My Texan Gaelic teacher tells me it is fun to get Dwelly’s Scottish Gaelic dictionary and look up words for sheep. She is right! There are words for a small or inferior lamb, draft gimmer, crooked hogg and other sheepish types I’ve never heard of. For a short tailed-ram, pet ewe-hogg and three-winter ewe. You can [...]
“I love you kilt and thistle with your tartan bounty and rich heritage”
Notes from a morning in Portland, Oregon, during which I continue to be perplexed about the fact that people make sporrans — Scottish manbags/kilt accessories ...
Crow’s Feet
This morning I walked up to the library to collect a few books I’d ordered. The books were a lot heavier than I’d expected, so I had to weigh up how much I really wanted today’s tomes. I checked that nobody in the vicinity was doing online bongo lessons like the last time I was [...]
Backdropped
Today I’m in a Venezuelan café where they sell empanadas and play slick R’n’B. I’m drinking very strong coffee that will soon turn me into a crazed monster who will wreak havoc on the world. I’m not supposed to drink coffee. Usually, at this writing slot time, I write in a Starbucks, its bland anonymity [...]
Norm and The Herring Belt
I live in Parkdale. I like to call it Little Scotland, but it’s actually Little Tibet or Little Roma-ville or Little Halfway House. Doing laundry round here can be interesting. There’s a laundry much closer than the big, airy one I trek to at King and Dufferin, but I prefer a laundry where the folding [...]
The Stars of Spencer Avenue
Spencer Avenue has always got something going on. Maybe it’s the vacant eyed guy in the burgundy fedora, preaching damnation as he strides north. Or the six-foot-five man who wears pristine jumpsuits, belted at the waist and tucked into knee high sports socks, might model a fine new cream or taupe number. Or the sweet [...]
Nude, Neon, New Orleans
Ahoy! Here’s a wee snippet of the latest chapter… the second last one. The end is nigh! Let me know what youse think of it. When Maggie and I eventually reach downtown New Orleans, we stroll to Canal Street, the eastern hem of the French Quarter. The street is grand, wide and punctuated by a [...]
Summer nights in Scotland
I was back home in Scotland last week and it was still as bright as (a cloudy Scottish summer day at) midday at 9:30 pm. The evening light is rather delicious. It’s only really dark between about midnight and 4 am at the moment. Twenty hours of brightness is obviously splendid… we just try [...]
Nice One, Hen, or The First Time I Worked At A Fish and Chip Shop
When I was 18, I got a job in a fish and chip shop in Dumbarton, just north of Glasgow. This was a mistake. Dumbarton has a picturesque ruined castle and views of the Highlands, 3196-foot-high Ben Lomond and the River Clyde. I did not see any of these things. I did see a lot [...]
The Somerset Cheddar – part 1
I wrote a story about cheese. I was originally going to make the main character a cantankerous Mature Isle of Mull Cheddar, but to show that I have no hard feelings towards those from south of the border, I made it a story about an English cheese. This is part 1. Click here if you [...]
The Somerset Cheddar – part 2
I wrote a story about cheese. I was originally going to make the main character a cantankerous Mature Isle of Mull Cheddar, but to show that I have no hard feelings towards those from south of the border, I made it a story about an English cheese. This is part 2. Click here to read [...]
Scot shot of the week
Glencoe, driving north towards Ballahulish
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