Sung exclusively on Hogmanay and at the end of weddings; has anyone ever heard “Auld Lang Syne” sober?

 Shelley Shingles, showbiz correspondent and Miss Fetteresso 1985

I am so looking forward to OAITS down at Stonehaven 2moz! That’s Open Air In The Square for those of you not UTD on your acros, LOL! I’ve always been a fan of the fireballs (they are totes amazeballs!) but this year will be extra special because ‘80’s legends Simple Minds are going to be playing! OMG! (That’s ‘Oh My God’, as opposed to OMD which stands for ‘Orchestral Manoeuvers in the Dark’. Mind you, they are also ’80’s legends. I wonder where they’re playing 2moz night?)

Simple Minds singer Jim Kerr and I go way back. Our paths have crossed more than once and I just know that when he’s up on stage giving it laldie I’ll catch his eye and we’ll share a moment. We first met back in 1984. I was doing some promotion work as the face of Bon Accord Sparkling Drinks at one of their gigs in Glasgow. The band had just finished their set and he comes over to me all sweaty and horrible and he says ‘see us a round of ginger for the band, doll’. I was running low so I told him I’d need to go and get a new crate. As I walked away he called after me:  ‘I’ll wait here, hen but don’t you forget about me!’  Now I’m not saying I co-wrote their biggest hit, of course not, but I was clearlyan inspiration to him. Particularly as I bumped into Viv Lumsden on my way back from the cellar. What a blether! By the time I got back to Jim, the band had settled for Irn Bru. We met once more in 1992.  I was in my early days as a showbiz journo doing an interview with him for ‘Smash Hits!’ Magazine. He’d turned up with a blonde woman in tow, and although her face rang a bell I just couldn’t place her. I’d done the traditional in-depth questions about his star sign and favourite colour when I noticed his wedding ring. I asked him ‘What’s your wife’s name, Jim?’ He paused, and then nodded at the blonde wifie and says ‘Patsy Kensit’. Well, you could have knocked me down with a feather. Imagine not knowing something like that! So I turned to her and said ‘So, Patsy, what’s Jim’s wife’s name?’

Ron Cluny, official Council spokesman

No sooner have the malcontents and whingers who criticise the council’s every move polished off their Christmas pud but they are on our case again.  No complements of the season for us; it’s straight into the supposed paucity of our Hogmanay arrangements, with snide comments about Edinburgh’s street party for 80,000, and some wags wondering aloud about how it can be that an oil rich city of a quarter of a million people cannot afford a major celebration, while a town of ten thousand a few miles South manages to stage a high quality event.

I have a two word answer for our detractors.  Who cares?

Who cares what happens in the rest of Scotland? Aberdeen does not engage in such petty, small-minded rivalries. We play on a global stage. We do not aspire to have the best Hogmanay celebration in Scotland; we aspire to have the best Hogmanay celebration of any town called Aberdeen anywhere in the world. And don’t worry, a fireworks display and sets from a couple of crack local bands is enough to knock Aberdeen, South Dakota into a cocket hat. Although, in fairness, Aberdeen, Hong Kong is definitely going to be the Aberdeen to be in on 31 January.

As the New Year arrives, all across the world, people will be joining hands and mangling the lyrics of an Eighteenth Century Scottish folk song. Even those who get them right don’t really know what the words mean, so here’s an updated version of Auld Lang Syne, for 2014 and beyond:

The Irish have Saint Patrick’s Day, which they celebrate with vim.

We’ve got a saint as well, but naebody gives a hoot for him.

In Scotland, Hogmanay’s the time to ramp it up a gear.

We tak an affa bucket on the last day of the year.

 

A snifter fairly warms you up afore you leave the hoose.

And mind and set your video for ‘Only an Excuse’.

Then out into the freezing night tae see, performing live,

A band who hinna had a hit since 1985.

 

We wrap ourselves up warmly; for the lads, a short sleeved shirt

And the girls in winter boob-tube teamed with cosy mini-skirt.

