Everyone tremendously excited about wedding they won’t be invited to

Shelley Shingles, showbiz correspondent and Miss Fetteresso 1983

O. M. Actual. G! Can you believe there’s a ROYAL WEDDING on the horizon?! And it’s a proper one too, not like that damp squib when Charles and Camilla got hitched in 2005 in a registry office and the biggest name on the guest list was Jilly Cooper. Yes, the eligible young ladies of the world weep as Britain’s favourite Ginger (if you don’t count Ron Weasley and Ed Sheeran) is off the market, after popping the question to the lovely Meghan Markies!

It’s a big deal, of course, and it’s just as well we’re not living in a period of extraordinary political, economic and social upheaval, or there might not have been time to devote two thirds of all news coverage to the announcement that 2 people getting married. In fact, I’ve heard the words “mixed-race royal” more than I’ve heard the word “Brexit” this week, which is enough to reform the staunchest republican and as a massive bonus, must be driving Katie Hopkins and Nigel Farrage absolutely mental! I think it’s great that a front-line Royal is in love with a divorced American socialite. It’s a wonder one of them hasn’t tried it before.

They’re going to get married in the Chapel at Windsor, and I have to confess to getting VERY excited when I heard that from my insider source, because he sneezed halfway through and  I thought he’d said ‘Chapel of Garioch’. Already we royal correspondents are asking all the important questions –  “Who will design the dress ?” “What will the bridesmaids bottoms be like? and, most importantly, “Will we all get the day off?”

I don’t know Meghan personally, though I have binge watched all seven seasons of ‘Suits’ since Monday and she seems to be a very good lawyer. Of course, me and Harry go way back. I first met him when I was doing some promotion work for Mackie’s Ice Cream at the Braemar Gathering in 1999. I was just about to nip in to the shoppie for some ciggies (filthy habit, but it kept me thin!) and there’s this freckly 15 year old hanging about outside. “Can I get anything for you?” I asked him, showing him my tray of tubs. “Yes, thanks” he replied. “Could you get me 10 silk cut and a bottle of crème de menthe? Grandmama has locked the drinks cabinet and one is gasping for a libation.”

Wise words from a true gent.

 

Kevin Cash, moneysaving expert and king of the grips

I may hae a reputation as a caul-hairted mannie, jist cos I eence gave my grunny a packet of tissues for her Christmas (in my defence, it wis actually a very thoughtful gift. She hid the flu and hid spent Christmas Eve sneezing intae her snowball), but I am nae withoot feelings, and that is fit wye I’m feeling gye sorry for Aiberdeen City Cooncil of late, because in their desperate drive tae dae fit I dae – cut doon on unnessecary expenditure – they jist canna get it richt. They’ve even paid financial consultants £17,000 tae advise them how best tae economise. Here’s an idea, next year – dinna. See? I’ve saved ye £17,000 a’ready.

Last wik, the Cooncil got a kicking for stopping funds tae the Youth Festival and ha’eing a raffle tae pey for the Art Gallery revamp. And noo we hiv “UniformGate”, fan their shelling oot £30,000 for 75 new staff uniforms files proposing tae charge us for foodwaste recycling bugs (ye ken, the green slidey eens, fit are apparently made oot o’ a combination o’ clingfilm and middle-class guilt)

£30,000? That’s £400 per unit. For work claes! Really there’s nae need tae ging feel here, ye ken? My mate Mick the Pill kens a quine fa’s snogging a laundry assistant at ARI. He can dae them a job-lot of scrubs for a tenner each. We can dae them ony colour they wint, Jist as long as it’s maistly reed, ‘cos some of that stains is a job tae shift. ‘Corporate branding’ is nae problem either: I’ve made individual wee badges by cutting oot the ACC logo from my last 75 unpaid cooncil tax reminders.
So, I’m awa up Marischal College of noo, tae discuss terms wi’ Barney in a location suitable tae this level of transaction; the top of the Helter Skelter at the Christmas village. If he disnae bite might hand aff, he’ll be roon the twist, and gan doon in mair wyes than one!

See the best of the Flying Pigs live in ‘Now That’s What I Call Methlick!’ At HMT June 2018. Tickets available now. A rare Christmas present for onyb’dy ye like. Or even onyb’dy ye dinna like.

“Youth is wasted on the young” said George Bernard Shaw; but then he never saw The Ricciotti Ensemble at Inchgarth Community Centre

Ron Cluny, Official Council Spokesman

As chief spin doctor for the current administration, I can safely say that as my Auntie Maisie used to put it, ‘there’s aye a something’. This week my paymasters have pushed the boat out for me, after stripping it of life belts, with the decision to end the funding of The Aberdeen International Youth Festival. But, as usual, radged up by the liberal elite, the public has got hold of the wrong end of the stick and is trying to hit us over the head with it.

The decision follows an independent report from a top-class consultancy in Brighton that I can summarise as follows: ‘Nah mate.’  Unbelievably, there have even been complaints about our use of these people, on the basis that consultants in sitting in an office in Brighton have no first hand knowledge of Aberdeen and its cultural landscape. But that, I have to say, is insane. I’ve seen the invoice these boys put in for the report – Oof! Imagine how much more it would have cost if they’d actually travelled the length of the country to find stuff oot?

