The Herald

Ready for Take-Off; Ostrich Meat Made a Shaky Start in Britain As a Rival to Traditional Steak, but Its Healthy Properties Mean Its Stock Is Now Rising. By Nell Nelson

The Borders isn't the obvious place for an alien invasion, but for the past 11 years strange creatures have been roaming the fields near Duns. The Berwickshire town is home to Scotland's largest ostrich farm, where the large, curiously athletic but flightless birds are bred in a three-acre paddock before being processed and sold as meat. Ostrich meat first arrived in Britain in the 1990s, when the prolonged BSE scare prompted many farmers to diversify out of fear that the beef market was abou...

Food for Thought; Helen Lederer's New Fringe Show May Poke Fun at Lifestyle Fascism, but She Still Finds Herself Drawn to Domestic Delights, Finds Cate Devine

How do you make food funny? You put it in the hilarious hands of comedienne Helen Lederer, whose new stage show about the pressures of foodie perfection is about to hit the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Entitled Finger Food, it tells the story of struggling fortysomething presenter Bella le Pard, who is desperate to make her mark with a cookery pilot for the cable channel Flair4LifeTV. A divorcee with a semi- delinquent child and group therapy costs to meet, Bella's career - and livelihood - dep...

Count Your Blessings, Not Your Midge Bites

Glasgow may be less buttoned-up than Edinburgh, but having group sex in the middle of George Square is pushing things a bit far, even if you are an ant. When swarms of male flying ants appeared in Glasgow this week in pursuit of their females, they managed to get into people's hair and up their noses as effectively as any gang of blokes on a stag night.

In Brief

Indiscipline costs Hibernian dear HIBERNIAN paid the price for their poor disciplinary record when they were yesterday fined (pounds) 5000 by the Scottish Football Association.

[ It's Not Too Often That the Godolphin... ]

Balancing the Books; You Might Expect the Home of a Publisher to Be Full of Paperbacks. But When She's at Home, All Alison Mcbride Wants Is a Calming Space Geared Around Family Life. By Beth Pearson

IT seems reasonable to expect someone who works in publishing to live in not so much a home as a fitted library. Wall-to-wall books dispense with the need for a coherent colour scheme and the overflow may even obscure the floor. The furniture would reflect the passive nature of the bookworm, with a plump sofa to sink into for heavyweight non-fiction, an elegant armchair for novels and a short- stay stool for dips into poetry. A shushing librarian would surely be an accessory too many, but the...

Join the Jet Set; Foreign Property European Hot Spots

Not content with a house price boom of our own, thousands of UK residents are taking advantage of rising prices in this country to fuel the European market. According to research conducted by Barclays, in 2003 alone 40% of all dwellings built on the Spanish Costas were bought by the British, and of those 63% were bought as holiday or retirement homes. It's a similar story in France, where some second home hot spots have seen property prices rise by almost triple the national average in the pa...

Grounds for Approval; Give Your Imagination Space to Roam with Three Homes Boasting Extensive and Secluded Gardens

Dullatur offers over (pounds) 895,000 PROPERTY: Melding traditional details with modern sensibility, the essence of this imposing three-storey eighteenth-century mansion mirrors the mood of its setting - a heritage village close to a New Town. William Wallace raised the standard for the Battle of Bannockburn on land opposite the house.

Hanging in the Balance; Sam Taylor-Wood, the High-Flying Artist Who has Overcome Serious Illness, Is Ready to Conquer a New Challenge - in the World of Film Directing. By Moira Jeffrey

The artist Sam Taylor-Wood has just handed me a pile of new self- portraits to look at. We are sitting in the muggy city sunshine, on the balcony of her East London studio, talking about Strings, the film installation she will show at Edinburgh College of Art as part of this year's film festival. She has just been filming in Death Valley and taking photos in Los Angeles for a project - soon to be unveiled at a New York exhibition - which she will only describe as "actors in tears". Claiming j...

