It's a dog's life

CONGRATULATIONS to Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson who has announced she is pregnant. As Herald reader William Lamont shrewdly observed: "Does this mean that the prospects of the Scottish Tories are on the wean?"

Ruth is not married to her partner Jen, but she once told us the reason was they had put money aside for their wedding, but their pet dog was knocked down. It was either having him put down or using the wedding money to pay for the surgery to save him. They chose the surgery.

Shielding our readers

AND congratulations also to my old chum, and the journalist who took The Diary to giddy heights, Tom Shields, for his lifetime achievement award at the Scottish Press Awards. Tom, who has just written the quirky and well-informed book, 111 Places in Glasgow You Should Not Miss, is remembered by readers for his Diary stories poking gentle fun at the Ayrshire town of Kilwinning. He once wrote about the Kilwinning chap who announced he was getting married and his pal warning him: "No her! Hauf the men in Steventson huv been wi' her!" After a moment's thought he replied philosophically: "Ach it's no that big a place Stevenston."

Gnashing his teeth

DENTURES, continued. Barrie Crawford tells us: "An old friend of the family couldn't find her dentures. After searching up and down, she finally discovered her husband’s dentures still in their box and that he was wearing hers. When she chastised him, his only comment was, 'I wondered why I’d been talking so much!'”

Doing a runner

WE asked for the oddest excuses for being late, and a reader tells us about George Bradford, deputy head at Blantyre High School, who told at his retiral do of the pupil coming in late who told him: "Please sir, I was running that fast I ran right past the school gate."

A gobfull

OUR picture of the closed-down restaurant named Spity reminds Angela Morgan: "The menu at the long burnt down hotel at the Spittal of Glenshee included Spittal Burger and even more enticingly, on the sweet menu, 'Spittal Surprise'. I cannot, I'm afraid, offer any opinion on the actual tastiness of either."

Head case

REARING children, continued. A reader tells us: "I remember taking my nephew to the soft play for the first time Worried about letting him climb on his own I stood at the bottom shouting instructions, and at a point where there was a low ceiling, I shouted, 'Duck Archie duck' to which he turned to me and replied 'quack quack' just as his head bumped into it."

Fair do

THE Herald ran a story about Tories wanting Donald Trump to visit Scotland when he comes to the UK on Friday, July 13. Says Ian Tomney in Glasgow: "It is fairly obvious from the date that Donald Trump’s visit to the UK will be to Scotland. Where else would he go on Fair Friday?"

Hot stuff

OH dear, here comes a colleague who announces: “I left my wife because she drank the last of the drinking chocolate.” I stare at him until he cheerfully adds: “Left me with no Options.”