SITTING up here in our eyrie on the 10th floor, quietly sipping a glass of vintage champagne, Dom Perignon 2002 if you must know, and looking over to the Haughs of Cromdale, we silently mused on last week's edition of this blatt and had a sudden fillip from a headline near the back page which read, "Coach praises Strathie's fantastic performance." We found ourselves wondering aloud just which coach had read our work and been justly impressed with our clever use of language and pithy humour.
Further inspection of the article disabused us of any flattering critique in our sports pages as it turned out that the coach was Kincraig's Mark Lynch, the short answer to rugby, and the 'Strathie' in question was Strathspey Rugby Club.
Even in our distressed state, having discovered it was no paean of praise for this column, we still continued to read the article - demonstrating a strength of character that would surprise you all - only to discover that Strathie had been beaten by the Grampian Police side by 27-7 points.
The problem is that should Mark ever describe this column as fantastic, we will find ourselves in a lather of confusion about what exactly he means. Perhaps he'll tell us before too long.
OUR more politically-aware readers will know that local community councils are having elections in the very near future, and it is fair to say that even amongst community council members a degree of confusion exists.
Hot off the press we hear that in many cases Highland Council has not received sufficient nominations to make a viable council in some areas.
To use their own words more or less: "If the number of candidates elected is less than half of the total maximum permitted membership no community council will be established at that time."
This means that some of you out there are in danger of losing your local voice. Unfortunately, the closing date for nominations was yesterday (Tuesday) before this newspaper hits the streets - or to be more accurate, falls off the back of a lorry outside your newsagent - so we have left it too late to warn you.
They say in life that timing is everything, and here we have failed, but maybe not quite as spectacularly as Highland Council.
In many cases local council members are elected by default or to use an older term 'press-ganged' and Highland Council has chosen to disband all the watchdogs at the same time.
The cost of the election is being met by Highland Council, but many of the watchdogs look like evaporating into political thin air as people are taking the opportunity to step down.
We can't help feeling that maybe in these days of uncomfortable belt-tightening, possibly a severe critic might just criticise the timing.
WE two on the 10th floor take great pride in our rooftop garden.
It has in the past been likened to a rap star's hangout, and in all fairness we did for a while live on the wilder side of life, parties every third night and even stayed up late on a Friday.
However, that is all behind us now, the pampas grass has been confined to the dustbin, sod the gold-plated pool steps - we managed to fashion a set of passable solar panels from them.
No, instead we have turned the place into a veritable haven for wildlife, an absolute oasis.
And so it was whilst sitting out in the glorious summer weather we have had over the last seven hours, lazily viewing all our little wildlife critter friends we were lost in bucolic paradise.
Exactly an hour later the mood in our garden of tranquility had changed dramatically. Having logged onto our online news service, just in case some news had happened, our attention was caught by the headline "Squirrel meat served at Edinburgh restaurant".
Apparently The Spoon café bistro in the capital is doing good trade in the stuff and the owner reckoned that as grey squirrels were being killed in an attempt to protect the native red squirrels then it made sense to eat them.
Catching each other's sideways glance it was immediately apparent what we were both thinking.
Rather than a haven for wildlife who simply cost us money, with some inexpensive electric fencing and a bit of imagination we could have our very own squirrel meat farm.
All we had to do is lure the wee beasties in with the promise of some peanuts, slam the trapdoor shut, and then fatten them up for market on a diet of lard and beer.
The only flaw we could see regarding the plan was that up here we only have red squirrels and to be honest they do garner a fair bit of public sympathy.
But then again, surely all squirrels are red once you get there wee furry jackets off aren't they? Food for thought.
We should like to make it clear that no squirrels were harmed, neither physically nor emotionally during the culling of this article, (well one did faint but we loosened his collar a wee bit and he seemed to perk up)
OUR caption competition with the photograph of Highland Wildlife Park's favourite resident, Walker the polar bear, received a few entries and we struggled to decide which should be the winner.
Eventually using a complex system of scoring that involved a ping pong ball, a cup, a bucket and a wet wellington boot we decide on the one shown below from Frank Spencer of Kincraig.
There were some other good ones which we will mention here.
Debbie Michie suggested,"So Walliams swims Thames an amazing feat. I take my hat off to him but it ain't as amazing as these feet!"
Sandra Irvine from Nethy Bridge offered, "What happened to my lilo?".
Lastly Margaret Pearson tells us that she thinks Walker could be thinking, "If I keep up this training I'll be swopping this blue thing for Olympic Gold!''.
All good but we have to pick just one as the winner.
DON'T forget to tell us all the embarrassing stuff about your friends. We keep our ears to the ground but all we get is our heads run over. Be a mole. Foolscap needs moles. Keep in touch with us at foolscap@btinternet.com.
