WHATEVER happened to Johann Lamont, the former Scottish Labour Party leader? Our contact at the annual STUC Women's Conference in Dundee tells us: "Johann was one of the guest speakers. Surveying the delegates in the hall she remarked, to laughter, that she, 'wasn't used to such a big audience these days.' Speaking about gender equality, she went on to say that she was proud of, not just Kezia Dugdale but First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and Ruth Davidson, all of whom represented 'a modern and new Scotland.' She also recalled that, when she first joined the Labour Party in Scotland, no one seemed to think it was odd that the person who was the party's Women's Officer was a man.

YOU can tell the Panto season is about to begin as the various characters are having their photographs in the newspaper. Reader Dougie McNicol in Bridge of Weir remarks: "Seeing the panto picture in The Herald, featuring David Hasselhoff, and Janet Tough as Wee Jimmy Krankie, I couldn't help but ask myself - is this the first ever photograph of The Hoff and a hauf-pint?

A READER overhears a group of women in a west end bar discussing exercise with one of them enthusiastically claiming: "Yoga helps you look and feel better naked."

One pal who was not convinced replied: "So does vodka."

OUR mention of the famous footballers from the Ayrshire mining village of Glenbuck reminds Brian Donohoe of another Ayrshire mining hamlet, Lethanhill. Says Brian: "I remember my father who was Heidie of the school also took the football in Lethanhill. On picking the team however, no one wanted to be winger. Strange you might think, but there was apparently women with umbrellas on the touchline who whacked you if you got by their team. It wasn't a pleasant experience, especially if they managed to get it hooked around your leg."

AUDIENCE questions continued. Says John Crawford: "Thirty years ago the Institute of Waste Management was holding a meeting in Hamilton, at the time when the new automatic public conveniences were being introduced, and the manufacturers' senior technician from France gave a flawless presentation about the circuitry and mechanisms involved. When he’d finished he took questions from the audience including one from a Central Belt councillor, ‘how d’ye ken the door wullnae open when yir hivin a dump?’

"The chairman thought it best to pursue this with the councillor over lunch rather than try to explain the question to the presenter."

OUT shopping in Glasgow the other day, a reader heard a woman walking in front of him tell her partner about a fantastic sunrise she had witnessed the other day, and that it was a pity he missed it. "Sheila," the chap emphatically replied. "There is no sunrise so beautiful that is worth waking me up to see it."