an email sent to friends and family on February 1st 2004, shortly after the incident occurred:

Hello everybody, hope you are all well and not dying of hypothermia in the Arctic wastelands of northern Europe. Perth is almost unbearably hot during the day now, and we haven’t seen anything you could properly call rain since we were in Singapore six weeks ago (although Melbourne and Brisbane have been battered by huge storms which have caused floods big enough to submerge cars – thankfully that is 5000 miles away!)

The fact that we’re in Perth at all is due to a series of events which has given me the impression that we’re doomed to stay here forever more. Initially we arrived here just before Xmas, with the intention of finding jobs for a couple of months. The only problem with that plan was that there weren’t many jobs worth doing that were available to travelers (we’re only allowed to work in one job for three months at a time). So after a month or so of generally fruitless searching, albeit with a combined total of six days work between us for the month to show for our endeavours, we decided that our best option would be to buy a car and head south for some fruit picking work.

We purchased a decent-looking Mitsubishi Station Wagon from a Japanese couple, after test driving it and making sure that it wasn’t a battered old heap. After collecting the car on the Friday, we decided to spend the weekend visiting the Pinnacles desert 400km north of Perth, to see the standing stones and the stromatolites (the oldest life on Earth).

Two hours into our four-hour journey, the car began to lose power, eventually dying by the side of a near-deserted stretch of highway. For anyone picturing a small country road in the middle of nowhere, please take into account the fact that Western Australia is a state one-and-a-half times the size of the UK and Ireland put together, and that only 2.5 million people live in this huge expanse of nothing, 1.5 million of them in Perth. We are talking SERIOUSLY deserted stretches of road.

Looking under the bonnet of the car, smoke was rising from puddles of oil which had spurted from some mysterious fissure in the engine, which, despite an almost complete lack of mechanical knowledge, I deduced was not a good sign.

Fortunately, we had trundled to a halt near a small farmhouse, and I walked across to ask for the use of a phone. As this farmhouse was also running a small business selling watermelons and grapefruit, we also hoped for some refreshments while we awaited the arrival of our knight in shining tow truck.

As I approached the porch of the house, a woman emerged, eying me with a look of disdain as if I were about to deposit a decomposing skunk upon her doorstep. Explaining that our car had just broken down, I asked if I could call a local mechanic, to which this cheerful businesswoman replied “No” and walked off, possibly to torture small children in an outhouse somewhere. Completely unprepared for this event, I could only gaze open-mouthed before heading back to the car.

Now our only option was to use my British mobile phone to call the RAC in Australia. So for the next 20 minutes I patiently tried to explain to the monkey on the other end of the line that no, I wasn’t a member, and that yes, I would like to have somebody rescue our car, preferably before we had to resort to cannibalism to survive. Twenty pounds worth of exasperated conversation later, with the added treat of the $158 membership fee on top, we were promised that the mechanic would be with us in an hour.

Sure enough, he arrived at the allotted time, tried the engine a couple of times and declared that there was nothing he could do. Our options then were to get the car towed to the nearest town, Gin Gin, for free or anywhere else for $1 per kilometer. As Gin Gin is over 2hrs from Perth, we weren’t especially keen to take the car there, so we began the journey back to Perth. About an hour into the journey, Patrick (the mechanic) reminded us that we would have to pay $1 per km to Perth AND BACK, which would have cost us another $200+. So we decided instead to leave the car outside a garage in the town of Wannerroo, an hour from Perth by bus.

Which is where it still is two weeks later, having a replacement engine fitted. I think the only suitable name for the car now is Titanic, collapsing as she did on her maiden voyage. The car originally cost us $2500, a sum which has now inflated to $5200, money which has taken us exactly nowhere.

As a result, we are now back in Perth, in the same flat, with no realistic chance of moving in the near future. We’ve both found jobs in a British theme pub round the corner from the flat, [Miss Girlfriend] behind the bar, me collecting glasses, which is at least letting us pay the rent and feed ourselves on pasta. The pub is called the Elephant and Wheelbarrow, part of a chain across Australia, so if we can ever get to Melbourne or Sydney, we might be able to transfer across there. Although the 10pm-5am shifts are a bit of a weekend killer, the house band on a Friday is a pretty good Beatles tribute band, followed on Saturdays by a 70s and 80s cover band (the only band I’ve ever heard follow a Cyndi Lauper cover with Ram Jam’s Black Betty), which means it’s definitely not the worst job I’ve ever had.

Aside from this rather lengthy tale of misery, there’s not much else to tell. We’ve visited Rottnest Island, about 20 miles from Perth in the Indian Ocean. It’s the only place in the world where you can see wild Quokkas. A Quokka is a cat-sized marsupial with a long rat-like tail, and they are in over-abundant supply on Rottnest. The only real way to see the island is by bike, so we spent a day cycling round, and every time we stopped we were approached by groups of Quokkas looking for food and attention. We’ve got loads of photographs of them, should anybody want to see exactly what I’m talking about.

The only other event of any note was Australia Day last Monday, a nationwide celebration of all things Oz. [Miss Girlfriend], myself and our flatmate Leah spent most of the day on the bank of the Swan River, watching air shows, water displays and other entertainments, which culminated in a spectacular fireworks display from boats in the middle of the river and from the tops of the Perth CBD skyscrapers. There was also a fairly decent concert televised from Canberra, on a day which is as much an excuse for alcoholic over-indulgence as anything else.

Well, this episode of our adventures over, I am going to finish here. Keep in touch folks (thank you all my Celtic-supporting acquaintances, I am now well aware of the famous Glasgow Rangers’ capitulation in the Old Firm match, and of the gap at the top of the SPL, you may cease the reminders at any time).

Our address, should anyone wish to send cans of Irn Bru or UN-style food parcels is [address deleted to protect the current residents from the strange folk of the worldwide interweb].

And that is the sorry tale of the exploding Australian Mitsubishi. We did eventually get the car back, and managed to drive it all the way across Australia from Perth to Melbourne, eating and sleeping in it along the way. We made some good friends in Perth as well, so having to spend four months there wasn't so bad after all.

Eight Things About Me

As seen over at Blog d'Elisson and at Blissful Bedlam - Eight Random Facts About Me.

The useless knowledge is listed below, but first we'd better keep things proper by explaining the rools:

Write a post enumerating eight facts/habits about yourself. Include the rules at the beginning of the post.

Tag eight people, posting their names and links to their sites. (I'm not going to do that - if anyone wants to play, feel free. If you don't, don't.)

Leave comments at the sites you’ve tagged, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

So here we go - eight things you didn't need (or want) to know about me:

1. I've never had an operation under general anaesthetic. In fact, I can count my hospital visits on the fingers of one hand: the first was to get a piece of grit removed from my eye as a teenager, the second was to see how badly I'd damaged my ankle playing football (it turned out to be a strained ligament), the third was to see whether I'd broken my nose playing football (notice a theme here? I hadn't, just burst it open quite spectacularly), the fourth was to see if I'd broken my ribs playing football (I hadn't, they were just bruised) and the fifth was when I had my toenail removed by a doctor who gave me a single local anaesthetic injection. Please note that I was touching wood and crossing my fingers whilst I wrote that answer.

2. The longest I've lived in one house is seven years, when my parents and I (and for three of those years Baby Brother) lived in a small cottage in the countryside near Montrose. I took a drive down there on the way home from work a couple of weeks ago and it hasn't changed at all in the intervening 20 years.

