Every evening this year at 6pm the BBC have forced the same small band of brothers to don swimming trunks and like a regiment of Reggie Perrins turn as one and march out into the freezing briny.
From a licence payer and one who wouldn't jump into water at this time of year clad in anything less than a minimum covering of 5mm of neoprene, Stop it BBC.
I know that waterboarding currently gets all the heat with regard to methods of aquatic torture, but this pushes it close. At the very least introduce a rotation policy so that the same bunch aren't subject this nightly barbarity which serves as an amuse bouche to the evening news. Yes a dancing bear and of course the bearded ladies and those swimming hippos were a lot of fun but this daily ritual of driving these same souls off the beach by way of a bit of a filler before the nightly news is at best medieval at worst downright cruel!
Anyway.
Chainsaw work continues, balsam poplar stumps have been burned, vistas have been created and my new saw continues to perform well. For five consecutive days night time temperatures dropped to between minus five and minus seven and a big fire on a clear frosty morning has been a welcome addition to the working environment. We are currently attending to the forces of crack willow that have taken up position on the top shallows, I last went at them about five years ago which is a little too long, three years is about the max as they can really impact on weed and marginal growth if allowed to run riot. It's the time of year for funny birds, and there is something up where we are working that I have yet to identify, it makes a funny noise that I'll not try to replicate vie the medium of the written word but as soon as I have identified it rest assured it will be writ large on here. There are many redwing and a flight of canaries that on closer inspection in good light proved to be yellowhammers. Child A also reported a bird making a funny call on her return late one night from work, too early for the Nightjar so with the amount of lurgy about the place at the moment my guess is an owl with a cold.
There now follows an appeal on behalf of the RSPDP (Royal Society for the Protection of Depleted Aquifers)
Crikes we need rain
I'll say that again for the sake of emphasis.
CRIKES WE NEED RAIN!
My new friend who is a big noise in the EA informs me that meetings are being held and there are concerns at a regional level on the amount of water currently held in the ground in this part of the world
Yet the media and public disconnect from what constitutes good meteorological conditions for a particular time of year increases daily: our local news programme has just declared the current week a wash out, with scattered showers forecast and spells of prolonged drizzle.
Vacancy
A position has arisen for a suitable candidate to fulfil the position of promoter for a wet week in winter in the South of England. The candidate shall possess excellent communication skills and be able to get a simple message across in words of no more than two syllables to a large audience with limited appreciation of the subject.
Last week, with a view to prolonging life, we walked six miles up and down the river Hamble. It is a place we have driven by countless times, watched cricket matches within a mile of its banks and yet it remained relatively unknown territory to us. Parking among the cravats and Breton sweaters much favoured by the Howard's Way set in Bursledon we headed north on the left bank, through a few marinas under the M27 then out into the marshes round a creek and into the Manor Farm Country Park where we encountered four hundred or so cross country runners charging at us down a narrow path. There were runners from across the county and while the leader was obvious it was difficult to determine when the last runner was due through in order for us to complete our trek.
We stood by the side of the path and noted the change in body shape and BMI as the field progressed until a chap on a bike sporting the requisite high viz whistling the theme tune from "Chariots of Fire" arrived chivvying along the endomorphic back marker.
It's a great place for a walk and surprisingly peaceful, placed as it is between Pompey and Southampton and its proximity to a very busy motorway, it just gets a bit crowded when Zatopek and Mary Peters et al turn up.
The chickens continue to present us with the gift of eggs with every other one a double yolker, production is increasing and I move their pen every other day as I have delayed their release into the paddock until the threat of flu has passed.
A friend enquired recently if I had caught the Andrew Marr show on Sunday, to which I replied I had cancelled my subscription to the show. After six days a week of despair at edicts being issued and rhetoric uttered in all corners of the globe, Sunday once again serves as a break from the outside world, so apologies to the Andrew sisters (Marr and Neil)
I really value a one day a week break from the grim madness that currently grips planet earth (and feel free to make a contribution here Tim Peake rather than putting all your efforts into blagging another free trip into space)and now a Sunday is spent immersed in the three W's.
Not Worrel, Weekes and Walcott
but walks, wine and Wodehouse,
A brief word from Wooster:
"... in the course of a beano of some description at the Sherry-Sutherland, I made the acquaintance of Pauline Stoker.
She got right in among me. her beauty maddened me like wine.
