Ash Trees,Scams & Thieves

It's oft said, but

Here I come again, lookin' better than a body has a right to.


For which we give thanks to Dolly and her kind words.

I may have dreamt that last bit, but with grass on the rise I currently chuck out this guff with a severe affliction of "Strimmer's hip"

Your correspondent's hips and knees ain't what they once were and discussion at our weekly meeting of OFAL (Old Fellas - Ageing Ligaments, both Michael Flatley and James Brown former presidents) centres around whose knees can make the most noise.

Anyway, ailments aside, fishing has been fairly good.

The mayfly are late, but then the cuckoo was a tad tardy. Fish now know what mayfly are and for much of the week, any fish caught in the afternoon have fallen to a mayfly pattern. Monday 20th of May was the first day that the fish fed hard on a heavy hatch of mayfly.

There is a dance,

albeit a reticent hop, with only a handful set to partners as we took chota pegs in the garden last evening.

A heavy hatch of mayfly remains a tremendous sight with creatures of all persuasions taking advantage of an easy hit of calories. I've said it before but if the Seventh Day Adventists are to be believed and on departing this earth we return as another form,

Or was it the Buddha?

at which point I could go on about the uselessness of a secondary education experiment in which a hundred teenagers were lumped into an open plan area to learn English Language, English Literature, Religious Studies and History under the umbrella subject called Humanities in which we would never sit an O level.

One hundred teenagers of mixed ability and interest in an open plan teaching area, what could possibly go wrong?

But no matter, Adventists or Buddhists, I'd rather not come back as a Mayfly as danger lurks at every corner.

We are experiencing one of the heaviest falls of willow blossom that I can remember. It lies like snow through the wood and the surface of the water is carpeted with the stuff. I don't know what it looks like from a brown trout's perspective but they seem to pick out the flies from the fluff.

I've had two reports of pike spawning in the valley although they seem to have done the business in these parts and currently kick back in a post coital reverie waiting for the munchies to strike.

I'll break off there for some consumer information. For reasons beyond my understanding I was dispatched to mix with the cream of local town society in one of the out of town retail emporia.

Tesco, to be exact and a quest to source three toilet brushes.



With the spirit of Esther Rantzen upon me,

Yes, I know she is still with us, but for the sake of the piece.

Esther Rantzen by the way, a tremendous force for good and a gifted raconteur.

I once attended an award ceremony hosted by Esther.

I wasn't up for any gongs as I rarely win anything,


although there was that Hants FA groundsman of the year award runner up in 2011.

Anyway,

I attended in order to provide a photographic record of of worthy winners.

Throughout the evening Esther held us in her palm (big hands) and made each recipient of a worthy award feel like they'd made the New Years Honours list.

I seem to have become distracted , where was I?

Oh yes, three toilet brushes.

Regular readers will remember the thing about product placement so here's the big p

P
Tesco currently bang out a plastic toilet brush for 80p, yes that's 80p. You heard it here first folks.

A few aisles over, the lowest priced toothbrush is 99p

There isn't too much maths to be done here, but the quest for three toilet brushes was raised to five and with adequate labelling nothing too much should go wrong.


What times we live in.




Cyril.

Back on the river there have been concerns aired regarding weed growth in the upper Dever. Weed is very slow to grow in this stretch this year, although the ranunculus on the top shallows has come on quite a bit in the past week with the first few flowers now poking out of the water.

There won't be much weed cut in June here, but over on the Itchen the ribbon weed is demonstrating no little vigour.

It is now all too apparent that this summer I will be walking around the wood with my pot of paint putting ticks on ash trees that appear healthy rather than crosses on trees that appear doomed.

This is what ash dieback looks like and it seems that most of the ash trees about the place are infected. There is much work in the wood for the big orange saw come winter.











I don't know why my family currently draw the eye of humankind's low life, but to the names of Tamas Lukas, Sabrine Zvitch and a frenchie called David Brown (I know, I know) can we add the C£$%s in Camden who broke into William's car and took his cricket bag and bike the night before he was down to turn out for Longparish CC

The velocipede had a bit of a sharp saddle and they're welcome to it, but it was a quite a good cricket bat and made to measure at that.

I could be wrong, but I'm pointing the finger at you David Warner, to whom the bat may well be suited.

I may not have been in the wagon of a travellin' show, but come on everyone join in:

Ash trees, Scammers and Thieves (Cher circa 1971)

I find singing alone in a dimly lit room quite soothing, although the dogs don't approve.


F

Footnote: To all those freelancers out there who are required to repeatedly remind the accounts department of Big Business about stumping up coin for words provided many months prior,

I hear ya Sista/Bro/Genda neutral.

I believe this kinda coda is current.

I am required to hit deadlines for written guff, how about hitting some deadlines regarding payment for guff provided.