But more to the point, in our brave new Brexit Britain, fit is fit for the future, do we really want all these International Youths coming over here and cavorting aboot? They give very little back to the local economy; in all its 45 years, I’ve never seen a single AIYF participant in the queue at my local chipper in Kincorth. I suppose they’re too busy performing to large crowds of elitist intelligentsia in venues that are simply out of reach for the regular Aberdonian; like Inchgarth Community Hall and the top of the St Nicholas Centre.

The main issue, of course, is that when you have hundreds of prodigiously talented, multilingual young people swarming into the city every year, it rather shows up our local loons and quines for the surly layabouts that they are. My twa wouldn’t recognise an award-winning Swedish Girls’ Choir if they tripped over one on the way to Greggs, and would only feel a sense of inadequacy if they did.  But by ridding our city of this menace, we can expect a definite upswing in our own young peoples’ sense of self-worth.

Of course, fiscal probity is very much the watchword of this administration. The funds saved will be being channelled into other important city projects.   Such as the temporary tarmac used for the Christmas market (which, by happy coincidence, cost almost exactly the same as next year’s AIYF budget) or the job-lot of 250 watt light bulbs we’ve installed in our offices, to offset the large and inexplicable shadows now being cast over Marischal College.

Deep down I think everyone knows that we are dealing with a local institution which is largely ignored by the general populace, seems to be run for the benefit of a select few, and is prone to profligate overspending. No wonder it doesn’t want to pay for the Youth Festival.

 

Davinia Smythe-Barratt, Ordinary Mum

 

We shall overcome!  Like all ordinary Mums, I’ve been keeping a close eye on events in Zimbabwe as my African brethren and sistren have finally succeeded in pressurising their despotic supremo, Robert Mugabe, to resign.  I can’t tell you how delighted I am for them, having successfully ganged up on and bullied a nonagenarian into submission!

 

Of course, the girls from my socio-politico-prosecco discussion group (we meet every Tuesday at Kippie for a late brunch and the dismantling of the patriarchy) have been lending our support to their cause in whatever way we can.  Saskia has upped her game when it comes to correcting the grammar of strangers on the Guardian website and Genevieve has left a plethora of unfavourable Trip Advisor reviews for Zimbabwean hotels. Sample: ‘The spa is divine, but the management’s tacit support for the ruling regime, less so.’

 

Our activism did become confrontational on Wednesday evening, though.  Finella, our resident anarchist (part time – 2 days a week she works in PR on Albyn Place) told us about a ‘Zimbabwe Night’ she’d seen advertised at the local hall in Westhill, so kitted out with placards, whistles and a loud hailer, off we went to chant and sing protest songs.  As expected, our presence caused something of a stir, and some people came outside in garishly bright clothing to engage in lively debate.

 

I think it was just after things started to get ugly, that we all realised Finella had misread the notice and that we were interrupting a Zumba session.  Thank goodness I’d double-parked the Disco so we could make a swift getaway to the Chester for a Bellini!

 

See the best of the Flying Pigs live in ‘Now That’s What I Call Methlick!’ At HMT June 2018. Tickets available now. A rare Christmas present for onyb’dy ye like. Or even onyb’dy ye dinna like.

Taxing times with Apple and sushi

J Fergus Lamont, Arts critic 
I’m just back from a whistlestop trip to Londinium, as I insist on calling it, where I stumbled across the kind of public-space art installation for which the Capital is rightly famed, and which we in the provinces can only view with thinly disguised envy. Outside the Apple Store in Regent Street I found a snaking line of human flotsam all waiting for the chance to buy something called an iPhone X. Well, I was intrigued. The name itself a chimera of conflicting ideas – ‘I phone’ distilling 21^st century technological isolation and the sublimation of self to a punchy two syllables, while the ‘X’, redolent of mystery, and, of course of the doomed tyranny of the Roman Empire – expensive, luxurious, faintly ludicrous and possibly fated to destruction from barbarian attacks.

Thanks to my engaging in some improvisational dialogue with the assembled throng, I found my self perfectly placed to enter the store as soon as the doors opened, accompanied by some ‘in-character’ screams of invective and abuse from the performers. And so it was that I found myself the proud owner of one of these miraculous devices. Of course the reason for my excitement is the stunning ‘Animoji’ feature, where by users can animate a cartoon animal’s features with their own facial expressions. In short, it gives to the man in the street the capacity to emulate such cinematic masterworks as ‘Babe’, ‘Alvin & The Chipmunks’ or the seminal ‘Beverly Hills Chihuahua’. Incredibly, one can also use it to make telephone calls. Indeed, I spent a happy 2 minutes on the phone to my mother asking how her hip replacement operation had gone, but a much happier 2 hours making a cartoon chicken sing Bohemian Rhapsody.

Of course, all of this is possible thanks to the device’s facial recognition technology, which allows users to unlock the device with a scan of their features. Though this ‘Face ID’ has inherent dangers, as I discovered after my purchase. As I left the store I observed one heavily tattooed gentlemen gathering up his sleeping bag after being turned away as stocks had run out. ‘Bad luck old bea’ I commiserated, “I gotone, look how marvellous it is!’, and he was so moved by my words that, midway through my Animoji demonstration, he cried “Laters, bruv!” and gave me what was clearly intended to be a friendly punch on the arm of approval and camaraderie. Sadly he misjudged the playful force required, and also his aim, breaking my nose quite conclusively, and altering my physiognomy sufficiently that Face ID couldn’t recognise me and I was unable to switch the phone on again to call the emergency services. However, someone may have received a 3 hour video of an animated panda requesting an ambulance!

