39 days to go

I woke up in the Selkirk Arms in Kirkcudbright this morning just a stone's throw from Tanpits Lane , where my Mum spent the last years of her life in this little blue painted house . She moved here after my father died in 1994 and they , in their turn, had moved to the town itself from Troon some 20 years earlier so that my father could take up his last promoted post at Kirkcudbrigh Academy.

I love the wee , douce, town of Kirkcudbright and after last night's YES meeting , and a drink with with some of those who had taken part, Cathleen and I went walking through the streets , enjoying the darkened buildings , the bustle of activity at the harbour and the view of the river in full flood.

The meeting was also enjoyable - a strong contingent of NO voters who attended gradually found that they could not refute the arguments being put by myself, Richard Arkless and Karen Campbell.

Moreover the surprise attendance in the audience of Julian Brazier, Tory MP for Canterbury & Whitstable and UK Junior Defence Minister (who was on holiday in the area staying with friends) added a certain something which can best be described as a bafflement with the contemporary reality of Scotland which slowly dawned not just on him but also , very productively, on the undecideds.

For my part I marvelled - and continue to do so - at the divergence between the political culture he represents and the one I am part of. There could be no better representation of the fallacy of a "one nation" approach and the need for political power to be vested in Scotland rather than at Westminster.