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One of the sharpest, funniest books ever written about Glasgow Freshers Week, Glasgow University, 1973. Getting on for a half a century ago, and I was swilling about Gilmorehill with hundreds of other hapless 17-year-olds, simultaneously thrilled with myself and absolutely terrified. Swaggeringly confident second-and-third years told us world-weary tales of drinking, political activism and…

Deep-fried, Kevlar crusts, the Domino’s effect and the Brigadoon option Bellshill, Lanarkshire, home to so many of my formative food experiences: The iced drink (ice cream soda) and super frothy, utterly tasteless milky coffee, both products of 1960s and 70s Italian cafes. The pre-gospel meeting Sunday frenzy of phenomenal home baking (Ulster Scottish, courtesy of…

If you like a lot of chocolate on your biscuit… McVitie. Once a Scottish name for a Scottish biscuit, a company founded in Edinburgh and then subject to ever-more-convoluted takeovers until now, with the closure of the factory bearing that name in Tollcross, Glasgow, It’s just a label. The Turkish multinational Yildiz Holdings, rebranded as…

Chittery bites, Troon Swimming Pool and vending machine glories The best soup came out of the Troon Swimming Pool vending machine, all salt, fat, flour, onion powder and, though we wouldn’t have known it then, monosodium glutamate. It was scalding hot and went a little way towards reducing the hypothermic shivers induced by compulsory swimming…

One: Spaghetti junctions Spaghetti came in tins and was luridly orange, tangy-sweet with a sauce which was supposed to be tomato but looked more like it was made from tangerines. Heinz spaghetti. Before hoops, which didn’t arrive in Britain until 1965. Soft, almost soluble pasta in short, swallowable sections. I loved it. Then one day…

It was a Kirkwall summer night in 1991… It’s 30 years since the band Runrig, then at the very peak of their powers, played an open-air gig outside the Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall, Orkney. Thousands attended from throughout the isles, and the concert has become legendary, both for its musical quality and…for the fact that…

An occasional series for would-be urban escapees. 1: the single-track road Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life. And few there be that find it… There are single-track roads throughout rural Britain, and the ones receiving most attention at the moment are those making up the Scottish Highlands’ North…

. The Red Guitar Spotify playlist. From Steve Earle and Neil Young to…Red Guitars: It’s out of print now, my novel Red Guitars in Heaven, though you can buy a used copy easily enough on eBay or Amazon. It has its moments, and a few people liked it a great deal back in 1994, when…

in the summer of 2020, I became a cleaner at the local health centre. Six nights or early mornings a week I vacuumed, scrubbed, mopped, wiped, disinfected and binned. Random thoughts occurred. Hoovering. Havering Hoover. I have hoovered. I will hoover. I have been hoovering. This carpet needs hoovered. Except it’s not a Hoover, of…

Clues to a ‘Shetland’ plotline. The dog can talk! Has anyone figured out the plot? There’s pet food in that fake cake fridge It’s to do with dogs…oh yes! I’ve got It! There’s crap upon the football pitch! A number two by the corner post! They’ve called  Perez; that idle sod Spends maybe half an…