The son and heir reads little other than Facebook and various twitters (and this, I fear, will be clearly demonstrated when he gets his "A" level results this summer). But he does find it expedient at times (such as when the Golf has been scratched yet again, or when he might need a lift back from a party at 2am) to pretend to take an interest in the old man's mad electronic scribbling. Last Saturday he was making some witty remarks concerning his dad's ability to shoot and scribble, but then made a very perceptive remark: "Dad; you never write anything about fishing. When you are staring out of the window don't you ever daydream of salmon and trout?"
That is very true, (writing about fishing I mean, naturally not the guff about staring out of the window) and as I explained, the reason for that is because I never go fishing. And the reasons for that are the usual ones of time and money. "But, my boy, when you are earning zillions on an arbitrage desk in Canary Wharf then I shall at last and at least have the money to pop off to Hardy's and commission a rod, and the time to find some new friends with nice riverside walks", I thought. But did not say - not least because the zillions thing may be a long time off in the future at present rates of progress.
Occasionally though I have found myself by the river bank with a couple of mates in very long wellies, in my case flask in hand rather than rod. I will admit that on a warm summer afternoon there is nothing wrong with allowing one's mind to wander around the wilder shores of derivative products in a sylvan setting, inspiration being kindled by the sparkle of sunlight on water, and new complex structures driven by the tantalising pattern of willows on quiet pools. And then waking up to enjoy a decent Romeo y Julietta, and the thought of trout for supper.
Indeed I have a hospitable northern mate, Bill, who has managed to devote his life to doing almost nothing but still somehow made a reasonable pot of money, which enables him to rent a couple of bits of well stocked river in north Lancashire.
A few years ago he asked me up for a weekend in June, and having not much to do and the thought of a jolly country inn with feather bed and proper cooked breakfast appealing a lot, I headed north. On my arrival at the designated spot I was brutally reminded that Bill is a proper northern lad and did not get where he is today by thoughtless extravagance. Oh no. My dream of the agreeable village pub turned out to be the reality of an ageing very modest caravan parked close enough to the river that he could sit on the steps and fish. The feather bed was a plywood shelf with some waterproof type of bed "sheets" probably recycled from supermarket carrier bags. And somehow, I knew that breakfast would be Kellogg's by way of Morrison.
But your scribe can rough it if required; on being told that the pub in the village did a selection of decent beers things seemed a little brighter, and I was happy enough to go along with the suggestion that on the way there we strolled along the river to see if the fish were jumping or biting or dancing or whatever it is they do.
Rounding a bend in the river we came across another northern type standing up to his hocks in the middle of the current and with that sort of dreamy gormless look that anglers seem to take on when near water. The two great sportsmen regarded each other in silence until finally Bill launched into what in the north of England is regarded as sparkling repartee:
Bill: "Aye"
Man in Middle of River (brightly): "Aye"
Long pause whilst these two philosophers absorbed their exchange.
Bill: "Owt?"
MiMoR (after extended thought): "Nowt!"
Further long pause for due consideration.
Bill: "Aye"
MiMoR: "Aye"
And, conversation over for the day, Bill and I walked on.
MiMoR may well have been right. Probably there was nowt. But what there was, was first class beer in the village pub, and do you know, after a couple of pints (or maybe six) of it I have no memory whatsoever of sleeping in that caravan. It must have been the soporific effect of sleeping next to the sound of the river. Or maybe fishing really is good for you.
Friday, 18 May 2012
Tuesday, 3 April 2012
Season's Greetings
The Season is over. Now is the Holidays, which will last, unless I find a very kind friend with an overstocked grouse moor, until late September, and the thrill of partridge across dry stubble. So, you may ask, why no summary of the winters activities, no valedictory comment on the thrills and spills of the 2011 to 2012 chase? Has old B retreated into some cave close to the rearing pen to live off poached pheasant (no, madam, that does not mean simmered in white wine and a herb garni) for the summer? Or even gone off with Stuffer to the African plains in search of the wonderfully exotic?
No, there is a worse reason. B is having to work. One of the problems with the fun of the chase is that it does not come free. No Sir. If Mrs B knew what was spent on the simple pursuit of the odd pheasant for the pot there would be trouble. The sort of trouble which starts in Dolce and Gabbana, proceeds to Armani, has a quick lunch at C, and then finishes the afternoon in Ferragamo.
B is not into supporting the Italian economy, not that part of it on that scale. But Mrs B was a country girl before Chelsea beckoned and she has some idea of what a day walking about in the rain can cost, or a pair of yellow woollen socks, or some (quickly muddied) boots. Her knowledge of the cost of a 250 bird day is a little out of date (nor, I think, does she compute the cost of fifteen of them) but she knows this hobby comes in a bit more expensive than, say, moderate stamp collecting. so, no words are spoken, B does not ask the price of that frock or those shoes, and Mrs B does not enquire how much 4000 cartridges might be, or whether it is necessary for the tailor to run off another pair of plus fours. (Why, incidentally, should trousers cost MORE when there is a foot of material missing from each leg?) But there is a long established understanding and the bank account has to be primed ready for the onslaught from town and country.
