‘Beast from the East’? – it’s a snow storm, not an all-in wrestler fae Arbroath.

Cosmo Ludovik Fawkes-Hunt, 13th Earl of Kinmuck

Well, strap me to a snowplough and call me Gerald, what a lot of tommyrot has been bleated in the last couple of days about a spot of inclement weather. Chaos, disruption, trains cancelled and schools closed; a whole lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth merely because some lily-livered central belters have got a bit of the white stuff to contend with. Depressingly, even up here in the normally resilient North-East of the country we’ve got panic stations. The Met Office have issued a ‘Yellow Snow’ Warning, which I usually only have to worry about when I’m taking the hounds out for a canter at Christmas and inadvertently stand downwind.

Now, you all know me, I’m not one to be prejudiced, unless it’s against foreigners, but this is not even traditional British snow, such as that described by Dickens. Instead I read it’s the distinctly sub-standard imported Russian variety. Well, call me bonkers, but I thought Brexit was meant to put a stop to this sort of thing? We don’t want Eastern European snow coming over here, taking away the livelihood of hard working British sleet and hail. But as ever, we allow Johnny Arctic Blast to waltz in and lower our temperatures without so much as an attempt to learn the language or integrate into our way of life.

Back in the good old days we had proper British snow-drifts. I still recall the winter of ’79, trudging 10 miles to prep school through 5 feet of snow with my 4 foot Nanny; and she wasn’t the only one we lost that winter. Perhaps I am made of hardier stuff thanks to the Kinmuck family pile being here in the frozen north, but I take a very dim view of “snow days” and bleating about it all on the news. ‘Red Alert – risk to life is likely’ indeed. What piffle! Whatever happened to rolling up one’s sleeves, pulling up one’s socks, and just getting on with the work in hand, whatever the weather? Not that I do any work, of course. I have the staff do that sort of thing for me. But dash it all, they sleep in unheated outbuildings, and I don’t hear them complaining. Though, now I think about it, I haven’t heard or seen anything at all from them since Tuesday.

Cava Kenny Cordiner, the football pundit who takes a bit of everything

“And sent them homeward, tae sink a gin”. Old Kenny is still on a high after watching the egg chasing down at Murrayfield at the weekend. I was busting with pride when the boys in blue stuffed the auld enema! I’m not normally a big fan of rugby, but when one of your pals lays on a VIP coach trip, pre-match hostility and 5 star digs, I’d honestly go and watch a scrabble tournament!

The Scots was superb and got torn into the English right from the let-go. And fair play to the ref, he had loads of big decisions to make and he done the right thing every time, by giving them all in Scotland’s favour. So for the first time in 10 years we got our hands on the Calculator Cup, which is a funny name for a trophy, but fair play – it is a headache adding up all that different points for penalties, trys and conversations.

At the match I got a shot of one of that special high-tech headrests that allows you to hear what the ref is saying to the players. It got me wondering what it would have been like if fans in the stands had been able to hear all the things the refs used to say to me when I was playing… “Watch yoursel Kenny”, “That’s a yellow Kenny”, “Sorry Kenny, you’ve got to go”, “No Kenny – get your hands off me!” “Help!”
It’s just a shame that the Dandies never matched the rugby team when they was sticking Celtic on Sunday. Once again they copulated to the bhoys in green and white. To make matters worse, Aberdeen’s latest signing got his jotters for trying to half Scott Brown. That’s just not good enough at this level – if you’re going to get a red for a tackle on Scott Brown, you’ve got to make sure you catch him properly!

See the Flying Pigs live at HMT Aberdeen in ‘Now That’s What I Call Methlick!‘ June 2018. Tickets available now.