Sticky times

 For once, all the plans I made and mentioned last month have actually come to fruition. Currently we are rushing around sorting out the house by the North Sea, as well as trying to enjoy our time here. Whilst here we have decorated the place and then replaced cupboards and sofas as well as adding a new all-glass coffee table which is nigh on invisible. I have the bruises on my knees to prove it! We should be heading south again sometime next week, in Wendy’s new car. No, it’s not electric or even hybrid, I’ll leave others to spend their money saving the planet, while we trail-blaze down the motorway to France with 300+ horses under the bonnet. Poo, I hear you say but, once back in France, this nice little hot-shot Merc will barely do five thou per year, and those will be mainly shopping and posing with the lid down. And that, in my mind, doesn’t require me spending extra squillions to carry a trailer load of lithium batteries under the seat, just so I can out-smug my neighbour, whilst bemoaning anyone who dares park in your allocated blue space!

Again as mentioned, we had a cracking couple of weeks in Spain last month, overlooking the Med from the seventh floor in a quite swanky apartment which cost next to nothing. The weather was mostly in the late teens but the place was deserted apart from a few folks walking dogs for Pooper to bark at. Unfortunately most of the bars and restaurants were shut too but we made our own entertainment, and dinner, as it happens. As promised to myself, I took the time to finish my latest novel which is now in the cupboard for a while until I revisit it with fresh eyes. Eventually I worked out whodunit!

Today I have sticky fingers. That is to say I have spent 20 minutes trying to glue a small plate around the stop-tap under the stairs to stop the draft blowing in. However, as with super-glue the world over, it refuses to stay put and the only bloody thing that has been stuck is my fingers, all of them, together. It is like having webbed feet, and getting them apart again has been a massive issue, involving the misuse of any number of solvents.  Hence this column is once again late to the editor as I originally reverted to typing with my elbows! On that front, the steroid injection into my shoulder joint last month seems to have worked its miracles. I even had intentions of playing golf this week although work-time has gotten in the way. A trip to the physio this morning was quite revealing and going well until the guy asked me if I have an aversion to latex! What sort of a question is that to ask your patient? ‘I’m not overly keen on cyclists,’ I replied, only to be handed a couple of bands of the stuff with which I now need to do daily stretches to rebuild my shoulder muscles. Methinks I will get enough exercise lambing a few sheep, to be honest, but I’ll humour him, for now anyway.

On the sheep front, we got to see Beatrice and Basinga last week, our two latest Ryelands who are destined for the Royal Highland and Welsh shows this summer. It’s been a long while since I was at the Welsh and I have my father’s rather large footsteps to follow in at that event, but we’ll do our best. Basinga’s mum (she came with that name) won the Highland show in 2019, so she has something to live up to as well. My good pal Robert has them in top form already but I’m not sure they were too keen being bare shorn in January, although they were considerably warmer in Scotland than they would have been in France where the weather has been absolutely baltic. Hopefully it will pick up by the time we get to lamb our few ewes at the end of the month, so Daisy Death-wish doesn’t keep battering her way out of the field in search of food! Now in her tenth year, the auld girl hasn’t done so bad, since I fished her out of a snowy ditch at 2 hours old, thinking she was a gonna. Poor Skippy is not doing quite so well though, having lost a few teeth recently. I think it may be a diet of fruit-gums for him from now on.

Our house-sitter has turned out to be something of a character. A United Nations lawyer, she has intelligent chat and enjoys a drink and the occasional argument. Hailing from Copenhagen in Denmark, she has a much better grasp of the French language than I do, and I think she is looking to call France her home from now on. Well that’s kinda handy, because we have a lot of miles to cover this year, and Hoggy needs someone he/she can control when it comes to feeding time.

Jabba Jabba

Hoorah, after over half a year I am at last back to reasonable health, albeit, about 8 stones heavier. While you were all getting you third jab, I got an extra one, with a 6-inch long needle, right into the ball joint of my shoulder and am I ever thankful for whatever was in it.  I was advised not to play sports for a few weeks, which was no big problem in this winter weather, and my rugby shirt may be a bit tight anyhow! However, I have this week, for the first time, been out cutting and collecting firewood, as we experience a deep freeze here in France. In fact, the weather has been so cold that tomorrow we are heading south to the Spanish coast for a few weeks of paella and sangria by the barrow-load. After that, assuming things have settled down, we will be in UK for a couple more weeks before coming back here again for lambing. That is, of course, if we remember to write on our immigration forms that we have just been to Spain, unlike poor old Novax, the silly sod!