But all this takes a certain amount of that folding stuff - or on this scale - that electronically transferred stuff...
So, from February onwards B rolls off to the office and works very hard (no, really) on his esoteric structures and incomprehensible products. He attends the training seminars, laughs at the boss's jokes, mingles at the evening receptions and away days, and is agreeable to rising stars and cautiously dismissive of falling ones, (not too much so, you never know when they will pop up again). Clients are breakfasted lunched and dined, proposals are drafted, rivals rubbished, and the mandates and instructions roll in.
In the quiet moments B looks out of the window and sees not streets, red buses, and towering office blocks, but autumn woods, brown and purple hills, and high hedges. He hears not raised voices negotiating hard, but the squawk of a nervous pheasant and steady tapping of sticks on trees. Anxious spaniels whimper instead of analysts muttering whilst rerunning Monte Carlo simulations. When he looks back at the mountains of paper on his desk he knows that if shuffled correctly and dealt out in the right order it will be mysteriously transformed into a day here, and two days there, into howling winds and curving pheasants, into partridges breaking in covies, fine reds in good company, a very muddy Rangie with a couple of the best mates lolling in the leather seats.
So in the office B gets his head down and looks ne'er to left or right. And Mrs B strolls thoughtfully up and down Bond Street, wondering why the man at Beretta is watching the street so hopefully.
No, there is a worse reason. B is having to work. One of the problems with the fun of the chase is that it does not come free. No Sir. If Mrs B knew what was spent on the simple pursuit of the odd pheasant for the pot there would be trouble. The sort of trouble which starts in Dolce and Gabbana, proceeds to Armani, has a quick lunch at C, and then finishes the afternoon in Ferragamo.
B is not into supporting the Italian economy, not that part of it on that scale. But Mrs B was a country girl before Chelsea beckoned and she has some idea of what a day walking about in the rain can cost, or a pair of yellow woollen socks, or some (quickly muddied) boots. Her knowledge of the cost of a 250 bird day is a little out of date (nor, I think, does she compute the cost of fifteen of them) but she knows this hobby comes in a bit more expensive than, say, moderate stamp collecting. so, no words are spoken, B does not ask the price of that frock or those shoes, and Mrs B does not enquire how much 4000 cartridges might be, or whether it is necessary for the tailor to run off another pair of plus fours. (Why, incidentally, should trousers cost MORE when there is a foot of material missing from each leg?) But there is a long established understanding and the bank account has to be primed ready for the onslaught from town and country.
But all this takes a certain amount of that folding stuff - or on this scale - that electronically transferred stuff...
So, from February onwards B rolls off to the office and works very hard (no, really) on his esoteric structures and incomprehensible products. He attends the training seminars, laughs at the boss's jokes, mingles at the evening receptions and away days, and is agreeable to rising stars and cautiously dismissive of falling ones, (not too much so, you never know when they will pop up again). Clients are breakfasted lunched and dined, proposals are drafted, rivals rubbished, and the mandates and instructions roll in.
In the quiet moments B looks out of the window and sees not streets, red buses, and towering office blocks, but autumn woods, brown and purple hills, and high hedges. He hears not raised voices negotiating hard, but the squawk of a nervous pheasant and steady tapping of sticks on trees. Anxious spaniels whimper instead of analysts muttering whilst rerunning Monte Carlo simulations. When he looks back at the mountains of paper on his desk he knows that if shuffled correctly and dealt out in the right order it will be mysteriously transformed into a day here, and two days there, into howling winds and curving pheasants, into partridges breaking in covies, fine reds in good company, a very muddy Rangie with a couple of the best mates lolling in the leather seats.
So in the office B gets his head down and looks ne'er to left or right. And Mrs B strolls thoughtfully up and down Bond Street, wondering why the man at Beretta is watching the street so hopefully.
Wednesday, 15 February 2012
Somerset: An Apology
Those of you, if any, who read "Cow Boys" may be labouring under the impression that Somerset is a little wet. I now wish to withdraw any insinuation or suggestion that it is in any shape or form wet, slightly damp, or even moist. I am now closer informed; further and better particulars (as mi' learned friends would say) have been furnished by courtesy of an end of season shooting visit to mid-Wales.
Approaching the Welsh borders in late afternoon in the dark it occurred to me that the drizzle that had been making itself gradually known was building up some force. The windscreen wipers were doing the final chorus of the can-can, and there was an awful lot of puddles lurking about, hurling themselves with a desperate despair across the bonnet whenever I least expected it.
"Just a heavy shower" I thought and drove on. An hour later, as the heavy shower continued in even greater torrents, I turned into an extraordinarily twisting climbing and plummeting lane. After ten minutes, I began to wonder if I had accidentally turned into a mountain stream system, the way old ladies turn onto railway lines at level crossings. No lights, no houses, just water falling from all angles, too much to proceed at more than about 15 miles per hour (which is not the speed the old girl likes to be driven at). If the Rangy had been a Riva motorboat I would have been immensely proud of the waves cresting from her prow and down either flank, but I was not so sure the having the V6 underwater for the bulk of the journey was going to prove terribly good for it.
