Advice to new parents: the first and most important lesson that you need to learn is that you will never win, so pick your battles carefully. And the second lesson is that no matter what you do for your kids, it’s what you don’t do that they’ll chastise you for in the future. And if… Read more »
Posts Categorized: HNM Column
Charlie Hebdo. Free speech, or offensive? You decide.
As I write, it’s just over a week since we watched the moving images from Paris; tens of thousands of people gathered in the city centre to commemorate the lives of those killed when radicalised gunmen attacked the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo. If we hadn’t known much about Charlie Hebdo before, we learned about… Read more »
The discovery of…nothing new at all.
That’s it. Life in the Marr household is reverting to our version of normal after the Christmas holidays, and Daughter #1 has packed everything that wasn’t nailed down and taken it back to her student flat in Glasgow. Although she has been away before, this holiday was the first time we have experienced living with… Read more »
Being busy is no virtue. And I’m adopting Hygge…
New Year’s Resolutions. Love them or loathe them, they’re all over the place this week. We’re either smugly avoiding them, or smugly avoiding alcohol, cigarettes and animal products, and updating our Facebook statuses accordingly. Before the turn of the year I grandly declared that my resolution for 2016 was to start saving the planet. It… Read more »
The Moray Badge – and poking around great Scottish buildings
It’s over 30 years since I completed my Duke of Edinburgh Bronze badge, but I still remember the first DofE meeting we had at school. The school technician took us into the lab between two of the biology classrooms and started to unfold OS maps. He then handed them over to us, and asked us… Read more »
Paris inspired resolution and 2015 in review
Entertainment Review of the Year It’s time to look back at the best of 2015. Here, for what it’s worth, are my entertainment highlights. Do any of them match yours? Best film: Quantum Love. I caught this French gem at November’s Inverness Film Festival – a glorious story of attraction between a married man and… Read more »
Modern Day Adventurers. Mad, or inspirational?
At this time of year the majority of us will be finding it a challenge to finish the Christmas shopping while holding down a full-time job, keeping a vaguely sanitary house and maintaining genial relationships with friends and family. But one 35 year old former policeman is facing a bigger challenge. On 30th December Ben… Read more »
Bridges, boozy heroes and bah-humbug
Who would have thought that the closure of a bridge could be quite so entertaining to the outside world? I’m sure there will be a huge amount of inconvenience for regular commuters until the Forth Road Bridge opens at the beginning of January, but I am pleased to see that the residents of both sides… Read more »
Keep Christmas contained! And fun with albums…
So far, this is what I know about Christmas 2015. Daughter #1 is coming home from Glasgow University to grace us with her presence for ‘a few days’. Her ambitious social plans for the rest of her holidays haven’t been finalised yet, so we can’t guarantee that she’ll still be with us for Hogmanay. We… Read more »
In praise of books – and drama over a prayer
As soon as you have finished reading this column, I have a suggestion for you. Put away your laptop/phone/tablet (you can come back to it later) and pick up a book. Make yourself comfortable (I recommend a cup of tea, a blanket and a hot water bottle) and switch off your phone. And the telly…. Read more »