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Hoots & Havers with James Irvine Robertson

In these harsh economic times, it behoves upon us to watch our pennies. One way could be to consider how some of us spend money in order to maintain the appearance of youth. An ‘expert’ said the other day that sun block was just as effective as any face cream at keeping aging skin in good nick, but I can do better – and cheaper. People often remark on the remarkable similarity of my complexion to the bum of a baby. This is not due to expensive potions bought from beauty counters that contain miracle compounds but to my discovery many years ago of the joys of udder cream.

Imagine being a cow, particularly in winter. Your nipples are just as sensitive as those of any other mammal, yet, twice a day, some horny-handed yokel wipes them with a rough cloth and dips them in powerful disinfectant before slapping on a pump that grasps your tender flesh and sucks the milk out of you. Then you go back to lie down on some freezing surface that is likely saturated in dung or urine. No fun, and no wonder you are likely to become raw and tender. And that’s where udder cream comes in.

To my eye, and nose, it seems precisely the same the stuff that beautiful ladies smear on their faces. My brother-in-law once ran a factory that produced cosmetics and he confirmed that the udder cream that I once smeared on the nether regions of my cows appeared to be just the same as the stuff that he injected into dinky little pots. His sold for £20, so did mine except that it came in a ten-kilo bucket from the local agricultural co-operative rather than in a pretty little pink jar enveloped in packaging and purveyed by heavily-painted damsels in department stores.

Of course if you buy the latter, you are paying about five hundred times more for much the same thing, but it’s not waste. You are contributing to the income of squadrons of highly-skilled folk in white coats who infuse their product with pseudo-scientific ingredients with names like hydrologised antipeptides, and for that infuriating woman on tele who tells you to buy her particular brand of gunk ‘because you’re worth it.’ But if you merely want to stop your face being chapped and wrinkly, embrace your inner cow and buy udder cream.

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I recall a conversation in the locality a few years ago when the subject of the destruction of the Twin Towers came up. It was a plot by the Israelis was the consensus. The proof was demonstrated by the fact that no Jews were killed. I was the only one amongst eight people who thought the theory was barking mad and thoroughly nasty with it. I suppose the same sort of folk believe that Prince Philip was busy flashing in the Alma tunnel to put Henri Paul off his stroke and thus kill Diana.

The Israeli 9/11 conspiracy theory is shared by President Ahmadinejad of Iran, so those who believe it are in important company. But so I am. Mr Ayman al-Zawahri, the No 2 to Osama bin Laden, is awfully cross and has accused the Iranian of trying to conceal its covert alliance with the US and discredit al-Qaeda by implying that its greatest coup was carried out by Mossad rather than his own adherents. It’s beyond Monty Python.

Perhaps there’s some encouragement to be had in confirming that the psycopathic factions of the Muslims who believe that God requires them to slaughter those who disagree with them are such profound poo holes.

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I saw an item on the news the other day which warned that Pitlochry was likely to implode due to lack of labour. The town has been running on the exploitation of cheap east Europeans and, thanks to the decline of the £ against the Euro and strengthening economies back home, these workers are all going back to their countries of origin. Oh, woe! The Scots won’t work for the wages these establishments pay and they’ll all go bust.

Can’t they hire monkeys? Cockle-fishers? Or ship over a few containers packed with brown children from Bangladesh?

Lots of Scots became rich on the labour of unpaid slaves a couple of hundred years ago; perhaps we could repeal the laws against it. An alternative might be to pay the sort of money that would make it worthwhile for natives to take the jobs that the ungrateful underprivileged are now spurning.

If this means a rise in prices, so be it. That rise would reflect the true value of the goods or services offered. And if that prices them beyond the purses of potential purchasers, that’s just tough.

I know of a plumber in the south of England who pulls in £700 a day. It’s supply and demand, the happy face of capitalism. 

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The fluffy dog eats, walks, sniffs sinister things and sleeps. When there is nothing better to do, it just sleeps, lots.

I can’t help thinking it’s on to something. Our brains are programmed to keep buzzing – TV, books, chatter, shopping, even work - are things we do. The dog doesn’t. In such circumstance, it just sleeps and, occasionally, twitches. And I look at it with a certain envy. It seems a very seductive way to spend your time.