Duncan Harley

Celebrated each year on January 25 th  Burns night is an annual Scottish fixture extraordinaire. The supermarket shelves are full of the traditional and, of course, essential accompaniments to the bard’s memory. Not perhaps for the faint hearted, the haggis features strongly on eye-level shelves and on the dinner tables of those who choose to recall the impact the bard had on the folklore of the Scottish Nation. In his short time on this earth, Burns commented on every subject known to man at that time - from winsome witches to wee timorous beasties. He even inspired an Inverbervie born ship-designer to name The Cutty Sark in his memory. Robert Burns was of course almost certainly a fan of a dram as this extract from John Barleycorn clearly illustrates: “John Barleycorn was a hero bold, Of noble enterprise; For if you do but taste his blood, 'Twill make your courage rise. 'Twill make a man forget his woe; 'Twill heighten all his joy; 'Twill make the widow...

It’s really interesting to take an in depth think about links and friends on FB. Most folk are completely above board, completely honest and of course completely and utterly respectful. Why would they not be and what motive, if indeed they have one, would they have for being otherwise. Mind you, there are what I think of as the ‘users’. You probably know a few. Post a comment and, like it or not, before long they start promoting a product on the back of it. When you ‘like’ their site or their page you become aware of some underlying issue or other. It might be entrapment, in which case those intent on capitalising on your comment will no doubt pounce on the opportunity. Or, it might be simply a case of being remiss. I don’t really know; and perhaps I am being completely unfair. After all, we all need to put food on the dinner table don’t we. A very few FB friends, or indeed FB pages are guilty of the offence – so please, please don’t get too paranoid. I had a cull a few months ag...

Much of the fun in the penning of a book is in the reading of the final published text. Newspaper articles and magazine features pale into insignificance when your tome makes those dusty and hallowed bookshelves for the very first time. Not that it beats child-birth and not that I have experienced that first hand, although I have a couple of sons and can vividly recall the exhilaration of getting to know them both for the first time. So, yes, a book is different and not quite on the same scale at all. But, and I say this with all sincerity, it is still a big rush to cast an eye over the published product and hold that thought ‘I made this happen.’ Here is the introduction to The A-Z of Curious Aberdeenshire in its entirety. On the re-reading, I might have wished for a couple of changes. But hey, in the big scheme of things, it’s not at all a bad piece of writing: ‘The folklore and the history of Aberdeenshire make for interesting reading. Invading armies have come and gone and ...