I wept.

Cosmo Ludovik Fawkes-Hunte, 13th Earl of Kinmuck

So the press and public have got themselves into a lather about the shocking revelations that rich people with access to high-quality professional advice take steps to minimise their tax.  Well, slice me finely and flambé me in brandy, whoever would have thought it?  We Fawkes-Huntes appear prominently in the Paradise Papers, and I am damned proud of the fact.  We have have long cleaved to the view that tax is only for the little people.  The only dissenter from this view was my great-grandfather, the 10th Earl, but then of course he was only 5’2″.  It is our proud boast that over the years we have paid out more to the Croupier of the Monte Carlo casino than we have to Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs.  Of course, what the shrill voices shrieking about inequity overlook is that it is not just legal but right that we should make extensive use of overseas tax havens in the Caribbean.  After all, the great majority of the family fortune was made in the slave trade in these vary same dependencies during the heady days of Empire; it is only right that we give a little back.  Just as little as possible.

Tanya Soutar, local lifestyle guru

I dinna ken about yous, but I jist canna stand fussy eaters. Ye ken the type: “Can I hae nae ingin in my burger?” or “No thanks, I have a nut allergy and that fun-size snickers might send me into anaphylactic shock’.

Fan it comes tae food, my twa best pals, Megan and Big Sonya are so different, they’re like chalk an’ cheese. Megan’s vegan fit means she winna touch ony meat or animal by-products, like cheese; files Big Sonya will eat absolutely onything, including chalk.

Fit a pest Megan is. The one time she came roon tae mine for her tea I didna ken fit tae dae.  I couldna cook up my usual signature dish, Lidl’s lasagne, so I very thoughtfully went richt oot o’ my comfort zone and microwaved her a prawn curry. As soon as she started eating it she looks at me funny kind and says she says “is this shellfish?” So I telt her. “No Megan, it’s fine, your’e my freen so I dinna mind a bittie extra work.’

But I wis a bit miffed fan I seen that Donald Trump was getting pulledup for being a fussy eater in Japan this wik fan he turned down sushi in favour o a burger earlier. Let’s get this straight, there’s plenty good reasons tae gie Trump pelters, but turning doon a bowl o’ raw fish isnae een o’ them. That’s nae rude, tak it fae a veteran o’ Commercial Quay, raw fish is gadsy! Fit’s rude is serving food that’s nae cooked. That’s like going into the Ashvale and them giving ye an uncooked… fitiver it is they mak chips oot o’!

See the best of the Flying Pigs live in ‘Now That’s What I Call Methlick!’ At HMT June 2018. Tickets available now. A rare Christmas present for onyb’dy ye like. Or even onyb’dy ye dinna like.

Let’s go to the movies, in glorious MeikleWartleVision

View from the Midden with Jock Alexander

It’s been a cinematographical wik in the village.   We’ve been keeping on top of a’ the tawdry travails that hid beset Hollywood in recent wiks. And though mony of us have expressed surprise that that kind of thing has been rife in a wee village near Dumfries, we have nae been put aff wir love of watching films. Iver since 1897 fan the Meikle Wartle Majestic kinetoscope emporium wiz set up in the back of the village piggery by Skittery Wullie’s easily distracted  grandfaither, – Scuttery Billy – the village has loved good cinema. We’ve nivver had a good een, but we were ayewiz keen. So you can imagine wir excitement tae read in the news that Cineworld in Aiberdeen is in the process of installing a 4DX cinema, only the second of its kind in the hale of Scotland.  And fit a great wheeze by the boffins it is too! Noo that 3D is passe, fresh gimmickry resurrected fae the 1950s is needed tae keep fowk aff their Xphones and iBoxes and coming in tae the picters. So, they hiv technology fit’ll allow film screenings tae be enhanced wi’ live special effects, like seat vibrations, gusts of air and sprays of watter. If you ask me, they’ll also need some extra big popcorn buckets for fan the motion sickness kicks in, but fa am I tae knock technological progress? And fit’s good enough for the big city is of course worth ripping aff here in the village.  With this in mind, we are proof tar say that wir brand new village cinema is noo open, round the back of Feel Moira’s house. roll up, roll up and see a’ the latest films in glorious MeiklewartleVision. Of course, as it’s open air, in a field, in mid-November, in Aiberdeenshire, nae a’ yer senses will be working at full pelt, so we’ve cranked up the effects the compensate. Moira has done an affa thorough job an a’ – she has cannibalised  her 16 roostiest Massey Fergusons and welded them thegither intae 4 rows of 4; hey presto! Fan ye switch on the engines  – shoogly seats. Screen  size is important, and oors is the size o’ the side o’ a barn. For obvious reasons. It is situated within sniffing distance of the sewage works and Moira’s kitchen. That, combined wi’ the typical Meikle Wartle micro-climate, mair than taks care of a’ yer ither senses.  It’s a highly evocative combination, jist as lang as a’ the movies ye come tae see involve yella fog, sleet, and the aroma of unidentifiable meat. Cheerio!

