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On yon Zoom the ither day a wee bit friendly argie-bargie stertit up aboot whit exactly wis an ashet when it wis at hame? Well, some wid huv it it wis a muckle-great delft platter for servin, say, a hail gigot o mutton roastit wi aw the trimmins an ithers insistit, naw it wis nuthin but a humble enamel pie-dish sich as ye’d mibbe mak a shepherd’s pie in, or yaise for reheatin (o aye, in a gey hoat oven!) yesterday’s left-ower stovies or day-afore-peyday pan-haggis (never ever cryin that skirlie, nut ata, no here in Glesca, no in the West.) There’s folk wouldnae gie houseroom to this shabby aul chrome-platit slottit-spoon wi hardly a scrap o rid or black pent left on its widden haunle, but – it was ma mither’s – I haud it in ma haun wi ma heid fu o mince an reminiscence, thinkin how a clock could be a clock or a black beetle how a sair heid is a sair heid but a sair haun is a piece an jam — oh as long’s the slice o breid’s as thich as a doorstep an the jam strawberry or rasp (the blood, the bandage) — an I’m wonderin — since the press in ma kitchen contains baith a chippt bog-standard wee white pie-dish, an thon oval antique art-nouveau losol-ware tulip servan-dish I got for a shillin in a kirk jumble-sale in the sixties — pie-dish or platter? Which is the classic ashet? Och, settle an argument with a friend, wee bit o elementary detective work in a dictionar an here, it turns oot it’s no either/or but baith/and — which is even better (for mair is ayeweys mair than less in ma book, eh no?) An I’ll tell ye wan thing for shair: ma brand-new winterdykes I ordered online an that arrived the day fae Amazon might no be made o wid but raither o clean plastic an lightweight metal an huv an awfy well-designed an nifty wey o foldin doon tae nuthin to store gey neatly in the loaby press or o openin oot lik wings and takin a loat mair claes than ma pulley ever could? But they’ll aye be ma winterdykes.