Streets ahead
WE were sad to hear of the death of world-renowned theatre director Peter Brook. It’s over 30years since his version of the Hindu epic The Mahabharata was staged at the Old Transport Museum, now called the Tramway.
Reader Mary Gilbert saw the11-hour drama with her husband, and asked for his opinion as they were leaving.
“Reminds me of Coronation Street,” he said. “Goes on for ever.”
Inflation and deflation
THE Diary recently discovered that the UK has been dragged back to the 1970s, an era when inflation was higher than your average skyscraper – though there were very few average skyscrapers around in the 70s, because everyone involved in constructing them was on strike.
Luckily the office workers who should have been queuing up to work in the skyscrapers not being built were also on strike, so everything balanced out perfectly. (As the journalists of the time would undoubtedly have reported if they hadn’t been on strike.)
With such an enervating epoch returning, we’re making a list of things in the 70s that were just a bit rubbish.
Jennifer Patton recalls the Space Hopper, a rubbery ball-like contraption that was a mode of transport for children.
“I thought mine would bounce higher than trees and boing over houses,” says Jennifer. “Instead it wobbled. And lilted. Then deflated… making me feel seriously deflated, too.”
Credit crunchy
ON the subject of inflation… Reader Tom Byrne sends us a receipt from a newsagents in Glasgow city centre, where he was charged £6.99 for one bag of crisps.
“I shouldn’t have been shocked,” admits Tom. “Especially when I spotted the name of the crisps on the packet… they’re called Cheetos.”
Niffy yet nifty
OUR readers occasionally accidentally pick up a competitors’ publication, briefly flick though its pages, then scurry back to The Herald for its pithier, punchier, more pristine prose.
David Donaldson stumbled upon an article in one rival rag, where he read of an Edinburgh chap’s house being flooded by "rancid sewage".
“Is there any sewage that isn’t rancid?” wonders David. “I suppose in Edinburgh they have a more fragrant class of sewage. Come to think of it, isn't the whole of Morningside fairly effluent?”
Wee book
OUR Book Nook continues to do a roaring trade, with readers promoting top tomes to peruse. Brian Crook from Bearsden suggests that Middle Eastern classic Stop Over In The Desert by Mustafa Pee.
Footering about
TRAINEE entertainer Nigel Russell says: “I'm nervous about covering my boss’s clown shift this Friday. Those are huge shoes to fill.”
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