3. The most keepie-uppies I have ever done with a football without it bouncing on the ground is 120. At the end of the session, my legs were exhausted and I'd moved about 10 metres in the time it took, which was probably about five minutes. So I can't begin to fathom how Martinho Eduardo Orige managed to keep a ball in the air for 19-and-a-half hours.

4. I've visited seven of the eight Australian States and Territories, including the Australian Capital Territory and Tasmania. Mrs Wife (then known as Miss Girlfriend) and I didn't make it to the Northern Territory because of an unfortunate incident with an exploding car engine that cost us $2,500 to fix.

5. I can lick my nose and wiggle my ears. But not at the same time.

6. Whilst at university I worked as a security guard, a kitchen porter and as a journalist for a Premier League football team.

7. My favourite alcoholic drink is Cointreau, lime and lemonade. Which is probably the least masculine drink that one can order at any bar in Scotland.

8. I'm allergic to cats and have a phobia of birds. Apart from that, I like animals.

Wonderful Weather and Woeful Weather

The weather over the weekend was magnificent, and gave the people of Montrose their first glimpse of a real summer.

On Saturday, when my friend came to visit the town for the first time, we walked into town and along the seafront, but the heat and the humidity made it a tough trip.

But by Sunday, the humidity was gone and the sun blazed down on the Montrose Donkey Derby. Despite several attempts, I was unable to pick a winner in any of the races, and also failed to kick a football through a hole in a wooden board. Regardless of these shortcomings, a fine time was had by all, and we returned to Dungroanin' for an impromptu barbecue.

So, when we went to bed last night, I expected that today would dawn in glorious sunshine, as July finally remembered that it is supposed to be the height of summer.

But it's not. It is freezing cold and pishing with rain once again.

So summer lasted two days. Wonderful.

Free Fun

As there is still a fortnight to go until the next pay day, but my bank account is already looking bare and my credit card is hollering for attention after a period of sustained abuse, Mrs Wife and I will be living on the cheap until the end of the month.

Thankfully, a combination of free tickets to the Cirque Surreal circus at Queen's Links in Aberdeen and our cinema passes means that we won't be short of entertainment this evening.

In fact, combined with a gala day in Montrose tomorrow, a visit from a friend I haven't seen in a long while tomorrow evening and a donkey derby on Sunday, it seems that this next two weeks will be jam-packed with excitement, none of it costing a penny.

Terrifying Tunes

I always have a song battering around inside my head. During every waking moment of every day, my subconscious will be merrily singing its own private tune, generally one that I've listened to or inadvertently heard in the preceding hours or days.

Usually, the tune in my head at any given moment will be one that I like, from my own vast library of music. I'll tend to repeat one riff or line over and over in my head, although this often branches out into whistling or singing.

In recent weeks, the songs that have been playing on my own mental jukebox have included Kate Nash's Foundations, the piano riff from The Beatles' Hey Bulldog and Thin Lizzy's Dancing In The Moonlight. All of these are perfectly fine, and I'm happy to have them on shuffle as I go about my daily business.

But for the past few days, I've woken up with a horrific medley of ABBA's Waterloo and Madonna's La Isla Bonita playing in my head. Nothing I can do can shift this combination from my mind. I've tried listening to some of my favourite catchy tunes in the car, or whistling something else to take my mind of the horrors of 70s disco and 80s pop.

And for a short time, these tactics work. But too often, the polished vapidity of Sweden's finest will come creeping up again, sledgehammering its way in between my silent renditions of Kings Of Leon and The Stone Roses.

I blame Live Earth - Madonna's "Romany Gypsy" rendition of La Isla Bonita with Gogol Bordello would have been enough to make me claw out my own ear drums, had I not been driving when it came on the radio. It was pure car crash radio (not in the real sense of the term - I didn't actually crash) - who in the world REALLY thought that what Madge's work really needed was a gypsy remix?

Anyway, I digress. How can I banish the horrors of my mind's inner gay bar forever, and replace them with good old-fashioned rock'n'roll? Help me, please.

Write Here, Write Now

As seen over at the Adelaide Green Porridge Cafe, some magnificent writing from high school students, the like of which I have never seen before:

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a ThighMaster.

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.

18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long it had rusted shut.

19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

John Smeaton: A Tribute

Courtesy of Sho, I thought it was only right to share this reworking of "Flower of Scotland", penned in tribute to John Smeaton:

O John of Smeaton
When will we see your like again
That fought and panned in
Two Al Qaeda men
And set about them
Osama's army
And sent him homeward
Tae think again

The airport's bare now
And cherokees lie burnt and still
O'er land that is saved now
Which brave Sir Smeato held
And set about them
Osama's army
And sent him homeward
Tae think again

Those days are passed now
And in the past they must remain
But we can still rise now
And be a nation again
That set about them
Osama's army
And sent him homeward
Tae think again

Country Living

Along with Alasdair Gray, Bill Bryson is one of my favourite authors - I've yet to read one of his books that hasn't left me in stitches.

Perusing The Guardian website this morning, I was delighted to read Bryson's views on what makes the British countryside so special.

I agree with his statement that we seem to take our countryside and heritage for granted. I remember when Mrs Wife and I visited Tasmania, we were shown "the oldest bridge in Australia", built in 1823.

In my home town of Brechin, the Brechin Bridge is so old that no-one seems to know for certain how old it is. All that we seem to know for is that up until the 1780s it was the only bridge across the River South Esk. Which means that, in all likelihood, it is more than 100 years older than Australia's oldest bridge. And no-one knows or cares enough to bother even finding out when it was built.

I agree wholheartedly with Bryson's view that we should fight to protect our countryside and to preserve it from haphazard development. By all means, we should enable this country to grow, and we should be looking to build affordable homes, but not at the expense of our countryside.

All Around The World

I would consider myself fairly well travelled - I've seen a good bit of Europe and spent a year travelling around the world before real life got in the way.


But, having ticked a few boxes on the Travbuddy website, it seems I've not seen as much of our home planet as I had imagined.


In fact, I've only been to 10% of the countries. Which isn't all that many really.


It's maybe a bit strange that I haven't been to Wales - but, in my defence, it is full of Welsh people and is basically just a smaller, crap version of Scotland, but with even worse football teams and a horrific accent.


And Mrs Wife and I missed out on the Northern Territory when we were in Australia, because it's largely just a desert and we were a bit too strapped for cash to travel 5,000 miles to look at a lot of sand and a big rock. But we'll go back at some point.


Meanwhile, there are places on this Earth that deserve to be listed simply through virtue of being unlike anywhere else on Earth - if we're going to include the Vatican City (essentially just a luxurious bit of Rome behind big walls), we should really include Scotland's islands, each of which has its own distinctive character.


And we most certainly should include The People's Republic of Tarbert, an insane north Kintyre village inhabited by insane villagers from the north of Kintyre - when you've been to Tarbert, you never forget it.

Time Of The (Close) Season

Many football fans despise the close season - the six week gap between the cup finals and the start of pre-season friendlies.

But it's a part of the footballing calendar that I've always enjoyed, ever since I was a wee boy first becoming interested in the Beautiful Game. (As an aside, Pele obviously never sat through the Hibernian v Dundee Utd match that I reported on in 2002, which could never have been described as beautiful. In fact, there have been occasions in my life where I have been more entertained by examining the contents of my navel.)

