Breaking news

As you read this, Issue 212 of the Spurtle is thundering off the presses and being folded and stacked in huge piles at a high-security, top-secret printing plant somewhere in EH7.

Within hours, a sophisticated distribution system will swing into action. Bullet mail-trains, unmarked HGVs, taut-muscled bicycle couriers, former Olympians seeking paper-round experience, and buckets of imagination will all be employed to deliver November's edition across Broughton and slightly beyond.

As reported in Issue 210, the new owners of Gayfield House at 18 East London Street seek to upgrade the historic Category A-listed Broughton landmark they have adopted as a family home (Ref. 12/03731/LBC).

If you happened across something like this on your street, you'd possibly assume someone had been sick and step around it.

You probably wouldn't expect to find another example around the corner, and would certainly be surprised to discover it was the work of Council contractors. Each instance was accompanied by a sign proclaiming, optimistically, 'Investing in your neighbourhood'.

Earlier this month we reported neighbours' opposition to plans for a new building at 4 Barony Place (Breaking news, 10.10.12).

Now, showing that there are two sides to every two-storey story, a local has written to the Spurtle with arguments in favour of the development and claims these views also find support in the Broughton community.

Many readers will remember Axolotl Gallery, whose exciting Dundas Street exhibitions were regularly reviewed by the Spurtle until the gallery's recent closure.

Fewer, perhaps, will be aware that Axolotl's founder Derek Butter died in September after a long struggle against stomach cancer.

Reader Sandy Buchanan emailed us this photograph of a 'new resident in East Broughton Place' today, for which we are grateful.

He added the comment 'Spotted on way home last night', from which it is not clear whether Mr Buchanan was on his way home or the new resident was or both.

If you have information about the yellow-hatted individual's past location or future plans, please let us know.

Permission has been granted for change of use and alteration to form a large flat at 95 Broughton Street in the Category B-listed former Kingdom Hall on the first floor (Ref. 12/03050/LBC; Issue 208).

Locals on Logan Place (next to King George V Park) have been puzzled recently by the uninvited, unannounced and unexplained arrival of this pub sign next to their wheelie bins.

Spurtle has traced it to Bellman's Bar on John Street in Penicuik, where it formerly sat atop a pole to the left of the building (see Google streetview). But so far we have no explanation for its arrival. No-one answers the phone. No-one responds to messages. There are suggestions online that it may have closed 'or relocated'.

Police yesterday released details of a sexually motivated assault at the weekend.

On Sunday morning at around 2.40am, a 23-year-old woman was grabbed from behind and pulled to the ground on St Vincent Street. She struggled and screamed, and her male attacker made off towards Stockbridge.

He is described as 'white, between 25 and 30 years old, 5ft 8ins to 5ft 10ins tall with a skinny build. He was wearing a navy-coloured hooded top with the hood up and jeans.'

Anyone wishing to become or remain a Spurtle subscriber should act now to get maximum value for money.

Subscribers pay £12 per year (or whatever they can afford) in return for which a copy of the paper is hand-delivered monthly to the door of their choice. Those wishing to receive copies by post in the UK now pay £18.20. The subscription year runs from 1 October.