Xmas is the season of food, and a couple of interesting examples have cropped up in St. Andrews recently. In the doorway of the erstwhile Pots and Pans, a 24 Hour Bakery has sprung up:

“24 Hour Bakery” appears to be a posh term for a hot-pie vending machine, where the definition of “hot pie” extends beyond the Scotch pie once favoured by Pie-Face, to include faux (flaky) bridies, fudge doughnuts and bacon rolls. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, when I passed by it was reporting itself as being out of order. Apparently it sells out fast.

Somehow hot food seems wrong though. In Scotland, winter’s the traditional time for ice cream, as shown by the third image in this BBC photo gallery (a bit of a classic). I think rather than ice cream consumption being prompted by hot weather, a bit of a chill reminds Scots of what they could really do with right now. And lo and behold, Luvians has the answer:

This time, the shop wasn’t out of order, so despite having got drookit in heavy rain earlier on I popped in and purchased a cone, with a scoop each of the Christmas Pudding and Gingerbread flavours. The Gingerbread, which wound up as the upper layer, was reminiscent of Starbucks’ gingerbread latte but a bit colder, and was very pleasant. There was a very slight nip of ginger to it, about right for a gingerbread. The Christmas Pudding flavour was less immediately distinctive, but had a brandied overtone and frequent hints of vine fruit or candied peel.

To be honest, it wasn’t really the weather for ice cream, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. It might be more successful at the Christmas table as suggested by the sign!

Next weekend (21^st September), I'll be in Edinburgh, taking part in the second of three annual marches in support of Scottish independence.

If you read my account of last year's march, you'll know that as, generally speaking, a non-activist, I found it quite enjoyable. If you fancy coming along this time, it would be good to see you there, and good numbers will help to sway public opinion. As far as I can tell, support for a "Yes" is higher than most of the media would have you believe, but still trails a "No". However, about a third of people are still in the “Don’t Know” camp, so visible public support does matter. Poll reporting is often phrased in a way that may encourage you to assume the “Don’t Know”s support a “No”; make sure you check the actual numbers. If you support Scottish independence, don’t let the Catalans put you to shame!

This year's march begins at noon next Saturday, and is from the High Street to Calton Hill. More information on places, times and travel at the official web site.

I’ve complained to the BBC about the make-up of the panel on Thursday’s Question Time. I was prompted to do so by the Scottish Greens’ official complaint, which seems to me to be quite justified. The Scottish Lib Dems were also short-changed by the inclusion on the panel of George Galloway of Respect and Nigel Farage of UKIP (neither of which parties have significant electoral support in Scotland), but the Scottish Greens have plainly come off worse, only having appeared on Question Time once in 14 years of continual representation in the Scottish Parliament.

Although Question Time’s for a UK-wide audience, on the relatively rare occasions when it’s recorded in Scotland I think it has a responsibility to accurately reflect Scottish politics to the rest of the nation as well as to Scotland itself, and I don’t believe that was done on this occasion.

Here’s the text of my complaint. I could have said more, but after writing this and précising a bit to fit more in, I only had about five characters space left.

The selection of panellists, although the programme made a feature of the independence debate and took place a week before a by-election, did not appropriately represent political viewpoints within Scotland.

Two parties with significant electoral support and representation at Scottish Parliamentary level (the Scottish Liberal Democrats and the Scottish Green Party) were excluded in favour of politicians whose parties have neither (Respect and UKIP).

I recognise that Question Time is intended for a UK-wide audience, but it does that audience no favours to misrepresent the politics of Scotland; particularly when this appears to form part of a pattern of under-representing the Scottish Green Party, who have appeared on Question Time only once in 14 years of Holyrood representation.

I have listened to suggestions from the BBC and David Dimbleby that (a) this was not an independence special requiring a reflective panel and (b) "Question Time does not follow by-elections and never has". They do not stand up and I do not accept them. On independence, the audience was selected with a particular feature of the referendum in mind, and split evenly in terms of opinion; and more than half the programme spent on an independence question when the independence debate was not particularly prominent in the week's news. Functionally, it's clear this was an independence special; and Question Time has clearly responded to a by-election as recently as February (live from Eastleigh).

If you want to watch the programme and judge for yourself, you can find it on the iPlayer for the next 12 months. There are only three questions covered in the programme, and the independence one is second. In an hour long programme, it runs from roughly 17:25 to 50:25, so about 33 minutes. Oh, and the "particular feature of the referendum" that I mentioned was age; the audience was made up of 16 and 17 year olds, because people of that age will be able vote in the referendum.

Pollphail, the ghost village near where I grew up in Argyll, and which I mentioned a few years ago, has changed hands again. Sounds as though the buildings may finally come down, having gone uninhabited since being built, thirty five years ago. Unless you count the sheep who took shelter there.