"Jeeves, " I recollect saying, on returning to the apartment "who was the fellow who on looking at something felt like somebody looking at something? I learned the passage at school, but it has escaped me."
"I fancy the individual you have in mind , sir, is the poet Keats, who compared his emotions on reading Chapman's Homer to those of stout Cortez when with eagle eyes he stared at the Pacific"
"The Pacific, eh?"
"Yes, sir. And all his men looked at each other with a wild surmise, silent upon a peak in Darien"
Thank you Jeeves.
Hey Donald, i know it would be another white male in later life appointment, but you could really use a Jeeves
In other news, I'm a few weeks away from the 25th anniversary of my current employment. Protocols dictate that carriage clocks are de rigueur at this juncture but the well preserved form of the lady who sleeps on my left and my own withered husk, each born three days apart confirms the thesis that time moves at differing paces for different people and all aspects of horology are hooey,
or was it Astrology?
No matter, if we can all agree that one of the "ologys" is hooey we'll move on
To mark the 25 year event "the firm" have stumped up for, not a clock, but a fantastic trip to Italy where Madam and myself will both break new ground and revisit a few old favourites - report to follow.
Very exciting and thank you very much, the last twenty five years on a special stretch of river have been a blast and a terrific place to raise a family, thank you for having us for the last twenty five years.
Just finished my midday repast of jacket potato cottage cheese and sauerkraut, (the sustained consumption of which along with red wine, dark chocolate and regular gentle walking guarantees I will be dancing the funky chicken at the next millennium), and it has started to rain.
A weather event heralded throughout the week by a media who now seem to be using comics as a source for meteorological metaphors.
At the time of writing we are promised Thunder Snow, Power Rain and Menacing Fog as KAPOW! Storm Steve arrives in the West to deliver his deadly cargo of precipitation that will fall with a SPLAT! and a BDOING!
Seems the Meteorologists have now too taken the stance of "If we're not scared they're not doing their job" (and I'm pointing the finger at you for starting this Jeremy Vine) It's the first real rain we've had in the region for weeks so in the spirit of counter culture I have rented a village hall where all like minded people can meet for the launch of a new weather cult.
Think "Pagan lite" with all action kept above the waist line
The arrival of rain will be met with rejoicing, panpipe music, no little mead with every wet day declared a bank holiday.
There are many rivers in the South that are desperate for rain, but that story doesn't meet the demands of today's hyperbolic media. Springwatch Disneyfied the countryside, it now appears the media are Disneyfying the weather
and for that I blame Idina Menzel and her theme from Frozen,
Yes it's clearly Idina's fault.
Chainsaw work continues and to date we have managed to burn four of the big balsam poplar stumps that fell over four winters back. It's a steady business with each stump requiring a substantial amount of other wood as fuel for a fire hot enough to make any impact.
With one left to burn, we have several substantial willows to attend to on the river bank that will be felled and dragged to the remaining recalcitrant stump by the tractor and the vista will be complete.
Many moles have massed on the river bank and more hills appear with each passing day but we remain mercifully rat free, which is unusual for this time of year.
It may be that I move with more stealth as the years progress as I seem to be able to get a lot closer to a Muntjac than I used to. We have one who watches me split logs from behind a stick fifteen yards away and we regularly get within twenty yards of others when walking the dog. They used to be incredibly windy but seem to have become increasingly bold.
I recently received an invitation from the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust to a workshop on watercress in the headwaters of the Test and Itchen, I declined the invitation but well done the H&IOWWT (did I really just say that)
For a few years now we have allowed the cress to grow in during the second half of the season when often there isn't enough water to run a full river channel. It can help to pinch little rivers and maintain a speed of flow that limits the sinister siltation. It must be managed as it can choke a river and also smother good weed such as ranunculus and in the unlikely event of high water it can be cut back or pulled out, but it can serve a purpose for a few months of the year, although the first few frosts soon see it off.
We have yet to have anyone fish for grayling in 2017. The last chap who had a go was a big noise in the Environment Agency who enjoyed a productive day but commented on how high the banks were to which I replied it's not the banks that are high it's the river that's low,
much too low.
