Of mice and men, a stowaway cat and red squirrels on Burns Night

The lassies have been toasted, the haggis addressed and the Immortal Memory delivered. Another Burns Night has come and gone with suppers held in hotel ballrooms, town halls and family homes.

The Ploughman Poet’s work has been recited by schoolchildren and celebrity speakers alike and allowed us to pause during our busy lives to admire, reflect, and be entertained.

With themes of poverty, equality, hypocrisy, money, war, royalty and politics, Burns’s work is as relevant today as it was more than 200 years ago.

Take any story of the week and there will likely be a Burns poem to supply some words of wisdom on the subject – with the possible exception of the cattle grid on Skye which has a gateless road right next to it.

That one has most people lost for words.

“It doesn’t make any sense,” said Skye resident Carolyn Leah. “When I first saw it I just laughed, it was hilarious.” It’s sure to give the local coos and sheep a giggle as well, something Burns would approve of, given his love and respect for all his “earth-born companions”.

In Aberdeen, red squirrels are having the last laugh as a survey showed their numbers have increased as the grey population fell.

The Great Scottish Squirrel Survey also confirmed the red squirrel population in the Highlands is safe and free of greys thanks to conservation efforts.

A tabby who thought to dwell “cozie” in a skip saw his plans gang agley and he was found in Perth 130 miles away from his home in Alness.

Ginger was returned safely to his family thanks to microchipping, but will need a few Burns suppers of his own after losing weight on his adventure.

NATURE

Extreme weather events confirm that “man’s dominion has broken Nature’s social union” and this week China’s northernmost city Mohe saw temperatures fall to a record low of -53C.

Not as frosty as that, but decidedly lukewarm, were responses to the chancellor’s speech yesterday with criticism that it was lacking in detail and selective with its statistics.

At one point Jeremy Hunt advocated a more positive attitude to risktaking, saying it had paid off when investing in a Covid vaccine.

He didn’t mention the risk the Tories took with Trussonomics and what financial experts have dubbed the “moron premium” still looming over the UK economy.

Later Mr Hunt insisted the government is committed to the HS2 high-speed rail line ending at Euston in central London. He was quizzed after reports the service might terminate at a hub in the suburbs outside the city, and thereby serve as a metaphor for a government that consistently falls short.

The chancellor did confirm that he hasn’t paid an HMRC fine, unlike his Cabinet colleague Nadhim Zahawi, so at least that’s something.

Burns defended Customs officials and Zahawi might be reminded of the lines: “Ye men of wit and wealth, why all this sneering; ’Gainst poor Excisemen? give the cause a hearing.”

Given that the bard had much to say about equality, he might have been interested to hear that girls will take part in Junior Up Helly Aa for the first time in the Viking festival’s history when it returns to Shetland next week.

And Amy Underwood, aka The Digger Girl, has become a role model for women in construction after notching up more than 300,000 TikTok followers.

In March she will go from digging ditches in Dalmally to Las Vegas, where she is making a guest appearance at the biggest plant show in the world.

Burns’s poem The Rights of Woman is especially relevant when it comes to one of the most serious stories of the week – that of a transgender rapist being moved to a men’s prison.

Isla Bryson had been remanded to Cornton Vale women’s prison in Stirling after being convicted of the rapes when she was a man called Adam Graham.

It seems fitting to leave the last word this week to Burns:

“Amid this mighty fuss just let me mention,

The Rights of Woman merit some attention.

First, in the Sexes’ intermix’d connection,

One sacred Right Woman is, protection.”

When I first saw it I just laughed, it was hilarious