To me, the close season, with its daily transfer rumours, new signings and players leaving in the hope of greener grass elsewhere, is as exciting as the seasons that precede and follow it. Every new signing gives fans the hope of exciting times ahead, hope that for many is dashed almost immediately once balls are kicked in earnest.

I remember as a teenager hearing that Rangers had signed Basile Boli and Brian Laudrup. Boli, a European Cup-winning centre back, seemed like the kind of exciting and exotic signing that Rangers needed to take them to European glory. Sadly, he wasn't, but for those brief weeks between his signing and his first slip-shod appearances in Royal Blue, the propsect of seeing him in action kept my appetite whetted.

Rangers' close season signings may no longer be defenders with such rich pedigrees (Kirk Broadfoot and Alan Gow are unlikely ever to hold the Champions League trophy aloft) but the close season is still a time to revel in the world of football, where essentially meaningless activity is laden with the hopes and dreams of millions.

Public Transport Problems

Public transport in Scotland is useless.

This weekend, Mrs Wife and I are visiting her parents in Oban. Our visit will also include a spot of dog sitting, which begins for Mrs Wife tonight. Therefore, she is driving through to Oban after work this afternoon.

Meanwhile, I am working tomorrow. Rather than take two cars to Oban, and then have to bring both of them back to Angus, I thought I could get a train or bus.

But I can't. There is no way I can make it from Aberdeen to Glasgow in time to catch the last train to Oban on Friday night, as it leaves Queen Street Station at 6pm. Even supposing I could work through my lunch hour and leave an hour early (at 3:30pm), I still couldn't get to Glasgow by train in two and a half hours.

The only other option would be a bus - but in a remarkable stroke of genius, the last bus from Glasgow to Oban also leaves at 6pm. There is a bus from Dundee, but it leaves at 4.15pm, so I'd be struggling to make that, even if I left Aberdeen at 3:30pm.

If the government is really serious about tackling climate change and reducing congestion on our roads, public transportation in this country needs to be drastically improved. How can it take longer to travel by train from Aberdeen to Glasgow than it takes to drive the same route? And why, if you work normal hours, are you unable to finish work and then take public transport to Oban, one of the country's favourite holiday destinations?

As for the cost of travelling by public transport: it is cheaper for me to drive to work every day than it is to get the train, even with a year-long railcard.

I have travelled through some supposed third world countries that have better, cheaper and more efficient public transport systems than Britain. In the 21st century, that amounts to a hilariously unfunny joke.

Smeatonmania - "We'll set about ye"

Things have gone a bit crazy here at Groanin' Jock over the past 24 hours - with more than 200 visitors dropping by to read about John Smeaton's heroics.

So I thought that it was only right to share the video of the great man giving his TV interview.

Modern Day Hero

Scotland has a long and proud history of folk heroes. Great military leaders and kings like William Wallace, Rob Roy MacGregor and Robert The Bruce are immortalised in our nation's history.

In the modern age, our heroes have tended to come from the realms of science, politics and football. Amongst the inventions created by Scotsmen are the television, telephone, penicillin, radar and the pneumatic tyre.

But since Saturday, when Islamic fundamentalists brought their war of wonky ideologies to Scottish soil for the first time, Scotland has a new hero.

John Smeaton, a baggage handler at Glasgow Airport, is fast becoming a legendary figure not only here in Scotland, but around the world.

Spotting one of the would-be terrorists running towards police officers whilst on fire, John reportedly sprinted towards the man and felled him with a kick.

Interviewed afterwards by an American news crew, John said: “Me and other folk were just tryin’ tae get the boot in and some other guy banjoed him.”

John's bravery can only be commended. I am quite sure that if I saw a burning Pakistani running through an airport terminal, I would not be running towards him.

The people behind the John Smeaton tribute site have begun a campaign to reward the man himself with drink (as we do in Scotland). So far, they have received enough pledges to buy our own have a go hero more than 600 pints at the Holiday Inn at Glasgow Airport.

I urge you all to recognise the heroism of John Smeaton and to raise a glass in his honour.

(Thanks also to Silversprite and Big Rab for publicising John's heroics.)

Of Bowling, BBQs and Bombs

The weekend - where to begin?

As I explained previously, on Friday the company we work for paid for all employees in its Aberdeen office to spend the afternoon playing Pirate Island Adventure Golf, spinning about the on the dodgems, eating too much, playing pool and bowling.

Four minutes on the dodgems wasn't enough to demonstrate my Lewis Hamilton-esque driving, my golf was inhibited by poor approach work (though my putting was immense) and my pool playing was a bit rusty. I did finish a creditable joint third in the bowling though, missing out on the five pound prize after a play-off decided by means of one game of pool. (I came from seven balls down to lose it on the black - so close.)

And then Mrs Wife and I rose on Saturday morning to find Montrose basking in glorious sunshine. In fact, had we started our housewarming barbecue at 9.30am, the weather would have been perfect. But by 1.30pm, clouds were scattering across the sky, and by 3pm drops of rain could be felt cooling my sunburt neck. And by 6.30pm we had a full-on Montrose monsoon. But by then most people were fed and, if not drunk, merry enough not to care that they were crammed into Dungroanin' like giant sardines in a standard-sized phone box.

It was whilst we were partying indoors that news came in of the terrorist attack at Glasgow Airport. For so long, terrorism in the UK, whether that perpetrated by the IRA or by Islamic extremists, has focussed on London. But to find out that this unholy war has moved north of the border was a shock.

I would imagine that every single person in the room when the news came through has been to Glasgow Airport at some point in their lives, whether as a passenger or there to collect a relative. To see mobile phone video footage of the burning jeep at the airport brought home the fact that this was happening just over 100 miles from my front door, almost live as we saw it.

Apparently this is the first bombing in Scotland since the Luftwaffe crossed the English Channel. Whether that's true or not, I don't know. But if we thought that those who claim to be acting in Allah's name were going to concentrate their efforts on New York, Washington and London, we were obviously wrong.

Should we be afraid? No, we should be angry. We can't live in a state of fear - for then these ideological cretins, who would kill anyone unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, would have won.

It remains the case that you're far more likely to die in a car accident or from a heart attack than as a result of a terrorist attack. And our emergency services and military are amongst the best in the world - Glasgow airport was fully functional less than a day after the failed attack.

The greatest show of strength we can put on is to continue life as normal, to show that no matter what evil these people can summon, we will always overcome.

Fun Day In The Floods

This afternoon, instead of sitting at my desk messing about on blogs and watching as the clock makes its deathly-slow journey towards 4.30pm, my colleagues and I will be braving the Aberdeen monsoon in a quest for fun, entertainment and better bonding as workmates.

The company has generously stumped up the cash for our office to troop down to Codona's Amusement Arcade on Aberdeen's Beach Boulevard, where we will compete in games of Pirate Island Adventure Golf and ten-pin bowling. These activities will be separated by a shot on the dodgems and a meal. All of which certainly sounds more entertaining than an afternoon chasing stories about oilfields far, far away.

I will therefore spend this afternoon demonstrating that I can play golf like Tiger Woods, drive like Lewis Hamilton and bowl like John Goodman in The Big Lebowski.

Or, as is more likely, demonstrate that I play golf like Goodman, drive like Woods and bowl like Hamilton.

The Years Haven't Been Kind...

...To the Spice Girls.