Cava Kenny Cordiner, the football pundit who’s knocked out a few household names.

The last few days in the footballing world has seen a lot of emulsion.  The World Cup playoffs has seen entire nations experience the agony and elasticity that only the beautiful game can provide.  There was heartbreak for both parts of the Emerald City Isle, with Northern Ireland going out to Switzerland and the other bit of Ireland getting stuffed by Denmark.

Now he’s out of a job, I watched the Northern Ireland game with my old team mate Gordon Strachan.  When we sat down with a tinny, just before kick off, I says to Gordo, I says “Who are you supporting Gogs?” And he says to me, he says, “Switzerland – ’cause I’m neutral!” then he started laughing.  I guess all that time off is going to his head.

That was never a pen, though, in the first leg. If that ref had given a pen against me for something like that, I think I might have stuck the head on him.  Strach says to me, he says “I think you might have done something worse, Kenny.  You might have lost your temper!”  like a lot of people, I don’t get his sense humour, but he’s hilarious, is Gordo.

Ireland joined their neighbours on the international football scrapheap challenge when they got turned over by the Great Danes, but there was no doubting the biggest shocker of the playoffs, when Italy was sent crashing out of the World Cup by the Swedenese. A World Cup without Italy is like an international buffet without pizza, and I felt sorrow for them, especially goalie Gianluigi Buffoon, who retired with a tear in his eyes straight after the match.  And when I look back over these results and think of a World Cup without Italy, Holland, Greece, Ireland, Wales and Northern Ireland, it helped me put things into periscope: maybe being a Scotland fan isn’t so bad after all.

See the best of the Flying Pigs live in ‘Now That’s What I Call Methlick!’ At HMT June 2018. Tickets available now. A rare Christmas present for onyb’dy ye like. Or even onyb’dy ye dinna like.

It’s the ultimate Trick or Treat: “Gie’s a sweetie or we’ll tell you fa won The Bake-Off”

View From The Midden – Rural Affairs with Jock Alexander

It’s been a chronometrical wik in the village. It’s yon time of year fan the nights are nae so much drawing in as dragging on, and there’s nithin for it but tae turn the clocks back. Me, I jist rely on my ain body clock, on the understanding that nae metter fit time it is, my body winna be shifting fae my cosy bed unti a’ the frost his melted aff the seat in the cludgie. But at this time o’ year, onyb’dy can get confused and make a collop o’ things that are dependent on kenning the richt time. Jist look fit happened tae yon wifie fae isnae Mary Berry fae the Great British Bake-Aff. Noo I dinna understand that show. Ab’dy watches it for reasons naeb’dy can adequately explain. Including masel. I dinna ken the first thing aboot baking, in fact, I canna tell an Entremet fae the Internet. As the loon fae Curry’s observed files he angrily scooped chocolate mousse fae my laptop’s disc drive.

But fit a stramash fan the new judge, fitiver-her-name-is-that’s nae Mary Berry, forgot she wiz 6 hours ahead of the UK and inadvertently revealed the name of the winner on Twitface, far abd’y wi’ nithin better tae dae on Halloween could see. I missed it masel, as I wis still trying tae extricate the kitchen knife I had embedded in a neep in this years effort to mak a traditional lantern. Fan will I learn that the only wye tae make a traditional turnip lantern is we’ the aid o’ state-o’-the-art laser cutting equipment? It wiz a bit tie scary this Halloween, I hive tae say. I tell ye, it’s name like it wiz in my day fan we jest went guising wi’ a wee baggie, a paper mask, and wheelbarrow containing a large unsupervised bonfire.

This year in the village the chill night air wiz fairly rent asunder wi’ the wails o’ the tormented and the shrieks of the damned. ‘Oh, for ony sake’ you could hear them cry, their anguished voices floating over the roof tops, ‘will you kids gie’s peace? We’ve a’ready dished oot a’ the sweeties, and we’re trying tae watch the final o’ the Great British Bake-aff’.

Onywye, there she wiz, the wifie fae used tae be Mary Berry – nae hermin’ naeb’dy, in the weel-kent centre of patisserie that is Bhutan fan she got a’ mixed up wi’ her timezones and thocht that we a’ready kent fa won. Nae doot she’d had o’er muckle cookin’ sherry, or fitever the Himilayan equivalent micht be. Michty, I’ve hid the same experience masel. Last Hogmanay I couldnae hiv telt ye fa I wiz, niver mind fan or far. Turns oot I wiz in Moldova, but I digress. So I winna hear a word against fitever-her-name-is. Whether the clocks ging forward or back, or fitever time zone yer in, it is true tae say that time marches on regardless. Yesterday is today’s memory and tomorrow is today’s dream. This is particularly true if ye’d had o’er much cooking sherry. Cheerio!

 

Cava Kenny Cordiner, the football pundit who calls a trowel a shovel

There’s an old saying that says, it says, “good things come to those who lift weights”, and for Aberdeen players Ryan Christie, Kenny McLean and Graeme Shinnie, they has been weighted long enough. They finally got a call up to the Scotland squad, funnily enough as soon as Gordon Strachan got his jotters.