Apparently it became part of an art project late in 2009 when demolition was thought to be imminent. Check out this video for eerie atmosphere with added graffiti:

If you're feeling brave, you can also watch this found-footage short:

Yesterday I attended the first of three annual March/Rallies that are to be held in the lead up to the Scottish Independence Referendum in 2014. The last (and only previous) time that I was part of a public expression of opinion would have been towards the end of the Thatcher government in the 1980s, when I was part of a protest against Michael Forsyth opening the East Sands Leisure Centre in St. Andrews. I’ve nothing against the fine institution that is the East Sands Leisure Centre, I should hasten to add; just the company it kept at the time.

That was an angry protest; very civilised, because it was St. Andrews, and quite small scale, but angry at the things that the government of the time was doing. Although it was also very civilised, yesterday was otherwise a different kettle of fish.

It was a bit bigger, for a start. 9,500 according to the organisers; 5,000 according to a police estimate, but that was apparently made before the march started and certainly not at peak attendance, which would have been at the start of the rally in Princes Street Gardens.

The main difference, though, was atmosphere. This wasn’t a protest against something, it was a statement of support for something, and the overwhelming mood was positive. At the rally, I listened to about two and a half hours of people giving speeches (interspersed with musical interludes, of which see a couple below), and it was only towards the end of that that we started to get some angry speeches – from trade unionists railing against the current Westminster government. While I could sympathise with their reasons, I’m glad that the majority of speakers were not in that mould. That’s not to say that other speakers didn’t have an occasional dig, but it would be as an aside in a more forward-looking speech.

Another good thing its that it clearly wasn’t about one party. Obviously there is one party which has an enormous presence in this debate, but after a speech from the First Eck there were speakers from other parties and none. Margo McDonald was first up, followed in an order I can’t recall by Dennis Canavan and speakers from Labour for Independence, the Greens and the SSP. Conspicuous by their official absence were the current parties of Westminster government – which is a shame, as there must be some who have an interest in Scottish independence. I hope someone in those parties has the guts to take the sort of stand against their leadership that the Labour for Independence guy has. One journalist came out in support – the chronologically gifted (her words!) and more-than-usually-worth-reading Ruth Wishart.

Anyway, I just wanted to write about the experience of being there, not to change your minds. Having said that, if you want to accompany me next year, that’d be great.

Dougie MacLean sang Caledonia for us, which was well received:

Rock bagpipes have been done before, but Gleadhraich were rather good at it and moreover come from Carnoustie. Shame I didn't capture their rendition of “My Generation”, which was also highly enjoyable:

If you want to hear "My Generation", Gleadhraich themselves have an earlier performance on YouTube.

At work today, someone drew my attention to this BAFTA-nominated indie comedy movie, Electric Man, set in Edinburgh:

They're trying to raise money for promotion, before the end of today (Pacific Time). They're a fair bit short of their target; why not boost them a bit by pre-ordering the DVD?

During the week, I also walked along this short stretch of the Fife Coastal Walk, the last part in the East Neuk that I hadn’t been along.

Being fairly short, there’s not a huge amount to report, but I had been looking forward to it because it’s this stretch that contains the St. Monans windmill and salt pans. I’d seen the windmill from a distance, but wasn’t sure what to expect of salt pans.

It seems it’s possible to inspect the interior of the windmill, but you have to either turn up between 12:00 and 16:00 in July or August, or borrow keys from the Post Office or Spar in St. Monans. I didn’t pass either of these on my way through St. Monans so perhaps there’ll have to be a return visit some day. The windmill isn’t operational, and has skeleton sails in place.

On getting closer, it turns out that the salt pans are immediately below the windmill. There’s not much to see. Most look like this:

That’s the ruin of a panhouse, of which there were once nine. Out beyond it, you can just make out a couple of holding tanks cut into the rock of the shore. The salt water was pumped up from the holding tank, probably using wind power from the windmill, then distributed to the panhouses by pipes or a cart. There’s one ruin that’s uncovered, so you can get a better impression of what’s there, with aid of a helpful diagram (click through for larger version).

From there a pleasant but fairly undistinguished walk took me past a shag drying its wings with the Bass Rock in the background…

… to Pittenweem.

I’ve been to Pittenweem before, so I didn’t revisit St. Fillan’s Cave…

…but I did make the obligatory visit to the The Cocoa Tree Café. The Cocoa Tree is a serious chocolate shop that also sells some other food, and if nothing else you should try their hot chocolate. You don’t even need to visit Pittenweem to do it; they have a stall at the monthly Farmers Markets in St. Andrews and Cupar where they serve Milk Hot Chocolate, White Hot Chocolate and their speciality, Caliente.

Caliente is their chilli hot chocolate, and it is to other hot chocolates as espresso is to other coffees. It’s thick and smooth and intense, and just hot enough, and yes, it’s served in espresso-size cups.

If you despair of visiting Pittenweem or the farmers markets in person to have Caliente prepared properly by the Cocoa Tree, you can order a sachet of four servings of Caliente powder online. There are instructions (which should be followed), and the recommended approach is to make up the whole batch at once, and keep unused servings in the fridge for reheating.