Well, not only was it double trouble for dress etiquette at last week’s Guild of Agricultural Burns Supper – but it was a triple apparel disaster – and compounded by the fact that two of the three wearers also had the same coat! 
Now, while the labels might have been different, to all intents and purposes (at least going by what men were able to ascertain), the dresses that Erika Hay, Carol McLaren and Sarah Anderson wore to great effect, all looked the same. Having said that, the men were their usual shambolic selves.
And, we can report some fine fare courtesy of QMS (for the biggest haggis ever seen) to the sirloin of beef supplied by ABP’s Frank Ross and cooked to perfection by the kitchen at John Milligan’s Ballathie House Hotel, at Stanley, near Perth. Some of the speeches weren’t half bad either.

Watch the birdie ...
‘SAY cheese!’ was the order of the day for Muller UK’s communication director, Graeme Jack, at the wedding of his nephew, Aaron Swan and his new wife, Charlotte, both of Laurencekirk, in Aberdeen, last weekend 
Not for them the traditional wedding cake. Instead, a beautifully sculptured cake comprising five tiers of a range of different cheeses made for a less than traditional ‘cake-cutting’. According to a wedding ‘insider’, the cheese came from Muller’s main rival, Arla! However, it was deemed ‘real tasty’ as not a crumb was left by the end of the night.
However, Muller were not to be totally outdone, the toasts were washed down with Muller’s full cream milk.


... commune with 
the birdies
I DON’T know whether this is just another way of telling us that ‘yer no’ getting penicillin’ by the medical profession, but apparently they are trying to tell us that getting out and mixing with animals and nature, can make us healthier.
Instead of drugs and steroids, the ‘Prescriptions for Nature’ scheme, as piloted by NHS Shetland, could be rolled out across Scotland. It recommended that some patients should get out and about, take in the scenery and commune with nature as a way of keeping them healthy.
Docs give you a prescription of how far you should walk etc and how long to spend outdoors. However, I can’t help thinking that by carrying this out in Shetland, it was preaching to the converted as they already have a fairly active outdoor lifestyle. Maybe they should have tried it in Govan, Gorgie or Garthdee?