A night of wild abandon is enjoyed by many folk.

But pity those who hiv to hose doon the streets of a’ the boak. 

 

In days gone by we’d wait in silence for midnight bells to chime

Now ab’dy’s mobile phones go off at slightly different times.

On New Year’s Day – a price to pay. We look and feel like hell.

So bravely, as a nation, we take the second off as well.

 

 

In the Internet age, Christmas cards are outdated, wasteful and redundant. Mind you, an email looks rubbish on your mantelpiece.

Davinia Smythe-Barratt, ordinary mum

I’m sure all our friends are wondering when the eagerly awaited Smythe-Barratt Christmas card will arrive, but we’ve decided to dispense with tradition this year and send our annual newsletter without a card. The time has come to finally reject the tyranny of that outdated mode of communication and bring an end to the rapacious capitalism of Hallmark, Clintons and their ilk.  I usually send environmentally sustainable cards in aid of charity, but this year the designs on them were frankly ghastly.  You’d think the Barnardo’s ones had been drawn by a child!

First of all, Milo wishes you all a ‘Feliz Navidad’ from Belize.  Christmas is a difficult time to have a husband in exile in the Caribbean, but Kaiser Osborne’s latest tweak to the tax system leaves us no choice.  If the revenue raised was being put to good use, like supporting the NHS or foreign aid, then that would be one thing, but as a protest against the policies of the Coalition government we refuse to pay a single penny more than is absolutely legally required by the current legislative framework.  Milo hopes to make it back some time in 2014 but it’ll most likely be to the villa in Guernsey. In the meantime we shall stay strong.  On the plus side, it was probably high time that Milo saw at first hand how our tobacco plantation is doing.

Emmeline is, of course, getting along fantastically well at school.  She’s top of her class in all subjects and is captain of the dressage team.  We were hoping to take her to Aspen for some advanced skiing lessons in February but her coach has rather inconveniently taken a year’s sabbatical to join the Red Cross as an emergency aid worker. Emms was distraught, poor thing. She was really looking forward to improving her carving.  Very selfish.  Still our solicitor assures us that we have a water-tight case against him for breach of contract, so that’s something.  He’ll think twice about distributing blankets to Syrian refugees once our legal team gets hold of him!

As for Fidel, he continues to develop into a wonderfully wacky little character.  He wears shorts every day. Not because he has to, but because he wants to. He & two of his pals are on a mission to make it through the whole school year. I did object, for the first twenty cold days, and then I gave up – I’m not fighting with him about it every morning. I never win anyway.  And he’s so endearing when he puts his fingers in his ears and blocks out what you are saying by shouting “I hate you I hate you I hate you” at the top of his little lungs.  He did it the other day, when we were stocking up on festive necessities in the Waitrose in Stirling (I still maintain that it is a breach of our human rights that there is no branch in Aberdeen).  I asked him to go and get me some vacuum-packed chestnuts to use in the stuffing for the organic guinea fowl with orange and Szechuan pepper. He absolutely refused, and rolled around on the ground screaming until mummy said she was sorry.  It transpired that he had seen Michel Roux on “Food and Drink” say that the frozen ones were much superior.

Our festive catering this year comes, as always, courtesy of Snežana, the au pair. She’s Bulgarian, but she’s marvelous. Last week she actually asked for Christmas off to visit her mother in Plovdiv. Bless her heart, I told her I would be happy pay for the flight myself, but she’s just indispensable at this time of year, so sadly I had to refuse.

As for me, I just muddle along as always, like any ordinary mum. The Range Rover has done 50,000 miles  this year – and not just on the school run! I’ve criss-crossed the length and breadth of the country, as I campaigned against the environmental impact of unnecessary car journeys.  I have also taken up the cudgel against the latest predations of the oil and gas sector (I have warned BP; if they start fracking, I shall have no alternative but to sell Daddy’s old shareholding).  In the New Year, I shall be using the media attention afforded to the World Cup as a platform for my drive across Brazil.  Freya from two doors down and I shall be hiring an air-conditioned Toyota Hilux, stripping to the waist to demonstrate our solidarity with the oppressed and exploited Akuntsu people of Brazil, and touring the country to highlight the twin threats of deforestation and climate change.  With any luck, we’ll manage to bring home some under-priced native art and a mahogany side-board into the bargain.

