HAS the movie Mamma Mia rekindled your love for the Swedish pop group Abba? If so, book your table now for the 2008 Energy Ball at Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre, Bridge of Don, on August 16, when Abba tribute band Bjorn Again will be playing for the dancing.
Also on the bill are Scottish rockers the Red Hot Chilli Pipers, and your Diarist will be compere.
Ball organiser George Walker said: “We already have 1,100 people signed up, but more will be welcome.”
Phone him on 01467 628876 or e-mail george@ georgewalkerevents.co.uk.
Taking place on August 15 is a golf challenge at Murcar. Phone Hector Emslie at 01330 822226.
NOT since the Cold War days of Checkpoint Charlie has your Diarist ventured into Berlin, but all that changed last weekend.
A trio of Scotland’s finest snooker players – former world champions John Higgins and Graeme Dott and world number-two Stephen Maguire – wowed a crowd of 1,500 as they met and rebuffed the challenge of Germany’s finest in the second event of a world series.
Snooker-mad Aberdeen quines Wendy Smith and Debbie Mitchell, of Fabulous Black, have invested in the series and invited your Diarist to put on the tartan trews and waistcoat and do a mini David Vine on the Eurosport TV channel. It lasted a whole minute and little did we Scots know that we were being filmed by another Scot, Duncan Richmond, from Stonehaven. The Hampshire-based former pupil of Mackie Academy has been a freelance cameraman since 1992. “I began my career at the Aberdeen University Television Service,” said Duncan. He moved south and worked for London Weekend and TVS before going freelance and has lived in Southampton for 21 years. Duncan has older brothers in the north-east, Bob and Rod, and their widowed mum, Elspeth, 91, lives at Clashfarquhar House, Stonehaven. The boys’ Orkney-born dad, Robin, who was blind, was minister of the town’s South Church. He died in 1985.
Dott beat another former world champion, Shaun Murphy, from Yorkshire, 6-1 in Sunday’s final at Berlin’s Tempodrome. Next stop for the players is Warsaw on October 25 and 26.
AN EXHIBITION of old and new pictures with the catchy title of In the Buchat is being staged next month.
Organisers would like to hear from you if you have memories or old photos of Glenbuchat. “The show will link the glen’s rich recorded history with a contemporary collection of photos taken by the community,” say Isobel Gilchrist, who is at 019756 41341, and Sheena Scrafton on 019756 41388. The exhibition will run daily from August 16-24 in Glenbuchat hall (11am-5pm).
IS THERE a Jock McKay still about in Aberdeenshire, asks old sea salt Sid Reynolds. The 75-year-old, who works part-time for Tesco, said: “I served with Jock aboard the minesweeper HMS Leverton between August 1955 and May 1957 and I am trying to organise the first reunion of the ship’s company. Given our ages, it could also be the last.” Phone Sid on 02380 411300 or write to him at 38 Hoe Lane, North Baddesley, Southampton SO52 9NH.
THE doyenne of Aberdeen amateur theatre, Annie Inglis, 85, celebrated her MBE award with a party in the Linklater Rooms at Aberdeen University. “I could have opened a florist’s business, there were so many lovely flowers,” she said. Fellow thespian Graeme Wilson, of Banchory, sang Annie’s praises.