I would like to have taken him over to the Itchen where the gravel bar that stands clear of the water grows bigger with each passing week, and ask him if he believed the figures he was shown regarding river levels and discharge, but I didn't because it was Christmas and he was quite a nice chap. But instead informed him that there was less water flowing down this river than when I first started work here nearly twenty five years ago. The book will show that then fish were caught from the Millstream which remained fishable for much of the season, this is no longer the case. The hatch on the house was opened wider during winters twenty odd years ago to let water go, this is no longer the case. There are jobs that I now have to do differently to compensate for lower flow, I could go on, (and often do, interminably) but will leave it there, but can we all agree that this river's flow is diminishing as the years progress.
With some trepidation Madam and myself have resumed contact with HMRC and submitted forms relevant. You may recall that we spent the first half of last year giving battle with the revenue collectors after they insisted Madam had not filed a return. She had, and we were forced to invoke ministers and parliamentarians in order for them to relent and accept that there had been a problem at their end regarding their clever website. The wounds are still quite raw and this year paper copies, screen shots and photographs have been taken at every turn should the unfortunate experience be repeated.
Earlier this week I was summoned to Madam's chambers (which also doubles as the living room when I am tied to the kitchen table chucking up guff) to take in Rick Stein's series at 7pm on BBC2. To use contemporary parlance, Rick's lucked out and got the gig of taking short breaks in most of the European cities that we have visited in recent times.
Bologna (still one of our favourites) first.
My employer and one fat lady frequented Rick's place in Padstow many times and can confirm (my employer, as all fat ladies have left the room) that fish is Rick's thing.
It's all about the pasta in Bologna and Rick's fish free programme (bar a can of tuna) had us reaching for the tablets as we will be in Italy later this year and wondered if we could tag on a couple of days in La Rossa before returning home. Flight checks were made and instead of the usual "there are twelve other people looking at this flight" it flashed up there are four thousand and three people currently looking at this flight" It may have been an error or Rick's programme has done more for the food capital of Italy than the town tourist board,
Bologna could be quite busy this year.
Rick was in Lisbon the next day and we were again reminded of a tremendous time in a top city albeit with fish very much to the fore, some top trams, a bonkers outdoor lift and some wine glasses from a department store called Pollux that we somehow managed to get back to blighty in one piece,
one of which I am about to drain of delicious Douro before signing off.
And finally, news just in from Chick 'O' Land,
We have received the gift of egg and on the morrow the full family shall gather at the table in the manner of Tom and Barbara to share in the harvest,
Well here we all are in another year, Christmas was fun and thank you to family and friends for making it so but with the business done I'll make the perennial appeal for rain. Currently the river is lower than the end of season level, over on the Itchen the large pool below the bridge has developed a new feature, a gravel bar standing proud of the centre of the river big enough for a garden table and chairs. There was a piece in the paper this week by a chap who decried Joe Public's failing appreciation of the seasons and its weather.
Hear hear to that Sir,
We have been banging on about the same subject in this parish for a few years, and can I now propose a period of mourning for each dry week experienced in the south from November to March and a bank holiday for every hundred millimetres of rain to fall in the same period.
It's just a thought, but we really need some rain to fall in this valley.
Chainsaw work continues and the vista is a few days away from being complete, the rides have also been attended to in the wood that still plays host to a good number of woodcock and high numbers of increasingly bold Muntjac.
With the river retaining the clarity of late summer grayling fishing continues and it is not easy. One chap turned up to chase roach and was taken aback at the size of the fish that he failed to catch but could clearly see as they patrolled beneath his feet. A barn owl is about most days and even flopped through our narrow garden one afternoon this week. Seven Cormorants flew over one day this week which is a lot for this valley although nothing to the groups of graculus that congregate on the main river.
We have a few geese on the meadow upstream along with half a dozen swans, which I'll take following a few of our rambles about the county in the name of lengthening life.
Two days after Christmas saw Madam and myself in Titchfield for a walk along the Titchfield canal that borders the Titchfield Haven, a tremendous place pitched between Pompey and Southampton that has echoes of Bransbury Common, so well done Hampshire County Council for that.
We picnicked on the beach looking across to Calshot and the Isle of Wight with Brent geese to the left of us, to the right of us, in front of us on the water behind us in the field and above us in the sky. There were hundreds of the things.
A few days later saw us rope together for a seven mile shuffle in the Upper Itchen valley, a SAC and one of the most protected pieces of chalk stream in the world. Some stretches are stunning examples of how a chalk stream should be, so I was dismayed to find hordes of swans stripping ranunculus from what was once one of the most pristine pieces of chalk stream known to man. There is an awful lot of good river restoration work going on in the chalk valleys that is being stymied by the arrival of large groups of Geilgud. There's a conversation needs to be had (the opening exchanges may already be underway if the jungle drums in the west are to be believed) as they are directly impacting on chalk stream habitat. The odd pair is ok but thirty or forty on a beat can render the place void of life bar the big white birds.
