Rural Gnome, Urban Yessing

Finally! Proof that Santa spends his summertime Saturday mornings dressed as a gnome terrorising women's bedrooms. And I'm not even going to
mention the strange circle of light in the middle of the picture. Oops I just did! Perhaps it's where he stores the Christmas spirit.

The other picture was taken by another Women for Indy wifey, who captured some of us melting in the heat outside Markies. Aberdeen city centre was all about being gloriously hot, sparklingly granite and heaving heavily with protestors of all creeds, colours and beliefs on Saturday. From the dignity of the pro-Palestine demonstrators, swelling to great numbers in groups and families, to the wild moves and drums of a rolling visitation of Aberdeen Youth Festival groups giving it laldy, to the Yes stall stalwarts that kept popping over to say hello, this wee bit of Aberdeen felt like a massive slice of Edinburgh Festival pie, basking in sunshine. Some of the yestival lot turned up in yellow tshirts to flyer for the national collective tour visit to Aberdeen that evening but between you and me they were not so much national collective as rudely selective, as they didn't even register the Yes foot soldiers around them.

Pleasingly there was a definite change to the last time I was on the stall, 90% yes. I only lasted a couple of hours before the next group of ladies came on shift, too hot for my bones, but as I walked past the no stall on my way home, of all the throngs of people in the city centre talking amongst each other, sharing ideas and stories, the three no souls looked so very, very angry. So much so I wanted to buy them a lovely orange refresha (my new favourite drink) from a well known coffee shop to cool their tempers.