RickMcD

Hope your talking tongue in cheek here,Tracy. It's so dreary to think that in this day and age if you were born on the green side of the street you are bound to have a soft spot for c*ltic and vice versa for blue side. I was born on the black and white side and I don't particularly care about the old firm or anyone else. As long as most teams survive. We've got to have something to do on a Saturday afternoon.

That seems to have jogged something in my memory assuming you're not referring to the obvious. Was it the Lion the Sea Lion and ? Can't remember what. Dug? Donkey?

I think this is a great post as was FS's. I started the Say Something Good About Paisley thread and was pleasantly surprised. Stu got in a dig about bombing the town but to give him credit he also threw in one or two less negative comments. It's very easy to knock your home town and ignore the fact that most towns are having problems such as those Paisley is suffering. Where I live now was once a thriving holiday resort and it's trying it's best to recover a little of it's former glory. Our councillors are absolutely hopeless so that's common ground with Paisley if half of what you guys say is true. The number of boarded up shops is getting alarming. I think it's the same everywhere. Sonny's thread is great and we all seem to be enjoying it. It's reminding me about so many things from my youth that I had forgotten. It's not really such a bad place, is it?

I paddled in it many a time too. I know it's an old story but I can only remember long hot summers in those days. I suppose it came down like cats and dogs sometimes but don't remember that. I've never heard that about the oak tree. Great story and it would be nice if anybody can confirm it's still there.

I was in that building many a time when it was Lion's Coal office. It was quite plush inside. I can remember our coal being delivered by horse and cart. The horses were huge Clydesdales and there was almost a kind of initiation ceremony us boys had to go through and that was to pat the horse. When you're about three years old a big horse like that was frightening. Stirrat's Dairies delivered milk by horse and cart too and I remember one day the cart overturned dragging the horse down.It was a big white horse and it got quite badly hurt. There was blood everywhere and a lot of us were nearly hysterical. Amazingly within days it was back at work as if nothing had happened and the scars soon faded.

That's a great photograph. I wonder when it was taken and why? It's obviously an aerial shot from I would guess the 50's. I wonder if it was from a series of many parts of the town. Is that Watson's the butcher the same one that had the place on High Street where the buses used to pull in?

I always thought it was kind of scary looking too. Does anybody know the derivation of modele? Pronounced generally as 'Mowdill'. I always thought it didn't sound like a proper word.

I thought all the shots were terrific and I don't think I had ever seen any of them before. Being an ex-BB boy, it was nice to see them at the funeral. They looked very smart, just like we were in my day.

I'm like most of us and love this thread. I think we exiles in particular enjoy it. The stuff about the Glen Cinema staggered me. I knew the history but I always believed that they tore it down after the fire. I'm absolutely shocked to discover that not only was it not torn down but in fact is largely still intact! I always thought my knowledge of local history was reasonably good so I don't know how I missed out on that. Great stuff,Sonny.

Pretty sure you got that right,Bluto. Our janny at Langcraigs John Martin was an officer there and the 22nd.was definitely at Sherwood. I remember reading something by Billy Connolly saying that his first ever professional gig was in Paisley and I think he said it was in the Methodist Halls.

'I danced with glee, I jumped with joy, for I was here.....' Oh the hell with it! I saw a bit of flogging when I was younger but not before the big drop.

Thank you for that. An absolute classic. I was in tears laughing at it.

I remember that PDE feature too but are you sure you were just a lad? I would have thought it was a bit later than that. Hairy arsed schoolboy springs to mind.

I used to live very close to it but damned if I remember. Slumberland keeps coming into my head but I'm far from sure.

Cook had a bad run a year or two back but recovered. He seems to get out too often to balls he shouldn't go near. I remember after he had scored a couple of centuries they were already talking about him being the next England captain. Seemed a bit premature to me. Having said that do you recall the FEC story about Athers? They got that right on both counts. I wish they could always play with two spinners but you usually need a genuine all rounder to get away with that. One of the reasons Swan got picked ahead of Monty was the fact that Swan could bat a bit. Not scoring very well now though.

He might not need to now that these few posts have appeared but I do think that something along the lines of what you say is damned near enough. Maybe on the first of every month or some such he could say something. When did the first one expire? Must be nearly three months ago. I think the lack of communication last time was unhelpful to his cause and he shouldn't make the same mistake again. I remember the comment about letting fans take more of a role but is anyone doing anything? If it's apathy, it will die.