Whilst in London, we are taking my son Sam to the opera, something I am pretty sure he hasn’t experienced before. I think I was his age when my father and mother dragged me to see La Boheme at the Birmingham Hippo in my rebellious Pink Floyd t-shirt! After which I was hooked on Puccini, and still am. I wonder if it will have the same effect on him? I am still not comfortable with being in an enclosed venue with hundreds of coughing people, a sad reflection on life, I suppose. Anyway, from there to collect some new wheels for the wife, a trip to Stirling Bull Sales to conduct a bit of business, then to Fife to sort out some furniture and our busy year has already sprung into life. We didn’t make it to UK for Hogmanay as planned and we were actually supposed to be in New York this weekend but everything got covid-cancelled last minute. I’m not too unhappy about the latter, not being a big fan of the US, apart from the fact that most Americans make me look thin!

On the work front, I have picked up where I left off two years ago, writing my first crime fiction novel. It makes such a refreshing change being able to make up baddies and places rather than having to stick to historical fact like I do in my day job. It sort of brings out the journalist in me! I plan on finishing it in Spain in the next fortnight, glass in hand. The plot is based around a distillery in West Scotland and uncovers a layer of corruption in the whisky industry, so if you don’t hear from me again, you will know that I stood on one too many toes and drowned in a vat of amber nectar. Damn, I have just given away the ending!  

On that point, Peter recently sent me a rant that I wrote for this magazine some years ago and, my, what an angry and controversial young man I was, bemoaning everything from the NHS to the M25. The editor even accused me of becoming mellow in my old age! So to that, I will have a mild bluster about a previous bug-bear of mine, Towny Blair: a man who has told more lies than Prince Andrew, OJ Simpson and Novak Djokovic put together. Having near bankrupted the country with his gross mis-handling of the Foot and Mouth crisis which left a staggering 6 billion pound invoice in its wake, he then took us to war, telling us he was searching for Saddam’s weapons when everyone and their dog knows it was really a testicle-holding alliance with George Bush to control the price of oil. It does make ‘forgetting you had a garden party’ sound fairly lame in comparison? Sir Tony, my arse! I wouldn’t trust that man to clean my f**kin windows!

 

A big wee storm

 Want to buy a Dalek? I do. But not for ten thousand quid, which is the guide price for a real one in auction this week. I wonder which spoilt child is getting that in their stocking? I have to admit it would be quite fun to be able to get inside it and drive around terrorising pensioners!

We have had a filled month, making our way to Scotland via the hell-hole that is Stanstead Airport. How can such a handy and central place deteriorate so fast into such chaos. We stayed overnight, as we often do, in the Radisson hotel which is pretty much attached at the hip to the terminal but, for reasons only known to politicians, no longer appears to employ any staff! Order your drink via an app that doesn’t work, and then watch one bewildered foreigner in an ill-fitting cheap waistcoat wander around an hour later, with no idea how to count, delivering the wrong thing. When it comes to food, a big sign says ‘we serve burgers.’ Great, I’ll get one of those then; except the burgers are only chicken or vegan! Since when did the word beef, let alone the product, become so offensive it can even be seen in public? Eventually I was press-ganged into an inedible pizza and went to bed hungry.

One of the reasons for going over was to visit the Scottish National Fatstock Show, except I am not sure we are allowed to call it that either? It’s now the ‘un-thin’ show, I guess?  With some top class animals on exhibition, it was great to watch on, as well as catch up with what appears to be a number of ‘fans’ of my podcast, many of whom had not met me in the flesh before, but knew my voice. It was a weird Bond-like feeling.  Unfortunately storm Arwen decided to rock-up that evening, which caused a few problems, not worst-of-all a lockdown in the Lanark Market Bar!

Sorrowfully, we got more news from back home, our dog wasn’t so good. Over the next day or so we got updates, but sadly, at nearly 15 years old, Louis the pointless pointer didn’t make the weekend. Losing a close pet is always a hard pill to swallow, but I am sure he wagged his tail till the end and, for those who take comfort in such things, may still be wagging it with his old pals in doggy heaven. He certainly left some indelible memories in his daftness, much of which has been documented in this column for over a decade. He won’t be forgotten.

I did get acquainted with another animal character though, one ‘Cellardyke Big Wee Eck’, to quote his Sunday name, the first Ryeland lamb we have bred, who is now 8 months old and some creature. What he lacks in size he sure makes up for in attitude and I truly believe we might to have bred a winner at our first attempt. Time will tell but, along with a few females from the new flock, he will hopefully get a walk out at some major shows next summer in his best haircut.

