In March we dropped into the V&A, Dundee for something to do.

We came across a small exhibition of postcards by Valentine’s, once a Dundee institution.

According to the V&A site this exhibition was supposed to end in January 2023!

I have many Valentine’s postcards in my collection especially those of the 1938 Empire Exhibition.

I had not realised, though, that Valentine’s themselves had constructed for them an Art Deco building on Dundee’s Kingsway, as these two postcards from the V&A Exhibition attest. The building is now long gone:-

Also on display was this postcard of Portobello Bathing Pool:-

Images of Portobello Bathing Pool in its heyday are here.

The V&A, Dundee, is holding an Exhibition about tartan. It goes on until Jan 2024. It’s worth seeing.

We visited it in August (and again with our eldest son, his wife and daughter, in September.)

One of the exhibits is the oldest piece of tartan known:-

There are many examples of tartan being used for promotional or decorative purposes:-

These can go back a long time:-

However I did not expect to see a NATO tartan nor one commemorating the SALT Treaty:-

Tartan is not an exclusively Scottish style. Below is a Burmese one:-

Beside that  was a Masai one:-

Madras tartans were once thought to have been inspired by Scots but they are in fact indigenous to India:-

Tartans from Balmoral testify to Queen Victoria’s enthusiasm for Scottish culture:-

Modern takes on tartan. (There’s a Dundee FC strip in the background here):-

One of the things that happened while I was away was the draw for the group stage of the League Cup (apparently now called the Viaplay Cup.)

We play Airdrieonians, Inverness Caledonian Thistle, Bonnyrigg Rose and Dundee, the first and last away, the other two at home.

I suppose we’ll be out of contention after two games as usual.

I was so sad to see on the TV news last nighty that Willison House in Dundee – subject of my post Dundee Art Deco Heritage 4 – aka Robertson’s Furniture Store and a listed building, has been ravaged by a fire that was apparently set deliberately.

It seems the damage is so severe that demolition will be the only recourse.

My only consolation is that I saw and photographed – it before it became too much of an eyesore.

I show it again as it was in happier times.

Kirriemuir, in Angus, Scotland was the birthplace of playwright and creator of Peter Pan, J M Barrie.

It’s a nice wee town, north of Dundee and a few miles away from Glamis and its Castle which was the childhood home of the late Queen Mother, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon. (I posted a photo of the War Memorial for Glamis village, on which is the name of her brother, as the Honourable Fergus Lyon, here.)

Many of its buildings are constructed from red sandstone:-

In the centre of the town there is of course a statue of Peter Pan:-

Barrie’s birthplace is now in the hands of the National Trust for Scotland. The family lived in a room and kitchen on the first floor.

In a house like this the kitchen is a largish room with a cooking range of some sort and usually what is called a bed recess, which is an alcove designed to fit a box bed into. Probably all the kids in a family would have slept in that bed. Today a kitchen like that would be described as a ‘family room’ as it was multi functional. The ‘room’ usually had a bed recess too and the parents slept in that one. Sometimes the ‘room’ doubled up as a sort of parlour during the day. There were eight children in the Barrie family and what with all of them and the noise of the weaving looms on which his father worked, it must have been a bit lively.

The entrance doorway is round the back:-

Just across form the entrance is a washhouse which was J M Barrie’s inspiration for the Wendy House in Peter Pan.

There’s not much light in there but you can see the tub, basket and washboard:-

Barrie never forgot his origins. One of his brothers died young and he used this as the genesis of the idea for the ‘boy who never grew up.’ Barrie’s mother could not get over her loss and he himself felt pressure to live up to her perfect memory of his dead brother. Despite his subsequent fame and fortune he was buried in the family plot in Kirriemuir Cemetery (which is up a fairly steep hill from the road leading east out of the town.)

Barrie’s grave. The plaque saying ‘J M Barrie Playwright’ is reasonably new. When I first visited there the grave’s surroundings were much plainer:-

This post’s title is the perennial cry of the lesser spotted Scottish football fan.

However, Saturday’s Scottish Cup game against Dundee largely hinged on a red card being shown to Ross MacLean for violent conduct as a frsult of which we played the whole second half with only ten men.

This red card has now been rescinded.

