Winning ways
THE men’s kickyball league in Scotland has become somewhat stale and predictable lately. And by lately we mean the last hundred years or so.
Celtic and Rangers covetously transfer the top trophies back and forward to each other, immersed in a private game of pass the parcel, where the party music never stops.
Thrill a minute has turned into thrill a millennium.
Which is why the Diary prefers watching women’s footy, which is far more exciting.
Reader Foster Evans shares our passion for the ladies’ Premier League, and says: “Any team with Priscila Chinchilla (Midfield, Glasgow City) or Chelsea Cornet (Midfield, Rangers) deserves to be a success.”
Green goes blue
MOVIE-MAD Diary correspondent David Donaldson sat down to watch The Banshees Of Inisherin on Prime one evening, and was astonished at the amount of swearing that goes on in this flick set in a rural corner of the Emerald Isle in the 1920s.
Says David: “Watch it and you'll never call the Irish country folk of yore feckless again.”
Stretching the truth
WE’RE discussing Management Speak, those numerous occasions when bosses botch the supposedly simple job of communicating with their underlings.
Says Ian Noble from Carstairs Village: “I used to have a boss who, if I said anything approaching hyperbolic, would reply, ‘I’ve told you a million times – don’t exaggerate.’”
Grammar goner
WHEN it comes to protecting the English language, Diary readers are pugnaciously pedantic. They hate to see the mother tongue mangled, mauled or minced.
Alas, it may be too late to save our majestic lingo, claims Sally Grey from Eaglesham, who adds: “The days of people using proper grammar has come and went.”
Playful ambition
AN intriguing suggestion from Fife playwright David Greig, who says: “As well as a bucket list you should also compile a Beckett List of all the best bits from the great man's plays which you intend to enact before you die. My first is "sit in a bin and shout at my wife".”
Stolen childhood
CONFUSED Rab Gibson from Falkirk tells us that a popular phrase he doesn’t really understand is "legally adopted". Says Rab: “It’s not as though you can be illegally adopted, is it? That’s just kidnapping.”
Key to confusion
“WHEN nobody is looking,” says reader Barry Cooper, “I like to swap the A and E keys on people's keyboards in the office. Some people might claim that I'm an immature prankster, though I categorically deny this is the case. I'm an immetura prenkstar.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here