People often say to me, “Davinia, what an inspiration to us all you are.  Why do you do it?”  Well, the answer is simple.  We live in a dreadfully self-absorbed world.  It takes the actions of people like me – simple people doing remarkable things, quietly and without fuss, – to change the world for the better.

So, dear friend it simply remains for me to wish you a non-commercial Christmas and an ecologically-sound New Year.  May your chipolatas be hand-raised and may all your chestnuts be frozen!

Mandela’s memorial saw world leaders both black and white join together. To flirt with the Danish Prime Minister.

Ron Cluny; Official Council Spokesman

Last week provided us with an opportunity to reflect on the wonderful contribution to humanity made by Nelson Mandela, and also to Aberdeen’s own contribution to popularising what was then a controversial cause by awarding him the Freedom of the City. I well remember the arguments at the time. Why should the city of Aberdeen involve itself in these, matters should they not be left to diplomacy between national powers? The answer, then as now, is this. Yes, the world is made up of countries. But more fundamentally, it is made up of people, living in local communities, but subject, too, to broader bonds of fellowship and humanity; bonds which, although subtle and often overlooked, are real. Real, too, is the fact that every person has a voice, albeit a small one easily drowned out by the winds of oppression. But when people band together, their collective voice is louder. And when cities band together: Aberdeen, Glasgow, Rio, Rome, and call out that a wrong is being done and must be righted, the collective voice of their citizens becomes too loud to ignore. Having said, that, given North Korea’s attempts to become a nuclear power and the recent fall out in the Kim Jong-un family that puts even the most hardcore Christmas family dust-up in the shade, we, the council wirsels, have come to the conclusion that it’s probably best to shelve our plans to rename Seaton Drive ‘Jang Song-thaek Way’.

Struan Metcalfe; MSP for Aberdeenshire North and Surrounding Nether Regions

“Bravo!”, I say. “Bravo! Hoorah!” and multiple “Hosannahs!” to the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority! An 11% pay rise to MPs from 2015 – now that’s what I’m talking about. Take note Eck Salmond. Instead of chucking away the tax-payers’ hard earned on your glossy pamphlet (“Scotland’s Future”, cracking read by the way. Hilarious.) why not spread the love a bit? I guarantee massive Cross-Party support for a Crimbo bonus! You could learn a thing or two from the IPSA Chairman – my old buddy Sir Ian “Comedy” Kennedy. He’s come in for a bit of stick for proposing such a massive hike for the honourable members given the prevailing economic climate. But as the IPSA pointed out, it’s a very good deal for the taxpayer – and if they don’t like it then, well, they weren’t appointed to be popular, so stuff them! Quite right, I didn’t come into politics to be liked by the electorate. That’s just something I have to appear interested in temporarily once every four years. I came into politics to meet totty. And to make this great nation of ours a better place for the people I represent. Politicians with trust funds! That said I am more than somewhat shamefaced and apologetic about my mid-week – and mid-snifter – tweet: “11% pay rise to MP’s undermines trust in MPs whilst Joe Public struggle”? I should coco! Means we don’t need to fiddle expenses any more. LOL!” The down-side to the proposals of course is that they involve an end to the ancient tradition of the Tea & Biscuits Allowance. They giveth with one hand and taketh with the other. That’s put paid to my ambitions to move from Holyrood to Westminster. What’s the point if I can’t argue with the lefties whilst enjoying a Gin and Garibaldi? Apparently, making the MPs pay for their own tuck at the Houses of Parliament is going to save a million quid a year. Of course, the Government could achieve the same thing by de-selecting Eric Pickles.

