Cutting quip
THE Diary adores a highfalutin' yarn about foreign royalty. Our scribes even have a special set of swanky quills we use to write such tales.
Instead of the standard goose quills we normally write with, these are plucked fresh from the wing of a swan. (Tobias, the office swan, isn’t particularly happy about this. Though, in truth, he’s never particularly happy about anything. He’s a miserable creature, who reads far too much Samuel Beckett during his tea break.)
The swan quills we write with are dipped in gold ink before we start scribbling copy on vellum parchment.
All of the above, the Diary now proceeds to do, with this comment from reader Oliver Miller, who says: “I see that Queen Margrethe of Denmark has stripped four of her grandchildren of their royal titles. In regal circles, is this known as an heir cut?”
The number crunch
OUR readers are loyal to a fault. Except when they are being faultily loyal. For example, Finlay Buchanan comes to us, head hanging in shame, to admit that he was almost tempted to purchase a rival, inferior newspaper. (We won’t shame Finlay further by naming the despicable rag.)
What enticed him was an article in the publication which claimed to contain scientific instructions on how to reverse your biological age.
Says Finlay: “What stopped me buying the paper was I realised that reversing my age would make me 96 rather than 69.”
What’s the drama?
WITH Scottish soap opera River City celebrating its 20th anniversary, Gordon McRae wonders if it’s perhaps time the writers introduced fresh themes.
He suggests: “A group of older citizens arrive for a bus tour of Sheildinch in an episode called SagaCity. Then a gallus group of younger folk rock up in an episode titled AudaCity.
Rock of ages
LED Zeppelin-loving reader Nigel Harris gets in touch to point out that: “Every stairway is a stairway to heaven if you're clumsy enough.”
Fairy faux pas
TUCKING her young daughter, Jennifer, into bed, reader Moira McComish promised to read the little girl the fairy story known as The Princess and the Pea.
Jennifer had never heard of that particular tale, and was surprised when mum introduced the narrative by explaining it was about a princess facing discomfort in bed.
“Hadn’t she been potty-trained” enquired Jennifer. “Is that why she needed to pee?”
Jumpy individual
BREAKING news from reader Martin Walton, who says: “Police have confirmed that a man who fell from the roof of a nightclub was not a bouncer.”
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