Above: The First Minister enjoying Glen Campbell’s contribution to the discussion At today’s briefing, BBC Scotland’s Glen Campbell asked: ‘With Boris Johnson returning to work todaaay, are you an he as one in your approach to lifting lockdown or are there differences? And if the UK hits its 100 000 testing target later this week what will Scotland’s total contribution to that have been.’ No self-respecting politician is ever going to admit to being ‘at one’ with Johnson as, like Trump, he has blood on his hands resulting from his law of the jungle approach to saving the lives of … Continue reading Glen Campbell, the lineman for the Union, asks daftest question today

Personality Traits and Demographics Influencing Social Networking Site Addiction by Vikanda Pornsakulvanich Overall, the findings revealed that those exhibiting Extroversionwere more likely to be addicted to social networking sites, whereas those exhibiting Emotional Stability and Conscientiousness were less likely to be addicted to social networking sites. Continue reading SHOCK LATEST: Some of you (me) are neither stable nor conscientious!

The Health Secretary didn’t repeat the First Minister’s encouraging comments of the 24th when she presented the briefing on the 26th but the trends are still going the same way, so the comments still apply: These figures for hospital admissions and intensive care are giving us real and growing cause for optimism that the current lockdown is working to suppress the virus. That’s the good news, perhaps the less good news is that also tells us why we must stick with these lockdown restrictions, because as I’ve said many times before standing here, any easing up on that at all … Continue reading Health Secretary confirms encouraging trends

Three times this morning the Herald misspelled the word ‘shielding’ triggering something in the creative mind of our resident Hill-farming Correspondent and leading academic, Professor Jock Robertson, as he was relaxing in his bath – ‘SHEILINGS! THAT’s IT!’ What is a sheiling and what does it have to do with coronavirus? The term sheiling is mainly Scottish, originally denoting a summer dwelling on a seasonal pasture high in the hills, particularly for shepherds and later coming to mean a more substantial and permanent small farm building in stone. Farmers and their families lived in shielings during the summer to have their livestock … Continue reading Herald spelling mistake prompts unique Scottish solution to social distancing according to leading academic

From Energy Voice today: A Scottish marine energy firm has announce it has completed construction on a giant tidal turbine near the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. Simec Atlantis Energy, which has a number of renewable energy projects in Scotland and Wales, today confirmed the completion of its  SG500kW tidal stream turbine. The mammoth structure, with a rotor diameter of almost 60 feet, was installed between the islands of Putuoshan and Huludao in the Zhoushan archipelago in China in the past week. https://www.energyvoice.com/otherenergy/237523/scottish-marine-energy-firm-builds-turbine-near-wuhan-during-pandemic/ And in RECHARGE: China is switching on its first-ever utility-scale tidal turbine, following installation by energy giant … Continue reading Maybe small but too smart to stay in the UK? Scottish company builds giant marine turbine near Wuhan!

This story is all over the ‘UK’ media from ITV to the Guardian but not so far in Tory press or the loyal BBC. I can find no sign of reports of comparable shortages in Scotland, not even from the BBC Scotland and Herald health correspondents who recently ran with insubstantial social media sources from one Glasgow GP who ia Anas Sarwar MSP’s cousin or nephew or brother-in-law or something. Absence of evidence is not always evidence of absence but we can be sure that if they had anything at all, from even the GMB, we’d know all about it. … Continue reading 33% of doctors in non-Scottish parts of UK struggle to access PPE

Days after a flood of praise has been heaped on the First Minister, sometimes from the least likely of sources such as George Osborne, Ian Duncan-Smith and Allan Cochrane at the Telegraph and as they sink without trace in the polls, the Scottish Labour Branch have pounced on a leak revealing that she did not attend some of the early COBRA meetings on the coronavirus outbreak. Feeding it to the Sunday Mail, Neil Findlay described the news gleefully as ‘extraordinary revelations.’ Just for context, this is Findlay: Second best with only 29% of the vote in a working-class area. Way … Continue reading Sunday Mail, Herald and Scottish Labour launch witch-hunt in desperate attempt to halt First Minister’s popularity surge

By Brenda Steele: Am I being a bit of a snowflake [Ed: NO!] or are these folk getting a bit above themselves?  Government could learn from local community enterprises responding with astonishing speed and efficiency to get help and food where it is needed most – including NHS staff on the frontline. http://sceptical.scot/2020/04/rapid-response-social-enterprise-shows-the-way/ As I understand it, folk were begging to help and this is one of the suggestions of things they could do.  I suspect that ScotGov has rather more urgent things to do requiring technical knowledge. And then there was this. Nicola Sturgeon announced on Thursday that they … Continue reading The Scottish Government deserves support not snide comments from the uppity!

Revealing his true self, this morning, Gordon Brewer said: Can we start by talking a bit about care homes? Which has become a major sss..issue in Scotland! There are reports today that the military are going to help, at least in England, to create pop-up centres where effectively military units could visit care homes and test people in them. Is that something that you’re going to take-up here? Did Jeane catch him out with her response that, yes we are, with five and then eight of them? Brewer then suggested that Scots had been unable to request tests because the … Continue reading Brewer’s subconscious wanted to accuse Jeane Freeman of responsibility for a care home ‘scandal’ but it came out as ‘sss…issue!’

Marr this morning: A third of Scottish deaths have been in care homes. That’s a lot more than than in England and Wales. Why? The FM was too polite for my taste in refusing to say the English figures are inaccurate. Then Marr went on to select the GMB rant to throw at her. Marr knows damn fine the answer and thus his question was in the lowest grade of tabloidism. Ironically, he had earlier in the show used the FT/ONS report suggesting deaths in England & Wales were probably double those being reported and that, inevitably, most of these … Continue reading Andrew Marr repeats myth about care home deaths being higher in Scotland