Who wants a local bank when you can have a local pub instead? - Vladimir McTavish

​​Like millions of people throughout the country, I do not have a local bank and have not had one for a number of years. I do recall people in my neighbourhood being a little bit disgruntled when the RBS closed down their branch on Ferry Road about a decade ago.

Thankfully we have said goodbye to lockdown pursuits like baking banana bread, says Vladimir McTavish

For months, grumbled conversations could be overheard at bus stops and on street corners, complaining about having to take the bus into town.

Very few voices were heard pointing out that none of us actually used it often and that it was a bit shabby and unloved, because the high head yins at the bank cared about it even less than we did.

A few months later, there was joy unconfined in the neighbourhood when the building re-opened. As a pub. Who wants a local bank when you can have a local pub instead?

After all, most of us do our banking online these days. You can’t really go to the pub online. We know that from the dull months of March to June 2020. On our daily walk, we would gaze forlornly through the windows of our favourite bars, wondering whether they would ever open again. When we had to make do with meeting friends and work colleagues for “virtual drinks” on Zoom.

That thankfully stopped with the end of the Pandemic along with other lockdown pursuits like baking banana bread and cutting your own hair.

The Herringbone has built a reputation as a welcoming watering hole where customer service is second-to-none. So imagine my dismay when I noticed this week that the place appears to be shut.

I fear for my physical and mental health. My Uncle Alex stays in Forres and was a regular customer at the howff over the road until ten years ago. In the space of a week, the pub was demolished and he had a heart attack. No one is sure if the shock of the pub’s demolition caused his heart attack or if the landlord had decided to raze the boozer to the ground because Alex was under doctors orders to lay off the hard stuff.

Yesterday I saw painters inside the Herringbone, suggesting that the place may just be closed for redecoration. I just hope it’s not going to re-open as a bank.