Democracy is a lie reads the graffito. As the peoples of North African and Middle Eastern nations voice dissent against their autocratic leaders, I’m caught short by the message sprayed on a wall on a Gorbals side street round the corner from the Citizen’s Theatre. On a biting cold day I pick over the remains of the blowdown of one of the Norfolk Court high-rises and wonder, what would the peoples of Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain and Libya think if…

Last Saturday, while travelling eastbound on the M8, I notice some weirdness going on in Stanley Street, these days a prime billboard site. Never one to miss a trick, I exit at the Tradeston/Kinning Park off ramp – bizarrely two inner city areas unrecognised by the city’s local newspaper, the Evening Times.

Moments later I discover that the Gray Dunn Biscuit Factory, a place that looms large in my memory, is being demolished. Incompetently and dangerously. The reporting of this,…