John Gibson: Dark days that could come back Don't titter. There's talk, more than idle gossip, that we'll have electricity rationing in the UK this winter. And it's taking me back to the days and nights when I was a bairn running wilt in Leith with nae chorus and verse in ma troosers. We were threatened with power rationing to prevent a blackout. Could this possibly happen? With this bunch of ninnies running the country, anything could. So we could have wardens shining torches into our windows, ordering us, if there's a chink of light showing from our blinds to switch off the lights and save electricity. Accordingly, with the help of the Time Team, I've dug out some of my dad's dusty 78s and, the wind-up gramophone and Vera Lynn classics like When the Lights go on Again. Now you'll have to excuse me. I'm dashing down to Cockenzie to join the campaign to reopen the power station. Beak practice You can't believe everything you read in the papers. We are informed that some day, but not too soon, humans will have beaks instead of teeth. Nutters at Sheffield University, who'd best be locked up, are earnestly blethering about it. Bad news for dentists but who cares about them, they're making fortunes. More concerned about myself. Where does all this leave me in the pecking order? Answers on a postcard. I sit corrected. A feisty correspondent calls from Fife to tell me the reason I couldn't see sand on the beach at Brighton was because there's none there. It's all pebbles. Well, stone me!