John Gibson: Aaah ... the pies, bubbly and Bublé

Published on Tuesday 24 November 2009 08:39

DEAD man walking. I'm toying with a glass of bubbly, Michael Bublé is giving Cry Me a Rivah laldy from his latest album and I'm into the second of three meat pies when in strolls Barnaby Hawkes, the man I once pronounced dead in this column.

A kind of hush might have fallen on the annual Jazz 'n' Pies night in Tom Ponton's Oz Bar in Candlemaker Row but I'd swiftly brought Barnaby back from the dead and everybody knows he has rejoined society.

On the guest list, he got a welcoming hug from the host, who was in extra convivial mood. His other watering hole, the Sportsman's Bar, was packed to the gunnels by the Royal Navy. The bar is a lifebelt's throw from the cruise liner terminal, where the destroyer Daring was moored on a courtesy visit to Edinburgh.

Said Mr P: "We've been doing a Jazz 'n' Pies for ten years and this has been the best, due largely to the robust Mike Hart band and the champagne provided by Icon Energy (Scotland), specialists in thermal water heating."

New sky-high technology but will it keep the pies warm?

Dubai for a try

Loose bawls. Nomadic Norrie Rowan got back from the Singapore Sevens just in time for the three Murrayfield games, prior to departing for the Dubai Sevens next week. The former Boroughmuir and Scotland prop revels in such trips.

"We call ourselves Rugby Ecosse. In Singapore we didn't do too well in the first and second halves but in the third half we were fantastic.

"In Dubai I'll be a guest of Greenock man Alastair Munro. He's got me a thousand-dollar hospitality ticket, he's major league out there, building desalination plants."

Rowan met up again with old chum Brian Edwards, former Boroughmuir captain. "He played in Scotland's 1982 Australian tour, when we beat the Aussies in Brisbane but lost in Sydney. The best tour I've known. I was in the squad but didn't play. I was what they call a dirt-tracker."

Edwards is based in Dubai with Scottish engineering company Clyde Blowers. Clannish, isn't it?

Afterwords . .

. . . What a racket! Andy Murray's debut in the music charts has been slagged out of sight. Andy has heightened my appreciation of Ruby Murray.