Charles Bannerman

This is not a case of "plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose". In a few years' time they may very well have changed their minds again. It's always wise to take account of history - during much of which the French have been, then not been, our best buddy, depending on where their legendary self interest lies.

Got you now Jock! I just remember "old" Bridge Street well enough to see where you are coming from, but it has been so long away that I didn't even think about it.

I have given IBM a "like" for the Reliant Dobbin - kushty! I'm also struggling with the locations. Is the first one maybe Queensgate or Union St? I believe that MacDougalls Hotel in Chirch St was also a temperance establishment.

Quite a lot actually. In particular it's difficult to escape the irony that the French should have been instrumental in keeping the UK put of the Common Market in days gone by but now it seems to suit them to want to intervene in the current campaign in an effort to get us to stay.

Once again, here is a poster with an alarming inability to distinguish between Scotland (with which I identify strongly) and the SNP (which I view as an embarrassing rabble).

On the first part of that quote, what is being described is an essential feature of broadcasting and indeed of journalism as a whole since the written press need to be equally selective about what they use. In many broadcasting situations, outwith dedicated sports programmes like Sportsound, it's not realistic to use full length interviews and this is even more true of TV than of radio. In a 2-5 minute all-sport round up within a news context, what is known as "clipping" is more or less the only option available. Then, of course, when clubs do all-in press conferences as opposed to one to one interviews, the chances of anything more than a clip being used disappear more or less altogether. On the other hand if people are desperate for full length interviews they can get these in all their objectivity and impartialityon individual club websites. On the second part.... well I actually thought it was just Rangers and Celtic that the whole world was against

Yeh. Seer as well. It's going to be "51-49 leave" in Scotland, "55-45 stay" in the rest of the UK.

For obscurity that one is surely straight out of the "tall ships passing behind Tomnahurich" stable! I am minded of a variation on a famous photo caption from a 1993 issue of LSM (the Caley fanzine) - "Right lads, what to you want do do? Keep trying to be the greatest Highland League team in history or build a Scottish Cupwinning club down the dump with Fiona Larg?" The irony of the original caption lingers on!

The idea of Caledonian Thistle really began to emerge mid December 1993, although it had been talked about before that. Earlier that month, Caley passed the merger in principle for a second time, but with insufficient support also to secure asset transfer. This led to the Rebels suggesting that a merged team called Caledonian and playing in blue would be acceptable to them. This is turn forced Thistle to the brink of quitting a bid which by now had been past the point of no return for over two months. A couple of weeks before Christmas, INE Chairman Norman Cordiner spent an evening of shuttle diplomacy between the two sides - Thistle at Kingsmills and Caley in the Kingsmills Hotel. (It had to be Norman and not his CEO Fiona Larg because women weren't allowed in the Thistle boardroom!). The product of these knife edge negotiations was a three fold agreement - the club would be called Caledonian Thistle, the new park would be called the Caledonian Stadium and the team would play in "predominantly blue" strips (there are still plenty of people around who remember what that actually worked out as). Even though they were the minor partner in just about every respect, this still represented a significant concession from Thistle. As a result, since Caley weren't going to accept any name without the C-word in it and Thistle weren't going to surrender the small bit of the action they had got, they were walking a tightrope on that name. Having been in Caley's Rose Street meeting and having doorstepped the Thistle one ten days later, I really do believe that this was the only name that was going to be remotely acceptable at the time and the name was just one of a range of issues on which the entire deal - and SFL football for Inverness - could have collapsed. At this point, all other possible names departed the fray.

Quel prix La Vieille Alliance?

The debate took a painfully ironic twist today when French President Francois Hollande warned Britain that there would be "consequences" if it left the EU. Mr Hollande's desire to persuade us to stay does rather fly in the face of his predecessor Charles de Gaulle who, in 1963, very publicly said "NON" to the notion of Britain joining "Les Six", which kept us out for a further decade. I can't say I take the French terribly seriously because, whether it's sending their Secret Service into a New Zealand harbour to blow up the Rainbow warrior, surrendering to the Germans in 1940 contrary to an agreement they had made with Britain or their farmers dragging their carts on to main roads in protest against CAP subsidy levels, they can usually be guaranteed to put their own interests first. I certainly remember 1963 when my dad was still in contact with many of his Army mates who, less than 20 years previously, had fought and died across France to bale them back out again from the mess they had got themselves into in 1940. Yes, a few "consequences" had to be suffered in order to liberate France. There was a lot of anger among these ex-servicemen at the way de Gaulle behaved - many of them suspected because he had not totally got his own way when he was a refugee enjoying our hospitality during the war. It's partly having many of our affairs dictated to us by people like the French, who will suddenly - literally or metaphorically - drag their carts on to the road when they don't get their own way, that inspires the Eurosceptic in me.

