Out and about in Edinburgh

And so to Edinburgh where I spent most of my time looking for a smoker-friendly venue to host a Forest event later this year.

Last summer we hosted a successful dinner at the National Museum of Scotland. The private dining room and rooftop terrace comfortably accommodated 20 people but this year, as part of our 40th anniversary programme, we want to invite a few more.

Venues must be smoker-friendly and it's hard to find somewhere that meets all our requirements. It was refreshing however to visit places where smoking is considered entirely normal and no-one bats an eyelid when you explain why you need a smoking terrace.

I had appointments with several hotels and restaurants that have smoking areas (one even had a smoking 'room' that was too small, sadly, for our purpose) and although none were perfect one might work well on a fine summer evening. (Not sure what we'd do if it rained but the events manager seemed pretty relaxed.)

The main feature was a two-acre rooftop garden with two terraces where we could have a drinks reception followed by dinner in a permanent covered marquee.

It was recommended by a friend from university who now works as a PR consultant in Edinburgh. We met to check out another venue and the discussion inevitably turned to people we both knew from our time in Aberdeen.

It was disconcerting to know that people I can only visualise as 18 and 19-year-old students (because I haven't seen them since) are now almost as old as me.

While I was in Edinburgh I also saw Brian Monteith. We met for dinner at Petit Paris (above), a French bistro opposite my hotel in the Grassmarket.

Readers of this blog will know that I've known Brian for the best part of 40 years. From 1996-98 we even shared an office in Leith.

At the time Brian was Forest's spokesman in Scotland and I was a freelance journalist. In 1999, having led the campaign against devolution, he became a member of the Scottish Parliament but stood down in 2007 and is now a columnist for the Scotsman, Edinburgh Evening News and City AM.

Last year Forest published his report, The McNanny State, and no event marking Forest's 40th anniversary in Scotland would be complete without him. If we can make it work we'll make an announcement by the end of the month.