I spent a rather wet weekend in Scotland.
It included an afternoon in Largs where we took refuge in Nardini's, "Scotland's most famous café, restaurant and ice cream parlour".
The feuding Nardini family hasn't run the business for over a decade (see Frozen out) and their absence hangs like a cloud over this historic institution.
The cafe overlooking the sea may have had a multi-million pound refurbishment but it lacks the family touch that made Nardini's such an attraction for families with young children.
I wasn't complaining. We were glad just to shelter from the rain with a cappuccino and an ice cream sundae.
On Friday evening we booked in to a hotel in Eaglesham, a conservation village just south of Glasgow.
My wife grew up in a neighbouring village and we got married, 22 years ago, in St Bridget's, a tiny Catholic church overlooking the famous Eaglesham Orry, a long A-shaped green that dominates the centre of the village.
After the service we walked the 20-30 guests across the Orry to a small tea room, and after that an even smaller group (a dozen or so) embarked on a five-hour drive to Skye where we spent a long weekend at this hotel before driving all the way to Gatwick.
Naturally I had forgotten that the night before the wedding I had stayed in the same Eaglesham hotel with a number of friends, but there are quite a lot of things about my wedding I don't remember!
Anyway, on Friday we found ourselves in a room directly above the main entrance while a party took place in the private function room.
Every few minutes two or three people would slope outside for a smoke and although they weren't rowdy we could hear every word.
I soon drifted off but I'm told it was gone 2.00am before the final guest had puffed his last cigarette and retired for the night.
On Saturday we were transferred to a room at the back of the hotel – where we enjoyed an undisturbed's night sleep – but the shocking truth remains:
Director of world's oldest smokers' rights group forced to flee as noisy smokers gather outside hotel room.
You couldn't make it up.