I don't have a clue what's going on but late last year Richard came in for a lot of stick for the deafening silence about what was going on. It was a PR disaster and it seems he is still leaving St.Mirren fans in the dark. Possibly all those who signed up to deal Mark 1 are being kept in the picture- I don't know. I accept that confidentiality may be a problem but if I was in his position I would be issuing regular communications even if they had to be pretty bland statements. I wonder if the attitude is that the fans can bloody well wait until it suits Richard. Sid appears to be Richard's only groupie and he hints at insider knowledge- not only about the CIC. But he's saying nothing either. He'd probably have to kill us if he told us. Richard is a director of the club and he surely owes the fans a bit of respect. Even tell us if it is proceeding and If he still thinks it will work. At the minute it looks like another PR disaster in the making.

I had realised there was a bit going on. I just get the feeling that the ICC will never come out again and ban anyone for chucking. I don't know if Ajmal was but it does look odd. If you only complain after you get beat it looks bad. Muralitharan took stick for years but then got OK'd. I saw a thing on TV a year or so ago when they spoke about his action and I felt than even then although the contributors were saying he was fine, they still seemed to have reservations. I remember too that after discussing him they switched to looking at Warne with the comment 'Now here's a guy where there is no problem.' It seems a pity for he was such a nice guy but I think that even in fifty years time if his name is mentioned as the greatest bowler of all time that element of doubt will stick. Another really unfortunate aspect is that so often there are overtones of racial bias which I think are unfounded. It's crossed my mind that what cricketing nations could look at is finding kids with strangely bent arm or wrist joints and teach them to bowl.

Yes England that it was going to be a piece of cake and Pakistan were raring to go. I expected England to do a lot better in the second test and it looked they had them. Pakistan bowled well but the England total was an embarrasment. After the first test I was waiting for some comment on Ajmal's action. England can be bad losers too but I'm glad they didn't go down that route.

Boy, you're right. Don't expect Monty to score runs but the top order batsmen played like numpties. Rheman's 6-25 even put Monty's figures in the shade.

Great to see Monty back and bowling beautifully. 6-62. Many cricket fans among us? I think I know of at least one.

Do you think it worked?

When you say heavily populated do you mean for that era? I would have thought putting figures to any population in those days could be no better than a guess. How did they spread the word? I know they were literate but what about the Scots? If it's word of mouth, how was it done? Nice to see you're back. Were you away or no weel?

Sid, I've never believed the Irish first brought Christianity to Scotland. I thought I hadn't even mentioned anything about religion but I see I did make a whimsical remark about what might happen to you if you didn't go along with what some of the so-called saints suggested.Many of these guys were warriors and trouble makers. If you take St.Columba,we were all told at school how he came from Ireland out of the goodness of his heart to convert Scotsmen to Christianity. There's plenty evidence that he'd been a bit of a troublemaker and he probably got out of Ireland just ahead of the posse. One of his ancestors was Niall Of The Nine Hostages and he was quite a lad. Getting back to Mirin, I think there is fairly strong evidence that he came from here and was known as Mirin of Benchor, one of Bangor's old names. He was also rumoured to have been Greek. Anyway, it suits me to believe he was from here and unless firmer evidence surfaces you won't change my mind. It would be nice to think Mirin was a really good guy but he was probably as bad as the rest. It's impossible to know how much Christianity they brought with them. I don't know how Columba could spread the word from a tiny remote island. I've always wondered how Columba and his men spent the long,cold winter nights on Iona. I'm surprised they didn't come up with Buckie before that other lot. I suspect they had to cuddle up for warmth. And have you any idea how missionaries discovered that African people didn't have sex in the missionary position? I can assure you that the sectarian nutter brigade hoodwinked me about nothing. It was listening to all their crap that made me look at the history of the relationship between Scotland and Ireland.

You're absolutely right Dumbarton_Bud. It was some kind of religious community. I didn't mean to say the Abbey. His community was apparently somewhere around the Hamills on the Cart. There's a model of the community where Mirin was educated in Bangor and he is supposed to have based the one in Paisley on it. Bangor Abbey is built on exactly the site of the old community. Despite what Sid says, there's a fair old amount of documentation over here which appears to completely back up the fact that Mirin was born over here, possibly in the north of Co.Antrim. Most 'scholars' believe he was definitely Irish and studied under St.Comgall in Bangor.