As seen at Agent Bedhead

Is anyone else alarmed that Victoria Beckham's breasts are larger than her head? Or that Geri Halliwell has turned up for the biggest press conference of her life wearing her Granny's curtains?

Music Makes The People Come Together

My legs are stiff from a double dose of football yesterday, my brain is tired from a lack of proper sleep this week (thanks to Mrs Wife's newly-instigated Zero Tolerance policy to my snoring, which means I get a dig in the ribs every time my nose whistle pipes up), so I'll dip into the Magic Tune Box to see what kind of mood it's in today. What ten random noises will it pick from the 14,000 at its disposal?

1: Long Haired Child by Devendra Banhart (from the album Cripple Crow): Insane psychedelic hippy folk tune from the insane psychedelic hippy. Proclaims the necessity of encouraging children to grow their hair long.

2: His Last Painting by Manic Street Preachers (from the album Know Your Enemy): From the Manic's sixth studio album, which sounded like a good record thrown away. His Last Painting is the band in their comfort zone, with neither the growl of their early work nor the elegance of Everything Must Go. But hey, middle age (in rock'n'roll terms) will do that to you I suppose.

3: May This Be Love by The Jimi Hendrix Experience (from the album Are You Experienced?): Hypnotic, jangly love song from James Marshall Hendrix. Not his finest work, although things pick up when the track breaks into a driving chorus a minute in. Mitch Mitchell's drumming is, as ever, faultless.

4: Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol (from the album Eyes Open): I'm not a massive fan of Snow Patrol, but even I have to admire their tenacity in finally making it to the big league after years of slumming around in the indie undergrowth. Chasing Cars is probably their most famous track, and is pleasant enough, but a wee bit dull in my opinion.

5: Good People by Jack Johnson (from the album In Between Dreams): Pretty much sounds like every other Jack Johnson has ever released. Happy clappy, acoustic hippy track from the Hawaiian surfer turned alternative acoustic superstar. I first heard Johnson's work whilst living in Australia, and his albums almost seem perfectly made for days relaxing on the beach with a cold drink and the surf crashing onto the sand.

6: Aneurysm by Nirvana (from the album Incesticide): Aneurysm is one of my favourite Nirvana songs. This version was recorded for Radio 1's Evening Session, and includes Cobain's almost trademark buzzsaw guitar work backed by typically loud Grohl drums and purposefully off-key Novoselic backing vocals. Recently voted the band's third greatest song by Radio 1 listeners - not bad for a B-side.

7: There There by Homer: Indie pop song that puts me neither up nor down. Unremarkable enough to be pleasant, but not exciting enough to get, well, excited about.

8: How Soon Is Now? by The Smiths (from the compilation Best...I): My favourite Smiths song, How Soon Is Now? is also one of my favourite songs by any band. From Johnny Marr's fading guitar and slide work to Morrissey's lyrics ("I am the son and the heir of a shyness that is criminally vulgar), everything about this track fits perfectly. As I've said before, I hope The Smiths never reform - it's better that they leave their memory unsullied.

9: Mario Man by Super Furry Animals (from the album Fuzzy Logic): I've written about my love of the lyrics of Gruff Rhys in the past. Their second album, Radiator, is amongst the greatest I've ever heard, but debut Fuzzy Logic was also pretty darn good. It's less focussed than its successor, but it still showcased a band of unique talents. In Mario Man, Gruff tells us that he "bought myself a frying pan and sailed it to the Isle of Man for a holiday". Insane indie genius, I'm looking forward to seeing the band again at this year's Connect Festival.

10: Mamma Mia by ABBA (from the compilation Gold): OK, in preparation for this weekend's housewarming BBQ, I put a whole load of "party" songs onto the Magic Tune Box - amongst them ABBA, Madonna and Prince. So, ABBA now make their debut on this blog. I'm no fan of them, but some of their tunes are pretty good - and I'm sure that they'll help keep the party spirit flowing on Saturday.

7,000th visitor

Well, the 7,000th visitor to this far-flung outpost of the worldwide interweb was someone from Perai, Pulau Pinang, Malaysia, who visited for the second time to check out the story of the testicle-eating woman from Liverpool.

So, if you're that South East Asian reader, drop me an email and I'll send you a wonderful prize.

All wight?

In very poor taste, but funny nonetheless.

Those of you who don't know who Michael Barrymore is, type the name into Google alongside "murder" and "pool" and you'll find out soon enough.

Sporran Language

Jesus Christ on a bike (apologies if that offended anyone....in fact no, no apologies. This is MY blog - if you don't like a wee bit of blasphemy, just point your browser in another direction).

The British government is giving serious consideration to issuing licences to people who own sporrans.

As regular readers will be aware, I both own an (fairly) regularly don a kilt in an effort to convince people that I am a stylish, well-dressed drunk, rather than a scruffy, looks-like-he-dressed-in-a-charity-shop-with-his-eyes-closed drunk.

I've owned my kilt since shortly before my wedding last year - so therefore my sporran would be subject to the licensing laws.

So how exactly does one go about obtaining a license for a bit of dead seal bought more than a year ago?

What is this country coming to? Are we on a slippery slope to having to apply to the government to own a pair of leather shoes? Will angry mobs storm the streets demanding that the authorities recognise their Right To Wear Wool?

Well, the government can try - but I don't fancy their chances of getting that piece of legislation through.

Makes You Think

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Jake The Snake

Courtesy of my Baby Brother, some of the finest acting I've ever seen:

Summer Cleaning

Not much time for blogging today: In a week's time, Dungroanin' will be the venue for a housewarming BBQ/party.

In preparation for this event, Mrs Wife and I are cleaning the homestead from top to bottom, sorting out the garden and building garden furniture and the BBQ itself.

So I can't stop for long. I will return once Dungroanin' has reached Mrs Wife's high standards.....

Oh Dear

British builders - what a bunch of geniuses (or should that be genii?)

Doctor Jones Is Back

Doo-Dee-Doo-Doo,

Doo-Dee-Doo,

Doo-Dee-Doo-Doo,

Doo-De-Doo-Doo-Doo

I'm as excited as a bespectacled Sean Connery who believes he's just taken a drink from the Ark of the Covenant - The first photographs from the fourth Indiana Jones film have been released.

My boyhood years happily coincided with the peak of Harrison Ford's career, from Star Wars through to Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade.

So please excuse me if I get excited at the prospect of seeing Indy flick that whip as he searches for further artefacts from the dawn of time.

What's Worn Under The Kilt?

Disturbing results from my latest batch of Google referrers.

In the past three days, the search terms that have brought people my way from the world's favourite search engine have included "anal gerbilling", "she pulled my testicles" and "colour underwear with kilt".

Of the three, it's the last that is most disturbing.

If you need to ask what colour of underwear you should be wearing beneath your kilt, you shouldn't be wearing one.

Life On Mars?

Anyone fancy spending a year and a half on a trip to Mars?

The European Space Agency is looking for volunteers to take part in a simulation of what life would be like for a team of astronauts travelling to the red planet from Earth.

According to the BBC report: "With the exception of weightlessness and radiation, the crew will experience most other aspects of long-haul space travel, such as cramped conditions, a high workload, lack of privacy, and limited supplies."

The ESA could save itself some money though: the experiment is taking place in Moscow - surely they don't have to build a dummy spaceship to simulate cramped conditions, high workload, lack of privacy and limited supplies? Just send the "crew" to live in a high rise block anywhere in Russia.