I was considering stopping to get into my waterproofs when below me appeared a light. This either had to be the village of Pontyaffonflantccwmbach or the Eddystone lighthouse, so I sailed cautiously on and within minutes life was suddenly made good again by the remarkable vision of a long white building, lights at all windows, and the hugely welcome words "The Jones Arms" emblazoned across the front.
We will pass briefly over the complete soaking of self and kit as it was transferred from car to chintzy bedroom, the ruination of a fine pair of brogues by repeated immersion in puddles that elsewhere would have fenced off as dangerous flooded mineshafts, a car that within seconds of the hatch been opened was as wet inside as out. Let us move to the sinking of the first pint of a fine local brew, and the prompt arrival of its twin. Which was made even more enjoyable by the arrival in the bar of various other drowned rats vaguely resembling my shooting syndicate mates.
Let us also pass over the pleasures of pump and table, but do let us pause several times during the night to listen to rain beating against the tiny window and pounding on the low roof, water violently gurgling down some nearby drain pipe, and then let us meet again to the welcome sound of knife and fork tackling bacon, sausage, and egg. And to the door opening to admit a small dark dripping figure, clad in damp tweed and a big grin. "Good morning gentlemen! On your pegs in twenty minutes!"
Now, apart from sailing and diving, most normal people do not pursue their leisure and pleasure interests underwater. But shootists are not normal people and we had paid a lot of money for this day. So at 9.15 we were standing in what appeared to be a shallow lake with a wet wood in front of us and a wet wood behind. Wet spaniels, wet labs, wet pickers up, somewhere in that wet wood very wet beaters.
"They'll never fly in this" called Peter from my left.
"How will we know - we can't possibly see them if they do" responded David from my right. I kept my mouth shut; I had enough rain going down my shirt without letting it into my interior.
But do you know? Those damned Welsh pheasants, they must be specially bred for the conditions, little wiper units on their eyes, tails that create an airstream to lift the raindrops away, waterproofed feathers so that all waterlogging is avoided. Out they came and high and fast they flew, lifting clean across the valley, curving as they went.
And do you know another thing about those Welsh waterproofed feathers? They are lead proof too. Nothing came down - except great cascades of raindrops from my hat. Maybe my cartridges were wet, maybe the force of that falling rain of the land of the red dragons bore my lead shot straight to earth, maybe the specific density of gunpowder is weaker in wet conditions. Maybe when mounting the gun I didn't allow enough for soaked vest, shirt , tie, and waistcoat. Somehow, these blasted pheasants just flew on. And over. And across. And on several occasions around. But nothing came down.
Still the water ran down in great streams into my clothing. The only function of waterproof clothing seemed to be to keep the water in, so that everything squished and squelched as I swung. My boots were becoming heavier and colder by the minute and this was, I knew, because they were filling up from the water that was permeating down my plus fours.
Each drive merged into the next, as we peered into the black sky, blinded by searing wetness lashing across our pink faces. The faces of the pickers-up wore that expression that the failing shootist knows so well: "Soft bloody amateurs!"
Peter shouted down the line "And we do this for pleasure!"
"Try owning a football club!" shouted back the richest syndicate member. Soggy silence fell again.
Finally, we came to the last drive. We lined up, creakingly soggy at the bottom of a steeply sloping grass field. Above us a old wood, dark twisted shapes of wind blown trees. The wind driven rain lashed across into our faces. We stood, water running off sodden clothing, the only solace the thought that next would come a warming lunch and a decent red. We had much time to contemplate the possibilties of pork or beef or wet Welsh lamb as the beaters seemed to take an hour to get into position. Well, maybe it was ten minutes. The birds flew hard and fast. The lead went up behind and below them. My boots slopped and slurped.
Then at last it was over, the spaniels and labs gambolled about pretending to look for birds that they knew were now falling about laughing in Powys. We sheathed our soaking guns in damp sleeves. Then one of us, the richest member I think, turned to the west, and silently pointed. We followed his stretching finger and looked west. The last of the rain was drifting past, the sunlight was breaking on the distant ridge and behind it the sky was blue.
Gentlemen of the Somerset Sahara; my apologies. You don't know the meaning of the word "wet". But I do.
Approaching the Welsh borders in late afternoon in the dark it occurred to me that the drizzle that had been making itself gradually known was building up some force. The windscreen wipers were doing the final chorus of the can-can, and there was an awful lot of puddles lurking about, hurling themselves with a desperate despair across the bonnet whenever I least expected it.
