The Diary of a Country Bumpkin

I am killing three birds with one stone with this story for it will be both my entry in the FOWC one word challenge and the 3TC challenge and suffice as a rather interesting story for those of you who just read my blog.

If you live in the country you may be more aware of the stories of fairies and hobgoblins, a tree or bush can hide a multitude of things, an elf, or a fairy for who knows what lives at the bottom of the garden.

This is the story of the art of deception by two young girls, sixteen year old Elsie Wright and her nine year old cousin Frances Griffiths who lived in the village of Cottingley near Bingley in Yorkshire.

The two young girls believed in fairies and set about to prove their existence by borrowing their father’s quarter plate camera and set up their scenes with the use of hat pins and coloured paper cutouts near the stream at the bottom of Elsie’s garden.

As you can see, so convincing were their images that even eminent figures such as Sherlock Holme’s creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle were hoodwinked into believing the images were true.

The photos were taken in 1917 and Elsie’s father, a keen amateur photographer developed the prints and was not deceived by the images, however his wife Polly always believed in their authenticity.

In 1919 she took prints to the Theosophical Society in Bradford where they were giving a lecture on fairy life and from there things spiralled out of control.

It was during 1920 that Conan Doyle who was a committed spiritualist became aware of the photographs and wanted to use them for an article on fairies he had been commissioned to write for the Strand Magazine.

Following the publication of Conan Doyle’s article great controversy raged with leading scientists of the day arguing whether the prints were real or fake for many a year.

I have to say they are rather splendid images and call me a sentimental old duffer but I’m quite happy to go along with the view that they are real as I so seldom go to the bottom of the garden, for all I know they could be there dancing about as I write.

I have just found what is called the Sunday Whirl: wordle #388 which is a sort of word puzzle where one has to write something which includes a number of words which have been selected. I quite enjoyed this writing challenge.

A weekend in the country.

My wife and I were asked for a weekend in the country by Lord Peter Whimsy and at first, I was reluctant to take up the invitation but one doesn’t get the chance for this sort of thing that often and it would be a story to tell my grandchildren the next time they came to visit.

His Lordship lives in the country in the wilds of Yorkshire which was quite a long drive as it entailed going round and round a very discombobulated route through the countryside.

Eventually we arrived and I parked the Bentley at the front door and went with my wife to pull the chain to ring the doorbell and was rather taken aback when the hinge on the imposing front door creaked and the door opened to reveal, no-one.

I had been expecting someone to emerge but no, there was not a soul to be seen, when in a flash a small rather withered old man jumped out at my wife and I causing our pulses to race alarmingly.

He introduced himself, “Good day sir, madam I’m Scrotum the wrinkled retainer, do follow me to your room.”

“I’m afraid there is no rush to dress for dinner, his Lordship had tickets in the stalls to see the Mouse trap and is running a little late.”

Some time later we went down for dinner and met his Lordship who apologised for his lateness as it seems he had trodden in a puddle when entering the house which necessitated a change of clothes.

During the course of the meal which was a very rich platter he informed everyone that the plan for tomorrow was to go clay pigeon shooting which sounded as if it might be fun.

Unfortunately, the meal was rather too rich for my digestive system and I could no longer contain myself and I let off an enormous fart.

At first, I thought I had got away with it as his Lordship shouted to his dog, “Rover, get away from the table,” but I could no longer hold myself and let an even louder one rip.

Once again, his Lordship shouted at the dog and then to Scrotum, “For God’s sake man open the vents on that window.”

Shocked as I was by his shouting I let rip yet again this time even louder.

By this time his Lordship was virtually purple in the face, veins bursting from his neck.

He rose from the table and bellowed, “For Christ’s sake Rover, get away from the table before he shits all over you.”

Well, this is my story of our weekend in the country, I have a feeling we may not be asked again.

A driver has claimed a gamekeeper on a Sandringham Royal shoot battered him on the head with a stick after screaming: “Mind my dogs you f****** peasant.”

This was an article written in The Sun newspaper and you have to just love the language used, for example the title “Royal Rumpus” which implies there was Royalty present, although the article does go on to say that Buckingham Palace was unable to confirm whether Prince Andrew was in the party.

I rather suspect that Buckingham Palace would be unable to confirm whether a great number of Royal personages were in the party, was the Queen perhaps, hiding in the shrubbery waiting for Prince Phillip to pick her up in his new Range Rover. Personally I doubt it.