Supervision Order for Boy Who Killed

A 14-YEAR-OLD boy who stabbed his older teenage brother to death in a fight over a scratched CD was spared a custodial sentence yesterday. The boy, whose name was withheld for legal reasons, was sentenced to a three-year supervision order.

Tories Fail to Gain As Labour Support Drops

LABOUR support has slumped from 42% in the last election to 34%, according to a poll by YouGov. Michael Howard also faced bad news yesterday with the poll showing that the Conservative party, under his leadership, was failing to woo back voters.

Shan Sa; She Fled China After the Tiananmen Square Massacre. Now the Secrets of Her Homeland's Past Haunt This Sensuous Writer. By Alan Taylor

Change in China came dropping slow but when it did come it was sudden and significant. In the spring of 1989, debate on the country's cultural and political direction spilled on to the streets of Beijing, where students, intellectuals and other activists called for more democratic government. "Abolish prohibitions against street protests," they chanted. "Make officials disclose their assets and incomes." The focus of the movement was the vast Tiananmen Square, which has now entered the annals...

Son Boycotts His Mother's Funeral Over Council Row

FOR more than four years, Jean Campbell's body lay in a hospital mortuary as a dispute raged between her family and a local authority over her burial. Yesterday she was finally laid to rest - in the absence of her son, who had decided to boycott the funeral.

Tight Security for Rangers Cup Match

THE city of Newcastle is in the grip of a massive security operation to prepare for the arrival of 17,000 Rangers fans. Extra police were drafted in and pubs are boarding up windows ahead of the Newcastle Gateshead Cup clash between Newcastle United and Rangers at St James's Park today.

Will's Unlikely Shoe Fetish; the Craze for Product Placement has Made a Pair of Trainers the Star of I, Robot

In the mammoth summer blockbuster I, Robot - very loosely derived from the stories of Isaac Asimov - it falls to streetwise, rule- breaking cop Spooner (Will Smith) to take on the mighty United States Robotics corporation. Among the corporation's crimes is a misleading public image: it advertises itself as an innocuous friend to the consumer, even as it cuts every ethical corner in its quest for profits. Spooner even suggests a new slogan for them: "USR: s***ting on the little guy!" Such self...

'If I Win the Singles This Year I Will Probably Jack It In'; World Champion Alex Marshall Talks to Douglas Lowe About His Big Retirement Plan

Disillusioned and embarrassed, Alex Marshall is looking at ending his 15-year international outdoor bowls career on the highest peak possible. The 37-year-old from Tranent is a rare species indeed, a Scottish world champion, and over the next week in Ayr he will be making his own personal star trek: to go where no bowler has gone before him.

Agency Warns of Arthritis Drug Risk

DOCTORS and patients yesterday were warned of the dangers linked to a common drug used to treat people with rheumatoid arthritis and severe psoriasis. The National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) said that oral methotrexate tablets, taken by thousands of people in the UK, were safe and effective if taken at the right frequency and in the right dose.

Hospital Worker Treated for Tb

A 27-year-old employee at Glasgow Royal Infirmary is being treated for pulmonary tuberculosis (TB), NHS Greater Glasgow confirmed yesterday. The public health protection unit said that the man, who had no patient contact at the hospital, is recovering at home and is expected to make a full recovery.

Stores Refuse to 'Censor' Manhunt Game; Legal Action Threat by Family of Dead Boy

THE violent video game blamed for inciting a teenager to murder his 14-year-old friend is to stay on the shelves of at least three leading stockists. As the parents of Stefan Pakeerah, the dead Leicestershire boy, prepared a legal action against the Scottish-based makers of Manhunt, an 18-rated PlayStation 2 game, HMV, Virgin Megastores and WH Smith said they would continue to sell the product.

Victim Seen Talking to Two Men Before Murder

DETECTIVES investigating the murder of a 27-year-old man yesterday said they have yet to establish a motive for his death. John Chalmers of Ellerslie Street, Johnstone, was stabbed in the Renfrewshire town at about 9.40pm on Wednesday.