"Just a heavy shower" I thought and drove on. An hour later, as the heavy shower continued in even greater torrents, I turned into an extraordinarily twisting climbing and plummeting lane. After ten minutes, I began to wonder if I had accidentally turned into a mountain stream system, the way old ladies turn onto railway lines at level crossings. No lights, no houses, just water falling from all angles, too much to proceed at more than about 15 miles per hour (which is not the speed the old girl likes to be driven at). If the Rangy had been a Riva motorboat I would have been immensely proud of the waves cresting from her prow and down either flank, but I was not so sure the having the V6 underwater for the bulk of the journey was going to prove terribly good for it.
I was considering stopping to get into my waterproofs when below me appeared a light. This either had to be the village of Pontyaffonflantccwmbach or the Eddystone lighthouse, so I sailed cautiously on and within minutes life was suddenly made good again by the remarkable vision of a long white building, lights at all windows, and the hugely welcome words "The Jones Arms" emblazoned across the front.
We will pass briefly over the complete soaking of self and kit as it was transferred from car to chintzy bedroom, the ruination of a fine pair of brogues by repeated immersion in puddles that elsewhere would have fenced off as dangerous flooded mineshafts, a car that within seconds of the hatch been opened was as wet inside as out. Let us move to the sinking of the first pint of a fine local brew, and the prompt arrival of its twin. Which was made even more enjoyable by the arrival in the bar of various other drowned rats vaguely resembling my shooting syndicate mates.
Let us also pass over the pleasures of pump and table, but do let us pause several times during the night to listen to rain beating against the tiny window and pounding on the low roof, water violently gurgling down some nearby drain pipe, and then let us meet again to the welcome sound of knife and fork tackling bacon, sausage, and egg. And to the door opening to admit a small dark dripping figure, clad in damp tweed and a big grin. "Good morning gentlemen! On your pegs in twenty minutes!"
Now, apart from sailing and diving, most normal people do not pursue their leisure and pleasure interests underwater. But shootists are not normal people and we had paid a lot of money for this day. So at 9.15 we were standing in what appeared to be a shallow lake with a wet wood in front of us and a wet wood behind. Wet spaniels, wet labs, wet pickers up, somewhere in that wet wood very wet beaters.
"They'll never fly in this" called Peter from my left.
"How will we know - we can't possibly see them if they do" responded David from my right. I kept my mouth shut; I had enough rain going down my shirt without letting it into my interior.
But do you know? Those damned Welsh pheasants, they must be specially bred for the conditions, little wiper units on their eyes, tails that create an airstream to lift the raindrops away, waterproofed feathers so that all waterlogging is avoided. Out they came and high and fast they flew, lifting clean across the valley, curving as they went.
And do you know another thing about those Welsh waterproofed feathers? They are lead proof too. Nothing came down - except great cascades of raindrops from my hat. Maybe my cartridges were wet, maybe the force of that falling rain of the land of the red dragons bore my lead shot straight to earth, maybe the specific density of gunpowder is weaker in wet conditions. Maybe when mounting the gun I didn't allow enough for soaked vest, shirt , tie, and waistcoat. Somehow, these blasted pheasants just flew on. And over. And across. And on several occasions around. But nothing came down.
Still the water ran down in great streams into my clothing. The only function of waterproof clothing seemed to be to keep the water in, so that everything squished and squelched as I swung. My boots were becoming heavier and colder by the minute and this was, I knew, because they were filling up from the water that was permeating down my plus fours.
Each drive merged into the next, as we peered into the black sky, blinded by searing wetness lashing across our pink faces. The faces of the pickers-up wore that expression that the failing shootist knows so well: "Soft bloody amateurs!"
Peter shouted down the line "And we do this for pleasure!"
"Try owning a football club!" shouted back the richest syndicate member. Soggy silence fell again.
Finally, we came to the last drive. We lined up, creakingly soggy at the bottom of a steeply sloping grass field. Above us a old wood, dark twisted shapes of wind blown trees. The wind driven rain lashed across into our faces. We stood, water running off sodden clothing, the only solace the thought that next would come a warming lunch and a decent red. We had much time to contemplate the possibilties of pork or beef or wet Welsh lamb as the beaters seemed to take an hour to get into position. Well, maybe it was ten minutes. The birds flew hard and fast. The lead went up behind and below them. My boots slopped and slurped.
Then at last it was over, the spaniels and labs gambolled about pretending to look for birds that they knew were now falling about laughing in Powys. We sheathed our soaking guns in damp sleeves. Then one of us, the richest member I think, turned to the west, and silently pointed. We followed his stretching finger and looked west. The last of the rain was drifting past, the sunlight was breaking on the distant ridge and behind it the sky was blue.
Gentlemen of the Somerset Sahara; my apologies. You don't know the meaning of the word "wet". But I do.
Thursday, 2 February 2012
The Day of the Spaniel
Communist versus Fascist; Russia against America; the Labour/Tory divide; Gladstone and Disraeli; Manchester City vieing with Manchester United. These are nothing compared with that age-old endless debate: Spaniels or Labs?
