Golf Tango Foxtrot

There is a metal bridge on Castle Terrace in Aberdeen over a railway line that leads to the docks. Two performers on either side of the road use rubber-faced hammers to make the plates and webs of the bridge sound. Performance is ad libitum and underscored by ground bass of passing traffic. Afterwards the performers refresh themselves with a pint in the Prince of Wales public house.

Clouds Over Strathmore A fleet of lenticular clouds Process across Strathmore Alien spaceships Pinkened by the evening sun Their lights go out one by one - I drive to the west and enjoy. From My Kitchen I marvel through the window As freshly turned furrows Smoke in the sun The fence falls down minute by minute I remember the Gean tree that felled it. The Gean Tree Blown down in the Big Wind You blossomed yet for two more years You brought Spring, you! Two years was all you got  For a chainsaw to tick you off its list

It’s been a while. For this blog at least.  We have been busy in other spheres.  The rumour that we went to jail again is unfounded.  The word is busy. Busy +++. Bands, day jobs, consulting, contracting, agitating, politicking, making trouble.  That has been the watchword of the day. Since we last updated GTF, the Smurph has been appointed to be leader of “Scottish” Labour, whatever that may be.  It is simply an accounting unit within the great british Her Majesty's loyal opposition Labour Party. Murphy of course is a career politician.  He has never had any other kind of a job.  Like me (I am slightly older) he benefitted from a public policy of Grants for students.  We got our education at the public expense.  When an official of the National Union of Students Murphy was one of those who strove to ensure there would be no opposition to the abolition of grants. One difference between Murphy and myself is that the public has ...

One of the great attractions of Dundee for me is the fact that even though I live thirty five miles away I can always be sure to run into someone I know. Like this afternoon.  I went to down to attend a public rally against the Scottish Defence League neo-nazis who had been threatening to march through the City. When I got there it was pretty well a damp squib.  The nazis had cancelled their march a couple of days before and no-one had got round to telling the cops that the counter-march from our side had similarly been cancelled. With a result the the city centre was crawling with cops and a handful of anti-fascists who had come to join a static rally which in the hinder end didn’t happen. Undeterred I had a quick blether with some acquaintances and turned about to have a wander round Dundee’s historic toon centre when who did I meet but some friends from Banchory.  We exchanged news on the continuing Yes campaigns in our respective areas and headed off on o...

"It was the Day of Days, it was the Hour of Hours". The day of reckoning has arrived. The day for those who have been marginalised, ignored , condescended to and attacked by governments that they did not vote for. The day for those who have been deserted by a party that claimed the right to speak on their behalf while sucking up to the wealthy. The day that we have the chance to show that our vote counts this time and that things will never be the same again. The day that we say "another Scotland is possible". The missing million who never vote because they know their vote means nothing except to make a corrupt politician a Lord when he can no longer pretend to be bothered to seek the votes of his constituents. The people who never registered to vote since coming off the register in the Poll Tax days.  These are the people who will win this referendum for YES.   These are the people who need to reap the rewards of a new, better Scot...

Recently I went to hear Lesley Riddoch speak in Stonehaven. She was promoting her new book “Blossom”.  The meeting was promoted by the local YES campaign though the main thrust of Ms Riddoch’s talk was social rather than political. Comparing social norms in the Nordic countries and Scotland Ms Riddoch makes a persuasive case as to the simple abnormality of social relations in Scotland as compared to countries in similar latitudes. Highlighting the differences between thriving Hammerfest in Norway and depressed Wick in Scotland,  Ms Riddoch makes the point well that communities in the Nordic countries have access to their local resources of land, water and environment. Access which is utterly and pointedly forbidden to communities in Scotland.   Developers of tidal power technology in Norway were able to get access to their local tidal stream without having to pay exorbitant rents to the Crown Estate.  Communities in Norway have access to land for recreation...

Lest we forget on the centenary of the outbreak of what I still refer to as "The Great War".  An extract from "Scotland's War Losses" by Duncan Duff. “It may well be that the total Scottish loss in the war does not fall far short of that of the United States of America, which was 126,000 out of a population of106,000,000. It is rather startling to find out that the losses of the United States of all services, Army, Navy  and Air were at the rate of nearly 1200 per million population, while Scotland’s loss in infantry alone worked out at about 18,000 per million. The losses of Scottish Infantry Regiments alone exceeded the whole Canadian losses (Navy, Army and Air Force) by nearly 23,000. They were considerably higher than the total Indian losses, and though New Zealand is generally credited with having made the greatest sacrifices of all the units of the British Empire yet its rate for all services is much less than that of Scottish infantry, whose losses ...