In 1985, Mairi was asked to play in the "extra" band at the Skye Balls. Two years later, she was a sked to organise the extras herself, and sent out a plea for musicians. One of the respondents was one Alastair Graham Campbell who, it transpired, was also going to Oxford that autumn. As was Charlotte Pinney... and we found ourselves saying, This is a laugh, we really must keep it going. By 1989,having recruited Grousechicks Muffet Leslie and Bernie MacCulloch, we were playing extras at Skye, the Northern Meeting and the National Trust for Scotland Ball in London. We had our first proper commission from the Royal Agricultural College in Cirencester (a leap of faith on the part of Mairi's cousin Duncan) and subsequently played for Durham University at Alnwick Castle (thanks Bro) and Oxford, at the rather less glamorous Wantage Civic Centre. 1991 saw us beginning to get established, taking on more gigs, recruiting a few more occasional players and getting the hang of amplification. St. Andrew's night found us playing in London, Durham and Cirencester on successive evenings - a memorable hat-trick, mainly for the journey to Cirencester. Al rang the long-suffering Jo from the train to say that he was arriving into King's Cross forty minutes early (a feat never to my knowledge repeated since on GNER), would she come and meet him? She arrived to find that the party also included Rob, Liz, Nikki, Mairi and instruments (two fiddles, clarinet and 'cello). Al's words of greeting were "Have you got the boot key?" "What boot key?" It is, I assure you, possible to fit six people plus luggage plus instruments into a family saloon and drive for two hours, but even so, don't try it at home. 1992, Charlotte took up a teaching post in Germany and Mairi in Spain. The Grouse soared on... 1993, both came home, Charlotte to marry Ed, a terrific wedding with the Grouse in full force. 1995 found most of us settled in London and with one or two regular gigs coming in. Al got married in 1997 - another fantastic day, only slightly ruffled by Alan conclusively losing the car keys so that the Mackinnon Ford Fiasco remained attractively parked in the middle of the Ansons' yard throughout proceedings. We did have a number of generous offers to hot-wire it from the creme de la creme of Gloucestershire and Perthshire... Poor Al was therefore unable to take enough holiday for the other great wedding of that year - Alice and Stuart Morgan, in Ibiza. Geordie, Nikki, Sean, Mairi and Alan had a wonderful week, ate paella, got sunburnt and attracted plenty attention, especially the boys in their kilts. 1998 saw the next overseas tour, to Bucharest - read Mairi's account - now an unmissable annual fixture. 2000 found Al, Geordie, Nikki, Roger and Liz with a very large number of stockbrokers in St Moritz. 2001 promises three Grouse weddings, in April (Rob), May (Mairi) and September (Alan). Regular gigs include the Haggis Hop in Hammersmith, the biennial Matthew Miller fundraising ball in Edinburgh's Assembly Rooms and the above mentioned Bucharest Caledonian Ball. We've played at over a hundred parties, from mediaeval castles to poolside villas - technically we've come a long way, almost everyone can play Lord Elcho even - and the main thing is, it's still a lot of fun.