Like living north or south of the Thames, every shooter, beater, and picker up is born either a spaniel supporter or a labrador lover. Only in matrimony may positions be compromised, where the household has to hold two or three of both. (Children are of course discouraged in such relationships, they are difficult in their eating habits, won't sleep in sheds, and cannot be thrown in lakes to retrieve the badly dropped pheasant.) Out in the field the proud owner will stand back from the line, at his or her heels the chosen black or yellow (whatever happened to chocolate?) short or rough coats, sitting quietly and calmly, and looking snootily at the nervously shivering multi-coloured yipping piebald shaggy eared creatures who have dared to invade the field of dreams. And as the day goes on, so does the endless argument, the bramble penetrating qualities of the spaniel ventilated against the gate scaling abilities of the lab, the anarchistic independence of the spaniel compared with the adoring loyalty of the labrador.
Your correspondent does himself have a firm preference, which he will not reveal for fear of death threats and sneering remarks (but he has a deep admiration for long floppy ears).
So last week, finding a Fellow Gun who had been allocated the family Golf so Mrs FG could take the Range Rover on a difficult and demanding trip to J Sainsbury, I naturally offered him a lift and was only a little taken aback when he opened the Golf front passenger door and a black and grey spaniel got out.
"You don't mind, do you?"
"Of course, not, wonderful dogs. Charming chap, what is his name?"
"SHE is Bonny. Twelve years old. I'm afraid she doesn't like sitting in the back, I'll keep her under my feet, if that's alright"
"Of course. What a lovely girl"
She was indeed a lovely girl and in spite of her advanced years sat neatly through each drive and dashed about in a very professional manner when instructed to find and fetch. After each burst of activity she hopped into the front footwell and looked at me with those adoring spaniel eyes. By the end of the third drive, and after the third sloe gin, I was wondering if I could get a dog basket in my tiny kitchen and what the boss would say to the odd yelp from under my office desk.
The final drive was on the very muddy bank of a winding stream and Bonny's owner was delighted to receive a pheasant from the reeds. He was not so delighted to find that his black and grey girlfriend now was mostly brown, including those big floppy ears. "Well," he said, "she's going to have to sit in the back now" and I slipped quickly out of the drivers seat and went round to the back door to clear a space and break out a cartridge carton for her to reside on.
"Oh Christ, out, out, Bonny" came from the front and I looked through just in time to see a whirlwind, an Amazonian storm, of hairy legs, heaving body, and flailing ears surrounded by a spray of wide splattering mud.
It is astonishing, the mud carrying capacity of spaniel hair. A liberal coating was applied to my beautiful leather seats, to the dashboard, to the windscreen, my multi-function steering wheel, the door panel, the audio unit. The valet company are taking the car in for the third time next week and this time hope to get the deep residue out ("Next time, try not to let it dry in, sir") . Not that I knew what post spaniel valeting would cost as I watched the Golf drive away, those loving spaniel eyes adoring me out of the back window.
.
Like living north or south of the Thames, every shooter, beater, and picker up is born either a spaniel supporter or a labrador lover. Only in matrimony may positions be compromised, where the household has to hold two or three of both. (Children are of course discouraged in such relationships, they are difficult in their eating habits, won't sleep in sheds, and cannot be thrown in lakes to retrieve the badly dropped pheasant.) Out in the field the proud owner will stand back from the line, at his or her heels the chosen black or yellow (whatever happened to chocolate?) short or rough coats, sitting quietly and calmly, and looking snootily at the nervously shivering multi-coloured yipping piebald shaggy eared creatures who have dared to invade the field of dreams. And as the day goes on, so does the endless argument, the bramble penetrating qualities of the spaniel ventilated against the gate scaling abilities of the lab, the anarchistic independence of the spaniel compared with the adoring loyalty of the labrador.
Your correspondent does himself have a firm preference, which he will not reveal for fear of death threats and sneering remarks (but he has a deep admiration for long floppy ears).
So last week, finding a Fellow Gun who had been allocated the family Golf so Mrs FG could take the Range Rover on a difficult and demanding trip to J Sainsbury, I naturally offered him a lift and was only a little taken aback when he opened the Golf front passenger door and a black and grey spaniel got out.
"You don't mind, do you?"
"Of course, not, wonderful dogs. Charming chap, what is his name?"
"SHE is Bonny. Twelve years old. I'm afraid she doesn't like sitting in the back, I'll keep her under my feet, if that's alright"
"Of course. What a lovely girl"
She was indeed a lovely girl and in spite of her advanced years sat neatly through each drive and dashed about in a very professional manner when instructed to find and fetch. After each burst of activity she hopped into the front footwell and looked at me with those adoring spaniel eyes. By the end of the third drive, and after the third sloe gin, I was wondering if I could get a dog basket in my tiny kitchen and what the boss would say to the odd yelp from under my office desk.
The final drive was on the very muddy bank of a winding stream and Bonny's owner was delighted to receive a pheasant from the reeds. He was not so delighted to find that his black and grey girlfriend now was mostly brown, including those big floppy ears. "Well," he said, "she's going to have to sit in the back now" and I slipped quickly out of the drivers seat and went round to the back door to clear a space and break out a cartridge carton for her to reside on.