It was nice to get a week in our house in Fife, the first time we have been there long enough to unpack since we finished the extension. It was a bitter sweet time, taking in the above news, but we made the most of it, and enjoyed the uninterrupted view of the Forth with a few drams and some time off work. On that front, I am still up to my axles in research and writing contracts, to the point where I am turning stuff away, as my podcast is still gathering interest, both at home and overseas.

The festive season may be over once this gets published, as we career blindly into the next year and what it may bring.  If the status quo does return, we have another busy one planned, which includes two family weddings, two Atlantic trips, two national Ag shows, and at least four stag do’s.

We are now back home in France again today, this time choosing to travel through Dublin, where the covid rules are even more confused than ours. Thankfully we are still scoring negative tests, although I have a short stint in hospital next week, trying to diagnose my duff shoulder problems, which is often as good a place as any to catch a lurgy.  Christmas will be here in France this year, with just one dog and three cats, along with two vegetarians for lunch. I have no idea what they taste like!

A few days planned in Ludlow on our way back over, in the camper, and I’ll see you back in Scotland for hogmanay. Bring a piece of coal.

Rurally depraved

 December already, and the goose is getting fat. Well, for goose, read 'me', for I still cannot get out and do all that hard work that constitutes exercise. You may recall I was laid up last month with a poorly shoulder? Sadly is has made very little stride towards recovery as yet, despite scans, armrests and painkillers. Next stop may be the knife, although I am not sure whether the French, nor British, medical system has a theatre-window in their schedule this side of next Christmas, let alone this one. So I'm still off games, with Wendy doing the driving, gardening, cooking etc. 

Alas, through the shifting sand, our plans have been revised a few times but hopefully by the time this goes to print we will be in our house on Fife's east coast, gazing serenely out into the Forth with our woollies on. Of course, there will be domestic chores that go with that, such as redecoration and running repairs after a highly successful rental season, before a flurry of bookings already in the diary for next year drive us back south again in spring. Again, I may be excused of some of those duties due to the aforementioned affliction. At least now I can manage to write, something which is occupying much of my time just now.

This trip we will be without the animals for once. Can't say I will miss the wee terror that is Hoggie, or Hoggina as she is now called. I am not sure if I mentioned this but when we took him to be neutered it transpires that it is in fact female, quadrupling the cost of the job in the process. Well, I wasn’t to know how to check, was I? I did try to Google 'Sex Kitten' but got some rather disturbing results and a rush of blood! Anyway, the little rascal really has now got her feet firmly under our table or, more concerningly, on it, as she thieves like a Ali Baba - except I am probably not allowed to say that in this PC world anymore? Sadly, Louis the pointless pointer is slowly deteriorating into a world of confusion, as doggy dementia seems to be setting in. Despite him never being the sharpest knife in the drawer it is quite heartbreaking to see him wondering round in circles but I am sure he is as happy in his own little world as he ever was. So they are all staying home with house-sitters, for a wee while anyway.

Meanwhile, on the business front we are midst a small property deal in the Balkans which as always is besieged with trauma. One would have thought that, since these countries joined the EU, things might be a bit more straight forward, except that... Oh yes, we are no longer a member! What joy. Talk about one step forward, two steps back. This thing could win Strictly!

As a Midlander, I find the latest UK government stoochie quite amusing as it proclaims it is going to 'level up the North'! Now, this to me sounds about as achievable as lighting up the dark side of the moon, or moving the equator. How on earth does anyone in their right mind believe they can plug a century-old financial chasm with talk and a few hand-outs?  'Here, have a railway. In fact, no, you can't have that, it costs too much. Have some extra council houses instead!' And by the way, we will no longer mention the word 'depravity', which has been scrubbed from our dictionaries along with 'slavery, inferiority and Thatcherism', and since been replaced with words like 'rurality' which basically means a place where few people live.  If only the word 'honesty' could still be aligned with sincerity. Then, instead of all these hollow promises, someone in the mid-benches might stand up and say what they really think: 'If you don’t like living in the North, bloody well move south to civilisation!'  Or shut-up, head to Primark and buy some extra vests!

Happy Festivities, one and all, when it arrives.

Machine fun

 Nobody here is increased in a free-kick.

