He had his pie, now he’s had his chips.

Cava Kenny Cordiner, the football pundit who gives you a mouthful

I felt sorrow for rolo-polo goalie Wayne Shaw earlier this week. He’s the hefty substitute custodian for Sutton United what ate a pie on the telly during Monday’s FA Cup tie with Arsenal. It all seemed like a bit of armless fun at the time but next morning it was not armless anymore because it had growed arms. And legs.

It turns out Sutton’s sponsor was offering 8-1 on Shaw eating a pie on TV, and that the pie was laid out especially for him. Football and gambling don’t mix, these days; so poor old Wayne has shot himself in the sword and had to fall on his foot.

I recall when I was at Brechin we was sticking Alloa at Glebe Street, and the bookies took several unusually large bets that I would get my marching orders in the second half.  The beaks was notified and they watched the game with compound interest to see if old Kenny was playing with a stray bat.

Of course I never knew nothing about no bets and thankfully I proved my incontinence by not getting sent off in the second half. Happily, I chinned their left back early doors and got sent off in the third minute.

J Fergus Lamont, Arts Critic and Author of “Did I Mention I Ken Rod Stewart? – The Ricky Simpson Story”

I noticed, when thumbing through the latest copy of the Michelin Guide, that one of Scotland’s foremost restaurants had attained coveted Michelin star status.  You may not have heard of it – it lies well off the beaten track and is the destination de choix of only the true insider – but The Horn Restaurant and Milkbar is at the very cutting edge of modern cuisine, its rooftop Fresian simulacrum luring customers in off the A90 like an ungulate Siren.

“Magnificent!” I cried, much to the surprise of everyone else in Waterstones, and, deciding I could not go another day without again savouring the Horn’s extraordinary fare, I leapt into my jalopy  and took off down the road.  I screeched to a halt by the door and fairly sprinted into the restaurant.  “A bacon roll!”  I demanded of the adolescent server, who, I am pleased to say, was as plooky and surly as tradition demands.  And then it happened.  She opened up the be-margarined bap before her, and forced in not one, not two, but three tongs-full of brittle bacon scraps.  “Bravo!” I cried, causing a nervous lady of a certain age to choke upon a tattie.

After the ambulance had gone, I spoke to the owner, asking why the coveted Michelin star was not on display.  He asked me what on earth I was blithering on about.  It transpires that it was not the Horn which has been awarded a Michelin star; but a restaurant in Horn, on the Germany-Luxembourg border.  Laughing, I took another bite of my bap, and a shard of bacon lanced its way into the gap between my teeth, embedding itself in my gum.
I wept.

Prof Hector Schlenk, Senior Researcher at the Bogton Insitute for Public Engagement with Science

As a scientist, people often ask me questions like ‘Can you assist at the SPECTRA festival?’ ‘Are you sure this ground covering is thick enough?’ and ‘Oh for goodness sake, when will this grass grow back?’  As I write these words, I am very excited.  In fact, I’m beside myself.  Thanks to the little cloning experiment I’ve spent the afternoon on.  What inspired me was the exciting news that Harvard boffins are but two years away from cloning a woolly mammoth. Or to be more exact, a hybrid of elephant and mammoth. A ‘mammophant’. This is not a real word, but it is real news, at which I felt a hybrid of enthusiasm and delirium, or ‘deliriasm’. This is also not a real word, but is a real emotion that I often feel upon reading scientific announcements.

This being the North-East of Scotland in February, and my heating being on the blink again, I could immediately see the advantages in a covering of mammoth-like woolly hair, and so decided to try my hand at cloning a more hirsute version of myself.  Having quickly shredded and stuck my wife’s mohair jumper to a papier-mâché replica of myself, I only await the next lightning strike to bring the homunculus to life. Mrs Schlenk was so excited by what had become of her sweater she left almost immediately.  I shall not repeat the hybrid of things that she called me as she left but I suspect ‘Blutcase’ is not a real word either.