Explosive entertainment

IT’S that day of the year again, when it’s obligatory to stuff earplugs deep in the lugholes. No, not because Ed Sheeran is releasing a new record.

It’s Bonfire Night, when the November sky explodes like James Corden in a New York restaurant.

Of course, Diary aficionados don’t think there’s anything particularly special about a bunch of fireworks romping and rioting overhead. Our lucky readers get to enjoy fireworks every morning, when they eagerly tear open their Herald to read of the incendiary antics of our contributors.

And who needs a Catherine wheel when we supply freewheeling humour?

So ignite your sparkler, huddle close to the bonfire, and brace yourself for explosive entertainment, courtesy of the following classic tales from our archives…

Soulless behaviour

A TALE of the kindly folk of Glasgow town. A local recalled the time he witnessed a chap getting punched unconscious in the middle of the road outside a nightclub. Everyone piled around him, wondering what to do. Then a young woman broke through the crowd, saying, “Let us through, ah know furst aid, let us through.”

She knelt down next to him, unloosened his laces, and said: “Ye awright, pal? Ye awright? Aye, just stay still.”

Then she ran off with his shoes.

Diner on a blow-out

THE dining establishments in Scotland are all very sophisticated. A reader told us his favourite dish served in his local eatery was sausage, beans and chips. It was well known that he preferred his beans cold. One day, after placing his order, he noticed that people who had ordered after him had been served, while he was still waiting.

He caught the barmaid’s eye, and she dashed into the kitchen, reappearing with his dish.

“Sorry,” she apologised, “we were blawn oan yer beans.”

Whither the weather?

A READER on the Isle of Man confirmed that the island moves at a more sedate pace than mainland Britain. He told us: “On one occasion the weatherman on Manx Radio announced: ‘Here is the weather forecast. Oh, I seem to have forgotten to bring it in, so I’ll read out yesterday’s instead’.”

War? What war?

A HISTORY teacher told us he was tempted to give a mark to the pupil sitting an exam who, when asked ‘What ended in 1918?’ wrote £1917".

Supermarket ‘slumming’

A READER was pushing a trolley round a south-side Asda when he heard two women who bumped into each other chatting.

“I thought you normally go to Waitrose?” said one of them.

“I do,” replied the other. “But I couldn’t go to Waitrose dressed like this.”

Flavour most foul

“HAD barbecue-flavoured crisps at the weekend,” said a chap in a Glasgow pub. “Didnae like ‘em. Tasted of grease-covered metal and charcoal.”