Bottled it

THE Herald reported that parents' groups and charities are calling for the trend of giving teachers Christmas presents from pupils to be stopped because it puts families under financial pressure. It reminds us of the primary teacher in Drumchapel who had been given the usual pile of chocolates and bubble bath from her class when one of her more colourful 10-year-olds sidled up, confiding: "Ah wis gauny get ye a Christmas present, miss . . . but ah'm no' auld enough tae go in the shop and buy a bottle of Lambrini fur ye."

Takes the biscuit

SAYS Bob Stewart: "Your items on cute remarks by children reminded me that recently our four-year-old great-granddaughter was caught by her mother raiding the biscuit tin. On receiving the inevitable scolding the little one retorted, 'Mummy! You have to learn to share!'"

Sized him up

BBC newsreader Richard Baker has died at the age of 93. He wrote in his biography about the shock of newsreaders becoming personalities and being stopped in the street by the public who asked for autographs. He did add though that once in Glasgow someone in the street saw him and cried: "It is! It's no'!" The fan then reached the loud conclusion: "It is! Wee fatty!"

Mums the word

AUTHOR Barbra Paskin has just published a book on the late entertainer Dudley Moore, entitled Dear Dudley, which includes copies of the many letters that celebrities sent him to cheer him up on his 64th birthday when he was ill. We liked the one from Des O'Connor who reminded Dudley in his letter: "I remember you telling me what your mum said when she saw you nude in the film '10'. 'Oh Dud, I saw all your bits and pieces and I haven't seen those since you were a baby... and you haven't changed a bit.' I'm still getting laughs in concerts with that story."

Cup runneth over

THE word came up in a Diary story yesterday and reminded Margaret Thomson: "I was visiting a friend, and she asked her daughter to make coffee for us. 'Will I make instant or catheter coffee?' asked the girl. We opted for instant!"

Doggy tale

GREAT to see the statue unveiled at Saltcoats to Celtic's unassuming Lisbon Lion Bobby Lennox. We recall that when Bobby produced his autobiography, Thirty Miles From Paradise, he was doing a signing in a Dundee bookshop where a Celtic fan came in with two German Shepherds. Staff were about to tell him about their no-dogs policy when the chap told Bobby: "I named them after you – Bobby and Lennox."

Bobby was well chuffed, until the publishers' representative with him said: "I was going round book signings with Rangers' John Greig last year and we met lots of guys who had been named 'Greig' after their father's hero – you only got dugs!"

Just pants

EVEN though I was typing furiously to get this written for the deadline, it didn't stop a colleague from coming over and interrupting. When I finally looked up he declared: "My wife hates it when I put her chocolate bars in other sweet wrappers."

I just stare until he adds: "It gets her Snickers in a Twix."

Butter them up

WE mentioned being posh in Glasgow's west end, and a reader there reminisces: "In the old days the description of 'posh' was when one used the butter knife even when dining alone. How things change."