You know, this referendum is already degenerating into the same disingenuous tedium as the last one - the only difference being that it will be over in a few short weeks so will not weigh us down for years on end. In both cases, it's the status quo, with which the electorate are hence already familiar, against a change, the consequences of which are a matter of debate. So both in 2014 and now, any attempt by supporters of the status quo to point out possible disadvantages of a change are simply being rejected as "scaremongering" or "Project Fear" by those on the other side who look on this as an excuse not to answer the questions. This therefore allows those wanting change to fudge and criticise the highlighting of its obvious difficulties and also to make unsubstantiated assertions which they call "positivity" - as opposed to the alleged "negativity" of their opponents' concerns. It is also not a tactic which is available to supporters of the status quo, features of which are already well documented. So, also less than a year on from the General Election, we still have three-odd months (never mind - at least it's not three odd years!) of this latest Punch and Judy show still to suffer - and compounded by the efforts of sundry windbags to book their places on the Holyrood gravy train as well.

The producers of GTWB Enterprises will be devastated to read that implied censure Forums really are a lot less fun in this era of the Politically Correct and the Serially Offended!

Yes, I'm sure some will already have been wondering why I have started a topic on a thoroughly 21st century device in the Olde Inverness section? Well I was listening to a discussion on these on Radio Scotland earlier, where it emerged that motorists in places like China and Russia instal them so as not to be blamed when random pedestrians jump on car bonnets in an attempt to get insurance money. And I couldn't help but remember the legendary Inverness stories about Granville giving up jumping on sheep for the odd afternoon, instead to turn his attention to car bonnets in the town centre! I wonder if IHE remembers whether Toich did similar, or was he too engrossed in lamp posts? I would imagine Willie Bell would have had to check his AA book first, just to make sure that he only jumped on vehicles with English number plates.

Absolutely classic and totally accurate with the possible exception of No 7 since in these days there weren't too many plastic bottles about. And maybe they could have added "three corners = one penalty (or sometimes one goal)" and that the owner of the ball settles all arguments as to whether it was a goal or a "post" if the ball looked close to rolling over one of the jackets.

A "bowsher's" bike!!! They still keep a stash of them in Forres and race them at the Highland Games.

Makes you wonder how these guys could make a living out of that. Onions are pretty cheap and presumably also were back then so, with the cost of getting eux-memes, leurs bicyclettes et leurs oignons ici and living ici, there can't have been all that much profit!

Saw it broken down earlier today below the Castle, just a few yards from where it is in this photo!

Except possibly for the cost of the rents!

The spelling is actually Carrol but you are almost certainly right since the place is out Island Bank Road, on the left going out of town, between the Drummond Crescent junction and Boyndie. I believe it may have started life as a maternity nursing home but then became a children's home. It's near Rossal, which used to be an old folks' home but may more recently have become a House of Multiple Occupation

Nor do I snorbens, but this is presumably a photo of railway employees so it is possible that Butch, who was a driver with my grandad although a bit younger, is in there somewhere.

Ray MacLennan used to play on the wing for Caley and was also a very useful runner after he retired from football. He is Colin Baillie's brother in law. I think this will be the same Donnie Grant as went on to be Firemaster and he was also a Highland League player. Brian MacKintosh is now an esteemed barman in the ICT Social Club.

Yeh, and some of them Scots as well!

If professional polling companies are making sufficient errors, for instance in their sampling procedures before the General Election, for these to make headlines, what chance do you have just by taking a flavour on a football forum or in the workplace etc? Pollsters often use samples as large as 1000+ which they go to great lengths to make representative of the electorate as a whole. So in the absence of such rigour, it's not surprising that you get the kind of "there's loads of boys at my work who say they won't go to the Caledonian Stadium" assertions which people like Dougal take to be as accurate as what they read in the Beano or the Dandy. Sampling is a very complex procedure, and I'm interested in Sneckboy's anecdote that every single one of the 32 unofficial club Scottish Referendum polls returned a yes. Here, and indeed on football forums, the typical, or rather disproportionate, demographic is indeed young, white, possibly predominantly working class males which voter analysis did indeed later show was where the bulk of supporters of separation originated from. Now I don't know whether robbylad's anecdotal flavour of the IN/OUT situation originates from a similar source or demographic. But if it does, then we have an interesting scenario. Because if similar population samples, albeit unrepresentative ones, are showing both support for Scottish separation and for European exit, then that might suggest that the SNP are barking up the wrong tree by adopting a European stance which is more contrary than they think to the views of their core support. The implications for any demand for a second Scottish referendum subsequent to a Scotland IN/ UK OUT scenario are also interesting, as is the question of how many INNERS would be annoyed enough at an OUT vote to be prepared to change their views on the Scottish question in order to remain in Europe under the highly altered scenario of a separate Scotland.

Probably some jakey who found himself regularly transported there by G4S or whoever their predecessors were.