Double trouble

I was amused at Andrew Gray (Letters, 5 March) continuing this business of conjugating verbs and declining nouns and the trouble one can get into when being smart about language.

The thread of the three examples given in the letters page reminds me of the time a friend of mine, well known in Aberdeen social circles, was in a classy cocktail bar in the Granite City.

He and a colleague were drinking Cuba Libre, the fashionable description in those days for rum and Coke. After a number of them, and not noticing a change of waitresses, he summonsed the new girl, a very local lassie. Wanting the same again he waved his hands over the empty glasses and simply said “Dos”.

The girl was away for ages and eventually returned saying “Peter, we’re ah oot o’ Dos. Kin a get ye somethin’ else?” DOUGLAS S BRUCE

Stonefield, Portree