Tanya Soutar; local lifestyle guru

I dinna ken aboot youse, but I wis outraged to see David Cameron posing in some Danish wifie’s ‘selfie’ at Mandela’s memorial service. He embarrassed oor hale nation. I mean a’body kens, that’s nae foo ye tak a selfie! Here’s Tanya’s simple guide tae the perfect personal pic. The first wye oor PM went wrang wis fan him and Obama joined in someb’dy else’s photie. A selfie should ONLY contain yersel. Fit Mr Cameron wis actually doing is cried ‘photobombing’ – fit is a totally different art form a’thegither. Avoid this by ensuring naeb’dy else can get in sight of yer lens. The best wye is tae hiv it less than two feet fae yer face. A lot of the papers wis saying it wisnae appropriate tae tak a photie like that at the memorial service of een of the world’s maist respected peacemakers. They’re right, he should’ve turned roon first, to get the memorial service in the picter! In years tae come, fan oor PM is looking back ower his life, he’ll come across this snap and think “Fit wis I doing in a stadium?” The hale point of the selfie is so’s fowk can see far ye are. My pal, big Sonya, wis up in front of the sheriff last wik fer shoplifting. Dinna worry, she didnae tak a selfie of herself standing in the dock – no – she waited til she wis being led awa so’s she could get the jury in the background. That’s much mair memorable. Plus it’ll help her mind the faces of the radges that found her guilty files she’s doing her 3 stretch. But perhaps the worst thing aboot Cameron’s embarrassing effort wis his face. I ken he’s nae a bonny loon, but the standard pose fer a selfie is nae a glaikit grin. The correct look is, of course, an alluring pout with smouldering eyes. If this disnae come naturally tae ye, try tae imagine that yer blowing someb’dy a kiss files eating a spoonful of peanut butter and trying tae calculate the square root of 187.

I’m in Kennethmont…Get me oot o’ here!

View from the Midden – rural affairs with MTV (Meiklewartle Television) presenter JOCK ALEXANDER.

Its been a challenging wik in the village. I’ve been real busy hosting Meiklewartle Television’s top Reality show, I’m In Kennethmont… Get Me Oot of Here!!! 6 celebrities, a’ competin’ tae be King or Queen! o’ Kennethmont. They’re camped oot in a pig-pen fit we’ve leased fae Skittery Wullie, and conditions are very basic. Nae electricity; nae het watter; and nae Wi-Fi. Although Dame Evelyn Glennie’s fae Methlick, so she’s thrivin on’t. There wiz excitement last night fan Willie Miller kicked aff, roaring and shouting that he wizna putting up wi bieng humiliated, until Joyce Falconer pointed out he used to manage the Dons. And earlier the day we hid a Bush Tucker Trial, and Cooncil leader Barney Crockett stepped up to the plate. Noo on MTV, we dinna hud wi witchetty grubs and kangeroo’s ba’s. At’s jist gadsy at. So oor celebs hiv tae keep doon somethin’ fae Feel Moira’s Burger Van, which is just as gadsy, but at least ye dinna ken fit it is yer eating. Although Barney got a clue fan he found a bit hoof stickin’ oot. Then we hid the efterneen challenge, fan Frank Gilfeather pit his hand into a tank o’ creepy crawlies; and the creepy crawlies run awa! Efter that, it wiz time fer the Gratuitous Shower Scene! Ayewis my favourite bittie. Although it wizna a’ I wiz hoping for. I dinna think I will iver be able to forget the image o’ Alex Salmond in a pair o tartan budgie-smugglers. Cheerio!

