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I had a pleasant surprise this morning when I received a phone call from Mr Northstar telling me that he, being the romantic bugga that he is, had brought Mrs Northstar to stay in a hotel in Dundee for a Valentine's treat. They dropped in for a cup of tea and a chat, and we blethered about the state of the NHS, amongst other things. Mrs Northy, who is studying some oriental healing technique called Riki (I'm not sure about the spelling, and I thought that maybe it had something to do with Edinburgh) tried to help alleviate my pain. I must admit that I did feel the heat from her hands, and that it did provide some relief, as I was able to sit relatively comfortably the whole time they were here. Anyway, they had to make the treacherous trip up the A93 to their abode in snowbound Inverurie to relieve Mrs Northy's mother of babysitting duties. After they had left I settled down to watch the rugby. The day just kept getting better and better as France beat England by a point. This means that England are, at least for now, just as piss poor as Scotland. I'm sure it won't last though (but it is nice while it does!). A relatively pedestrian and uninspiring French team has now managed to beat both Scotland and England - but my money is riding on Ireland to win the 6 Nations this year, and for Italy to wrest the Wooden Spoon from Scotland (please, please, please). The picture was taken at Heathrow Airport a couple of weeks ago, with the post-processing done today. As you will know, Concorde was a joint British and French project.