The story continues that Mr Patrick Panks said “I came round the corner at around 30 mph and this toff was stood with his dogs, about six of them.” At this stage I am wondering how he knew the fellow with the dogs was a toff as he hadn’t yet spoken to the chap, rather a snap decision I would have thought as not everyone who dresses in country tweed is a toff.

However, he continued; “I had to stop because they were in the middle of the road, he was waving his stick around and hit the front of my car.”

“I wound down the window and before I could say anything he shouted.” “Mind my dogs you f****** peasant, I couldn’t believe it.”

“I was furious so I leapt out and shouted; “I’m no f****** peasant, who are you calling a peasant?”

The photograph above was inserted, presumably to show the altercation between the two men but if I’m not mistaken you can clearly see a walkie talkie in the hand of one of the men suggesting to me that this is just a library picture of country folk at play.

The argument between the two men continued and I have to say it’s a jolly good job The Queen wasn’t hiding in the shrubbery for this is not the sort of language to use in front of her, no matter how broadminded she may be.

Eventually, the  gamekeeper seems to have tired of the conversation and set about Mr Panks with a stick causing him damage about the head.

Mr Panks said he suffered severe cuts to his head and neck and has cuts and bruises across both arms and his body. He went to A & E for a brain scan and doctors have warned him to expect concussion.

This is not the place to question whether the appropriate number of brain cells to rub together were found especially as the fellow does seem to have had what might be described as a damn good thrashing.

Apparently he reported the incident to the police but will not make a statement until he knows he is not concussed, which I would have thought was not an easy task, for if you are concussed I would imagine you would be too confused to know.  Perhaps someone will tell him

I have to admit I have taken a slightly flippant attitude when writing this tale but when I first read the story I couldn’t help thinking this would be so much better as an episode for a Jeeves and Wooster story, the final scene being the poor Mr Panks in A & E having shotgun pellets removed from his buttocks whilst the toffs are outside laughing hysterically.

This is my entry into today’s Three Things Challenge where the words today are; Couch, Foot and Helmet.

I think it is safe to say the weather today is what we in the country, at least those of us who live in the South East, call fxxxing cold. Just to clarify for my readers from north of Watford or those who live in the Arctic North of the Americas we had quite a severe frost this morning and I’m sure the temperature was below freezing. As southern softies this weather is quite severe to us!

Not only is this enough to trigger jokes along the lines of, “no breakfast this morning, Oates ran out,” and “I’m going outside, I may be some time,” but it causes many of us to cast our minds back to the heady days of summer where I seem to remember I was blogging about the sun beating down on my neck and extolling the virtues of a “sola topee.”

For those of you not familiar with the term a sola topee is otherwise known as a pith hat which was the sort of helmet worn by the gallant members of the British Army  for example those at Rorkes Drift, a small outpost of some one hundred and fifty men who repelled an attack by three to four thousand Zulu warriors and in the process earned eleven Victoria Cross’s.  How could these brave men have kept their cool in the heat of the battle were it not for wearing a pith helmet to keep the blazing sun from the backs of their necks.

As always when doing one of these challenges, one thing often triggers the lead to another and the reference to the Army was my prompt for the word foot.

I have written a play called Dulce Et Decorum Est Pro Patria Mori which was produced by The Wireless Theatre Company which told the tale of men in the First World War through letters written from the trenches. Due to the appalling conditions in the trenches foot rot was a common occurrence and the most frequently requested item by the troops was new socks.

How those men would have enjoyed a sit down on a sofa or couch as the American troops would have it and to remove their feet from the clinging wet mud in the trenches and to put on a pair of new dry socks.

I am posting this again as it seems suitable for a daily word prompt, the word being television.

Television casting.

I was listening to the wireless recently and left the room for a moment and when I returned I caught the end of an article about a digital bank which said they had no branches as the were digital, which set me thinking.

Many years ago we used to have a family bakers business which in those days dealt mainly in money, not digital money you understand but old fashioned notes and coins.

This is going to come as a surprise to some of my younger readers but at the end of each days trading we would count the takings and put it in bags which we placed in another small leather bag which was called a night safe wallet. On our way home the night safe wallet was deposited into the bank through a hole in the wall that only customers with a key and an agreement to bank in this fashion would have, the bag being opened in the morning when the bank opened.

