In Recent News

From The Oban Times of 18 October, this front page news:

All’s well that ends smell

A good Samaritan rescued his neighbour's dog from a septic tank full of maggots and sludge, then stepped back and fell down a second stinking hole.
An elderly Port Appin woman panicked last week when her dog fell into the tank at the former mink farm in the village.
The neighbour managed to free the animal, but he then fell down another uncovered part of the septic tank, and found himself standing in five feet of maggots.
By the time Oban police arrived at the scene, the man had managed to haul himself out of the hole.

What a scene! Five feet of maggots!! And I love this headline from 1 November:

Cool Donnie delivers granddaughter--after fixing car!

The story tells how the intrepid Donnie got a call from his daughter at 7:00 one morning saying that she was going into labor and needed a ride to the hospital. His car broke down on the way to her house, so he had to stop and fix it, then found that the baby was nearly born by the time he arrived at 7:30. He carefully washed his hands and caught the baby before the midwife arrived!

Other news:

• 'A young drunken man who walked through the streets of Bowmore, Islay with his trousers and boxer shorts around his ankles has been fined £300' (1 Nov.)

• 'An Islay man who struck another man on the head with a bottle has been fined a total of £100' (1 Nov.)

• From your Scalpay correspondent: 'Reports from early October say herring have been detected by local fishermen.' (1 Nov.) [This after months of herring reported scarce!]

This week:

• 'Police arrested three teenagers on Monday as riotous youngsters set off fireworks and ignited rubbish bins in Oban on Guy Fawkes' night. Emergency services were at full stretch as property was destroyed in many parts of Soroba. "It was like a scene from a Mad Max movie," one resident told The Oban Times.' (8 Nov.)

• A young family has bought the local cinema in Oban, enabling the cinema to continue to operate after fears that it would close down. 'The two screen Highland Theatre on George Street had been up for sale since March 2006.' (8 Nov.)

• An Argyll man has invented a mouth organ (harmonica) that plays the notes of a bagpipe, allowing 'the playing of pipe tunes which were not previously possible to play on the mouth organ like the big and heavy marches, jigs reels, hornpipe, laments and Strathspeys.' (8 Nov.)

That's all the exciting news from Oban for now! Tune in next week for more hair-raising tales of life in western Scotland.