Old Kenny knows all too well the pain of being cruelly overcooked when it comes to the National Squad. For years I was knocking my pan in, trying to attract Jock Stein’s attention, but I never got to experience life in the famous dark blue jersey. Apparently Jock thought I was a liability because I spent so much time knocking other people’s pans in, but I thunk that was a bit rich coming from the man what gave so many caps to Roy Aitken!

I seen that speedster Lewis Hamilton laced up his 4th world title in Mexico at the weekend. Some folks is saying that it’s amazing how the UK has produced someone so naturally talented at driving fast, but I doesn’t think it’s so surprising. Since summer they’ve caught 5000 drivers speeding on the A90, so I think there’s a little Lewis Hamilton in all of us! I just hope the other 4999 has drivers learnt their lesson, like what I did after my £200 fine and 6 points. Criminal.

A ban on skelpit lugs? That smacks of the Nanny State!

Tanya Soutar – local lifestyle guru

I dinna ken about youse, but I’m getting richt fed up of the Scottish Government interfering in the wye I live my life. Hear me, Nicola – I will raise my bairns the wye I wint til. I already get guilt trips for letting them watch 16 hours o’ telly a day (it’s highly educational, is ‘Geordie Shore’, ye ken. I’ve learnt a hell o’ a lot aboot self–tanning and narcissistic personality disorder) and nae feeding them organic chicken nuggets and free-range pizza, but noo they’re telling me I canna gie them a wee smack fan they’ve been naughty! Hiv ye ever heard the like?!

The next time my Jayden sets aff a box o’ fireworks in next door’s backie, fit am I supposed tae dae aboot it? Pit him on the naughty step? No– that jist turns bad behaviour intae a game. And onywye, last time I tried that he set fire tae the stair carpet.

They’re aye trying tae ban stuff, this mob. First it wis fracking, noo it’s smacking, fit’s next; shellacking? Hiv they seen the state o’ my nails?

You’d think the SNP would be mair keen tae preserve this essential element o’ a traditional Scottish childhood. Getting a skelp wis pairt o’ growing up. In fact, as my boyfriend Darren says “I got battered a’ the time fan I was wee, an it niver did me ony herm” faniver I visit him in prison, far he’s serving twa years fer aggravated assault.

And there wis mair bad news for parents this wik; the so-called “experts” is noo telling us we’ve tae stop asking  wir GP for antibiotics for wir bairns! Apparently, fan ye give folk medicine unnecessarily, they build up resistance til it, which means treatment for really serious conditions might nae be effective in later life.

Fit? Sounds like a lot of mumbo jumbo if ye ask me. Fit disnae kill ye, maks ye stronger; it says so on the picture of a wifie walking on a beach at sunset fit my pal Big Sonja his on her facebook. So next time my wee Beyoncé-Shanice gets a blocked nose I’m marching straight doon tae that doctor’s fer some amoxicillin! And see if he disnae gie it me? He’s nae a bairn, so the law winna stop me pitting him ower my knee!

View from the midden – rural affairs with Jock Alexander.

It has been a chronometric wik in the village. As Meikle Wartle’s chief cultural commentator, (ameen ither things – Meikle Wartle’s nae jist the metropolis, ye ken. Ye’ve tae dae mair than one jobbie tae mak ends meet here. So I dae the cultural commentating, sweep a pucklie lums, help oot wi’ the lambing fan it’s time, and dae a bittie colonic irrigation on the side) I spend a great deal of time perusing the printed press in detail, especially noo I’ve got a 100 watt lichtbulb installed in my ootside cludgie.  Top of the pile this wik is reports that the prehistoric builders of Stonehenge in 2,500 BC ate food fae north-east Scotland.  Apparently, efter poking aboot at a great pile o’ aul bones and teeth that they’ve found in the grun, archaeologists hiv identified them as coming fae breeds o’ cattle and pig indigenous tae this pairt o’ the world.

Weel, I must say I widna be at aa surprised tae fin oot that a precursor tae Skittery Wullie’s piggery wis in operation mair than fower thoosan years syne. Some of the clart on his dungers must be at least that aul.  But we should feel proud that, even in the far depths of ancient history, afore the Pyramids wis built, Rome was founded, or work began on the AWPR, fowk fae this neck of the woods were flogging their overpriced artisan foodstuffs tae gullible southerners.

The ither story fit caught my eye this wik wiz the unfortunate tale of the Aiberdeen bus that tried tae squeeze under the Wellington Suspension Bridge on Riverside Drive wi’ predictable results. Nae a problem for us in the village, of course, thanks to wir total lack of bridges, and, indeed, buses. I do however feel for the peer driver who nae doot misjudged the size o’ his charabanc. The city Cooncil his confirmed that there wis nae damage tae the bridge, but the same canna be said for the bus, which wis left, much like the driver’s pride, somewhat crushed by the hale affair. Cheerio!

EU’re all going on a Tattie Holiday

 Cosmo Ludovik Fawkes Hunt, 13th Earl of Kinmuck.

