Talk of the Town: MSP is sexy.. but only for a few hours

FOR two months it was dominated by the chiselled former bankers of the Home Counties and a vast new intake of glamorous female MPs joining the ranks of the Tories.

But finally the SNP has managed to break into sexymp.co.uk's exclusive set - even it was just for an afternoon.

Dr Eilidh Whiteford, the Nationalist's fisheries spokeswoman, was thrust into the top ten of 600-plus on Friday morning, edging out Labour Co-operative Liverpool member Luciana Berger. Nothing lasts forever though, and by 5pm she had been replaced by greying Cumbrian MP Jamie Reed.

Stetsons off to Walter Scott for influencing Wild West

EXPERTS are to discuss Sir Walter Scott's influence on the stories of the Wild West at a conference in Wyoming next month.

Walter Scott: Sheriff And Outlaw features academic speakers from the UK and US. Chief executive of the Abbotsford Trust, Jason Dyer, said: "It is amazing to discover the far-reaching influence he had. James Fenimore Cooper's The Last Of The Mohicans is similar to Scott's writing and Cooper's second novel The Spy from 1778 is based on Scott's Waverley."

We'll be expecting the appearance of a stetson on the Scott monument any day now.

Girls get wise to dirty tricks

IT was billed as the filthiest sporting event ever held in the Capital - although the team of photographers from a popular lads' mag perhaps had the wrong end of the stick when they signed up for Edinburgh's Swamp Soccer World Championship.

The sneaky snappers registered as a team to get into the site, but competitors were wise to their ways. "I don't think there was any doubt they were here to take pictures of the girls covered in mud," said Hannah Davies, 23, of city team Blackhall Bandits, "but we clocked them straight away."

Picky women lose in love

A recent survey in Edinburgh found that while women over the age of 30 would like to be in a relationship, only 40 per cent felt they would find love.

The research was undertaken by Beswitchedon, a city-based consultancy which offers advice on how to find your ideal partner, although it admitted perhaps the Capital's love-lorn ladies were being a little too picky. Director Karen Barr said: "Some of the statements we hear include, 'there are no good men out there', 'all the best ones are taken', and so on. All this from women who so dearly wanted to be in love!"