I biked up to Stirling Castle last night to try and catch the northern lights. It wasn’t what i had hoped for, i was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It looked like Argyll or the Western Isles may have been the best place to be.

You can definately see red, orange and green glowing beneath the darker blues.

That was facing west so depending on cloud, i think the best place to be could have been around Lochgilphead in Argyll. 

The forcast is for rain the next two days so i think weve had it for another year. If anyone reading this has any photo’s feel free to leave a trackback to your site.

Click below for the best laugh of the week! I promise!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmIjNuy_vEw#t=0m18s

There is a rare chance to see the northern lights tonight, not just in the far north but all over central Scotland and as far south as the English midlands.

You need a dark sky and as few clouds as possible. Your best chance should be between 10pm and 2am tonight.

Stirling is forcast to have the clearest sky, Glasgow and Edinburgh could be too overcast to get the full benefit, but the weather men are rarely 100% right so look to the north tonight where ever you are, and you may see a once in a life time experience!

http://news.stv.tv/scotland/190175-scotland-gets-rare-chance-to-see-northern-lights/

I got pulled over on monday night. I was out practicing for my test which was the next day, the car in front was doing about 25mph holding everyone up. I lost patience and overtook him, i was probably over the speed limit but not much over, maybe 5mph tops.

A split second after i overtook i heard a siren!

I was like that “where did they come from?”

They got out and flanked me, one on either side of me. One of them said nothing the whole time, just looked at me like the serious Arnie in Terminator 1. The other one did all the talking. He got tore right into me like a teacher scalding a wee boy for stealing her apple.

He said ” Did you know you were speeding?”

“i dont know”

“Why are you in such a hurry?”

“im not in a hurry”

“who taught you to drive like that?”

“i dont know” 

It went on for about five minutes. Question after question.  I kept trying to think of how not to answer, i was worried that by answering his questions i’d be incriminating myself.

He got a better towards the end, gave me some patter about fatal accidents and said he didnt want me to be a statistic. ”Take the warning son!” were his final words.

Ive noticed that the Polis operate like that, when theyre in two’s there is a silent one and an endless talker. A bit like the Pet Shop Boys.

To be fair it has had an impact and i will wisen up on the roads around town now. This method of policing is a much better approach than dishing out fines left, right and centre. Fines cause major resentment towards the authorities, i particularly hate those speed cameras!

A stern fatherly warning from a human has done what a thousand speed cameras never will.

Yer auld da’s blog has been quiet lately, because ive been training like fuck for my Mod 1 bike test!

This is the 3rd of the 4 tests i need to pass to get my full biking license. Its a maneuvering test conducted off road to prove your ability to control the bike.  Here is the exact test on youtube and below il give some tips on how to pass.

The Module 1 is the most controversial of all the tests in my opinion. There are six elements. Four of which are fairly easy maneuvers, however two of the elements require breaking at high speed and ive heard tales of many daft cunts crashing their bikes while trying to perform these procedures.  In my opinion Module 1 should be scrapped or they should at least lower the speed of these two exercises.

However, it is what it is, and heres how i passed the two difficult parts on a low powered 125cc bike.

You have around 30 metres to build up speed before encountering a bend, they say you must reach 30 kmh at this point, but this is not necessarily true! I reved to around 6000 rpm in 1st gear then went into 2nd gear about 10 metres before the bend, i dont know what my speed was but it wasn’t very fast i’d guess around 25 kmh, but as soon as i came off the bend i went FULL FUCKING THROTTLE! I stayed in 2nd gear all the way which didn’t sound good for the engine, but i passed through the speed guage at exactly 52 kmh both times.

The minimum speed to pass both exercises is 50 kmh so i only just made it but on a low powered 125cc its not easy and like i said before, the minimum speed should be lowered.  

Remember folks, easy and controlled on the bend then full fucking throttle the second it straightens out and stay in 2nd gear all the way.

Here are my friends and i in a Jib-Jab video as the chippendales.  

http://sendables.jibjab.com/view/SfJGAzh9gUYYiLP6

A couple of years ago i was in Clydebank library looking for a good dvd. Most librarys now are nearly as good for dvd’s as the main rental chains, and they rent for a quarter the price.

I nearly rented the daft Will Smith film Hancock, but i spotted an obscure Scottish film tucked away that no one had rented for ages. On the front of the box under the title a review said “One of the greatest experiences the cinema has to offer”.

So i took home the Bill Douglas Trilogy and hid Hancock so no one else would get it before i came back the next day.

The first of the trilogy is called My Childhood, which is based on Bill Douglas’s own childhood with a young actor called Stephen Archibald playing Jamie, the young Bill Douglas.

Set in the 1940′s during the second world war the film conveys the harshness of growing up in poverty in a mining village near Edinburgh.

There is minimal dialogue throughout the film, Douglas prefers to use images and does so with great effect. During the long silences my mind wandered in and out of flashbacks to my own childhood which was no where near as harsh, and strangely a voice that was like my own grandfathers started to narrate parts of the film in my mind. 

Its powerful stuff, but not overly harrowing,  its very watchable compared to hard to stomach films like Sophie’s Choice. There is incredible warmth in the film despite the gritty surroundings.

Jamie strikes up a moving friendship with a nazi prisoner of war who is interned nearby and all through the film Jamie’s facial expressions inspire a spectrum of emotions which no other actor in the world has ever brought out in me. I don’t think Stephen Archibalds performance has been matched by any Scottish actor before or since. 

My favourite scene is when Jamie spots a steam train passing through town and runs to the railway bridge to bask in the warm steam as it passes. It was an ecstatic moment, similar to the moment Du Fresne breaks out of Shawshank prison and embraces the rain as a free man.  

I believe it is the best Scottish film ever made, and like it says on the tin it is one of the greatest experiences the cinema has to offer.

I will review the other two parts to the trilogy shortly.

Mongrels is brilliant new BBC 3 comedy show. It hasn’t quite took off yet but mark my words, this will be as popular as Ali G.

Catch up on the iplayer http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00swyx1

Or on youtube if youre overseas

For such a small country, Scotland has an amazing diversity of accents.

When i travelled the world i was often told two things:

1/ i have the worlds sexiest accent

2/ i have the worlds most incoherant accent

I happily acknowledge the first, and grudgingly accept the second.  However foreigners can’t tell the regional differences, they think every Scot sounds the same.  So with a bit of local knowledge can we pinpoint the sexiest accent of them all?

Don’t think about big stars like Sean Connery or Sheena Easton, no one really sounds like them apart from them. Think about any random lassie or guy you met in the pub or club that had you hanging on their every word.  

Im torn between three accents and in no particular order they are (a) Edinbronian (b) Invernesian (c) Glaswegian

Il explain why later, first i want to hear what everyone else thinks: What are the sexiest accents in Scotland?

I caught a brief glimpse of it yesterday in George Square. 

Its not quite the Edinburgh festival, but its better than fuck all.