And so the Europeans are bleating that we don’t want to pay the divorce bill, and this Brexit farrago totters along with the rapidity, poise and purposefulness of uncle Neville after his 3rd bottle of claret. If we carry on like this, then the country will find itself doing what has, since that fateful Christmas day in 2001, been known among the family as ‘doing a Neville’. I don’t know how a country can actually contrive to be found face down in a rhododendron with its trews around its ankles and its dress shirt stained a shade of puce not previously known to human imagining, but if anyone can do it, May’s mob can. The Remoaners complain we have no bargaining chips but really, how hard can it be? We’ll get no-where by pussy-footing around with dinner in Brussels.

Get Junker to come here for negotiations over mince and skirlie at Ye May Gang Far and Fare Waur, and then we’ll see who has the upper hand!

In the meantime, I have been speaking to some of the farm labourers employed at the tattie howking this week. (I don’t normally communicate directly with help, preferring to speak through an intermediary or ‘gangmaster’, but on this occasion I’d driven the Land Rover into them and didn’t want to drive off without giving them a friendly warning not to report the matter).

Well unpick my stitches and sew me up again, these tattie pickers were not, as I had expected, of the traditional sullen child variety, but rather comprised a selection of strapping, efficient fellows, many of them highly educated, of Eastern European extraction. I was, of course, about to run them off my land, until I saw what a marvellous job they were doing. It seems that the youth of today are inexplicably unenthusiastic about being paid a pittance for backbreaking labour, even in the charming rustic idyll of a Northeast field in the middle of October, and so instead the work is now being done by Johnny Foreigner – Latvians, Lithuanians and Estonians, in the main. It seems that the price of restoring Britain’s will be potatoes lie rotting, unlifted in their fields. If you then wonder – “Who used to howk these tatties?” the answer is, like so many of the promises made about Brexit, a lot of Baltics.

View From The Midden – rural affairs with MTv (Meikle Wartle Television) presenter Jock Alexander

It’s been an adumbrated week in the village. Folk in the seething metropolis o’ Aiberdeen were astonished by the sepia coloured gloom that engulfed the city at aroond half three on Monday, a good couple of oors earlier than usual. Some said it wiz the End of Days. Indeed, mony young folk facetwitted that it felt lik a zombie apocalypse, fan brain-dead creatures roam aboot in an orgy of destruction. Those who’ve walked doon Union Street around 2am on a Seterday nicht replied “so fit’s new?”  Well, according tae weather experts, it wiz a’ tae dae wi’ Hurricane Ophelia, mixed wi’ dust fae the Sahara desert and particles fae bush fires in Portugal. So quite the maist exotic intercontinental weather we’ve hid for a while.  We here in Meiklewartle did notice the atmospheric conditions, but we’re weel used tae apocalyptic skies. Michty, fan the wind blaws in fae the sewage works and mixes the fumes fae Feel Moira’s burger van wi’ Skittery Wullie’s piggery, it aye looks like ‘at. Cheerio!

Kevin Cash, moneysaving expert & king of the grips

I seen in the news the ither day that the plight of the crew of the Malaviya Seven is still ga’an on. The peer lads on board hiv a’ been stuck here for mair than a year as the ship’s owners, Gol Offshore, owe them the half a million quid in back wages. Last wik the vessel wis due to be selt aff at auction, which should of finally raised enough siller tae get them hame, but the auction wis cried aff fan there wis the one bid, fit wisnae near enough. Noo, I’d love tae help them oot, and I likes a bargain as much as the next man, but I dinna hae pooches big enough tae buy an offshore supply vessel, even at a knock doon price. The thing is, it’s right in the city-centre, his stunning views of the harbour, and it’s got Wi-Fi and heaps o’ beds (well, Radar and hammocks, but it’s the same difference). They shouldna be trying tae sell it tae a shipping company; they should be listing it on Airbnb!

Google say their earphones translate any language, anywhere. Nae tae be contermashious, but they’d hae a sair fecht in Turra.

Professor Hector J Schlenk; Senior Research Fellow at the Bogton Institute for the public engagement in Science

As a scientist, people are often asking me tough questions like “Should a multimillion pound housing development at Rubislaw Quarry be built?” and “Is it still Europe’s biggest man-made hole, or is that now Union Street?” However, this week I have been turned away from local matters by the latest scientific breakthrough by the boffins at Google, who have built a pair of headphones that can translate foreign languages in real time. Notwithstanding the fact that by calling them ‘Pixel Buds’ they have invented something that sounds like a hi-tech method of ear wax removal; Google appear to have created a real-world equivalent of the Babel Fish from Douglas Adams’ seminal Science Fiction masterwork ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’. Other examples of Adams’ 1970’s sci-fi predictions becoming actual technology include the e-book, voice–controlled computers and Marvin the Paranoid Android, a permanently depressed robot, which tellingly presaged our current Prime Minister.

Stunningly, the Pixel Bud earphones both translate and enable you to speak in foreign languages, and at a launch event this week, they enabled an English speaker to converse with someone from Sweden. Of course, no technology is perfect at launch and there are some slight niggles. For one, they’re only compatible with Android phones, and so notwithstanding the exorbitant cost of their handsets, and dogmatic brand loyalty, the 500-million iPhone users worldwide will miss out. Sorry, I was meant to be identifying drawbacks, wasn’t I?

