Ballet who?

THE highfalutin Diary sashayed off to watch Scottish Ballet’s performance of Cinders! at Glasgow’s Theatre Royal the other night.

We popped into Burger King first, of course, because it’s always best to indulge in a sumptuous feast of elegant cuisine before an evening of classical dance.

The ballet was splendid, with lots of prancing and tippy-toe twirling. (Those are technical terms, which may confuse the layman.)

In a night of marvels, the highlight was undoubtedly the guest appearance by The Herald newspaper, which was projected onto the back curtain at one point.

The Diary expected the entire audience to supply a standing ovation at such a wondrous occurrence, with roars of “Encore, encore! Bravissimo!”

Alas, this did not happen, which leads us to regrettably conclude that ballet audiences are a bunch of boorish philistines.

 

Tinkling the ivories

WE mentioned a toilet mat with piano keys, on which you can genuinely play music.

But what tune to tinkle?

Hilarie McCallum from Falkirk suggests that classic 1970s hit, Yellow River.

 

Dead funny

IN the 1960s reader Rod Owens was an art student in London.

Along with his bohemian buddies he frequented a quirky coffee bar in Wardour Street where the tables were ghoulishly built to look like coffins.

The Roy Orbison hit Only the Lonely was once playing on the jukebox, and one of Rod’s more philosophical companions said: “Well, you can’t get more lonely than sitting next to a coffin.”

Another of Rod’s pals replied: “Actually, you can. Lying inside a coffin is much more lonely - just ask my dead gran. ”

 

Material wealth

“MY cousin is now a man of the cloth,” boasts reader Gareth Hendricks. “He got a job as a window cleaner.”

 

Pep talk

THE 13-year-old grandson of Edinburgh-based reader Tom Cameron is being raised in Manchester, which the Diary believes is some rain-sodden outpost of England.

A quaint and crumbling hamlet, no doubt, though apparently it has a pretty decent football team called Manchester City, who are almost as good as Forfar Athletic.

Tom’s grandson was visiting, and during breakfast he started to boast about Man City’s prowess on the pitch, inspired by the manager, a chap called Pep Guardiola.

Tom’s wife appeared to be taking a keen interest in all this technical footy talk, which is probably why she said to her grandson: “So, do his children call him Pop Guardiola?”

 

Fighting talk

SCOLDING reader Janet Gilbert gets in touch to warn us: “Don’t throw sodium chloride at people. That’s a salt.”