JONATHAN M LEWIS, local headmaster

As another term draws to a close here at Garioch Academy, I find myself brimming with pride at our youngsters’ achievements but, simultaneously, mindful of what the future might hold for these precious gems. Our Chancellor’s Autumn Statement provided a timely reminder that as my favourite troubadour Bob Dylan sang, ‘the times, they are a-changing’. A brilliant songwriter, Bob, albeit grammatically remiss! Of course, my stewardship at this fine school may well be over by the late 2040s, when the retirement age will rise to 69. Some may be concerned by the thought of near-septuagenarians educating their children, but they needn’t fret. They’ll be educating their children’s children. There was a clamour from our dedicated staff too, with several of our more experienced colleagues hammering down my door, desperation in their eyes, eager to find out if they would be permitted to extend their careers working with the increasingly respectful youth of today. Sadly, the thoughtless comments some parents levelled at our teachers in their late 50s resulted in a most unsavoury atmosphere at our recent parent council meeting. People must accept that there is nothing inherently wrong with Mrs White falling asleep in the science lab of a Friday afternoon. Who among us would not have been tired after a long week and a lunchtime cup of Horlicks? Especially in a warm science lab with all the Bunsen burners going full tilt. Admittedly, it would have been preferable if she had been awake before the curtains went up in flames, but she certainly woke up when the quick thinking third years grabbed the fire blanket she’d been using as a pillow. Criticism levelled at Mr Cooper in the geography department was equally uncalled for. It is churlish to suggest that the enormous banner he has made, counting down the days until his retirement, displays a lack of commitment to the school. Nothing could be further from the truth, he clearly made it to help pupils come to terms with his impending departure. He has further softened the blow by displaying a live video relay of the beach in Crete he’ll reluctantly head to in 31 working days.

KEVIN CASH – Money Saving Expert and King of the Grips

So the tax disc has been abolished. Happy days! Mind, it maks no odds to me. I dinna hae a car. At least, nae so far as Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs are concerned. The thing that looks a bittie like a Vauxhall Corsa that you might sometimes see in front of my hoose has a tomato plant growing in the glove box, and is therefore, technically, a mobile greenhoose. Mind, I dinna think the chancellor’s thocht through the consequences o’ this change, particularly for the hard-pressed small businessman. My pal, Mick the Pill, used to earn a crust by sellin knock-aff tax disks he made by colouring in the label aff a Guinness bottle and sticking the details on using his loon’s Lettraset. At a stroke, the Chancellor’s decision has shut him doon. I’m nae sure fit he’s gaan to dae noo, but the last time I seen him, he said he’d nicked a chemistry set, hot-wired a Camper Van and ripped all 5 series o’ “Breaking Bad” aff Youtube. He didna say far he wiz going, but he’s got femly up by Ballater, so if you hear o’ someone roaming round the Cairngorms running a crystal meth factory, ye’ll ken fa’s responsible. George Osborne.

600 pages of white paper; and about as informative as the stuff you buy for your printer

‘Scotland’s Future’ The Scottish Government’s white paper on independence was published last week; probably the single most important document in our nation’s constitutional history since the Declaration of Arbroath. So it’s a pity no one could be bothered to read it all the way through. We did try, but then ‘I’m a Celebrity’ came on and…well you ken fit like. Luckily, some of our regular contributors are on hand to give us their impressions.

Struan Metcalfe, MSP for Aberdeenshire North-by-North west

What? There was a White Paper on independence issued? News to me! I was off on a corporate bender for the Rugby World Cup at old Trafford (the electorate need not worry, it wasn’t on expenses, it was all provided by my corporate paymasters!) Afraid five days on the Stella Artois overtook me like a boy racer on the beach boulevard, so it rather passed me by. I know I haven’t read it but am sure the Nats haven’t been so dim as to try to keep the pound. Ha ha !

Archie  Fraser – gentleman of the road

I was very impressed with ‘Scotland’s Future’, it was solid, well put together, and at 600 pages, when torn up and stuffed under the shirt, excellent insulation for a December night under Union Bridge.

Tim Bee – the very conscientious objector

I strongly object to what I saw in the independence white paper. For one, the grammar was appalling. Secondly, it must have cost me, the taxpayer, a huge amount of money to produce. Are we meant to believe it a co-incidence that it was published on the very day the bin collection went monthly? I object!

