Iain Maciver writes …

OUR autumn holiday would be at the Mod. The family would have a great time going round the attractions of Oban while my week would pass with a warm and fuzzy feeling, meeting warm and fuzzy people I had not seen since I was last at the festival of all things heedrum-ho and enjoying beverages that would make me even more warm and fuzzy.

Sadly, someone else had other ideas. She treated my plan like islanders will treat an anti-Sunday ferries candidate – laughing at it, rubbishing it and then completely ignoring it. Sternly instructed we were going to the city of Glasgow, I thought how I love this marriage thing; sharing ideas and making compromises so we all get what we want.

A backup plan was called for. I pretended to misunderstand Seonag, the satnav. While loudly bursting into a chorus of A Pheigi a Ghraidh just as Seonag was telling me to enter a roundabout and take the first exit I sort of deliberately, but accidentally, took a wrong turn at Ballachulish.

This strange urge to sing loudly came intermittently – like when she began to quiz me on whether or not we were on the right road to Glasgow. Somehow, inexplicably, we ended up in a place called Oban where, gosh, we found a festival called the Royal National Mod in full swing. Dashed satnavs – can’t trust them.

It was meant to be, I suggested, as she announced we were staying for precisely 15 minutes. Then she met someone from Plasterfield. Yab, yab, yab. No one can talk like people from Plasterfield – especially to each other. So I was able to make my escape and dash upstairs to the Skipinnish Ceilidh Lounge.

Sadly, this imposing seafront venue has windows so large that she spotted me from across the road before I could even gulp my first dram.

Dragged by my aural appendage back to the car, I was ordered to drive and aim the car at the dear, green place by the Clyde unless I wanted to hear everything from now on in mono. Rumbled, I had no option but to head for Glasgow, a city often said to be ahead of its time. That’ll be why every second lamppost already carries adverts for “real” Christmas trees.

So, for a few days, I had to keep up with the Mod, courtesy of Tony Kearney and Mary Ann Kennedy, on the late-night telly. And what a grumpathon it was.

No, not Tony and Mary Ann. The two of them were happy to show off their dental work. But why is it that so many performers on the one TV programme celebrating the finest musicality of Gaeldom put on their dourest, sourest faces?

Very talented and normally happy people, competitors and established names, who should be ecstatic that they are performing to the nation, suddenly take on the joyless demeanour of our prime minister. Why don’t their tutors encourage them to smile – even if they are not enjoying themselves?

Thank goodness for Donnie Large, that’s all I can say. He helped lift the Gaelic gloom on one night, at least.

Getting all worked up about the nightly sulkiness, on Thursday I decided to head back to Oban to tell everyone to start smiling. I told the light of my life that I needed to take a train northwards to visit long-lost relatives in Dumbarton; I knew she didn’t like that place so would lose all interest in my movements. She can’t even say its name properly. She pronounces it as Dumb-Parton. I don’t know if she is having a go at that smiley, well-built country and western singer or just needs false teeth.

One of the first people I bumped into in Oban was the legendary comic entertainer Norman Maclean (autobiography now available in all good bookshops). He knows how to smile. We had a long chat about his run-ins with Brigitte Bardot and Frank Sinatra. Then we went off and had a few strong drinks together – Americano coffees in the Cuan Mòr restaurant.

Then there was another broadly-smiling legend. Willie Morrison, a veteran reporter of the parish of Durness who used to write for this very organ, was also to be found stravaiging on George Street. Many is the Mod I have had with Uilleam where he has regaled us in the late evening with heart-tugging renditions of ballads about the big sheep of the Highland Clearances. Willie could bring a tear to a glass eye, aye he could. But he smiles most of the time.

Reassured that there were enough smilers to keep things light until the end of the week, I headed south. I was soon to learn the perils of using ScotRail’s latest toilets improperly. Unlike the town-centre ones, you need to press a button to lock yourself in. Only then will the outside “engaged” light come on.

I was sitting not far from just such a convenience and saw a young lady enter. She did not lock it from the inside so no light came on. Oh-oh. A blue-rinsed Mod-goer was about to enter, so I warned her there was someone in already. She shot me a withering glare suggesting I mind my own business and muttered no light was on.

Shrieks from the interrupted youngster rang round the carriage. I felt like saying “Told you so,” but magnanimously I kept shtum.

It is a three-hour journey from Oban. A couple of hours afterwards, I noticed the haughty blue-rinse lady nipping to the loo again. I couldn’t believe it. No light. She’d forgotten to lock it.

Then a big, burly man, with builder’s cleavage, went to spend a penny. I know, I could have said something about the blue-rinse lady being still in there. I am so naughty.

Bloodcurdling screams reverberated everywhere as the door slid open and the grumpy woman was confronted at her business by the bursting builder.

I’m still giggling. Is that very bad of me?