The Pixel Bud earphones will apparently support 40 languages, and I for one am desperately hoping the software will be up to the task of including Doric. This will make my weekly shopping trip to Turriff far less traumatic. If not, I propose an ‘add-on’ app for the earphones which will facilitate translation into the local dialect. At the moment my own add-on is a little unwieldy, involving, as it does, plugging the Pixel Buds into the hearing aide of my Auntie Jessie, who will “live translate” as long as the hard wired connection is maintained. Users should therefore ensure that they don’t walk too fast for her to keep up. She’s marvelous but she is under the doctor with her legs. We will have look into minaturisation in due course, but as matters stand she’s only 4 foot 11 so it’s hard to see where we go from here. In terms of the business model, the application itself is free, with each translation paid for by an ‘in-app purchase’ of pandrops.

Cava Kenny Cordiner; the football pundit who’s paddling in the gene pool

Oh me is woe! Scotland’s dream of getting humped in the World Cup playoffs lies in tatters after a 2-2 draw in Slovenia saw us blown out of the water at the final hurdle. It all looked so good when Griffo put us in front, but 2 goals from set-pieces from one of the Slovenly subs ensured that in 2018 the Tartan Army will not be disgracing Russia with their presents.

Of course, Scotland gaffer Gordon Strachan is an old pal of old Kenny’s, we go way back to my playing days at Pittodrie, and whatever you thinks about his tic-tacs, he could really play the face off of the beautiful game. Football is all about ball control; and that wee ginger nut’s was some of the best controlled balls I ever seen. I know as well as what anyone else does how much Gordon will be hurting over us crashing out of the competition so ignoramously. But when he blamed genetics for Scotland’s failure, even I had to raise an eyelid.

Gordo reckons we don’t have the height or bulk to deal with our opponents these days, which, coming from a wee toot like him just sounds like sour grapes. The problem with Gogsy’s claim is that he never done his research. He says we was the second smallest team in Europe, but if he’d checked who was smallest (Spain) and third smallest (Portugal) he’d have realised that there’s a lot of truth in the old saying “if you is good enough, you is tall enough”. And vice verruca, putting big lads in the team is no guarantee of success. Duncan Ferguson was 6 foot 4, but he never helped us to a major tournament. Mostly because he was in jail.

Anyway, Strachan’s suggestion for how to improve our chances of qualifying for future tournaments was to get big men together with big women and “see what we get”. Now I’m no expert on geology, but I know Scottish football and what it doesn’t not need right now is more big babies.

‘Art is the New Oil’ – that’ll come in handy now fracking’s out of the question.

J Fergus Lamont, arts correspondent

You may have spotted billboards and posters around the town proclaiming that ‘Art Is The New Oil’. And no doubt many have passed these by without further consideration be yond an uncultured ‘Eh?’’ perhaps a boorish ‘Fit?’ or, in one case, witnessed with my own eyes and ears, a pause, a furrowed brow, and an emphatically uttered scatological expletive.

Some could interpret the slogan as merely the quirky strapline for an upcoming contemporary dance festival. But those words have a far deeper meaning for clever people like me who have their finger on the nub of the artistic zeitgeist and talk loudly in restaurants. Art, like oil, is precious, rare, and incredibly useful to society; but is also a finite resource which will run out if we don’t keep digging madly for it. And however much of it we produce ourselves, the value we derive from it is entirely decided on the whim of OPEC.

The metaphor does not, perhaps, hold up to intense scrutiny – but there can be no doubt that we are living in an artistic golden age. Few will be aware of the new piece of experimental theatre, ‘Mama Mia’, currently playing at HMT, but the complex power of this stunning work can not be over stated. You may never have heard of it; it has received little, if any, promotion, but last night’s clearly knowledgeable audience were aware of the symbolism of the piece, many joining in with key sections. Indeed, one group of young ladies in my vicinity, seemed positively drunk on the raw emotional force of the piece, encouraging me to ‘join in grandad’ in a joyous, life-affirming display of inclusivity. And gin.

Were that not enough, this evening I will be attending one of the city’s newer contemporary arts spaces, the modernist/brutalist Institute Nightclub which tonight is hosting a unique chance to meet two of the greatest exponents of early 20th Century feminist multi-media expression. I speak of course of noted Romanian performance artists The Cheeky Girls, creators of the Neo-Dadaist meisterwerk ‘Cheeky Song (Touch My Bum)’.

It occurred to me only this morning that the cultural life we now enjoy in Aberdeen is truly sans pareil. I wept

Professor Hector J Schlenk

As a scientist, people are always asking me questions, like “will face recognition technology keep my data safe?”, “can genetic modification eradicate certain diseases?”, and “would you mind closing your curtains if you’re going to parade around like that?” But lately, they’ve been asking me about fracking, which has hit the headlines here thanks to the Scottish Parliament’s descision to outlaw the process. The country that pushed the envelope with hydro electric, nuclear fission and North Sea oil, has decided it doesn’t have the stomach for an “unconventional” process like fracking, just because it entails forcing a high pressure jet of water into unstable subterranean rock structures, causing potentially catastrophic risk to the very ground we walk on. Does that make it intrinsically dangerous?

Well, yes, of course it does. And that’s the problem with taking policy decisions based on overwhelming public opinion. The public seem to be significantly less keen than the multinational oil companies on doing highly dangerous things under Lanarkshire, on the off-chance that it won’t cave in.

