Talk of the Town: You've been hit by a smooth criminal

EYEBROWS must surely be raised at Lothian and Borders Police's new theft awareness poster.

The poster appears to show a moonwalking burglar bathed in disco lights, complete with iPod and very fetching Jean Paul Gaultier-style striped sweater.

What's on the iPod, we wonder?

Our money's on Smooth Criminal or Bad by Michael Jackson.

Scots menus are hot stuff

IT SEEMS the owner of the world's only Indian restaurant with a menu in Scottish is being forced to print thousands of extra copies because tourists keep taking them as souvenirs.

The dishes on the menu at the Capital's Suruchi eatery are described in Scots dialect, including papadums "fae North India, plain or hoat", vegetable pakora as "a mixter maxter o vegetables makkit intae fritters served wi salad an a dookin sauce" and chicken kebabs as "sappie wee dauds o chicken sleepit in nae ower nippie spices".

The menu has proved so popular everyone, it seems, wants to take one away with them, says manager Anil Rakas.

Getting snappy over snaps

AS HOME to more than 7000 staff, including offices of several of Scotland's biggest financial institutions, you would have thought the security goons at Edinburgh Park would have plenty of things to do to keep them busy.

Not so, it would seem. One overzealous "minder" saw fit to stop an amateur photographer taking pictures of the new tram flyover at the council-owned business park.

"It's private property," was the only explanation given.

Everybody laughed in disbelief when South Lanarkshire Council staff recently banned an amateur snapper from taking pictures in their parks because it would breach the human rights of other visitors who had not given their permission to appear in the background of his photos.

It just goes to show such nonsense is even closer to home than we might have thought.