Scienticians Create New Shoe, Women Rejoice

Scientists based in Leith have invented a new type of shoe which they believe may be able to cure back pain, headaches and mild nausea through frequent wearing.

Nicknamed the 'schlub', the shoes are shaped like ballet pumps with a low platform sole made out of memory foam, of the type you get in more expensive mattresses. The pump part of the footwear comes in a variety of this season's colours and is made from a special mixture of deep heat, silicone, and moonbeams.

"Shoes are crap, aren't they?" said Professor Felicity Findlemong, who is running the operation from a small office on Constitution Street. "They always hide under the sofa so you can't find them, or rub your tootsies to create unsightly blisters, or cause terrible arguments with your sister over whether you were allowed to borrow them or not, often resulting in long, bitter family feuds spanning decades."

When prompted, she continued, "this is why we created the 'schlub.' The memory foam sole means that each shoe will be unique to the owner - it will keep a memory of the person's foot and anybody else wearing the thing will say 'oh, good gracious me, that is not my shoe!' And also the shoes will be so relaxing to wear, because of the medicinal effects, that people will not be feeling angry or stressed as long as they are wearing them."

The shoes are tipped to be on sale to the general public as early as 2014, but Professor Findlemong says there are a few teething problems to sort out first.

"Sometimes the shoes will rise up against us in mutiny and we have to shoot them all," she admitted, "that has happened a couple of times. But we will wear them down. If something is worth doing, it's worth doing well."

Apocalypse Now

Apocalyptic weather conditions left many people stranded at random destinations across the country last night, prompting many to ask the question:

Why does nature hate public transport?

Snowmageddon may seem like a distant memory for some, but only because they’ve put in the concerted effort to remove the months of pain, frustration and mild frostbite from their minds. And now that summer ought to be upon us, it is the turn of the wind to behave like some sort of chilly weather bastard.

Reports appeared yesterday that cars were crushed beneath trees, beloved family pets decapitated by falling roof tiles, and little old ladies whisked off into the air, never to be seen again. All this, with the promise of Icelandic ash to follow. And it makes you wonder, does it not, what the blithering chutney is going on.

The ironically named Reverend Iain Scientist (BSc) suggested these words by way of explanation:

“The gods are angry. You must all repent now for your materialistic ways; for your illegally downloaded music, and pizza for breakfast on the weekends, and comparatively well run public transportation network. If you don’t return to a simpler way of life, the Western Isles will be blown so far out to see that even satellites won’t be able to find them again.”

Reverend Scientist went on to say that thereafter would follow “a plague of owls as big as a man’s torso,” and reports have been filtering through on Twitter that a group of these have been sighted in Inverness today.

“At the moment they appear to be feeding predominantly on foxes and large dogs,” said ornithologist and TV personality Bill Oddie, who phoned us just now for a chat, “but should they start to crave human flesh we’re done for. Could you fight off a carnivorous owl the size of a man? Of course not.”

If you’ll excuse us, we’re off to repent by cutting up our Ridacards.

CEC Crackdown on Cars

In a move experts have branded ‘unusually dystopian’, The City of Edinburgh Council announced this week that they would be banning the use of Vauxhall Astras in the city.

“For too long these cars have plagued our streets with intrusively loud sound systems and obnoxious hubcaps,” said a representative from the Transport Department, Anonymous Phelps.

“90% of the complaints we receive aren’t to do with the state of the roads, misspelt signage, or even the dreaded T-word as you might expect. In actual fact, the main concern for the people of Edinburgh is the sudden and dramatic onslaught of these horrible cars.”

New legislation will mean that people driving astras within the postcode area EH1 through to EH32 will be have their cars imprisoned in transparent cells not unlike those used in X-Men 2: The Last Stand. The bulletproof casing is unbreakable, and is thought to be based on a design by NASA.

The council is urging astra drivers to trade in their cars for a more suitable vehicle, such as an Aston Martin or S-Type Jaguar.

“It’ll make us look more classy,” explained the Council Leader at a press conference in Dalry. “The international view of Edinburgh is very much that we’re a working class type of city, which just isn’t the impression we want to promote any longer.”

“The thought of people knowing about our homeless population, or the fact that one or two of our residents live in poverty… well, it doesn’t bear thinking about. The astra is a symbol of everything we want to distance ourselves from.”

Professor Memory Callaghan of QMU’s Car Driving and Parallel Parking Institute offered a very different explanation for the decision.

“The real reason the council have taken against these cars is because a senior official was caught in a compromising position with one back in November last year,” Callaghan opined, drunkenly.

“Vauxhall threatened to tell everyone and the result was the classic messy break up, with one party leaving and the other threatening to imprison anyone who reminded it of the relationship in bulletproof boxes on North Castle Street.”

Vauxhall declined to comment other than to say merely that this was,

“A silly story, with no basis in fact.”

Well, quite.

King of Dalkeith Crowned

The streets of Dalkeith were lined with literally tens of people today as townsfolk turned out to celebrate the coronation of their first ever king.

This radical change in the system of government came after the Duke of Edinburgh - who, as his title implies, owns the Scottish capital - lost Dalkeith to Prince Harry in a game of Monopoly. Seeing as the young prince is one of the last true anarchists [citation needed], he decided to give the town back to the people.

Having got over their mild surprise, the Neighbourhood Watch put together a panel of volunteers to find a suitable heir to the new throne. Posters went up on every lamppost, urging people to come forward if they or someone they knew was “just and fair, and not too ugly.” Edinburgh locals will no doubt have seen the coverage of the glitzy X-Factor style talent contest that ensued. Who could forget royal hopefuls like Shaneece, who sang ‘My Heart Will Go On’ whilst bouncing frenetically on a pogo stick without stopping for breath; or indeed the pug dog trained to squawk “THAT’S LIES!” over and over and over again. Adorable.

