Plight Of The Independent Scotsman

Donald McDonald opened his wallet. He had four thousand and fifty four merks. Merks being the new Scottish currency. Previously Scottish notes hadn’t been legal tender. A sore point with all. However, they couldn’t carry on using the English pound once they had independence so they brought in a currency all their own. A Scottish currency. Hyper inflation meant that the money was worthless and he could afford himself a slice of cheese at best…
It didn’t matter though, he was free.

He would have gotten into his car to go to the shops and spend his money. However, Scotland lacked a stable economy of its own before its independence so had nothing to build upon. Oil prices had shot through the roof so owning a car these days was out of the question…
It didn’t matter though, he was free.

So instead he walked to the shopping centre, it wasn’t too long a walk. He didn’t know where he would shop once he got there though. Most big businesses had pulled out of Scotland upon the declaration of its independence. Many of them being English and feeling as welcome as a dose of the plague. Those and the rest all because there was no profitability in staying. So instead, there were small local shops that opened, instantly went out of business and then were never replaced. The shopping centre was an empty crypt…
It wasn’t a problem, Scotland was free.

Indifferently he checked his watch, time to walk to work. Off he trudged. He got to the quarry and worked solid for 12 hours, digging the whole time with only two ten minute breaks. He would earn a fair number of pooonds for his hard work but they wouldn’t go very far…
It was worth it, he was free.

He finished his work and walked on home. He got to the house and fumbled in his coat pocket for the key. Yes, that was right. He had no key, he had no house. Who could afford to pay their mortgage in this financial plight? He found a wall and curled up against it. He would sleep on the floor…
A price he could bear, for Scotland was free

Now Donald was not a man to look only on the negatives. So much good had come from Scotland’s new found independence. He thanked the SNP.

If he had a telly he could watch the news on BBC Scotland but wouldn’t have to sit through all the irrelevant things that affected the world. Instead he could just watch the Scottish news. Free from the knowledge of a world outside his own.

Scotland was no longer in the British Olympic team. No more would he have to hear a British man or woman being referred to as a British man or woman. A most hurtful insult that had been.

Export of Irn Bru had been stopped. How sickening it was that Irn Bru was sold and drunk in England, it was the Scottish national drink! Of all the nerve in all the world. Now he could drink his Irn Bru safe in the knowledge that no more would it touch the lips of an Englishman. He thought nothing of all the English things he would eat and drink.

North Sea oil was to be for Scotland only. Sure it was almost exhausted but it was the principal. How wrong it was that oil off the coast of Scotland had been used to help fuel English cars!

But most of all, Scotland was Scotland’s and Scotland was free.