IN 1973 Douglas Johnston and some other adults took a group of children from the less salubrious part of Woodlands, Glasgow, to the Police Tattoo to broaden the youngsters’ knowledge of the constabulary.

As soon as the little mites entered the Kelvin Hall they scattered in all directions.

When they were finally located it was noticed that these fine examples of Glasgow youth had managed to accrue some keepsakes from the day.

“It took some time to convince them that stealing motorcycle gloves from the back of a police motorcycle was not a good career move at a Police Tattoo,” sighs Douglas.

With some reluctance the pint-sized pilferers replaced the items before they were missed.

The numbers racket

A DIARY mention of Manfred Mann’s 1960s pop hit Do Wah Diddy Diddy reminds Brian Logan, from Langside, Glasgow, of another of the group’s songs, 5-4-3-2-1, where the numbers were repeated multiple times with precious few lyrics in between.

Brian recalls Larry Marshall, of TV's The One O’Clock Gang, saying he had been offered the chance to record the song first, but declined as he couldn’t remember the lyrics.

Furball throw-up

PHILOSOPHICAL thought of the day from Russell Smith, from Largs, who asks: “Can a cat be as sick as a dog?”

Nasty knees-up

UNFORTUNATE reader Bob Jamieson received knee replacement surgery recently. His recuperation involves exercise (yeuch!) and stretching (urgh!) three times a day (ooyah!).

Bob’s no shirker, so a few days ago he got to work putting his knee through its paces, and (hooray!)

the exercises suddenly felt much easier.

“I put that down to my strict routine,” says Bob with some pride. With slightly less pride he adds: “Then I realised it was the wrong knee. Perhaps it’s the brain that needs exercising.”

(Drat.)

By royal decree

THE Queen has stated she would like Camilla to be known as Queen Consort when Charles becomes King. We recall Glasgow comedy writer and director Armando Iannucci saying the full title should be Camilla, Queen, dynamite with a laser beam.

Gone to putt

WE continue celebrating the arcane lingo of golf. A reader tells us that when putting, the etiquette is for the person furthest from the hole to go first. If the putt is short the same player goes again, which is known as a dead sheep.

The reason being that the other player gleefully announces: "Still youse"

Handling a hero

CONCERNED reader May Chandler gets in touch to ask: “When Superman was a child, did he always have supervision?”