How we might have fared with a full complement on the park is of course unknowable. But given we pushed Dundee fairly hard with only ten men it’s a reasonable assumption that we could have done even better with eleven on the pitch.

The ref has perhaps cost us a place in the next round – and the revenue that would bring – and a possibly lucrative draw in that round (though Dundee got Peterhead away – a tie which could have been negotiated by us into a quarter-final.) We were punished for an offence that in effect never happened. He was seemingly due to be fourth official at a Tier 1 game tonight and is due to do the same at another on Saturday. It doesn’t seem equable.

Scottish Cup, Round Four, The Rock, 22/1/22.

What to make of this?

Against a top division side we looked reasonably comfortable and even with ten men for 46 minutes – I don’t know what Ross MacLean did to get sent off, the Pixellot camera had done its usual panning away thing when nothing’s happening at a free kick, but he’s an idiot for doing it – were in the game. And they only scored from a penalty. It struck Joe McKee’s arm but he couldn’t have got out of the way.

In fact our best chance came late on. Stuart Carswell blazed over after a couple of headers from a free kick opened up the chance for him but he rarely scores from open play. (He rarely scores at all.)

It was a pretty nondescript game all round. Dundee hardly threatened us, a couple of close range headers in the first half – one sent wide the other easily into Sam Ramsbottom’s arms – and a long range effort Sam tipped over. Second half I can only think of a Leigh Griffiths shot dragged wide and another straight at Sam.

First half Dundee did look sharper and quicker thinking, especially at loose/second balls, but as the game wore on the difference seemed to lessen.

We can’t be judged on this. Dundee were fairly toothless and we didn’t lay a glove on them either. (Ross MacLean possibly apart.) Big Josh up front did okay but wasn’t given enough service. Defenders know he’s there, though.

Cove Rangers next Saturday is a bigger test of our league chances.

I hope the display gives the team confidence, though.

SPFL Tier 3, The Rock, 15/1/22.

What Ho, Jeeves!

A win! And a clean sheet!

Mind you. It was only East Fife.

The first half was odd. Both teams had chances – twice there was pinball in their penalty area and it seemed impossible we wouldn’t score; but we didn’t. It could have been 3-3 at half-time instead of 0-0. Sam Ramsbottom (in because our new loan keeper Kieran Wright injured himself in the warm-up, that’s how our season has gone) had a couple of good saves.

In the second half it was kind of the same except new striker Joshua Oyinsan put in a centre forward’s header from the six-yard line (I thought the keeper should have done better, as they say) from a great cross by our other official debutant Gregg Wylde, who actuallly played last week for us as a trialist. I had forgotten what a centre forward looked like! Oyinsan won headers and held the ball up, put himself about and got on the end of a cross; what’s not to like?

That goal, aesthetically pleasing as it was – there’s always something delightful about a headed goal from a cross – was surpassed by the second; a great hit by Gregg Wylde from thirty-five yards, hitting the post and rebounding back across the goal, crossing the line as it did so. What a belter! In those stakes probably only beaten by Lee Sharp’s at Livingston and Big Roy’s at Love Street on Christmas Day 1971.

Even so East Fife had two great chances themselves but both times failed to test Ramsbottom in our goal.

Still I’m not objecting to being eight points clear of automatic relegation and only two (realistically because of the goal difference difference) shy of the staying up spot at this stage of the season.

We’ll need to keep it up though.

A respite from league business next week with Dundee coming for a Scottish Cup visit.

But the next two league games are fiercesome. League leaders Cove at home and third-placed Montrose away.

Sons reward for beating Sauchie on Saturday is another home tie, this time potentially less winnable.

We will play top division side Dundee on Saturday, January 22^nd.

That’s almost two months away.

Despite it being relatively near we had never been up Kinnoull Hill near Perth till one fine day in August last year.

It’s a lovely wooded walk up to the top.

Path to summit:-

We could see the town of Scone (pronounced Scoon) through a gap in the trees:-

At the top there’s a good view of the “silvery” River Tay as it meanders eastwards:-

This is a stitch of three photos showing the river as it flows from Perth (on the right) under the Friarton Bridge then on towards Dundee.

This is another stitch showing Perth itself:-

This one is looking north towards Dunkeld and Birnam:-