He was writer-in-residence at Greater Pollok in Glasgow, then National Scots Language Development Officer.
In his final year of school, his teachers showed him the works of Robert Burns and Hugh MacDiarmid.
In 2002, together with James Robertson and Susan Rennie, he co-founded Itchy Coo, a publishing imprint and educational project to reintroduce schoolchildren to the Scots tongue.
He wrote the lyrics to Icker in a Thrave, the 2007 Scots entry for the Liet-Lávlut song contest for minority languages in Europe.
[5] He has also translated several Roald Dahl novels, including The Twits (The Eejits),[6] George's Marvellous Medicine (Geordie’s Mingin Medicine) and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Chairlie and the Chocolate Works),[7] and, in 2018, J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stane.