Some of the takings would be kept behind in our small safe at the shop to use as a float for the next days business, I’m assuming you’re with me so far, I’m only asking as the concept of moving bags of heavy money around may not be that easy for young people to imagine. Probably most of them are asking, well why didn’t you just do it with your phone?

During the trading week we would travel to the bank during opening hours carrying yet more bags of coins and wads of notes which were deposited for safe keeping in the banks vault. All of this carting of heavy coin was a great substitute for having to be a member of a gym, which may explain why folk in old black and white photos look so much slimmer than their modern counterparts.

I’m glad to say it was a fairly rare occurrence when men in balaclavas, or with stockings over their heads armed with sawn off shotguns would rush into the bank demanding the cash from the vault and then jump into the Mk 2 Jaguar waiting outside for their getaway.

Obviously having to stare down the barrel of a sawn off shotgun would have been a very traumatic experience for the bank manager and his staff, which may have had some bearing on the banks closing branches, especially in the countryside and pushing everyone to on line banking. This is a shame for older folk who still tend to use old fashioned money as the concept of paying by touching ones mobile phone on a terminal is a step too far!

It is quite a strange juxtaposition where the old fashioned bank would protect our money physically by putting bars at the window and latterly at the counter and storing our money in a large safe in the basement.

Whereas the modern digital bank doesn’t actually have our money for safekeeping at all for it only exists in a digital form and is only protected by a young computer programmer writing some code to keep the digital robbers at bay. Not quite as brave as the bank staff of old staring death in the face at the end of a gun barrel.

I’m lucky in that my bank still issues me with a cheque book which I have to admit I use very rarely, however I joined the Friends of Sywell Aerodrome which is a small art deco aerodrome in Northamptonshire and they requested payment by cheque.

How I wonder would younger people dealt with this situation, place their phone in a jiffy bag and head to the post office, if they can still find one that is open as they too are the victims of the digital world in which we live.

When I first moved to the countryside I was surprised at how many things were different from town living, one of the most obvious to me was how quiet it was. As we speak I am sitting at my desk typing and I can’t hear a sound from outside and this is not because we have the most modern double glazing, it is because there is no noise outside.

It sounds like we live in the wilds of the countryside but no, we live in Hatfield Heath which is a fairly large village near Bishops Stortford in Hertfordshire, although we are lucky in that our house is fairly well set away from the road.

Coming from London where even in the suburbs there is constant noise virtually twenty four hours a day, when first arriving in the countryside one is very aware of how quiet it is especially at night where you could hear a pin drop, except when a fox is having sex which is a very strange noise and surprisingly noisy.

I am exceptionally lucky in that most of the time I have no problem sleeping, I think it’s fair to say I can sleep on a clothes line as the old saying goes.

The above picture explains where the expression sleeping on a clothes line comes from, one could pay 4d (four pence old money) for a nights sleep on a very thin mattress of straw, or if you were even more poor a night on the line for 2d.

Life in Victorian Britain was fairly harsh for the poor, although obviously the rich had a somewhat better time of things. Many of the upper classes would dress in their “common clothes,” for a night of sightseeing and entertainment in the boarding houses and streets of the slums, hence the expression, “slumming it.”

Compared to this, people today don’t know how lucky they are, which reminds me of another expression once used by one of our ex Prime Ministers, Mr Harold Macmillan who in 1957 told the nation, “you’ve never had it so good.”

God only knows what expression he would have come up with to describe the current level of wealth enjoyed by most people, “rich as Croesus,” springs to mind!

There was a story yesterday about an angry pheasant who is terrorising a neighbourhood by biting and clawing residents, chasing pets and postmen.

Apparently this bird is so vicious that postmen are forced to defend themselves by squirting vinegar spray after high pitched alarms and gun noises failed to do the trick.

Residents have taken to carrying umbrellas with which to defend themselves, whilst one had to use the umbrella to rescue a postman who was trapped against his front door.

Now, I’m an open minded sort of chap so always try to see the other fellows point of view, or in this case the other pheasants point of view, so let’s look at the facts.

Open season for pheasant shooting started on 1st October so already this bird has been living on borrowed time for some two months; two months where he can hardly dare to show his face for fear of being shot at.