Even the "delayed communications with Earth" wouldn't be a problem, as anyone who's ever called Russia on a normal telephone will be able to attest to.

All joking aside, a mission to Mars sounds like a great way to spend 18 months. I would have thought it would take longer to get there, but you could do a round trip in three years, if you could build a spacecraft capable of holding that much fuel.

Ever since I was a wee laddy, I've always dreamed of going into space. I'm presuming that I'll never get the chance, although I suppose if, when they were children, you'd told my grandparents that they'd fly to France in an aeroplane, they would have had trouble imagining an aeroplane, let alone being inside one.

I don't know if the ESA will be desperately seeking overweight Scottish journalists for its maiden Mars voyage though.

Looking Good?

So, how are my socks looking in this photograph?

Considerably better than I am, I would say....

Socks Appeal

Dublin is a strange city. The city centre, with its Georgian townhouses and the landscaped beauty of St Stephen's Green, seems fairly affluent, albeit not in an overly ostentatious way. But the bus ride into the city from the airport takes you through suburbs as run down as any I've seen in western Europe. I suppose that all the EU money that the Republic of Ireland has pulled in over the past decade or so only stretches so far.

Mrs Wife and I were in Dublin this weekend to attend a party celebrating the marriage of a good friend of mine from my university days. Having decided to wed on a beach in Thailand, they then invited their family and friends to a low-key soiree in Dublin.

It was the third time I'd visited the Irish capital - the first was with the friend whose wedding party we were attending, way back in the days before I knew Mrs Wife and he knew his new bride. Six of us spent a week touring Ireland, a tour which involved spending more time in licensed premises than in tourist attractions.

My second visit was in 2003, when I took the then Miss Girlfriend to Dublin to see Justin Timberlake touring his debut album. At some point in the future, I may write about that trip, but for now, I will concentrate on this weekend.

Although I'd visited Dublin twice previously, this was the first time I'd flown into its airport, having arrived by train from Belfast on my previous trips. This trip was also different in that we knew that our sight-seeing time was to be limited, as we were partying on both the Saturday night and the Sunday night, the main event taking place on the Sunday.

When we were first invited to the party, I tried to book a hotel as close to the venue as possible. Mrs Wife and I have decided that, on reflection, selecting a hotel that "boasts" a nightclub which remains open until 3am was probably not a great idea. It would seem that the hotel in question makes most of its money from the nigthclub. Our room was easily the worst we have stayed in whilst travelling in Europe, and was worse than most of those we endured during three months in South East Asia.

Two enjoyable nights on the town aside, and discounting the grottiness of our room, the defining factor of our trip was my wardrobe. Deciding to exude a little Scottish class, I took my kilt across the Irish Sea. As I was awaiting our bags at the carousel in Dublin airport, it suddenly dawned on me that I had neglected to pack a shirt to go with the kilt. Whilst an inconvenience, this wasn't an insurmountable problem - I would simply buy a plain white shirt, which would be a passable replacement for the real thing.

Having found a suitable stand-in shirt, I was hanging up my outfit in the hotel and checking that I had all of the other constituent parts of the kilt. Sporran - check. Shoes - check. Bow tie - check. Socks. Socks. Socks? SOCKS?

Damn. I'd forgotten the socks. This may not sound like a big deal - socks are socks. Except when the outfit in question is a kilt. Because the kilt extends to knee length, and the shoes lace up around the calf and shin, the socks are vital to the overall look.

Mrs Wife was, of course, suitably impressed with this revelation. As Dublin's shops had closed for the evening, it meant that Sunday, the day of the party, was spent roaming the city's streets in search of socks for an outfit from a foreign country.

We tried many different outlets, including one chain that rents kilts out, but in vain - Dublin is not the best place in the world to buy kilt socks. Finally, with our hangovers reaching the "fatally dehydrated" stage, our patience wearing thin and our feet aching, we were directed to a store called House of Ireland.

They didn't stock kilt socks. But they did have thick, knee-length, woollen socks, which would stand as passable replacements for one evening. I almost baulked at the pricetag - ELEVEN POUNDS for a pair of socks (I am a man who normally buys underwear in packs of three and always for less than five pounds - eleven pounds for a pair of socks is a bit steep).

And the moral of the tale? Listen to your mother's advice - ALWAYS pack clean underwear.

(As a post script to this strangely lengthy tale of socks, most of the other guests at the party were wearing jeans and casual shirts. But hey, a man in a kilt in a roomful of Irish people wearing jeans is ALWAYS going to stand out.)

LALOLKFATYK

"LALOLKFATYK" - not the sound of a cat coughing up a particularly gruesome hairball, but the "Learn A Lot Of Little Known Facts About Those You Know" meme.

I've been tagged by Erica, my favourite Jewish Brooklyn wiseass. Anyone interested in finding out more facts about strange folk on the worldwide interweb can also find this meme over at Elisson's blog and at Chickie's.

WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? I don't think so. Mither has told me that when she first held me, she decided there and then when to call me. Just a pity she didn't pick something better than Groanin' Jock.

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? I can't remember. (Well, I can, but I don't want to say.)

DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? I like it just fine, although it is atrocious. On a day-to-day basis, I write in capitals, as my proper handwriting is just a scrawl. I prefer typing - I can actually type faster than I can write with a pen and paper. Which is probably why I never passed my 100 words a minute shorthand exam....

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT? Emmmmm - does chicken and sweetcorn mayo count? It would probably have to be chicken in one of its many forms - whether barbecued, cooked in a Mexican stylee or just served on plain bread with salad.

DO YOU HAVE KIDS? Not yet. But I am looking forward to the days when I have an army of little Jocklings to mould in my own image. If I can persuade Mrs Wife to pop out five of them, that's an indoor football team sorted, and the garden at Dungroanin' is big enough to teach them how to play smooth passing football. Plus it's also enough to form the Groanin' Five, like the Jackson Five only without the afros and pet monkeys. In the words of Homer Simpson: "Kids are great. You can teach them to hate what you hate and, with the Internet and all, they practically raise themselves." Although they won't be getting anywhere near the strange folk on my Blogroll.

IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? I think so. I'm pretty easy going, I like good music, I'm a fountain of wisdom and a have a barbed and sarcastic sense of humour. What's not to like?

DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT? Yes, every day, and far more than I should. Basically, it's the cornerstone of my sense of humour. Which is probably due to watching Fawlty Towers, Blackadder and Bottom during my formative years.

DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Yes. Thankfully, by the time I contracted tonsilitis as a wee boy back in 1986, the practise of removing them had died out. I think I was just told to eat ice cream.

WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? No, never. I experienced the thrill of the bungee ball when I was in New Zealand and that was was bad enough, but I just can't imagine ever wanting to jump head first off a bridge.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE CEREAL? It was always Frosties when I was a kid, but now I'm grown up (allegedly) I eat fruit and fibre every morning (nutritious, healthy and keeps things moving at the right pace). But I'm still partial to a bowl of Frosties (which are just as delicious when eaten "raw" - without milk) or Coco Pops.

DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Not usually - I'm lazy. Although when the shoes in question are new, expensive, my kilt shoes (which lace up around my calf and shin) or my bright blue Nike football trainers, I have to.

DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? Not really, at least not with my arms. Years of playing football and running mean that my legs are much stronger than my arms, and that I've got a belter of shot when playing football. Not always terribly accurate mind, but it'll hurt if it catches you in a tender part of your body.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE ICE CREAM? Pretty much all of them. I am partial to Ben and Jerry's Phish Food though.

WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE? Probably eyes, but I think you just take in the whole package in one go, don't you? With women, probably chesticles and butt.

RED OR PINK? Neither. I think I only have two item of red clothing, a cheap sweatshirt and a Vietnam football shirt, and no pink ones.

WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVOURITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? I'm lazy. I could easily tackle that problem by being less lazy, but I'm too lazy to do that.

WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? Both my grandfathers, who died when I was six years old and 12 years old. They never got to see me and Baby Brother grow up to be the well-rounded individuals we've become.

WHAT COLOUR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING? Pants - does that mean trousers or underwear? If it's the former, a pair of baggy blue Levi's. If it's the latter, white cotton boxers. Shoes - brown, white and red Pierre Cardin trainers.

WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE? A bowl of Tesco Fruit and Fibre with semi-skimmed milk and a pint of fresh orange juice.

WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? General office background noise - people typing, talking about reports, people shuffling papers.

IF YOU WHERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOUR WOULD YOU BE? Is there such a colour as Purple Haze? Sounds like a good one to me. But realistically, I'd be blue or black - the two staple colours of my wardrobe.

FAVOURITE SMELLS? Warm cotton that's just been ironed, Mrs Wife, chicken fajitas cooking, Indian food, petrol, fresh cut grass on a hot summer day.

WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? A close friend who served as one of my best men at our wedding last year. Just a general catch up.

FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH? Football. Which shall never, on this blog, be referred to as soccer. It's football. If it was soccer, FIFA would be called FISA, the SFA would be the SSA and the FA Cup would be called the SA Cup.

HAIR COLOUR[S]? Brown, which has gotten darker as I've grown older. There are now quite a few grey patches creeping in as well, including a big clump right at the front that looks ridiculous.

EYE COLOR? Green

DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? No, I've got 20:20 vision (but I've never seen the light).

FAVOURITE FOOD? Chicken Fajitas. Chili Con Carne. My Mither's spaghetti bolognese. My Granny's steak pie, which I'll never taste again. Cheese cake. Cadbury's Dairy Milk chocolate.

SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? I like movies that make you think - it doesn't matter whether they're scary, funny or thrilling, just make them entertaining.

LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? I believe it was Pirates of the Caribbean 3. Which was rather good.

WHAT COLOUR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? A white t-shirt with a green and black rockstar grafitti pattern on it.

SUMMER OR WINTER? Summer - I hate being cold. I don't mind playing in the snow, but I generally hate being cold.

HUGS OR KISSES? I like both, but I'll choose kisses.

FAVOURITE DESSERT? Pretty much anything that doesn't have alcohol in it.

MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND? I don't know - Sho? Tish?

LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND? Erica, Elisson and Chickie - they've already done it.

WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW? The Prize: The Epic Quest For Oil, Money and Power by Daniel Yergin - it's a massive book detailing the history of the oil industry. So far, I'm about two chapters in, and things are getting interesting between America and Russia around the turn of the 19th/20th Century.

WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? At work it's plain blue with Belkin written on it. At home I use a laptop.

WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON TV LAST NIGHT? Big Brother and the first episode of the second series of My Name Is Earl.

FAVOURITE SOUND[S]? An acoustic guitar being played by someone who can really play. Waves hitting the shore without any other background sounds.

ROLLING STONES OR THE BEATLES? The Beatles are the greatest band ever to have walked the Earth. They've been my favourite band since I was 16. But sometimes I get a craving for scuzzy rock'n'roll or something with a bit more growl than The Beatles ever recorded, and I'll listen to the Stones - especially Sympathy For The Devil and Gimme Shelter.

WHAT IS THE FARTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME? I'm not sure which is farthest away - Perth, Western Australia; Tasmania; Brisbane; New Zealand; or Fiji.

DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT? When I have time and put my mind to it, I'm a pretty good writer. I think there's a novel inside me, I just haven't got the time or the inclination to get it out right now.

WHERE WERE YOU BORN? Ninewells Hospital, Dundee.

WHOSE ANSWERS ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO GETTING BACK? Anyone who cares to respond.

Taste of Nuts

What's the worst injury ever inflicted upon you by another human being?

I think mine is probably taking a kick in the nose and mouth playing football - I bent downwards to head the ball, my opponent leant back to kick it, and my head met his foot at high speed. My nose exploded in a spectacular shower of blood, and I was left with an imprint of the Nike logo on my face for a week or two, but thankfully my nose didn't break.

The only other instance I can think of was when I bruised my ribs, again playing football, this time when an opponent and high collided at high speed.

Neither of these injuries was intentionally inflicted.

So I can't really imagine how 37-year-old Geoffrey Jones must have felt when a former partner ripped one of his testicles off with her bare hands.

According to the BBC report, Amanda Monti flew into a rage when Jones rejected her advances at the end of a house party.

She pulled off his left testicle and tried to swallow it, before spitting it out.

This woman clearly has issues. Not only did she manage to rip this man's testicle off - staggering enough in itself - but she then tried to eat it.

In a letter to the court that jailed her for two-and-a-half years, she said: "It was never my intention to cause harm to Geoff and the fact that I have caused him injury will live with me forever. I am in no way a violent person."

Of course you aren't dear, you just ripped a man's testicle out of his scrotum with your bare hands despite the fact that he was fully clothed at the time, then attempted to swallow it. You're obviously a timid pacifist.

Expatriot

With the exception of a year spent travelling around the world with Mrs Wife (then known as Miss Girlfriend), I've lived all my life in Scotland.

Last night, in a conversation with Mrs Wife and my uncle on the Munros, I realised that I've only been to the top of one of Scotland's 284 highest mountains.

The one Munro which I can say with certainty that I have climbed is Mount Keen at the head of Glenesk, which I walked up with my fellow members of Glenesk Youth Club when I was only 10 years old.

I've never climbed Ben Nevis, Ben Macdui or Ben Lomond, although I have been up Cairn Gorm in its funicular railway.

In truth, my experience of travelling around Scotland is pretty limited. Until last month, when I visited Skye, I'd only been to one of Scotland's islands, Mull. I don't think I've ever been to Stirling Castle, I've never been to Eilean Donan and I haven't visited Orkney or Shetland.

It's quite strange that I've visited Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Fiji and New Zealand, but I've never been to Blair Atholl. I've spent eight months in Australia, driving right across the country from the east coast to the west, but I haven't spent even a single day in Cupar.

In fact, I'm so poorly travelled within my own country that I think it's time I do something about it. Arran and Islay both appeal as the first ports of call on my Magical Mystery Tour of Scotland, which will begin just as soon as I have time.

However, it won't be this weekend, because that's when I'm visiting Dublin....for the third time.....

Sabbath

Every so often I'll have a week or fortnight long period when I immerse myself in the music of one particular band or artist.

I'll frequently go through periods where I listen to nothing but Bob Dylan's albums from the late 1960s and 1970s. Quite often, I'll find that classic Rolling Stones albums take up a semi-permanent residency in my CD player. And, on a less regular basis, I again become enamoured by David Bowie's recorded output, listening to random albums from the 1960s through to the noughties.

Recently, this strange affliction has moved onto Led Zeppelin, and, more often, Black Sabbath.

I love the sound of Sabbath's "Ozzy years". Subsequent incarnations without the band's original frontman just weren't the same.

