DORIC ON SATURDAY
The Doric Column
Caul kail het again
is aye pottie-tastie
– Aul sayin
Published:
OCH AYE, ere’s naething better than the first bilin - weel, apairt fae second day’s broth for some - bit here I am back wi ma aipple cairt, as John Argo, the faither o ma first radio producer, eest tae say fin I phone’t him up ilka Monday on ma local programme wi oor wikkly news aboot Doric wirds an phrases.
In ither wirds, gyan ower the same grun gaurs things ging stale bit I hid a gweed snuff at the hotterin pot an decidit tae folla on fae last wikk an the fine wye ye respon tae es column.
Last Setterday I wis quotin bits oot o a gran story fae a Buckie quine, Margaret Tong, noo hyn awa in California, an I dinna ken fa got the biggest begaik in the lythe o’t.
She sent an e-mail tae say that, bi chunce, she pit on the computer, gaed tae the web an, homin in on the P&J, harken’t in tae me spoutin fae her ain screid on the podcast.
So on tae anither o the same ilk, an es wis an article fae Ron Craig, noo bidin doon in Comrie on ‘Growin up in Wartime Kemnay’.
Like I did wi Margaret, I’ll jist pick oot the antrin wee snippet an leave you tae mull ower yer ain memories.
Weel there wis the food rationin for a start, nivver felt the same tae us country fowk as tae the toonsers.
The barter trade mang hens, eggs an butter, saa mony a deal deen aneth the coonter.
Like my memories o Dunecht Hall then, een o Kemnay’s kirk halls wis used for food storage, an foo mony fae at airt myn on the PoWs fae nearby Monymusk providin labour for fairms roon aboot? Air raid warnins were soondit bi the local bobby on’s bike, blaain’s fussle. Windas hid tae be cover’t wi tape in case they were blaa’n oot bi bomb. Fit eese wid at be the day?
Ron feenishes tho bi tellin me, on a stravaig back tae his aal village, he notic’t a lot o cheenges, bit he likes tae think it’s still a gran place tae bide. Fit ither that his a Paradise Road an a Paradise Lane – the widds o Paradise at yer elbick?
Sae catchin up noo on ootstannin ferlies, I think we hae crackit the query o the name o the timmer tool used for liftin secks o corn.
Bill Grant o Turra phone’t tae tell me that it wis caa’d “a peer man” an stracht tae the Scottish National Dictionary I gaed tae read - ‘a sack hoist’ - bit Bill’s main eerran wis tae lat’s ken that it wisna a spoke as some ither body suggestit.
Naething tae dee wi a spoke, he said. Haein wirkit in the widds fae a loon o fowerteen eer aul an noo siventy-siven, he startit bi draggin the fell’t trees wi horse an chynes an maakin’s wye up tae hunnle the saw. Here tee he wid work the spoke, a timmer pole a sax fit in linth an a thochtie mair, measur’t aff at ilka fit, bit as important, it wis push’t in aneth the tree far the cross-cut saw spew’d oot the sawdist an the leverage stoppit it fae jammin.
Thanks Bill, an still on the timmer, I gaed menchin nae lang seen on that verra cross-cut wi me on ae eyn an faither on the ither, syne swaitin ower the hackstock wi the aix. Es brocht anither body on the phone, Stanley Rothney o Culter.
Stanley, a bobby oot in Buchan in’s day, recaa’s the story o the loon fa kickit’s fitba inta an aul wifie’s gairden an her gettin fed up wi the number o times it happen’t. She tellt the wee nickum that the neist time he wid hae tae collect it fae the police station.
He hid till iv coorse - loons bein loons.
The bobby took him throwe the back an, pyntin tae his hackstock, said: “Ye’ll get yer ba eence ye hack my firewid”.
The loon vrocht aa efterneen an got his ba back - a lesson weel learn’t.
The day, wi aa es Asbos, ere’s surely mair nor jist the lesson for the loon in ere somewye.
See ye neist wikkeyn.
