Gloomy, but ...

Glen Massan. In the rain. I know - it's not exactly thrilling, and a hasty shot under the hood of an anorak isn't going to break any photographic records. But let's consider my title instead.

"Gloomy, but ..." can mean one thing to most people - it's a gloomy picture of a miserable afternoon in the middle of a very trying winter, but going out for a walk in the rain had its compensations by way of serotonin and endorphins, to say nothing of the physical fitness thing. "But", you see, introducing a counterbalance.

However, I'm originally from Glasgow, and in Glasgow "but" is frequently the kind of particle that apparently appears in some Latin and certainly in colloquial Glaswegian. It has the effect of intensifying what goes before it - although sometimes it seems almost to be a form of address, as if the person spoken to is "but".

There. More interesting, perhaps, than a wet hike up a slippy track?