It probably comes down to a preconception that there are some places where "everyone speaks Scots" and places were "no one speaks Scots".

But these places aren't geographic, they're cultural.

Everyone speaks Scots in the pub or on football terraces, no one speaks it in a lawyers office.

Scots is directly derived from the Northumbrian dialect of Old English, in the nineth century.

Whilst Education Scotland are increasing their Scots language provision for children and young people, this neglects those who have already left full-time education.

This map shows the proportion of people in each council area who reported they can understand spoken Scots, with a minimum of 31% in the Western Isles to a maximum of 64% in Aberdeenshire.

But everywhere inbetween is pretty much the same shade of "green".

If instead we put either end of the colour gradient at 10% and 54%, you get some grading and texture, but its mis-leading about the ubiquity of Scots speaking.

This is a histogram showing the proportions of Scots speakers in each census output area, with a median of 32.6%, and a standard deviation of about 11%.

If we pick a colour gradient with 0% as one colour and 100% as another, there's almost no places which will be either of the extremes.

We should note that 33% of taxpayers in the Perth and Kinross council area reported that they consider themselves able to speak or read Scots.

Its nice that they have finally spent some of the acquisitions budget on books written in Scots.

On the other hand, this still represents a tiny proportion of the monthly book acquisitions.

On the one hand this is a huge increase in the usual monthly acquisitions of Scots titles, where sometimes they buy none, or one or two titles.

The idea of a "Smartphone-Free School" is completely incompatible with diabetes treatment for children in the UK.

Merely having an exemption in any school policies isn't enough - the whole brand name has to go.

It was World Diabetes Day on Friday, raising awareness about the condition.

In the UK, about 400,000 people have Type 1 diabetes, and the normal treatment for it involves having a glucose sensor attached to your body and a smartphone.

Aye, I know that "gadgie" is quite a common vernacular term from traveller cant, in several regions of Scotland, but here Dr Hirst is using "gadze" as something like a technical term.

Is it the same word with both a general meaning and a specific meaning, or are these two different words?