Where are all the parents? I’ve been looking for them, but in vain. Oh there are plenty at the school gate at the end of the day, and sitting by beds in the children’s wards in hospitals wearing worried expressions. There are plenty in the supermarkets in the evenings, both working the checkouts and trawling… Read more »
Posts Categorized: HNM Column
On Good Friday I met a dead body. A moving experience…
This is going to sound gruesome, but on Good Friday I touched my first dead body. To say I was nervous would be an understatement, but it felt like the right thing to do. It was in a clinical environment, but it was strangely moving. And the longer I was with the body, the more… Read more »
Losing my Football Virginity at the Highland Derby
Losing my football virginity So when you watch football on the telly, or listen to the commentary on the radio, in the background, there is always singing. And accompanying that singing, keeping the lads on time and in high spirits, is usually a drummer. You hear the drum – it is meant to be loud,… Read more »
Promoting female led businesses, and Dunblane’s legacy
Introducing Hilary Clinton at a presidential rally in New Hampshire a few days ago former US secretary of state Madeleine Albright used a line she has quoted many times before; ‘there’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other.’ Her aim was to encourage American women to unite behind the candidate… Read more »
Coffeegate…and Real Mum Moments
Coffeegate. At least it’s not as bad as the #GOPDebate… It’s a struggle. I mean, where can you get a decent cup of coffee these days? Not in the committee rooms in Holyrood, that’s for sure – well at least not according to Highland MSP Mary Scanlon, who raised the matter in The Scottish Government… Read more »
When did the Oscars stop being about films?
Keep Politics out of the Oscars! I’m just wondering – when was it that The Oscars stopped being about films and became all about politics? On Monday morning it was too much like hard work trying to find out who had won what. Call me old fashioned, but I was actually interested to know what… Read more »
Tough call for Council Cuts
The first rule of economics, usually learned at the ‘pocket money’ stage of life, is that you can’t spend what you don’t have. If you don’t have the money to pay for sweeties or a toy, you have to save or earn more to make up the shortfall, and until then, you do without. The… Read more »
Who would be a farmer these days?
Who would be a farmer these days? It was a question I posed at the Drumossie Hotel, Inverness last week to a room full of invited guests – farmers, rural business owners and food producers – at the launch of a new initiative which aims to reconnect consumers with the people who grow and rear… Read more »
£50K+ to rescue Archers’ Helen Titchener.
Social media gets a bad press. I’m constantly hearing people (who are usually older than me) blaming it for ‘youngsters’ becoming increasingly isolated from real life, and unable to hold a ‘proper’ conversation, either because they’ve got their nose in their phone, or because they’re not familiar with having actual to and fro dialogue with… Read more »
Celebrity death. Is it ok to mourn?
I’m almost nervous that by writing this I’m tempting fate, but I’m hoping that February will be less cruel in terms of celebrity losses than the first month of 2016. January’s death register was star-studded indeed; David Bowie, Alan Rickman and The Eagles’ Glen Frey, and at the weekend, broadcasting legend Terry Wogan. I don’t… Read more »