An item of "Breaking News". Will appear on the Breaking News page and the front page.
The Water of Leith has featured a lot in the printed and online pages of the Spurtle over recent months.
Flooding, flood prevention, and the temporary ruination of local banks have all caught the attention of locals. People here clearly care.
These are exciting times for Broughton resident Valentina Montoya Martinez, a singer described by the Scotsman as 'combining passion, sensuality and musical intelligence' and 'a dazzling performer with a world-class voice'.
Originally a political refugee from Pinochet's Chile in the 1970s, she grew up in an exiled community in Britain for whom music was a vital bond with home.
In the years since, she has forged a great reputation for songs of love, longing and social change, most set in the folk music and tango traditions of Latin America.
With tensions on the Korean peninsula rising by the minute, the A-board outside Broughton Street's Artisan Roast has some helpful advice.
Contrary to expectations, Kim is the Supreme Leader's surname. Its use in this context simply reflects the commanding authority Artisan staff exert over beans and customers alike.
However, an extensive internet search this afternoon has failed to determine when Kim Jong-un last visited Edinburgh.
Thistle Street Residential LLP have applied to convert, subdivide and alter the ground and lower-ground floor office space at 29 Forth Street in order to restore its original use for residential purposes (Ref. 13/00792/FUL).
Congratulations to Ingrid Nilsson and Stuart Allan, whose flourishing gallery cum framer cum café Bon Papillon is two years old today.
One work in the Howe Street premises which took our eye last week was a recent painting by Nilsson herself: 'Susi Chevy' (right and below).
Nilsson explains the progress of another painting on the gallery website here. Look for the blog entry on 17 March.
The Edinburgh Evening News will relaunch soon in a major 'change of tack', it was claimed today.
Senior management at owners Jonhston Press want to reverse nose-diving circulation figures and plummeting profits. But rather than produce fewer and fewer pages at greater cost with an ever-increasing number of low-brow human-interest stories, bosses have decided to head upmarket and cover the news more seriously.
Spurtle encountered this extraordinary painting by young Scottish artist Leo du Feu in Bon Papillon on Friday. It's titled 'Dove and Swan' and measures 22 x 22cms.
We were instantly drawn to its ambiguous mix of hope and menace, nature and artefact, bilious yellows, sinister shadows and strangely unpeopled glade.
'Leo has just had paintings in both the Visual Arts Scotland and Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour shows,' says Bon Papillon's Ingrid Nilsson.
After weeks of grey skies, bitter winds and horizontal sleet, Broughton basked briefly in sunshine on Good Friday.
The change in weather brought numerous pallid joggers back onto the pavements for the first time since Christmas, and – out of the blue high above West Annandale Street – this unusual red squirrel skiing towards Newhaven.
Many thanks to Minie McIntosh who sent us the photographic evidence at around 6.30pm yesterday evening.
Today, normal service has been resumed with a dusting of snow overnight.
Scientists at Edinburgh Council's Scientific Services laboratory have found that frozen beef mince supplied to the shared kitchen of Pirniehall and St David's Primary Schools contained between 1 per cent and 5 per cent horsemeat.
The batch which tested positive was withdrawn on 8 March. However, it had already also been supplied to Oxgangs PS, Craigroyston PS, Braidburn PS and Forthview PS and 'It is not possible to confirm whether or not mince from this batch was served to pupils prior to the product recall'.
The Heritage Lottery Fund has awarded £707,705 towards the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh's rebuilding of the Botanic Cottage (Breaking news, 3.9.09; Issues 207, 216).