dougiedanger

So Mr Cameron was part of a board that had a strategy solely dependent on Rangers FC in the SPL? Meanwhile they put on an act of integrity to get people to buy season tickets, while all along the SPL clubs were fully behind Doncaster's stitch up? If that's how it was, then the other night might not be the last time this season I'm in Grant Street Park, but it might just have been my last Caley Thistle match!

To be brutally honest and I'm sure I'm not alone, it's very nearly the point of no return for Scottish Football for me regardless of what happens now. This afternoons vote should have been a line in the sand, an opportunity to try for a new start for Scottish Football, but instead it looks like the same old corrupt sh!te.

Spot on, it's an embarrassment to come out with such a statement. If the chairman was so concerned he should have had the courage to vote Sevco into the SPL when he had the chance and not passed the responsibility on to the SFL clubs, who have in their turn done the right thing.

And a further embarrassment to have that utter buffoon Doncaster representing you.

I'm half expecting the next step in the saga to be that Rangers will take the place of Bradford Bulls in the Super League. It would actually be a more sensible move than some of the proposals that have been put forward.

Talking of Bradford Bulls in administration. 14 days after going into administration, and a week after laying off all coaching staff(16 coaches) They are to be liquidated tonight if no one comes in to buy them.

Now, I know they are bigger business, with bigger debts, but how did it take Duff and Duffer, 24ish weeks to do the same thing, and with only 2 people leaving club?

Because their set-up is not fundamentally corrupt, perchance?

The 12th is also a very significant date in history.

In the bigots' calendar, yes.

"Creamola Foam fizzes and foams

Foams and fizzes

Fizzes and foams" .......

As the telly advert went. Can never remember the last line. Anyway, it was like a cheap substitute for proper lemonade...and the raspberry flavour was particularly noxious as i recall...a long way from the sublime taste of "Moray Cup" (and so back to the original posting...)

Fizzy juice was such a rare commodity that its arrival in the house was greeted with near delirium. After your parents' parties you would get up early the next morning to beat a path through the empty cans and overflowing ashtrays to sneak a slog of any leftover fizz. Alas, all that was left would be the dreaded Schweppes tonic water, and yet you would still throw it back.

Creamola Foam may have been the poor man's fizz, but it was not the lowest form of carbonated drink. Oh no, that was the Refreshers sweets cast into a glass of water, or a sachet of Beecham's powders, both of which provided the fizzy drink fizz.

Hang on a minute, Sir Gilet of EBT has walked away:

Rangers crisis: Walter Smith's consortium bid to buy club rejected

STV 19 June 2012 13:46 BST

"A consortium headed by former Rangers manager Walter Smith has failed in its attempt to buy Rangers. A statement released by the group on Tuesday confirmed it had met with new club owners Charles Green’s group regarding a takeover attempt. The statement from Mr Smith read: "I would like to clarify the background to the offer of £6million for the assets of the Club which I announced on Thursday 14th June 2012."

Full article here: http://sport.stv.tv/...-club-rejected/

The USA are nothing better than average. They have Maurice Edu playing for them FFS. Following their whipping of us, they got hammered by Brazil, drew with the mighty Canada, and scraped a win against Antigua and Barbuda.

Scotland were woeful that night, a complete and utter embarrassment.

Best comment I have heard yet on this whole sorry saga. Should be relayed to all club chairmen.

John MacBeath:

''Football would survive without Rangers, maybe not at the same level, and the game would may be lose some fans - but so be it,'' he said.

"If you look after the sport the money will follow you, if you look after the money you'll kill the sport.''

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/18265663

Good points Charles, there was an enormous stigma attached to being a patient at the Craig. Part of the fear was that it seemed like a kind of death sentence to be admitted there--you never heard of anyone getting out.

I don't know what they are doing with the building now, but I would not mind if it were demolished. I couldn't imagine living in a flat or working in an office there. It would be hard to forget all those that suffered there for so long. The grounds were always lovely up there, but the buildings themselves would not be missed.

IHE--great post.

There is a really interesting history to be written about Craig Dunain and its place in Inverness and Highland society. Behind each of these characters there is a story, and it would be interesting to compare how different generations related to people who for one reason or another have felt that they just can't cope with the demands of everyday life and work.

I think the large-scale sanatorium was an invention of the Victorian period, and was based on a growing feeling that such figures should not be in the public sphere. The out of mind should be out of sight as it were.

This in turn created the fear among many in the Sneck of ending up in the Craig, which looked over the town like a warning. What Sneck Ma has not screamed to her bairns: "Ye'll send me up the Craig you lot"?

As Pimple says, the dividing line between the apparently sane and the insane is usually an illusion.

Respect to the tramps is basically what this thread is about.

Bringing this back to the subject of the traditional vagabond, and linking it to the latest posts, what about the expression "derbs in the mooth" to refer to the garbled language of certain members of the travelling fraternity?