But if fracking is out, what is Scotland to do? The oil will soon run dry, and the annual national hours of sunlight we get would barely power a smoke detector. All that is left to us is wind power; so, again, thank goodness for the Scottish Parliament.

Doddie Esslemont, Radical Independence Campaigner

As the most vociferous (and indeed only) campaigner for independence for 39G Seaton Drive, I was shocked to see the violence in Catalonia surrounding the recent independence poll. I always thought I was being poorly treated on election day when barely-concealed sniggers after walking into the polling booth and unilaterally declaring independence from the oppressive yoke of the EU, UK, Scotland and Seaton Community Council. But in fairness, no-one has ever told me I’m not allowed to vote, cracked my ribs with a truncheon and thrown me down a flight of stairs. Not since the days of Fawlty Towers have I seen someone from Barcelona get smacked over the head with such regularity.

So shocked was I by what I saw that I took myself into that bastion of British oppression, the Seaton post office, to send my Catalan friends a goodwill package from a like-minded friend. It contained my mother’s special recipe swiss milk tablet – something sweet for them in a bitter time; the salty tears of a fellow repressed separatist; and a dirty great crash helmet.

Should a footballer player be sacked for taking the knee? When Willie Miller did it he just got a booking.

Cava Kenny Cordiner, the football pundit who’s first and ten. Whatever that means.

On Sunday night I seen the football from Wembley between Jacksonville Jaguars and the Balamory Ravens. I should make myself clear, I was watching what Americans cry “football” and what everybody else cries “American football”. Despite the name, it’s not nothing like our football at all, in fact, isotonically, it’s more like British Bulldogs, but with tinsel.

That not-still-standing, I’ve got quite into my American football of late. It’s got the power and physiotherapy of rugby mixed with the lycra and shoulder pads of Dynasty. But underneath those layers and layers of padding, the American footballers had something to get off their chest.

They say that sport and politics is like oil and water – they should not never not get mixed. But on Sunday that is exactly what they done. The players kneeled down in protest when they played the American National Anthem, the Star Bangled Spanner.

Now there has been a lot writ about what the protest is about, some of which the lovely Melody has read to me out loud, and if I has copied the bit out of the Guardian website properly, it started with one player trying to bring attention to America’s systemic problems of racial inequality. From that it has growed and growed, and now as well as that the players is also not happy about Donald Trump and how much of a bampot he is. And fair play to the lads.

Of course, old Kenny is no stranger to getting involved in a political controverbial. A few seasons ago I was at a Scotland game where they held a minute’s applause to commemorate a recently deceased hero of the national team. Some people got angry with me because I found that, when that suspicious moment come, I could not clap along with everyone else. I wasn’t being disrespectful or nothing, I just never had nowhere to put my Bovril.

Kevin Cash, moneysaving expert & king of the grips

Taxi-hailing app Uber is set to lose its London license efter a ruling that it was “not fit and proper” tae hold it. Five hunner thoosand Londoners hiv daen fit they ayewiz dae, and protested, and wi 40 thoosand drivers and millions o’ customers, ab’y’s a wee bittie anxious. Luckily, the very same day, the company announced it’s plans tae expand intae Aiberdeen “as soon as possible”. And good for them, I say! Just cos they’ve a’ready been banned by Denmark, Australia, Canada and France that’s nae barrier tae success in Scotland. Jist look at Irn Bru.

Uber has already been a great success in baith Glasgow and Edinburgh which are of course affa similar tae Aiberdeen, apart fae the weather, population size, and road systems.

But dinna get ower excited, Uber’s application is noo in the hands of the Cooncil, and we a’ ken the approach thaey tak tae controversial proposals. So expect fower year o’ lip-service public consultation and widespread opposition followed by the licence getting granted onywye. Luckily, files we’re waiting, I can fill ‘at gap in the market wi’ my ain high-tech transport service.

Noo, there are mony wyes tae travel at low cost in this city – hiding in the spacious footwell of a big black cab, drawing extra wrinkles on yer fizzog and using yer grunny’s bus pass, or nicking a moped aff the Deliveroo boy fan he’s waiting for yer neighbour tae answer the door. But my fleet of ice cream vans (formerly ‘Kev’s Kool Kabs’ noo renamed ‘Slider’) remains the best value around. We da need bus lanes, or taxi-ranks, or the right o’ way.

Uber his come under fire for failing driver background and safety checks. Nae such worries wi’ Slider drivers – they’ve nae had ony o’ those checks in the first place. A’ my drivers is recruited fae a specialised pool. It’s a pool of stale beer oot the back of the Grill, fit is een o’ the few places in Aiberdeen far ye can find mannies that are happy tae drive an ice-cream van wi’ nae MOT very fast intae oncoming traffic.

Uber may hiv GPS and its smartphone app, but that’s discriminating against fowk that dinna hae access tae technology, ken? I hiv achieved the same thing wi’oot the need for a’ that faff by keeping the ice-cream jingles connected up, so you ayewiz ken far we are. Plus, and here’s the clincher for canny Aiberdonians, I keep a few oot o’ date choc ices in the freezer for fan a customer gets the munchies.