Jimmy Hollywood – Sandilands’ most eligible bachelor

I seen the white paper. Magic. Fitiver the naysayers and gloom merchants think, a vote for Scottish independence hiz got tae be a positive thing, hiz it? Picture it, a win for the ‘Yes’ campaign, ab’dy spilling oot onto the streets, birds everywhere intoxicated by the concept o’ self determination. And long vodkas. It’ll be like VE Day a ower again, and Jimmy will be there, right in the thick of it, tae patriotically snog the faces aff them. Good times!

J Fergus Lamont – arts critic

My regular reading material of the moment being the Dickensian ‘Take A Break’ magazine, it was with some trepidation that I opened my copy of ‘Scotland’s Future’.  Alex Salmond is not an author with whom I had previously been familiar, but I needn’t have been concerned. The deathless prose, the epic imagination. Truly this work is a fairy-tale the equal of anything by Tolkien or CS Lewis. I wept.

Doddie Esslemont – radical independence campaigner

The white paper is totally lacking in the vision and optimism contained in my own purple paper (with green crayon).  Where is the offer for each household to receive the right to secede from Scotland and form its own state, complete with presidential limo, a seat at the UN and a personal Isla st Clair?  Until we see true visionary leadership like that, we will never tempt people away from the Status Quo, despite the fact that they haven’t done anything decent since “Rocking All Over the World”

 

Professor Hector Schlenk, Senior Research Fellow at the Bogton Institute for Public Engagement with Science

As a scientist, I’m always being asked questions such as ‘Was there ever life on Mars?’ ‘How long until we build the quantum computer?’ and ‘Don’t you think you’ve had enough to drink, sir?’  But recently, people have been asking me all about comets.   “Well”, I advise “it’s almost a year since they went belly-up.  Have you tried Currys?”  And then we laugh.  Until we consider the long-term implications of the collapse of Britain’s retail sector.

This week, astronomers have been eager to learn the fate of comet Ison as it blazes a trail round the far side of the Sun. Many people I have spoken to have been excited at the prospect of the greatest sight in the night sky since the Thainstone Mart fireworks display, but have furrowed their brows and nodded slowly when I attempt to explain the physics, so I shall try to put it in laymen’s terms.

Comets are huge lumps of ice and rock, essentially vast space borne versions of the kind of snowball that can break a window or, to my eternal regret, blind a school friend. They whizz around the sun in an extreme elliptical orbit, like a giant game of celestial swingball.  To help you comprehend the scale, try to imagine a Motability scooter cruising slowly down Causewayend, accelerating to Mach 1 as it negotiates the Mounthooly Roundabout and then gently coasting back up to Split the Winds. But with all sparks and fire coming out the back of it.

The scientific community expected that the comet – a ball of ice, remember – would be vapourised in its close encounter with the boiling, 1 million degree inferno that is the sun. But what would science be without a little unpredictable data?  Reports suggest that the plucky little ice-cube had, in fact, survived to yet wow the 12 people around the globe with access to a super-magnifying telescope.

Excitingly, this suggests we need to rethink our existing hypothesis about the interaction between frozen solid objects and intense heat. Accordingly, as soon as the wintery weather is here I suggest you build yourself a snowman, take it in the house, and leave it right beside a radiator.

Dundee isn’t City of Culture 2017 either. For a lot of Aberdonians , that’s as good as the win.

Ron Cluny, Official Council Spokesman

Regular readers of this column may recall the dismay with which I greeted the news that Aberdeen had been eliminated from the running to be the City of Culture 2017.  I have said it before and I say it again: when a city that boasts a great muckle Granite theatre, a great muckle Granite art gallery, and an indigenous breadstuff that looks like an air-dried cow-pat cannot waltz its way into the finals of a City of Culture competition, I don’t know what the world is coming to.  But our sense of disbelief was only heightened when we learned that Dundee had been short-listed in the final four. To finish behind Dundee had been a blow; but for them to go on and win the hale thing would have been an unmitigated disaster.

