Taken aback
A LENZIE reader tells us he was in his local at the weekend when the woman at the next table asked her boyfriend to scratch her back. Eventually he asked her: “Is that ok?”
She merely replied with a terse, “Higher!” so the bold boyfriend couldn’t resist putting on a high squeaky voice and asking again: “Is that ok?”

High as a kite
SOMEHOW the vegetable shortage is bringing out the lettuce jokes as a reader emails us: “It’s a little known fact that Elton John doesn’t like iceberg lettuce – he’s a rocket man. “

A novel approach
ROMANTIC novels company Mills & Boon wants to reverse the decline in people borrowing books from libraries and is launching a campaign to support mobile libraries.
It reminds us of Orkney Library announcing on social media that, despite bad weather, their mobile van would still be out on the road. It stated: “Our mobile library driver is going to be in Costa this afternoon. For those not in Orkney, it’s a place – he’s not skiving off for coffee.”

Steeling himself
COMMONS Speaker John Bercow is getting much praise for declaring that he doesn’t think Donald Trump deserves an invitation to address Parliament. We just hope his power to forecast the future has improved since he was Tory parliamentary candidate in Motherwell in the 1980s and declared on his election leaflet: “Conservatives recognise the crucial importance of the Scottish steel industry. Ravenscraig is now profitable and there is no question of it being closed.”

Driving home the point
OUR tales of Scottish customs officers being kind to fellow Scots reminds our old colleague Alan Hunter: “My school pal Dick Trodden, who joined HM Customs and was based at Dover, stopped a car heavily loaded, low on its springs, which to Dick’s experienced eye, was obviously carrying over-the-limit supplies of booze.
“The driver was from Kelty in Fife, and assured Dick he only had his permitted limits on alcohol, claiming he was skint. 
“He was waved on, with a look of absolute relief on his face, until he was told, ‘Stop – I need to talk to you sir’.
“Dick, always politely spoken, launched into the West Fife patois, telling him, ‘Mind and watch it when ye are gaun roond Kelty junction’.”

Fishy suggestion
OUR jokester colleague tried to put on a serious face as he came over and announced: “Make your partner believe they are on Question Time by hovering a fishing rod above the couch when they talk to you.”

Be prepared
SOME advice sent out by Austrian hotel group Falkensteiner which is worried about holidaymakers on skiing trips licking icicles for a fun photograph – don’t do it. Says the company spokesman: “Before you know it, your tongue will get stuck on the icicle, and seriously so – any saliva that follows will freeze too and make it more and more difficult to get your tongue unstuck.”
We like the fact that the solution is to use a hairdryer to release the tongue. Just the sort of thing you have with you when skiing down a mountain.