I beg your pardon! I have absolutely no idea what the above sentence is about, my speech recognition software just made it up.  Yes, we’re back here again, exactly 13 weeks since I broke my left shoulder, I have now broken my right one.  No I wasn’t drinking, yes I’ll take more water with it, yes I will give up the pole dancing and all the other hilarious messages that I have had from friends on social media.  Unlike the left shoulder however, the right one really does pose some serious problems along with the pain.  I am physically unable to write, physically unable to shave, shower, drive, in fact most things that you take for granted, I am unable to do.  After spending four hours in casualty the doctor tells me that I will be in this state for at least four weeks.  The only good news is that I get a supply of morphine and various other drugs which may or may not keep me happy during that period.  It will be at time of frustration particularly because of this software, which writes more lies than the Daily Mail. 

Considering that I run a weekly podcast listened to by thousands, I would like to think my diction is quite clear, but I might as well be dictating this in Russian for all the good that this Microsoft rubbish product can understand.  Only now it is getting upset because I’ve told it that it is rubbish and Microsoft do not like being told how crap they are!  Many times people have warned us to be careful what we say in our own homes when Alexa is listening, and she is listening because she has just asked me if I would like a cup of tea!  Apparently, if you say the word bomb in your own home the FBI will come knocking at your door.  However if you say ‘machine gun’ to this stupid speech software it interprets this as ‘marine fun’ and organises a boat party! 

We are having some lovely weather here at Chauffour, the sun shining most days, maybe to make up for that miserable spring that we had, or possibly just to p*ss me off because I can’t out into the garden to do any work!  This year we kept one of our ram lambs back to use on the flock and, as I speak, he is in the field with some of his aunties.  We have called him Unity.  We are still hoping to get to Scotland for the winter but that may depend somewhat on my health and whether I have at least one good arm to drive with.  I only hope we can make it to Twickenham in time to see England playing Australia in middle November, otherwise my sons will be getting an early Christmas present of two rather expensive tickets.

On the subject of my offspring, it looks like I have not one but two weddings in the family next year, both of which I am to provide wine for.  This may be a rather monumental task and I am considering buying a tanker to tow behind our camper, if only to save on recycling!  Couple these events with two trips to the USA, a stag do in Italy, another commentating job in Edinburgh, and The Golf Open in St Andrews, next year may be another busy one. Let’s hope we have put this dreadful Covid thing behind us by then as I couldn’t bear the thought, let alone that cost, of another hundred damn tests.

Meanwhile I have managed to shoehorn yet another new found profession into my life, this time narrating audio books.  This, I suppose, is quite timely considering the fact that I am completely unable to write at present.  I have started with a couple of my own novels but now have moved on to some professional stuff, reciting old books from the early 20^th century which are no longer in print.  Most of these will go out onto the Internet through a third-party company and be available free for everybody to enjoy.  Combine this with a very busy time with my podcast where we are looking at the history of many cattle breeds, and a couple of commissions for magazines and the short days seemed to be getting shorter.  I have to say it is a lot easier than trying to dictate through this godawful cloth-eared software! 

Anyway, at the marathon the bracket worst is good company for the Harrisons!  Ulrich one..

To be a pilgrim

 By calculated accident we appear to have stumbled on one of Europe’s hidden gems, in the form of Costa de Morte, in North West Spain. I’m sure we are not the first to discover it, judging by the wealth and size of posh holiday homes here, but it certainly is unpopulated by tourists and that suits me absolutely fine. Miles and miles of white sandy beaches and secluded wee coves, with virtually nobody on them. Admittedly this is September and towards the end of the season, and perhaps it usually rains around this time. In fact, judging by how green everything is, it must rain most of the time. But not this week, apart from the odd shower at night, as we sit on/or by the beach in pleasant sunshine. Don’t get me wrong, there are tourists here, thousands of them if you know where to look, being lugged around by coach to look at supposed hotspots and being ripped off by licensed bandits.

Many of you will have heard of the Comino, a walk made by pilgrims from Loudes in France, and other selected starting grids, all the way to Santiago de Compestella, at the north end of Galicia. We followed it for a few hundred miles, in the camper, each modern-day pilgrim identifying themselves in the bright dayglo habits and ski poles which they probably bought from a stall en route. I will admit, we steered clear of the city itself, just a bit too busy for our seven metre camper and my tastes. What a lot of people won’t know about the Comino is that it doesn’t end there at all. One guesses that someone in the system decided ‘hmm, when we get there and have said our prayers, what to do know?’  Or possibly, ‘how can we take more money from these blinkered souls?’ The answer is that the route extends 100kms past the city to a place called Finesterra, which loosely translates as ‘The End of the World!’ and for some foreboding reason, we decided to give it a look to see what such a macabre places would be like. Needless to say, as we grew nearer, so the roads were chocca with wannabe peasants from all lands, with only just enough money to buy bags full of religious tat and refill their bottles of holy water straight from the tap. More coaches brought in the infirm and lazy, all of which cluttered up the route up the hill to said lighthouse at the conclusion of the world. I had half expected to see them all throwing themselves in the Atlantic like Lemmings from the clifftops, and I am sure if one person did, the rest would have followed suit. Needless to say, we were there for less than five minutes, before we sidled around to the next bay and some more wine and solitude.

