Just to show you that Scotland isn't all dark and foreboding sheep and midge filled glens under the shadow of tall and rugged hills that are permanently hidden in storm clouds, snow or mist. The rain does stop at times, the clouds disappear and the sun comes out. We also have some flat bits too without a mountain or a midge in sight. This is Strathmartine, and it is on my doorstep. Isn't it nice, and not very Scottish looking? Nice to break a few stereotypes. Speaking of stereotypes... At a time when there are violent atrocities being carried on across the world, with people dying violent deaths in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, Palestine, Somalia, Darfur, East Timor, etc. With natural disasters destroying whole communities and claiming the lives of thousands in Indonesia. With the nations of Africa drowning in debt and disease under the rule of corrupt dictators and international indifference. While the police seem to act as if they are above the law and the politicians seek to remove our liberties one by one, a couple of English people who moved to Scotland to live have decided to make a complaint to the Commission for Racial Equality about the sale, in Scotland, of t-shirts bearing the message 'Anyone But England' - a reference to who most Scots would like to see winning the World Cup. Does that mean that we can take the EBC - sorry, the BBC - to the CRE over its coverage of the build up to England's apparently inevitable success in Germany? Somehow I doubt it. I wish I had as little to worry about as these poor wee lambs have, and I really do hope that their tender sensibilities were not too hurt by those bitter, twisted and ungrateful Jocks that they have chosen to live amongst. The phrases 'when in Rome' and 'sticks and stones' spring to mind!