Today I officially became a British citizen! I attended a ceremony at Dunfermline City Chambers, mouthing the words to God Save The Queen while seagulls squabbled outside.

The Provost told us new inductees that we should be "proud of our achievement". But obtaining citizenship is not so much an achievement as a display of endurance and financial commitment. It's been 6.5 years and about £2,500 in Home Office fees. Now that I'm on the other side I can freely bitch about those stinking Home Office fees.

Cynicism aside, I loved the minor pomp of the ceremony and it's great to be an official Fifer. Eh! KEN!

I reluctantly moved across the water to Dunfermline in 2005, just before I married Doctor G. I thought it was a grotty hellhole – incomprehensible accents, crappy shops and pavements strewn with exploded kebabs. But now The Dunny feels like home. Even if we could afford to move back to Edinburgh I think I'd stay here. As much as I miss Edinburgh's cafes and concerts, I like my tiny commute, my kickboxing club, the countryside access and laughing at the stupid peacocks strutting down the high street.

How could you not love a town that gives you a commemorative mug for becoming a citizen?

It features stunning Fife attractions like historic Culross, St Andrews cathedral, the Rosyth Dockyard and the Forth Rail Bridge (The Greatest Feat of Victorian Engineering™).

And a puffin.

And for some unknown reason, a Chinese dragon thingy.

Catchy slogan, eh?

So with dual UK/Oz citizenship I have permanent access to two lovely nations and my wrestles with bureaucracy are finally OVER! Unless of course we move back to Australia and Gareth can experience the joys of the Department of Immigration

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This chap in our neighbourhood has a ingenious way of dealing with his sloping yard. Or does everyone keep their lawnmower on a lead? I'd not seen it before…

UPDATE:  A dude on Flickr tells me Mowers On String are hella common. I plead ignorance as someone who's previously always lived in flat places

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It was a mighty 26 degrees here yesterday (79F), which pretty much constitutes a heatwave in Dunfermline. Sunglasses were needed in the high street to combat the blinding glare from pale topless men. Anything higher than 15 degrees then off come the jumpers and jackets and out come the bellies, concave or corpulent.

At the newsagents.

Down at the park the hillside was strewn with more bare-chested bodies. Birds sang and unprotected Scottish skin barbecued. On the bus the old ladies who moaned about the endless winter last week now moaned about the relentless heat. Hellish, they called it.

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Haggis, cheese and panini – together at last. But £5.65?!

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Aside from that time I chased guisers down the street, I've not done anything Halloweeny since I moved to Scotland. But this year it was totally spooktastic.

Gareth carved two pumpkins - one for us and one for his Mum's birthday, coz Mum's dig the handmade gifts. We dooked for apples at work.

Then Hippo played a Halloween gig at a local pub. As mentioned before, Hippo already had a bass player so Gareth got lumped with the keyboards. At least this give you a great excuse to put on a flowing blonde wig and dress up as the legendary prog-meister Rick Wakeman.

It was bloody hilarious seeing G with hair. He didn't stop fussing with it all night, tossing it over his shoulders; stroking it with tender absentmindedness; tutting when a rowdy reveller sloshed it with Guinness. 

Aside from Rick Wakeman the band featured a pirate, a scarecrow, a terrorist and Australia's favourite serial killer, Chopper Read. Here's some footage of the noisy lads at work; they were ace.

The next night we went to a Halloween party. Gareth's cape and wig were totally destroyed by the night of rock so he hastily assembled a new costume from his bike leathers and a grungy mask and club from the pound shop. He seemed to enjoy the raven locks even more than the Wakeman tresses. I bought a 50p pitchfork and £1 stupid hat that claimed to be devilish but just looked like a demented pilgrim. 

Do you remember that shitty, sinking feeling you got at school when you had an assignment that you did at the last moment in a half-arsed manner thinking that everyone else would have the same crappy attitude, but then you get to class and realise everyone has gone all out and used glitter and stuff? That was My First Halloween Party. Everyone put in so much effort; I felt totally budget. There were geishas, zombies, hippies; a disturbing Josef Fritzl and an Optimus Prime. One couple had handmade Rabid Care Bear costumes – they fashioned the heads out of coathangers and cushions and furry fabric then splashed the whole ensemble with fake blood.

Still, I learned a lot from observing the locals this year and will be sure to do things properly next time.

"I don't really get this Halloween stuff," I'd told one of my Scottish pals a few weeks ago, "We don't really do it in Australia."

"Do you come fae Australia!?" she said, "Ohh. I always thought you talked a bit funny."

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I've come to love so many things about Scotland. The fish suppers, the mountains, the graffiti…

At the train station
 

… but I cannot get my head around THE TUB.

You're familiar with a kitchen sink, right? Into which normal people would insert a plug, fill with soapy water and wash their plates?

Over here they ignore the sink and the plug and for some unfathomable reason place a large plastic tub inside the sink and fill that up instead.

 

Why?

Why?

Why oh why?

At first I thought this was just a weird habit of Gareth's, but as I mingled more with the natives I discovered they were tubbing it all over the countryside. My mother-in-law, friends, colleagues…

I just don't bloody get it. What purpose does the tub serve? You've got a perfectly good contraption there already with the kitchen sink, designed precisely for the task. Does the tub have historical significance? Is it an ecological or economical thing?

I've asked Gareth many times, why do they use it?

"Because we just do."

In my quest to fit in to my adopted country I'd come to tolerate the tub over the years and had actually stopped ranting about its pointlessness every single time I did the dishes.

Then my friend Jenny was over from Australia recently. She stared in bewilderment as I turned on the kitchen taps after dinner.

"What's the go with the tub?"

"SEE!" I crowed to Gareth, "Told you it was weird."

After staying with us for a week Jenny filed her report: "I can see only one benefit of the tub. If you forget to empty a cup or saucepan or something, you can tip it down the sink. But apart from that? It's just weird."

I'm curious if the tub phenomenon is a Fife thing or if it's rampant across the land. And what about the rest of the British Isles? Rhiannon reported with great relief when she first moved to London, "No tubs down here" but we've no data for the rest of England.

So… if there's any Scots out there:

1. Do you have a washing up tub?
2. If yes, why the hell why?

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NOTE:
Sorry about the Internal Server Errors. I have no idea why this is happening and will try to fix soon! Comments are being received by MT, just not published to the blog.

Last weekend Dr G and I stayed in these rockin' wigwams with a bunch of mates. After stuffing ourselves stupid with barbequed vegetarian sausages on bread rolls we all went for a walk to Tyndrum. Here we are clomping back through all the heather with Ben More and Stob Binnein glowering down at us.

The only thing that spoiled the weekend was when a pack of BASTARDS stole five of Dr G's beers from the communal fridge. That was NOT in the Spirit of the Wigwam!

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