Having survived the carnage that has been inflicted on his friends and relatives during the pheasant shooting season and hoping to keep his head down in a quiet residential area, he now finds he is being attacked with vinegar spray, loud scary noises and umbrellas, it’s no wonder the poor sole is angry.

I’m sure that if all the residents were to start treating the bird in a more civilised fashion he would respond accordingly as I have generally found that if you treat someone as a gentleman they tend to act like a gentleman.

I have to say in all fairness going round attacking people (or birds) in the street with umbrellas just isn’t cricket, it is more the actions I expect from a cad or a rather beastly  Russian assassin squad.

Please be more pleasant to the pheasant as we don’t want the poor bird to be caught by the shooting party and end up requiring the services of a pheasant plucker or a pheasant plucker’s son.

When I was much younger and still taking holidays with my parents I can remember being taken to the countryside or the seaside and my parents commenting, “oh what a wonderful view.” Whereas I was thinking, “is it really, I can’t see it myself, I would rather be at home riding my bicycle to the woods for a crafty fag with my friends!”

Perhaps, in retrospect I should have paid more attention to the view as I later went on to become addicted to Marlboro cigarettes and used to smoke eighty a day, a habit I am delighted to report I managed to give up some eighteen years ago.

I was reminded of this thought when watching a documentary on the television about Hitler and Eva Braun and how she gradually became more powerful in the relationship, from initially being his girlfriend and never being seen in public to taking control of The Berghof, Hitler’s mountain retreat in the Bavarian Alps. Eventually they married and then committed suicide when all was lost and the Allies were entering Berlin.

Eva was a very keen photographer and took many cine films which showed the wonderful view of the countryside from The Berghof and how smartly everyone dressed, especially the SS officers in their all black uniforms designed by SS- Oberfuhrer Prof Karl Diebitsch and Walter Heck which were produced by The Hugo Boss Company.

It’s rather lucky than World War Two wasn’t a fashion parade as the British uniform wasn’t anything to write home about, had that been the case we could well have finished in last place.  The only chaps who could present themselves properly were The Home Guard who initially had no uniforms and had to go on parade in their three piece tweed suits.

This post was prompted by the phrase, “what a wonderful view,” which reminded me of the immortal sketch by John Cleese as Basil Fawlty about the view that was expected from a Torquay hotel bedroom window…..”Herds of wildebeest sweeping majestically…..”

I shall leave you with part of the script from that very amusing programme Fawlty Towers.

Mrs. Richards:
And another thing. I booked a room with a view.

Basil:
[quietly to Manuel] Deaf, mad and blind. [Goes to the window] Yes, this is the view as I remember it, yes, yes, this is it.

Mrs. Richards:
When I pay for a room with a view, I expect something more interesting than that.

Basil:
That is Torquay madam.

Mrs. Richards:
Well it’s not good enough.

Basil:
Well, may I ask what you expected to see out of a Torquay hotel bedroom window? Sydney Opera House, perhaps? The Hanging Gardens of Babylon? Herds of wildebeest sweeping majestically…?

Mrs. Richards:
Don’t be silly. I expect to be able to see the sea.

Basil:
You can see the sea. It’s over there between the land and the sky.

As I mentioned previously I am attempting to keep this site more related to matters of concern to people living in the country which is not as easy as you might think, especially for an ex townie like myself.

However, that was yesterday and what should fall into my lap today but the perfect story for me to write concerning beautiful fluffy dormice who just happen to be sleeping at the moment and their well being is in danger if they are woken up too soon during the freezing winter weather.

I know how they feel as I myself hate to be woken too early, especially during the colder winter months, although unlike the mice I am not in danger of dying, I just get a little bad tempered.

Apparently they are turning a portion of the M1 in Northamptonshire into a smart motorway which means turning the hard shoulder into a fourth lane.

It seems that to do this they have to fell trees which are in the way and which are close to where the dormice are hibernating, the story continues that the trees will have to be felled quietly and lowered gently on to flat bed trucks.

I have to admit there is a certain amount of ambiguity about this story as I am wondering where they are going to acquire a silent chainsaw and silent lorries and workmen.

Whatever the truth of this story, if there are any fluffy dormice in danger whilst the roadworks are taking place, as someone who much appreciates his car and the use of the motorway system I am also concerned for the well being of the fluffy mice and I would be quite prepared to wait until they have woken up.