The folk in Perth are friendly and helpful. I know this for a fact because last night I had two friends coming to visit who were driving from down south (ie England), and who experienced a chance, yet extremely fortuitous, encounter in Perth.
Christine and Kathy telephoned me from about 10 miles outside Perth and I advised them that they should reach me at about 6.00pm. By 6.30pm I was getting a teensy weensy bit anxious; by 6.45pm I was relieved to hear a knock on the door, and welcomed two women who were in fits of hysterical giggles, gabbling something about having been told the stone cottages in the Highlands were freezing cold, so they were amazed to be dragged into the warmth.
"Do we have a tale to tell you!" they chorused.
Once I had them settled with a glass of champagne in front of the log fire, I sat back to hear their story.
All had been progressing very well until they reached Perth and could see no signposts for Blairgowrie. They drove around in circles and eventually found themselves in a back street, not far from a supermarket. Kathy elected to go to the supermarket and find someone who could give her directions.
She spied a fellow leaving the store and went up and tapped him on the shoulder.
"Are you local?" she asked.
"I am noo (sic: now)," said this very Scottish sounding gentleman.
"Well, I'm hoping you can help me."
"That'll cost ye five poonds,"
"I'll pay anything," said Kathy, perhaps momentarily forgetting she was negotiating with a Scot.
"Then that'll be ten poonds."
Bartering complete, Kathy explained her plight, that she and her friend were lost and needed to know how to get to Blairgowrie.
"Oh, that's nay problem, the road you need is on our way home, so you just follow my wife and I."
Kathy said that might present a problem because they weren't actually parked in the supermarket carpark but were in a back lane nearby and she was sure they would never be able to navigate the streets back to the carpark.
"Och, not a problem. I'll jump in the car with your friend, and you can go with my wife, and we will meet up a few miles up the road."
Introductions were made and Alec went with Kathy to find Christine, whilst Morag went to put their groceries in the car.
"Chris! Chris!" Kathy yelled through the car window to Christine. "I've found a man for you!"
Hoots of laughter, and Christine is thinking to herself that Kathy is a pretty fast worker. After all, she only popped into the supermarket to find directions, not a new bloke. But Christine's laughter soon turned to slight concern when she realised that not only was this strange man she had never met before climbing into her car, but her friend Kathy was heading off into a second car.
Now far be it for me to be a damp squib, but I did point out that Christine and Kathy had just thrown out of the window all the advice drummed into the heads of their children over many years about (a) never talking to strangers and (b) never getting into cars with strangers - and had one of their offspring been telling this story they would have been alternately horrified and terrified. They had the grace to blush.
Kathy and Morag enjoyed a cosy woman to woman chat as they negotiated the Perth rush hour and out onto the road to Blairgowrie. Morag did express some concern for Christine because she said her husband Alec could "talk for Scotland". Christine later confirmed this indeed was the case, "and England, Wales and Ireland too."
As they walked to Christine's car at the appointed meeting spot, Kathy turned to Morag.
"Omigod, the windows are all steamed up!"
"Aye," said Alec, with a wink. "We stopped a few times on the way."
This of course, turned out to be a fantasy on Alec's part, but on the journey he had regaled Christine with many amusing stories about his life, and realising he had a foreigner as his audience, also enjoyed telling some tall stories - including the one about the lack of heating in stone cottages.
"But why do they call them botties?" asked Christine.
"No, Chris, it's BOTHYS!!!"
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