World Exclusive : Some serious stuff is going down, man

I'm not a regular reader of 'Yapping Yousuf' Hamid, so many thanks to Ezio for pointing me in the direction of his latest scoop. I've always prided myself on keeping my finger firmly on the pulse, so I certainly would never have forgiven myself for missing this jaw-dropping exclusive - Nicola Sturgeon has convened a meeting of the Glasgow City Council SNP group.

That's it.

A small suggestion for Yousuf - I appreciate that genuine exclusives (particularly the golden ones that really catch out your political opponents) are quite difficult for bloggers to come by, however well-connected, so no-one is really going to blame you for slightly over-hyping the facts you actually do have. But to pull that trick off successfully it might be better not to openly concede "I've no idea what's going on" and then to finish your 'story' with the following appeal to readers - "If anyone knows what is going on then please do get in touch!"

But the fun doesn't end there. Yousuf adds a disclaimer that he rarely blogs about pieces of gossip, and only does so "if they are serious and if I am sure that I can believe them". This might have a touch more credibility if he hadn't already revealed that his sole rationale for believing there is any significance to Sturgeon's meeting is that it "must be serious" if she is making the time for it despite "firefighting on so many fronts". Now, for this logic to stand up to scrutiny, Yousuf does of course first have to establish that Nicola is indeed fighting on a number of fronts. So what are they? According to Yousuf, they include boundary changes to her constituency, the fact that she was 'in the cabinet that scrapped GARL', the fact that she once said something unspecified but really rather nasty about Steven Purcell, and the fact that the SNP group on Glasgow City Council 'didn't offer any resistance' to the SNP cabinet scrapping GARL. Crikey. With a diary chock-full of crises like that, Nicola really doesn't have time to do anything, does she?

Future Yapping Yousuf exclusives -

Sturgeon sneezes. No politician in the almighty mess that Sturgeon's in has the time to expel phlegm from her nasal passages. Only possible conclusion - the noise from the sneeze was intended to cover up the latest Salmond gaffe. Don't know what the gaffe actually was, but were YOU in the area? Do let me know what you heard.

Sturgeon visits Mum. Come on, does anyone seriously think a politician facing calamity on so many fronts would choose to waste an hour visiting her mother? Only possible conclusion - her mother is planning to defect to Labour, and Sturgeon is locked in desperate last-minute crisis talks to prevent that happening. Are YOU Nicola Sturgeon's mother's next-door-neighbour? Does she have thin walls?

Sturgeon goes to the hairdressers. Are we seriously expected to believe that a woman at the centre of the most perfect political storm the western world has witnessed since Watergate would stop off for a quick trim? Of course not. Now, I must admit I don't know what she was up to this time - perhaps her hair was planning to defect to Labour? OK, maybe not, but there must be something. So, do YOU work at Daphne's Scissor Palace?