On the subject of wine, we have discovered yet another local gem in the form of Albarino white grown in the area of Baixas, a sheltered valley where the grapes hang from trellises and are still picked by hand. Although slightly expensive, it is absolutely glorious. Today we continue our journey south and will cross the Portuguese border by mid afternoon. Here we anticipate a few problems; not with the border itself but we have been advised that the country has imposed a recent ruling that there is to be no ‘wild camping’, the term used for parking where you like and cleaning up after yourself.  I believe this is due to the massive rise in popularity of the sport of surfing, something for which I am far too long in the girth for these days. Seemingly thousands of them descend on the coastline in their VW sheep wagons, a badge that, for some crazy reason, spells freedom and inhibition. To me it spells cramped, damp, and no toilet, that will likely breakdown by teatime. So for the last few days on this leg of the journey we will either try to outwit the local rossers by hiding our motorhome away in forests or back streets, or we may need to conform and haul up next to other people in campers, the very ones we go on holiday to avoid, who spend their every morning hoovering out said vehicle and the evenings moaning to each other about the lack of sun and everything under it.

BTW, I’m not sure if you noticed that Costa de Morte translates as Coast of Death! I am told this is to do with the amount of ships that have perished off that coast over the years, not the capsized surfers or pilgrim-lemmings diving form the cliffs.

 

 

 

Hoggy in the house

 Why do things only work when you don’t need them? At last the heat-wave has arrived here in South West France and so the fridge in our camper has packed up, once again, just as we are about to head off to Spain.  This is the second time this has happened but for a few weeks there it did right itself. Of course all the gas engineers are either busy, on holiday or on strike, so it's down to me to voodoo the thing back into working order again, or suffer with warm beer for 3 weeks. Shouting at it does not work. Talk about taking away the umbrella when it starts raining. 

Before we head off west I am back in Blighty for a couple of days, at a sheep sale, trying to buy some more of those teddy-bear things. I say trying, as a few years ago nobody really wanted Ryelands, but now they seem to be the hottest property around and prices are rocketing. I think that is called the law of sod! Once I have bred a few to sell, of course, the wheels (or legs) will have fallen off again, and we will have mutton back on the menu, but I live in hope. The trip won't be without its fraught problems, with tests and retests to organise and pay for as the government still tries to steal all our money through their medical entrepreneurialism but I guess this will be the di-rigour for international travel for a while to come yet.

Talking of overseas trips, my wife presented me with a present for my 60th birthday of two tickets to see Billy Joel, in none other than Madison Square Gardens, NYC, in January. I only hope we can travel a bit more freely by then, as old William can't have many more tours left in him and I have yet to see him live. She also bought me a new sheep crook, as my old one broke long ago, which I would quite like to take to said sheep sale next week. Basically it is just a walking-stick, only slightly longer but apparently you need to be infirm to carry a walking-stick or else I will be charged to put it in the hold? I cannot find the exact ruling on the internet as when I type in the word 'crook' and 'Ryanair' into Google it comes back with Michael O'Leary!

Back to the subject of sheep I have to report that Daisy Death-wish is still alive and well, as is her daughter, Dreda, but she won't be for much longer if she keeps escaping and eating my garden. Last night I physically chased her three times round the swimming pool as she ducked and dived - well not literally dived - to avoid capture. Then, when she gets bored with that she just hops over the electric fence like Mutaz Barshim on steroids. I was considering retiring her from breeding this year as she approaches her tenth birthday but not now, she's fitter than I am. So another year in the penance of motherhood for you, you auld goat!

Last month I introduced our new kitten, whose official name is now Hoggy, after the Scottish rugby player Stuart Hogg. However, he seems to have taken to the name in more ways than one, demanding meals every three hours and making gallant attempts to help himself wherever possible. You may recall we had two ginger cats, one as gentle and loving as a cat can be, the other a thieving wretch with the mind of a criminal genius. Well unfortunately the latter got into a fight and bit off more than he could chew, sadly coming home to die on the morning our big party.  At least he wasn’t around to steal the vol-au-vents. I only hope, in his final days, he didn't pass on some of his trade secrets on to this wee one, like opening a locked fridge for example. Time will tell.

Fridge? Don't mention bloody fridges to me.