Watching the BBC's brilliant Seven Ages of Rock series on Saturday, it was great to see the band in their pomp, barrelling through huge slabs of proto-metal. Though they founded heavy metal, lumbering the band with that tag is unfair. They stand apart from other metal bands through their sound, a heavy blues-driven rumble. Bill Ward's drumming, apparently drawing inspiration from industrial machinery in their native Birmingham, and Tony Iommi's howling guitar stand head and shoulders above all of the metal acts that followed.

The biggest revelation from the programme was that Ozzy Osbourne was known to wander the streets of Birmingham in the 1960s, dragging a shoe around on a rope, which he would tell passers by was his "pet shoe". I guess I always just thought it was drugs that turned him mad, rather than just exacerbated his obvious problems.

I doubt many of you will share my love of Sabbath. But I defy anyone to listen to The Wizard and not move in some way. Whether it's nodding your head, tapping your feet, playing air guitar, dancing or lurching to "stop that infernal racket", I'm sure you won't be able to sit still for long.

Begins At Home

England's international footballers are amongst the most loathsome, obscenely rich people in the country.

In one passage of Frank Lampard's autobiography (which must be a thrilling read covering his 28 years on the planet) he supposedly regales the reader with the story of how he was in awe of the wealth on show on Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich's yacht. This from a man who earns about eighty thousand pounds a week.

In the space of a week, Joey Barton, a mono-syllabic thug who in any other walk of life would likely have been jailed by now, earns four times as much as the average British worker.

So, it is with mixed feelings that I read today's news that the England national team is to donate all of its earnings from international fixtures to charity.

True, the move is to be applauded. But we are talking here of 25 players making a donation once every couple of months. There are more than 400 players plying their trade in the Premiership, all of whom could make a sizeable difference by making a similar pledge.

I Am The Walrus

The sun is out, the sky is blue and I'm off to lie in the hammock. So I'll leave you with a masterpiece of psychedelic nonsense, from an era when four twenty-somethings from Liverpool were the coolest guys on the planet. This is the record that changed my life.

Weather or Not?

The weather here in Jockshire over the past 24 hours has been, for want of a better word, changeable.

Last night, as I drove home from Aberdeen, a lightning storm began to rip the thick black clouds apart, a forewarning of the Biblical rainstorm that followed.

All of last evening, as I sat in the house alone, the rain battered down, the lightning continuing for at least four hours. In fact, the thunder was still rumbling as I went to bed. I attempted to capture it on video, but unfortunately my mobile phone couldn't do the weather justice.

On the one occasion I ventured out in it, as far as the garage, I was utterly soaked, and the noise of the fat raindrops belting off the horizontal steel garage door sounded like bullets ripping into a metal bucket.

But this afternoon, as my colleagues and I left an Aberdeen restaurant following a "working lunch", the sun was drying Scotland out, beating down from a clear blue sky.

Which bodes well for a weekend when I have Dungroanin' to myself and when Mrs Wife is taking part in a sponsored walk up a Munro.

I sense a full hammock day is approaching.

What's In A Name?

Guess which site is top unsponsored link when someone types "male jock meat" into the Optimum search engine?

Even worse - I finish above Gay Man Flicks TGP - Free Gay Sex Movies Every Day :)

I really should have thought of a better name for this blog....

Time For A Tune

Every now and again, I like to dig out the Magic Tune Box, set it to shuffle and see where its whims take us. This is one of those occasions, so here's today's random ten.

1: Who Named The Days? by Arab Strap (from the album Monday At The Hug and Pint): Trademark melancholy from Scotland's own sadly-departed purveyors of misery. Includes a haunting cello refrain to drag Aidan Moffat's lyrics even deeper into tear-stained territory.

2: Wu-Tang Clan Ain't Nuthing Ta F' Wit by Wu-Tang Clang (from the album Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)): Still magnificent 13 years after its release, 36 Chambers is, alongside Straight Outta Compton, my favourite hip-hop album. There's an in-your-face delivery that still sounds menacing, whilst the Kung-Fu samples thrown in mark it as different from other records of its era.

3: Slow Fade by Teenage Fanclub (from the album Man-Made): From the Fannies' most recent record, this could have been recorded at any point during their lengthy career. That they've never made it to the upper reaches of the charts or the associated riches is criminal.

4: The Ballad of Danny Bailey (1909-1934) by Elton John (from the album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road): Recorded at the peak of Elton's commercial powers, The Ballad of Danny Bailey doesn't get the credit it deserves, having been dwarfed by Candle In The Wind, Bennie and The Jets, Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting and the album's title track. However, it bears favourable comparison with the cream of Elton's work, backing the electric piano with a soaring string arrangement.

5: I Forget by Campag Velocet (B-Side from the single To Lose La Trek): Ten-minute groove from purveyors of noisy, Clockwork Orange-influenced indie mentalists. Whispered vocals from Pete Voss fit in well with the Happy Mondays-style rhythms. A cracking track from a vastly-underrated band, one of the most absorbing live acts I've ever seen.

6: Get Back by The Beatles (from the album Let It Be): Paul McCartney may have gotten his way with the release of Let It Be...Naked in 2003, but Let It Be, despite Phil Spector's OTT production and the inclusion of snippets of dialogue, proved that The Beatles could still play hard and fast blues rock. Billy Preston's keyboard fits perfectly with the chugging bass riff and Ringo's freight train drumming. They may have been a band on the way out, but they ended their career in style.

7: All I Want by The Stone Roses (from the album Garage Flower): Garage Flower was intended as The Stone Roses' debut album, but the band scrapped it and went back to the drawing board, returning with the greatest album ever made, their eponymous debut. Garage Flower was eventually released after the band had split, and showcased a harder, punkier side than that recorded on the first official album. All I Want, like So Young and Tell Me, is probably underrated, but pales into comparison when played alongside anything from the official debut.

8: More Than Us by Travis (with Anne Dudley) (from the More Than Us EP): Delicate reworking of a track from Travis' debut album Good Feeling. Anne Dudley, formerly of the Art of Noise and now a composer, scored the strings for the remix, giving it a sound that fitted with the Britpop theme of the time purveyed by Oasis and The Verve.

9: The Song We Were Singing by Paul McCartney (from the album Flaming Pie): Paul McCartney's post-Beatles work has been unfairly maligned. Granted, much of his output in the 1970s and 1980s didn't cut the mustard, falling well below the standards expected of a songwriter of his pedigree. 1997's Flaming Pie did much to restore his reputation. Very Beatlesy, The Song We Were Singing is a gentle sing-along ending in delicate finger-picking and a strong string arrangement.

10: Sweet Little Sixteen by The Beatles (from the album Live At The BBC): Rock'n'roll standard recorded by the Fabs during one of their many appearances on BBC radio. Whilst showcasing a tight rock'n'roll band and John Lennon's vocal strength, it doesn't hint that the band would become musical revolutionaries within five years.

Movie Quiz - Take Two

Those of you who happen by this strange outpost on the far-flung margins of the worldwide interweb more than once may remember that I recently joined in the movie quiz meme, promising a fantastic prize for the person with the highest score.

So far, that person is Chickie. That is because, so far, Chickie is the only entrant. As she's already twice won prizes around these parts for landing here as the 3,000th and 6,000th visitor, I think someone else should jump in and gazump her (does that sound rude?).

The closing date for entries will therefore be noon GMT tomorrow - good luck!