"Oh Christ, out, out, Bonny" came from the front and I looked through just in time to see a whirlwind, an Amazonian storm, of hairy legs, heaving body, and flailing ears surrounded by a spray of wide splattering mud.
It is astonishing, the mud carrying capacity of spaniel hair. A liberal coating was applied to my beautiful leather seats, to the dashboard, to the windscreen, my multi-function steering wheel, the door panel, the audio unit. The valet company are taking the car in for the third time next week and this time hope to get the deep residue out ("Next time, try not to let it dry in, sir") . Not that I knew what post spaniel valeting would cost as I watched the Golf drive away, those loving spaniel eyes adoring me out of the back window.
.
Wednesday, 18 January 2012
Exotic Bird
A slight divergence. Permit me to introduce a very exotic bird indeed. Christopher Allsop, or Allsop of the Nile, as he is known in northern Africa and various west London bars. Mr Allsop is one of the last great explorers, currently back in London, whilst equipping himself with cleft sticks and pith helmets for his next great trek into unknown parts, and then on from Heathrow Terminal 3 to central Africa.
He and I share a common problem. Well, several, but the one we should like to share with you relates to our visibilty, or, a psychologist might explain, our self esteem.
Which boils down to this. Are we alone? Or, are there others out there? Or, to put it another way, is anybody else reading our stuff? Now, Allsop of the Nile's stuff is really worth reading, even given an over emphasis on perfect English grammar, as he is a visitor to the most extraordinary places, a wanderer amongst fascinating people, and an acute observer of all around. Find him at his best at www.whingeingbanker.blogspot.com (which, be warned, is coloured by, but not about, modern banking).
I know people are reading his lyrical account of travels in northern Africa, as various persons have come up to me, in a field in East Anglia, in a large house in Worcestershire, in a pub in Sussex, a restaurant in the City, and in several bars, (some of which Mrs B.... would not be happy about), to say how wonderful his oeuvre is. But he, and I, both of us, have received several complaints that it is impossible to make comments on our sites, and tricky to become a follower.
On the comments thing, this might be for the best, but both of us are prepared to risk the brickbats and rotten eggs of the public. I have employed a 14 year old technologist of the utmost skill and even he can't get his comments posted, and that is after offering him a rolo if he succeeded and the rest of the packet if he made a nice comment.
Any ideas, anybody out there? If there is anybody out there......
He and I share a common problem. Well, several, but the one we should like to share with you relates to our visibilty, or, a psychologist might explain, our self esteem.
Which boils down to this. Are we alone? Or, are there others out there? Or, to put it another way, is anybody else reading our stuff? Now, Allsop of the Nile's stuff is really worth reading, even given an over emphasis on perfect English grammar, as he is a visitor to the most extraordinary places, a wanderer amongst fascinating people, and an acute observer of all around. Find him at his best at www.whingeingbanker.blogspot.com (which, be warned, is coloured by, but not about, modern banking).
I know people are reading his lyrical account of travels in northern Africa, as various persons have come up to me, in a field in East Anglia, in a large house in Worcestershire, in a pub in Sussex, a restaurant in the City, and in several bars, (some of which Mrs B.... would not be happy about), to say how wonderful his oeuvre is. But he, and I, both of us, have received several complaints that it is impossible to make comments on our sites, and tricky to become a follower.
On the comments thing, this might be for the best, but both of us are prepared to risk the brickbats and rotten eggs of the public. I have employed a 14 year old technologist of the utmost skill and even he can't get his comments posted, and that is after offering him a rolo if he succeeded and the rest of the packet if he made a nice comment.
Any ideas, anybody out there? If there is anybody out there......
Tuesday, 10 January 2012
Cow Boys
Late last October I found myself standing on a peg in a Somerset wood. It's different down there. Wetter, for a start. My boots do leak, I suspected this last year but now I had clear and damp confirmation. Damn. The grass is - er - well, greener. And longer. And wetter. Much much wetter. In fact, I have a suspicion that Somerset may be a detached part of the Saragossa Sea, grass floating on water. A significant quantity of which was now inside my boot.
And another thing. The cows. Serious cow country this. There's an awful lot of cows in Somerset, leering over gates at you, greasing the lanes as they pass from wet field to milking parlour, idling slowly along narrow roads flicking those curious tails, steaming heavily in open yards, their silage clamps reminding your olfactory organs of their dominant role in the local economy.
But cows are not what this is about. Birds are what it is, obscurely, about. And that is why I was standing in a line of farmers in a damp field.
I had a very nasty shock on the second drive. I was standing down by a stream, wondering if it was a bit early to have a small cigar. It was in fact 11.25am; this is a Somerset farmers shoot, a group of neighours who pool (pool! hah!) their land (or bog) and ask along a few mates. One of whom was the local auctioneer, who I happened to have been at school with and who thought it would be amusing to leaven the cow talk with a City perspective. Prompt starts and tight timetabling do not seem to be the Somerset cow farmers' way.
