18th February:

Regular readers of this increasingly irregular blog will know that your congenial host has a relationship with his country of birth that can only be described as "uncomfortable". In a nutshell, I go through phases of missing it terribly and then disliking it intensely.

A flying visit North at the end of last week did little to tip the scales convincingly in either direction. However, it did yield one illuminating comedy moment: I was walking from the local train station to my parent's house and, as I passed one particularly well manicured lawn, I noticed an empty bottle of Buckfast that had been tossed on to the grass. Except that someone had ripped the label off the bottle. So drinking wine from the bottle in public during the day as you walk down the road is perfectly acceptable. But imagine the shame if anyone sees what brand you bought. Priceless.

Poverty and education are still massive social issues. Anyone landing in Sauchiehall Street (Glasgow) from Mars would assume that the Scottish national sport consists of throwing chips at pigeons. And I have a problem with that. Just as much as I have a problem with those kids who called me a "poofy bastard" when I was 9 years old just because I was capable of stringing an articulate sentence together using words of more than 2 syllables without breathing heavily through my mouth.

Scotland may have admirable aspirations to be a dynamic and entrepreneurial small nation within Europe, but it won't come close until it tackles the ignorance, intolerance, bigotry and poverty that lie far too close to the surface of daily life in the central belt of the country.

My country gave me many good things - a dry sense of humour, an ability to see through even the thickest bullshit, a healthy hatred of wind and rain at the same time and a curious fondness for caramel wafers. And I took these things with me when I moved on. Which is what people inevitably tend to do when they've tasted other parts of the world.

It's good to remember your roots but sometimes it's even better to be a stranger in a strange land.