Belter of a story

OUR tales of the tawse remind Sandra Scott: “At Woodside Secondary a very diminutive teacher was brought out of retirement to teach Maths part time. Her way to get silence was to put her belt on the desk and say, ‘Come out anyone who’s talking.’ “One day we decided to call her bluff and the whole class walked to the front at once. She proceeded to belt all 30 of us while shouting, ‘If I die after this, you are all to blame!’”

Put out to grass

EUROMILLIONS winners Colin and Christine Weir are to build a £4m training centre which they will then lease to Partick Thistle, who have never had their own training ground. It reminds us of course of when the players were training in Ruchill Park and a couple of neds were shouting at the players. Chic Charnley told them to come back after training “for a chat”, which they did with a samurai sword, a knife and a fighting dog.

Chic charged the guy with the sword wielding a traffic cone until the ned ran off.

I’m told that Chic was called to the police station but did not pick the ned out in a line-up. When asked why, he replied: “I’m frae Possil, I’m no’ a grass.”

Fishy tale

STV reports that a carer from a Midlothian nursing home has been accused of feeding a resident fish and ice cream mashed together.

James Doleman wonders if she is now working for celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal.

Wave of revulsion

WE’VE mentioned a few withering put-downs. Douglas McIntyre adds: “Our family’s old Aunty Polly occasionally spoke of a girl she was friendly with back in her youth. She would tell us, ‘She was so ugly that even the tide widnae take her oot!’”

Vote for change

MORE on the council elections as we hear that old chum Paul Drury is standing as an independent candidate in Giffnock and Thornliebank to stop a housing development. Paul tells us: “Proof-reading my newsletter, I noticed a mistake in the date of the election. I tried to be polite, and gently suggested to the printer, ‘I think we’ll change the date of the election to May 4.’ “He replied, ‘Wow. No’ even in yet and you can change the Polling Day. Impressive’.”

Keeping him happy

RELATIONSHIP difficulties continued. A Linlithgow reader hears a chap in his local declare: “The wife was screaming at me, ‘I hope you’re happy.’ I don’t think she meant it.”

Picking a fight

THE Herald’s archive picture today of Blackhill reminds us of the police officer who once told of stopping a fight between a father and son in Blackhill in which the son almost sliced his father’s nose off with a machete, and the officer held it in place while waiting for the ambulance.

Explained the polis: “Later in court he made the scurrilous accusation that I told him he shouldn’t have poked his nose into other people’s business. There’s gratitude for you.”