Sandstone, blonde and red, for brick

Glasgow and Oxford contrasted: fewer straw boaters, fewer crushed-strawberry trews, sweat-stained linen suits, and old owlish characters, scudding by at speed on their bicycles, in spectacles seemingly borrowed from a Labour cabinet minister of the 1960s. In Glasgow, more toddling, twinkly old dears, who call you "son" and religiously wear their quilted winter coats in summer, hipsterism rampant - and amateur Pillsbury doughboys, wan and suety, only sine chef's hat. Sandstone, blonde and red, for brick, the atmosphere less sleepily Edwardian, more mischievous, thronging, alive.

In short: I'm back in Glasgow after my four-year sojourn south of the Wall.  

Before I left, however, there was just enough time to record a final edition of the For A' That podcast from leafy north Oxford.  We're up to episode number 31, and joining us this week, was freelance journalist Peter Geogeghan, who writes for various folk, including intermittently in the Scotsman, and blogs over at the London Review of Books.

On this week's show, we discuss the state of the constitutional debate over the green salad days of the Summer. Peter has his worries about how the discussion over independence is developing. I wonder why you find marvellously few proper unionists these days. We also discussed some of the findings from the recent Panelbase poll (full tables here), commissioned by Wings Over Scotland and his readers, on the canny basis of crowdfunding.

Michael and I also revealed a couple of incriminating juvenile deliquencies. Mine involves a copy of the Bible, and I may never live it down. 

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