It was therefore with some trepidation that I logged onto the Department of Culture, Media and Sport’s website on Wednesday; and learned that Hull had won the title.  After only three hours spent reading the poetry of Philip Larkin (you widna mistake him for a ray of sunshine), listening to the music of the Housemartins and watching the YouTube video of ex-Don Dean Windass winning Hull promotion to the Premiership by skelping the ball past Bristol City’s goalie in the 2008 play-off final, I felt sufficiently confident that I could keep a straight face to phone my opposite number in Dundee.  “Where had it all gone wrong,” I asked him?  He was unsure.  The jury’s visit seemed to go so well.  They had been impressed by the Waterfront development, the city’s commitment to theatre and the arts, and their soon-to-open branch of the V&A Museum and   He had heard an unconfirmed rumour that the judges had been adversely influenced by the city’s association with the doggerel poet, William Topaz McGonagall.  But this was a great mystery.  The city had been assiduous in ensuring that no reference was made in any of the bid material to that one terrible blot on Dundee’s cultural copybook.  How had the jury ever heard of him?

I quickly passed on my commiserations and brought the call to an end. The poor man sounded so disappointed it just didn’t seem right to intrude upon his distress, and I was concerned that I would be unable to keep the laughter out of my voice and I reflected that I have probably never made better use of a first class stamp.

Here is a short poem I have composed to mark the occasion.

Wonderful people of the banks of the Tay!

Alas, I am very sorry to say.

That all your hopes have been taken away

On twenty eleven, twenty-ten-three,

A date which I find very pleasing to me.

Struan Metcalfe, Msp For Aberdeenshire North And Surrounding Nether Regions -An Apology

 Crikey,I’ve been a jolly good boy, haven’t I? It’s been absolutely AGES since I was last gently prompted by HQ to apologise for some slight misunderstanding. Then, as sure as Aberdeen city traffic will grind to a standstill at the first glimpse of a snow-flake, I’ve gone and made a honking mess of it all. Again.

I really must apologise unreservedly to the Conservative party, to my electorate and, most importantly, to Super Dave for my recent Tweet concerning Movember. The last thing I wanted to do was offend any of the fine fellows currently raising lots of spondooliks for the worthy men’s cancer charity by gradually growing to resemble Freddie Mercury this month. I deeply regret tweeting the following:

“Grow a tache for November? And risk getting caught with white stuff stuck in my furry top lip? Not me. That’s what did for Paul Flowers?! LOL”

I can see why “some” people might have assumed I was referring to Bolivian marching powder ingested through the nasal passage, but of course, what I actually meant by “white stuff” was icing sugar. From a Yum Yum, a local delicacy for which I have something of a weakness.

The Rev. Flowers, whilst accused of serious of offences, some of them apparently on video, remains innocent until proven guilty. I should, I fully accept, have included the word ‘allegedly’ in my tweet. In my defence, you only get 150 characters, and if I’d included it I would have had to miss out the ‘LOL’ and the smiley face which followed. Also, it’s a damnably fiddly word to type. My auto-correct always turns it into ‘alligators’.

I did once grow a moustache. Funny story actually. It was my final year at Gordonstoun before the end of year dance with the girls of St Margarets. I thought it made me look distinguished, like Errol Flynn. Or Magnum PI. After building up some Dutch Courage by scoofing out of the champagne bottle in the boys toilets,  I took the captain of the netball team for a Canadian Barn Dance and I could see she was impressed with both my pas de basque and my facial foliage.  I had my killer line prepared, courtesy of Beefy Fortesque of the Sixth form (regarded as something of a Don Juan, having once spoken to a girl he wasn’t related to and who didn’t work for his family). As our eyes locked, I felt the excitement grow and I knew this might be my chance “Did you fart?’ I said ‘Because you just blew me away!”. Well, you can probably guess what happened next.

Reader, I married her.