So there I was, all lined up in a glade by the stream, a sloping meadow in front up to a high hedge; left to grow high, thick, and toppy for the benefit of the shooting. The hedge had grown out at the bottom, leaving a large number of bare branches and trunks. I stood, watching and listening for any sign of life, fiddling with my little cigar lighter, knowing the minute I got one alight the birds would start flopping over the hedge. Then I noticed the hedge was busy walking off to the right.
I had been warned that Somerset scrumpy could do very odd things to the brain, but I had had only the one before dinner last night, and stuck to the beer after that. Maybe the combination could bring early onset Alzheimers? Not only was the hedge walking out on us, it seemed to be on fire as well. I vowed never to touch zoider again.
I was just about to draw my neighbours attention to this unusual activity when a cow's head appeared at a gap in the hedge, followed by forty or fifty more, and the Confused of the City moment passed. The hedge remained in place but the cows legs ambled along and carried them into the next field, or more likely, onto the lane with a large amount of Somerset mud, ready for the next cyclist.
Lawks, this drive was taking a long time to start. I lit the small cigar. I became aware of a distant shouting, getting ever nearer. My neighbouring gun started walking toward me, and then, out of the undergrowth like a Japanese survivor of the Second World War, appeared a farming type from our jolly group.
"Bill's blown it again" he said, in broadest scrumpy. "Some bugger's lost in the wood; he never pegs it properly"
I now worked out the shouting: "Number foive; where the bleeding hell is number foive?" My neighbour raised an eyebrow at me.
"Come on, yee can't 'ave forgotten yoiur numbers already; who is number foive?"
The shouting now joined us in the clearing, sweating and red in the face, gun under arm, various pieces of card and paper gripped in hand, followed by two more of our sporting number.
"Got a problem Bill?" one of them asked.
"Why can't you lot ever recall your pegs?" Bill replied "Number foive, any of you gents?" We shook our heads.
Another Bill bellow, honed by years of directing cows, no doubt: "Number foive, where the fxxx are you? Who is foive? Who is foive?"
My erstwhile neighbour looked thoughtfully at his boot and rubbed his chin.
"Well, Bxxx here is seven, and I am six, so...er...um...I think you are five, Bill"
We maintained stiff upper lips until Bill vanished into the wood, but the racous laughter after that must have startled the cows several fields away.
And another thing. The cows. Serious cow country this. There's an awful lot of cows in Somerset, leering over gates at you, greasing the lanes as they pass from wet field to milking parlour, idling slowly along narrow roads flicking those curious tails, steaming heavily in open yards, their silage clamps reminding your olfactory organs of their dominant role in the local economy.
But cows are not what this is about. Birds are what it is, obscurely, about. And that is why I was standing in a line of farmers in a damp field.
I had a very nasty shock on the second drive. I was standing down by a stream, wondering if it was a bit early to have a small cigar. It was in fact 11.25am; this is a Somerset farmers shoot, a group of neighours who pool (pool! hah!) their land (or bog) and ask along a few mates. One of whom was the local auctioneer, who I happened to have been at school with and who thought it would be amusing to leaven the cow talk with a City perspective. Prompt starts and tight timetabling do not seem to be the Somerset cow farmers' way.
So there I was, all lined up in a glade by the stream, a sloping meadow in front up to a high hedge; left to grow high, thick, and toppy for the benefit of the shooting. The hedge had grown out at the bottom, leaving a large number of bare branches and trunks. I stood, watching and listening for any sign of life, fiddling with my little cigar lighter, knowing the minute I got one alight the birds would start flopping over the hedge. Then I noticed the hedge was busy walking off to the right.
I had been warned that Somerset scrumpy could do very odd things to the brain, but I had had only the one before dinner last night, and stuck to the beer after that. Maybe the combination could bring early onset Alzheimers? Not only was the hedge walking out on us, it seemed to be on fire as well. I vowed never to touch zoider again.
I was just about to draw my neighbours attention to this unusual activity when a cow's head appeared at a gap in the hedge, followed by forty or fifty more, and the Confused of the City moment passed. The hedge remained in place but the cows legs ambled along and carried them into the next field, or more likely, onto the lane with a large amount of Somerset mud, ready for the next cyclist.
Lawks, this drive was taking a long time to start. I lit the small cigar. I became aware of a distant shouting, getting ever nearer. My neighbouring gun started walking toward me, and then, out of the undergrowth like a Japanese survivor of the Second World War, appeared a farming type from our jolly group.
"Bill's blown it again" he said, in broadest scrumpy. "Some bugger's lost in the wood; he never pegs it properly"
I now worked out the shouting: "Number foive; where the bleeding hell is number foive?" My neighbour raised an eyebrow at me.
"Come on, yee can't 'ave forgotten yoiur numbers already; who is number foive?"
The shouting now joined us in the clearing, sweating and red in the face, gun under arm, various pieces of card and paper gripped in hand, followed by two more of our sporting number.