You would later hear the same nasal mumblings from Bon-Accord employees, and it seemed like a kind of lingua franca for Ferry-ites.

Back in the late forties when I was at the Central School there were three names that most struck fear into our minds that was Bunnoes, Fortypockets and Clayuck cant say i ever met any of them and thought in latter years they were fictitious

Now it's got me thinking was IHE .... no..... or could it be.... surely not.... got to think about this will post again later!!

These sound like interesting characters--anyone else heard of them? Were they mates with 40 pockets? Why were the kids scared of them?

steady !!!! A lot of good folk came out of Dalneigh ..... Besides, if thats the case, why was the "poorhouse" in Hilton ?

http://www.workhouse...g.uk/Inverness/

To give the Dalneighers some exercise???

Paleface

Ah, the trampette, a rare breed, though must say that Dalneigh seems like a Mecca for the vagabond classes.

Hard to believe, but before Thatcher there were virtually no homeless people, and the idea of begging on the streets seemed like something out of medieval times.

What utter nonsense. In the fifties, sixties and seventies before Thatcher the town had lots of homeless people. In fact I would say the numbers went down during the Thatcher years. I remember Stonyfield in the fifties and sixties was awash with homless people. "Tinker Camps" they were called. The children attended the local schools though. At least ten went to Crown School.

They were all eventually accomodated in housing down in the Merkinch from memory.

These were probably travelling people rather than those made homeless in the 80s as a result of tory government policies and forced to live on the streets.

As I recall, homeless people were never seen on the streets of Inverness before the 80s.

Anyway, this thread is about bigging up the tramps, so stay on topic please.

Forty Pockets? Wasnt he on the go in the early half of the 1900's? Are you not thinking of Sandy (Santa)?

Another old tramp was Mad Eddie who used to go about Dalneigh in the 70s and 80s

Tell us more about Mad Eddie. Not sure if you can attain tramp status by sticking to one scheme though.

http://www.ebay.co.u...71#ht_500wt_689

Found one on eBay danger an ex sneck tramp living somewhere in the bowels of Lancashire

Dougal

Quite good D, took me a while to get it. On his way to take the Staigo...

That's a quality tramp though, a classy vagrant from days gone by, puffing on his pipe and not giving the slightest f**k.

Image not available

Forty Pockets lived until the late 50s according to this article http://www.inverness...s.asp?newsid=38 and is now commemorated on a mural

site link: http://northings.com...glis-cathedral/

I remember "santa" too, but others who might get classed as tramps by some might be better called "worthies" in my mind ..... funny thing is, that most of these "tramps" occupy a place in our minds that is far more positive than modern day society's homeless persons, some of whom are undoubtedly "tramps" in the old school style, whereas others might not fit neatly into that category ........

Must have been Santa I remember seeing then, it was outside the Town House.

That's a cool muriel, haven't been in town for a while, so hadn't seen it. I like its stylistic fusion of Art Nouveau, Comic Art and Graffiti, I must say.

I think you are right about old school tramps and their public perception--they seemed to be tolerated far more and seen as part of the fabric of the twon. Plus, they seemed happy with their lot, which may not have been the case, but they seemed quite carefree..

Talking traditional tramps of Sneck here, you don't seem to get them any more. Maybe it's harder to spot them when the town looks like a scene from Night of the Living Dead.

I think I remember seeing Forty Pockets in the early 80s or so. Hard to believe, but before Thatcher there were virtually no homeless people, and the idea of begging on the streets seemed like something out of medieval times.

So, what are your memories of the old time tramps?

Anyone know this Tory hun MSP Murdo Fraser, apparently he's from the Sneck and a former "caddie rat"? Big surprise that last bit.

Former pupil of mine at said institution Douglas old chap But it WAS from the more recent era when entry was determined by where you live rather than by brains.

"Tecky" boy yourself?

Thanks Charles, can't win them all I suppose. And I am guessing he came from the leafier parts of the catchment area, not from the Hilton ghettos.

Too young to have been involved in that particular "class war," though I just found out recently that my great aunt, who was brought up in Muirtown Street, was the dux of the Academy back in the 1920s or so. A pretty remarkable achievement for a working-class girl back then, I would say. Would love to find out more about her.

Anyone know this Tory hun MSP Murdo Fraser, apparently he's from the Sneck and a former "caddie rat"? Big surprise that last bit.

Ross County were nothing at all in the grand scheme of things as far as the Highland League went. They would NEVER have got into the league ahead of Elgin, had Elgin not been stripped of the Highland League Championship for cheating around the time of Scottish League Reconstruction was going thro.

As far as Rivalry went, County meant Nothing to Caley, as one was the most Honoured team in HL history, and the other team was a diddy team from a diddy town

In a nutshell. Nobody gave a flying one for the Baile Chaul, or whatever they called themselves.

Good that fans of all clubs are having their voices heard on these key issues.

Good to see some imagination and creativity being applied to the issue of ticket pricing.

Is MacGregor dougal??