The spurtle

My husband, Mr McG, used to recount that at his school, the Greenock Academy, he once had to attend woodworking classes.

At the start of that particular school year, parents were asked to fork out for enough wood for their child to make a coffee table.

By the end of the first term, having chipped and whittled and sawed away, A’s ambitions were slightly reduced: he and a few others were no longer going to make coffee tables...but workbenches.

At the end of the second term, it was agreed that A — and one or two others — would make something even smaller: jewellery boxes.

By the end of the final term, everyone else had finished their coffee table or workbench — or jewellery box. A came home and proudly presented the result of his efforts to his mother: see right.

She gave it back to him, mounted, a few years ago. It reads: “I enjoyed using this coffee table — lots of love, Mother.”

The spurtle…or stirry stick