Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Ken Fyne: Dreich, glaur and clarty sum up my week perfectly

The recent wet weather hasn't been great for Ken's vegetable garden.

Standing in the Fyne Place veggie patch early one morning, I wondered if the sun would ever rise again.

Then it dawned on me. It’s November, so chances of those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer returning for a pre-winter reprise are remote.

Until recently, we were worrying about our water supplies. Passing Loch Glascarnoch, between Ullapool and Garve, ironically in a downpour, low water levels revealed the old road and fields where they’d usually be under water.

Those doing energetic rain dances then might be regretting their over-enthusiastic tap-dancing now. This week’s deluges have turned our productive patch into a vegetable soup of mud and puddles. Runner beans are run down, kale keeled over, tatties tatty, chard anything but charred, onions obliterated and French beans now has-beens.

Sprouts and the plumber’s favourite, leeks, are thriving though, and our dual-cabbageway wouldn’t attract any environmental objections.

David Shiach has opened a new garden centre in Aberdeen’s Bon Accord shopping mall.

Scots have a great word for the mess, glaur, which matches the perfect word to describe the weather – dreich. No wonder David Shiach could be on to a winner with his new Green House garden centre at Aberdeen’s Bon Accord shopping mall, believed to be the first of its kind in the country.

Browsing plants indoors when on a shopping trip to the city is a blooming good idea, especially at this time of year, and given the growing interest in gardening he could soon, if you’ll pardon the pun, be raking it in.

I like the late autumn with its amazing colours, gin-clear skies, migrating geese overhead and cosy evenings indoors watching TV programmes about the outdoors. During one, my mind wandered and I unwisely opined on an unrelated conundrum that suddenly struck me. How did American Football get its name when of the 45 players ready to play in each team, only one guy actually gets to kick the ball? The rest just chuck it around and bash into each other. Shouldn’t it therefore be called American Handball?

My irrelevant intervention was predictably unwelcome so I retreated quietly to contemplate it elsewhere.

Why on earth do they call it American “football”?

My enjoyment of the pre-winter period is, however, tempered by the explosion of Christmas advertising from mid-October. It’s almost too much to bear.

In one shop Noddy Holder was already belting out “It’s Chriiiistmaaaas” over the loudspeaker system. My temptation to scream “Noooo, it (expletive deleted) isn’t” in retaliation was so overwhelming that I left before being asked to do so.

The first political party to pledge a manifesto ban on annual Christmas promotions until December 1 will get my vote. Perhaps.

Barely have the last bangs and flashes of this weekend’s firework displays left animals everywhere shaking in fright, it’s full ahead to advent. We haven’t had fireworks at Fyne Place, though, except when Mrs F discovered I’d failed to remove my glaur-caked wellies when popping indoors for a quick warming coffee.

Noddy Holder and his pals from Slade should not be heard until December at the earliest. (Photo by Gijsbert Hanekroot/Redferns)

The footprints were undeniable. No, not those on the carpet from my clarty wellies but those from the impact of her seemingly steel toe-capped slip-ons on my posterior.

I was going to show her the marks but she wisely decided that was one flash too many. Who chose light-coloured carpets anyway? A clue – it wisnae me.

Despite the weather, it was exciting to see the formal opening this week of the new community garden in Stonehaven’s Market Square. I love seeing new green spaces being created, no matter how small.

Gardens do us all good, and the climate, too. I just hope the vacuous vandals who seem to reside in every community leave it alone and allow folk to enjoy the space and the lovely plants. If not, the garden’s creators should also build a set of stocks in the Square into which perpetrators could be locked. Then everyone could bring their rotting and decaying waterlogged veg and hurl it at them. I’ll be first in the queue.

The subsequent residue could then be collected and converted into valuable compost for local gardens. Brilliant. Eat your heart out, Greta, an innovative and growing green revolution is alive and thriving in north Scotland.

OK, wellies on again, I’m heading outside to spread wonderful homemade organic compost on our Fyne Place soil. Yes, I’m doing my bit for global worming, too.