"Got a problem Bill?" one of them asked.
"Why can't you lot ever recall your pegs?" Bill replied "Number foive, any of you gents?" We shook our heads.
Another Bill bellow, honed by years of directing cows, no doubt: "Number foive, where the fxxx are you? Who is foive? Who is foive?"
My erstwhile neighbour looked thoughtfully at his boot and rubbed his chin.
"Well, Bxxx here is seven, and I am six, so...er...um...I think you are five, Bill"
We maintained stiff upper lips until Bill vanished into the wood, but the racous laughter after that must have startled the cows several fields away.
Monday, 9 January 2012
Birdie Par Two
You do get to see the world with a shotgun. Britain anyway. Last week I was not far from home, but in an empty Chiltern valley that I had never visited before. An hour's drive from central London, but as remote as a Northumberland fellside. Except for those big birds going into Heathrow. Rather you than me, I thought, looking up to the distant droning cigar tube, standing on a little cutout on a steep chalk hillside, looking across grass meadows to ancient beechwoods on the other flank of the valley.
Here, of course, you have to be careful of those other big birds as well. Also circling above, but in silence, wheeling around high above you, just catching the corner of your eye so that you flick the gun halfway up, then relax it again. Massive outstretched wings and that characteristic forked tail.
The red kite. A floating wheeling soaring object of great beauty, brought back here by an American billionaire after they became extinct in these hills. They obviously have an affinity with rolling high chalk downlands and beech woods, they are everywhere now. In the last ten years red kites here have multiplied from the rare to the commonplace. They, allegedly, do not interfere with the pheasants, though with those hooked bills and the sheer numbers of them, I would think it must take great forbearance on their part not to nick a pheasant chick or twenty in the spring.
And it does take a little forbearance not to swing the gun around that enticing circle. Just joking, RSPB members.
My host, a man of these parts, told me that one of his syndicate guns, a local farmer, (a proper one, a lot more rare than red kites now that the Chilterns are an easy commute to Marylebone) had a corner of the eye problem, swung a little too quickly, and the trigger finger connected with the deadly accuracy that only a farmer's can.
After a little discussion and without drawing too much attention (they thought) the kite went into the back of the farmers Shogun under a pile of sacks. "Take it home and bury it" was the host's clear instruction. Fortunately for lovers of justice, at least one of the beaters was an upright citizen and bird lover. Next morning the constabulary arrived at the farm gate and our farmer confessed.
He might have been best advised to hire a PR firm before his time in the dock at Aylesbury magistrates court. The sorry saga was frankly related to the glaring and appalled magistrates.
"And Mr Smith, what did you do with the bird once you had removed it from the scene?" one enquired.
"Took it home"
"And then?"
"Skinned it, cut the breasts off, and pan roast them, madam"
Once order had been restored in the court, the questioning was resumed:
"Ate it, my god, Mr Smith, ate it; what was it like?"
"Somewhere between a golden eagle and a buzzard, madam"
He is using a solicitor for the appeal hearing.
Here, of course, you have to be careful of those other big birds as well. Also circling above, but in silence, wheeling around high above you, just catching the corner of your eye so that you flick the gun halfway up, then relax it again. Massive outstretched wings and that characteristic forked tail.
The red kite. A floating wheeling soaring object of great beauty, brought back here by an American billionaire after they became extinct in these hills. They obviously have an affinity with rolling high chalk downlands and beech woods, they are everywhere now. In the last ten years red kites here have multiplied from the rare to the commonplace. They, allegedly, do not interfere with the pheasants, though with those hooked bills and the sheer numbers of them, I would think it must take great forbearance on their part not to nick a pheasant chick or twenty in the spring.
And it does take a little forbearance not to swing the gun around that enticing circle. Just joking, RSPB members.
My host, a man of these parts, told me that one of his syndicate guns, a local farmer, (a proper one, a lot more rare than red kites now that the Chilterns are an easy commute to Marylebone) had a corner of the eye problem, swung a little too quickly, and the trigger finger connected with the deadly accuracy that only a farmer's can.
After a little discussion and without drawing too much attention (they thought) the kite went into the back of the farmers Shogun under a pile of sacks. "Take it home and bury it" was the host's clear instruction. Fortunately for lovers of justice, at least one of the beaters was an upright citizen and bird lover. Next morning the constabulary arrived at the farm gate and our farmer confessed.
He might have been best advised to hire a PR firm before his time in the dock at Aylesbury magistrates court. The sorry saga was frankly related to the glaring and appalled magistrates.
"And Mr Smith, what did you do with the bird once you had removed it from the scene?" one enquired.
"Took it home"
"And then?"
"Skinned it, cut the breasts off, and pan roast them, madam"
Once order had been restored in the court, the questioning was resumed:
"Ate it, my god, Mr Smith, ate it; what was it like?"
"Somewhere between a golden eagle and a buzzard, madam"
He is using a solicitor for the appeal hearing.
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