Odd couple with fire in their bellies

THE odd couple. She's a belly dancer, he's a fire eater. I don't get to meet people like them every day. Hilary Thacker, who owns a bazaar on George IV Bridge and for a living teaches the fine art of belly dancing, and husband Jonathan Dunbar Snell, when he's not eating fire, is a portrait painter and psychologist.

They were exhibiting their talents in Glass & Thompson, the Dundas Street deli, where Jonathan's paintings are on display until mid-August. Hilary was there in support with her belly at the private viewing.

Her hubby wasn't playing with fire on this particular evening. "But my paintings are fiery in content," he said, "and as well as the painting I'm a psychologist.

"Hilary has taught me to belly dance as part of a technique that stimulates the mind and body. We're good for each other. We're 12 years married but we've been mates twice as long."

He's 63 from Suffolk, she's 46 from Reading. This is their first gallery exhibition. How long before we see them on Big Brother?

Hours of fun
You want the good news first? St Andrew Square Garden, as of Tuesday last week, has had its opening hours extended from a prohibitive 6pm to 8pm, seven days. Harvey Nichols general manager Gordon Drummond and I between us, we hustled for the extension.

Now the bad. Edinburgh has the strongest economy of any UK city, didn't you know? Stronger, even, than second-place London. Glasgow? Also ran.

That's how our city council can afford to squander £100k on flash desks and chairs for their meetings (get off their bums more, they wouldn't need chairs) and how they blew another hundred grand on counting trees. Back in the good old days they'd suspend bungling city fathers from the highest branch.

Spoke in the eye
On their bikes. Opera-loving Lord Arthur Hamilton and Lady Christine are in Weimar today for a classic performance of Wagner's Ring Cycle. They'll be chilling out in the German city this week.

Lady Christine's comment before leaving their New Town base: "Scottish Opera did a splendid Ring Cycle, one of the best I've ever seen, and they deserved a better, fairer press."