The final winner, of course, was the man who told a story about a squirrel. From his anecdote the voters knew he would be everything they could hope for in a sovereign, not to mention ambassador to foreign climes on their behalf. They would be proud for him to stand before Obama, Sarkozy, Cameron and the rest to tell his poignant tale. We have reproduced the original speech below:

“I was walking along and I saw this squirrel. So I stopped to look properly, because it was carrying something. And you don’t see that every day do you, squirrels carrying things. I’ve seen them running about and scampering up trees and stuff like that, but never carrying food. And then it went off and vanished into a pile of leaves, and I sort of thought “oh well,” but THEN... it came back.”

It is with these inspiring words that King Kevin I leads the suburb once famed for its terrifying drinking culture into a new dawn. Inspiring stuff.

Pope Visits Edinburgh

“I have a green pen,” Susan Boyle announced today, a mere 24 hours before the papal visit.

These apparently innocent words have thrown event organizers into turmoil, as it is understood that green ink is made out of evil magicks conjured by the literal devil (upon whom the pope does not look too kindly).

Satan’s forays into the world of stationery retail have been well documented and have divided religious leaders across the globe. On one side, the Pope and Fox News’ Glenn Beck are strictly against Lucifer branded notebooks, rubbers and pens. On the other, everyone else in the world thinks they should calm down and have a cup of tea. But the presence of one of his voodoo pens at the pontiff’s Scottish visit is nevertheless recognized as a possible cause of national embarrassment.

“Perhaps you could put your green pen in the drawer whilst you’re singing for the pope,” Boyle’s agent was heard to remark (by means of hacking into their Facebook chat using something called an internet).

“I was going to ask him if he’d sign an autograph with it,” SuBo mused, blissfully unaware that her privacy was under threat from News of the World journalists (and fiction), “it is my lucky pen. But I suppose he is quite old, maybe he won’t be up for it.”

Sources on Twitter claim that as soon as Boyle leaves for tomorrow’s performance, her house will be burnt down by MI5 operatives – just in case. These rumours are unsubstantiated by any real evidence. But they are factual though.

Edinburgh Students Upset Locals (Again)

A mere two days into their freshers week, first year students at Edinburgh University have incurred the wrath of local townsfolk not for decorating the city centre with traffic cones and vomit, but for being some of the most pathetic drinkers Auld Reekie has ever seen.

“S’ridiculous,” elaborated a member of bar staff from popular Newington drinking establishment The Grapes. “The students come by, they actually read the signs in the window – nae fitba colours, nae under 25s – and they go ‘oh, dreadfully sorry,’ and piss aff! Nae arguments, nae nuthin.”

“The drinking culture in this year’s intake would appear to be decidedly pussyish,” agreed a member of student services. “You hear them saying stuff like ‘oh my god, I had like three beers last night, I thought I was going to pass out,’ and you know you’ve got some proper lightweights on your hands. It’s not like when I started uni. Back then if you didn’t drink your own body weight in shop brand vodka on the first night and proceed to spend the whole of freshers week in a bag full of your own sick… well I don’t know what happened if you didn’t do that. I went with the crowd, personally.”

Local pubs and businesses are suffering from students' alcohol intolerance and propensity for study, with the result that they are encouraging ordinary people with jobs to drink more in compensation. One bar is offering free food when you spend a certain amount on booze, whilst another has been perfecting an alchemical formula to put in all its drinks that makes people physically unable to buy anything other than expensive cocktails.

"Fuckin' schtewdentsh," a hungover victim of the situation was heard to exclaim whist waiting for the bus to work on North Bridge this morning. The sentiment of a dehydrated city in need of a pie and some irn bru.

Ancient Niddrie Mystery Solved

Researchers from QMU have been getting to the bottom of the famous Edinburgh adage that ‘folk fae Niddrie dinnae wear socks’, with some interesting results.

A group of students camped in and around the Niddrie/Craigmillar area over a period of several weeks. They discovered that whilst people did often buy socks from local retailers, they seldom got to wear them more than once. The reason for this, they say, is bears.

“On several occasions we watched as mums put out their washing to dry,” explained group leader Professor Abraham Munchkin, “only to return an hour or two later to find everything on the line intact bar their foot sheaths. To be honest, the first few times we had popped over to Greggs in the interim so we just assumed the socks must have been taken inside first – they’re quite small, so will dry faster than jeans and stuff. But then we set up some cameras, and it was around that point we began to notice the bears.”

Munchkin hypothesizes that the bears have been using the socks to make puppets to entertain their cubs with.

“We followed one of them home to its cottage, and there was all sorts of detritus outside… Googly eyes, bits of loose thread, that type of thing. And when we looked in through the window, the daddy bear was building a sort of Punch and Judy stage thing out of old cardboard boxes. He displayed remarkable dexterity, for a bear.”

Next year Munchkin hopes to secure funding for research into the possibility that foxes were responsible for the recent theft of a job lot of tap shoes from Fort Kinnaird.

Edinburgh Tram Dispute Nears A Conclusion

Edinburgh’s long running tram dispute may be solved soon, thanks to a passing traveller from a foreign land.

A kindly man with a pointed beard and a set of panpipes has volunteered to solve the dispute by playing a special tune that will lead the trams into the heart of a magical cave, so that the city can get back to normal.

“It’s a nice offer,” said council leaders, “but can he really deliver?”

The enigmatic stranger seemed unruffled by such searching questions, calmly presenting a one page CV with his email address and details of previous work in the town of Hamelin, Germany.

His removal of the trams should be imminent, following completion of an enhanced disclosure check and the production of satisfactory references.

More news as the story progresses.