Craft workers are a very odd and tangential sort of people, as anyone who has visited a Bannockburn gift shop and inspected a macrame warrior gonk will tell you. Craft work is the delusion that knick-knacks and gifts can be made just as effectively at home by enthusiasts as they are by professionals.
It is very much the misfortune of the craft worker, though, equipped with buckets of buttons, plastic scissors and big pots of glue, to have found themselves lumbered with a pastime devoted to producing twee, hippyish tat. For further evidence, please consult what is apparently known as social knitworking.
Dundee designer Hilary Grant has developed a method of weaving patterns based on text messages into scarves and other knitwear. If I have understood this correctly, and I cannot overstate the unlikelihood of this, the incidence of sentiments recurring over a batch of messages are represented by recurrences in the design.
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Dr Stefan Agamanolis, research director at the lab which developed the technology, probably understands it a bit better than me: "This computer programme will hone in on a phrase such as I Love You and translate this into a pattern for a length of scarf that represents a year."
Or maybe not.
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And if even more evidence is needed, Douglas Little, a dressmaker from Los Angeles, arrived in Edinburgh this week to reveal creations fashioned from candlewax. "I use normal mannequins," he said, "but I pick specific ones with expressions and shapes to go with the piece I'm creating." Of course you do, Doug. His shop in LA, which has dressed Nicole Kidman and Angelina Jolie, is named Purveyors of Curious Goods, which to me sums up craft working pretty neatly.
But why opt for a waxwork dress when you can have a scarf with On The Train Now written all over it?
Stornoway black pudding's unstoppable rise to respectability continues apace. Not content with now appearing on as many Scottish menus as chips, the crumbly blend of blood and oatmeal is set for legislative recognition. Richard Lochhead MSP this week announced the Scottish government's plans to pursue protected status for the pudding. This is designed to forestall any incidences of bootleg or counterfeit puddings appearing in shops: "There are impostor Stornoway black puddings on the market," he harrumphed. "It is nothing like the real thing. Stornoway black pudding is a superb product, cooked in all sorts of ways and used in some of the top restaurants in the world."
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Well, up to a point, Lord Copper. Stornoway black pudding is indeed very toothsome, yet, because it's slightly sweeter, much of its appeal lies in its lack of resemblance to traditional black pudding. However, it still consists, let us not overlook, of roughage soaked in blood, made to congeal at a low temperature. Lochhead's conviction that it's some sort of truffle-like delicacy is clearly a touch spurious.
In contrast to other foods with protected status, such as Parma ham, Stilton cheese or Lubeker marzipan, Stornoway black pudding hails from Stornoway only inasmuch as batches of it are made there. What the government is seeking to protect is a recipe rather than a foodstuff. Which is fine for the five butchers who possess the recipe. Anyway, all this talk of Stornoway just distracts attention from the red pudding that's found in the chip shops of Fife. It's a boiling cylinder of gristle and food colourant. Let's see them protect that too.
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One of the benefits of age is losing all interest in contemporary pop stars; the moment you turn 35 a heavy oaken door slams shut between you and them, sealing you within a nice quiet room of memories.
This may be why I'm ill equipped to judge the wisdom of Amy Macdonald having been appointed one of Gordon Brown's advisers in the field of youth and talent. She is to be a guest of the prime minister at a forthcoming Talent and Enterprise Taskforce reception.
But in such sober company will she have much to offer? Maybe. Young Amy has sold more than 2m copies of her debut album, plus she has managed to get herself noticed by politicians well into their 50s.
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This is talent of a rare order. But will it serve her well?
Fiona McCade is away