Picture This

Just to prove that the words that appear on this humble blog aren't the overworkings of a head full of nonsense, here is the photographic evidence that I attended the primary school reunion last weekend.

Thank you to Sho, who risked the sack to send me the photograph instead of having me pay for it. For those of you who want to play "Where's Wally/Waldo?", I am NOT wearing a fluorescent shell suit in this picture. Which I'm sure will come as a great disappointment to many of you.

Foaming At The Mouth

Many aspects of my childhood years are gone forever - cartoons I enjoyed as a boy have long since been cancelled, the computer systems I grew up playing have long been rendered obselete and friends with whom I enjoyed countless games of football, hide and seek and manhunt have grown up and we've lost touch.

Food and drinks that I gorged on to satisfy my healthy childhood appetite have also changed, most of them not for the better. Curly Wurlys, once a half-hour of solid chewing on a slab of toffee half an inch think, are now thin, chocolate-coated slivers of caramel providing a far smaller task to finish. King Size Mars Bars were, to my recollection, once the equivalent of one-and-a-half regular Mars Bars, not slightly bigger, as they are today.

But one hallowed foodstuff from my formative years has gone forever. Creamola Foam, a soft drink made by mixing a flavoured powder with water, has long since disappeared from our shelves.

In Scotland, we revel in our unhealthy diet. If something can be consumed, it must have sugar added or be deep-fried. Creamola Foam, I am sure, can't have been healthy. It tasted unnaturally sweet and came in a variety of lurid colours.

Although I did enjoy partaking of a glass of Creamola Foam as a child, my fondest memories of it are from my teenage years, when a group of us found that it made the ideal mixer for vodka. It was common for us to mix a litre of vodka and a whole tub of Creamola Foam (which made around four pints of the soft drink) in a basin. Even with so much vodka swilling around this mix, no taste of alcohol could be discerned, making it the ideal concoction for teenage drinkers finding their feet in the world of illicit activities.

But alas it is no more. Which is why some of my nostalgic countrymen have begun a campaign to bring back Creamola Foam.

Gentlemen, whoever you are, I wish you every success. We may be living in a world at war, where children die every day due to poverty and where the very future of our planet is questionable. But I, for one, sincerely hope that your quest to bring back this vivid brew is a success.

Back To School

Until very recently, I believed that I was still too young to be invited to a school reunion. After all, it's only been nine years since I left secondary school, and only five since I graduated from university.

But despite still being a metaphorical spring chicken, I was recently invited to attend a reunion of all those fortunate past pupils of Tarfside Primary School who are still alive.

So, despite both suffering from chronic hangovers, Baby Brother and I headed back to the school for the first time in many years on Saturday.

Actually, that's a lie. Mither dropped us off at the school on Saturday. Which is pretty lame - a combined age of 50 and we're still getting driven to school by our mum.

It was an unusual gathering. Though many had travelled considerable distances to attend the event, many hadn't made it for one reason or another. So we were left with a strange spectrum of ages, ranging from the school's current pupils, all aged between five and twelve years, up to a handful of alumni now within grasping distance of their 80th birthdays.

(What is the correct collective name for a group of elderly folk? A wrinkle? A moan? A zimmer?)

The present, but soon to be retired, teacher at the school has retained self-made yearbooks for each of her years at the helm of the school, and it was equally intriguing and mortifying to flick through the pages chronicling my brief period as a pupil.

Parents in the early 1990s must have cruel, colourblind or both. Amongst the natty costumes I was sporting in the photos were a faded Rangers shellsuit, the jacket bleached a pastel shade closer to lilac than to the more proper Royal Blue; a Rangers strip (notice a trend here?) which I wore in its entirety, the shorts hiked up to somewhere around my armpits; and a pair of Bermuda-patterned Speedo swimming trunks, which at least provided some distraction from my lurid white pigeon chest.

Thankfully, this catalogue of what not to wear was shared equally amongst those of us who attended school around the same time, so the burden of shame wasn't mine to bear alone.

Even more toe-curling were the videos of school plays showing on a constant loop in a back room, showcasing to full effect the incendiary thespian skills of Scottish primary school children, starring yours truly affecting some god-awful English accent for recurring roles as a butler.

All in all, it was a great weekend, offering the opportunity to catch up with old friends who have been strangers for too long, drink to excess in the unique surroundings of Tarfside Masonic Hall and spend Sunday eating freshly barbecued hamburgers whilst playing football on the school playing field for the first time in nigh-on 15 years.

Needless to say, I had lost none of the magic.....

Happy Returns

So now to report back on the anniversary weekend.

Mrs Wife set off from sunny Montrose on the Saturday morning, bound for Gretna but with no accommodation booked. In hindsight, this probably wasn't the smartest move, given that it was a Bank Holiday weekend and we were heading for a town popular with wedding parties.

Nonetheless, we arrived at the Tourist Information office at Gretna Gateway Village (a discount retail park offering clothes, houshold goods and food at knockdown prices) and the kind ladies managed to find us what seemed to be the last B&B room in the whole of Dumfries and Galloway. Except that it was in England, but only by a mile.

We'd only been to Gretna once, passing through en route to visiting Mrs Wife's family down south. In truth, there isn't much to see - the Old Blacksmith's Shop and the retail village are about the extent of Gretna's attractions, at least outwith the football season.

So instead of hanging around, we visited Carlisle on the Saturday evening, where gruesome hen parties marauded the streets in search of fresh meat. There's a strange mix of accents in the Borders: native Scots mingling with the broad Geordie brogue, which can make drinking in the area a surreal experience.

Starved of excitment in Gretna, we visited Dumfries on our anniversary, where we turned our hands and feet to go-karting. Needless to say, male driving skills won the day, and I left Mrs Wife trailing in my wake (twice), despite crashing during an audacious overtaking manouvre.

In Dumfries we also saw a charity raft race on the river Nith, which given the cold wind and rain, seemed foolhardy at best.

Other local landmarks we visited were the camera obscura, our visit coinciding with one of the day's few dry spells, Robert Burns' house and his mausoleum.

For some reason, I didn't even know that Burns had a mausoleum - I thought he'd been buried in an unmarked pauper's grave. Which just goes to show how ignorant I am - his tomb is a majestic white building with locked gates and a statue of the man himself. This is doubly ignorant considering that I may be related to Scotland's most famous son.

Sunday's anniversary meal was a splendid affair in Smith's at Gretna Green, a luxurious hotel that doesn't seem to fit in with the rest of the village.

We had no plans for our journey home, but decided that a trip to Blair Drummond Safari Park near Stirling was as good a way to spend the afternoon as any.

I have hazy recollections of visiting the park with Mither and Faither as a wee boy, and of monkeys climbing on the roof and bonnet of the car. There were no monkeys this time around, but we did get VERY close to a pride of lions. We watched as several lionesses wandered past our window, followed by a male lion. The male stopped right beside Mrs Wife's passenger window, where he showed his disdain for us by pissing on our bonnnet. There was no question - we were his bitches.

So, in a car smelling of lion piss, we headed back to less-than-sunny Montrose, stopping only to watch the third installment of the Pirates of The Caribbean series in Dundee. I was most keen to see Keith Richards playing a pirate, a role which he pulled off with aplomb - although it was hardly a departure from his daily life.

And there you have it - a weekend of mausoleums, rock'n'roll pirates, go-kart crashes and lion piss. My second anniversary will struggle to live up to that.