P
I think you know what's coming, but yes we're back off to Dublin, on a £65 return flight from the world's best airport - Southampton.
We will once again be ensconced in one of the excellent Elegance rooms at the Fleet St Hotel, Temple Bar,
That's the Fleet St Hotel, Temple Bar
We will be there to take in Jack Whitehall after spending the day perusing the excellent shops the city has to offer and dinner at San Lorenzo's
That's San Lorenzo's one of Dublin's finest Italian restaurants.
We anticipate enjoying the experience so much that we have booked to return later in the year to take in the Dara at Vicar St as he makes preparations for his 2018 tour.
Back in the room.
Looking up not down, as we don't do ground game, shooting in this environs returned after a five year sabbatical following half the wood falling over and petulance and pomposity from one who withdrew favours regarding shooting on his land.
It wasn't the biggest bag, although we saw a dozen woodcock and fifty odd duck, but it wasn't about the bag. A tremendous morning with good friends bashing sticks in the wood, my employer's children and grandchildren manning the guns and all coming together for a long lunch and discourse on links between Alison, Gilbert and Sullivan and Basingstoke. A great day, a terrific advert for the sport and, for those who were unable to attend, one that will definitely be repeated,
Yes, we're back in the shooting game, and it feels goooood.
I'm loathe to mention the thing, but herefollows a bit about Brexit (if you've had enough of Brexit, scroll down to the vitriol regarding the continuation of Richard Madeley's career in various forms of media)
Please can we all agree to pull together and make the best of the situation we find ourselves in and end the chronic sniping and division
Last summer I was sent a link to an article by a baby boomer (we'll call him Rod) that questioned the appeal of sport and weren't we all making a little too much of this Olympic business in Rio?
Rod didn't get sport.
I get sport,
Most U11s get sport,
Once the game is done, the result stands. Winners and losers, we are where we are, now on to the next game.
Arguments over the result of a match long gone achieves precisely five eighths of F*&% A88
We are where we are (that phrase again) and there is niw a requirement to pull together and make it work.
A win for one doesn't mean that the other must automatically fall into line with the other's way of thinking. After a General election, opposition isn't eliminated, it has a part to play in proceedings and in the case of leaving the EU will aid in quelling the voice of the jackboot and nasty nationalist brigade who seem to be under the illusion that they have required more relevance.
Putting my purple of hat of positivity on (currently in post so I'll don the green cap of fingerscrossedity) 2017 is a year to come together for the common cause in a patriotic (not nationalistic or far right) kind of way and make the best of where we are.
Continuing to pick over the bones of a referendum result and vilifying the forty odd percent who voted the other way (I'm looking at you Alison Pearson et al) achieves nothing.
Stop looking back, move on, make this thing work and trust in the next generation, because in my experience they're a pretty clued up bunch
Happy New Year and sorry for banging on, but Richard Madeley is currently on the television in the next room working his way through planet earth's resources of the word "I" and "me" so I had to find something to do as he always makes me cross.
With the season now upon us (take note shops and radio 2 breakfast show who herald the onset of festivities earlier with each passing year) I feel a carol coming on (not you Vorderman!)
But soft, an adjust of approach and apologies, but the long run is marked.
Recently I was made party to a series of emails regarding river business, a proposal had been made (an excellent and enlightened one ) and opinions were being sought from a range of interested parties. It was a "reply to all" fandango and a private one at that so I won't pick over the bones too much in this piece,
But twice during the ethereal exchange it was suggested that a particular generation of keepers had had a negative impact on the river and the sooner they shuffled off the better.
With the spectre of raising a bat to fifty fast approaching I declared an interest and opted out of further discussion regarding the matter, opting instead to sit seething, occasionally popping outside to furiously dig holes in the garden,
it's a practice I picked up from Alan Partridge and his Forward Solutions and it never fails to quell an ire.
Each generation considers itself more enlightened than the last, failing to consider that circumstances at the time were probably very different when compared to the present day.
It's a cheap shot, and the chap who made the assertion should know better.
When I bounced into this valley in the mid 80's priorities were different. Throughout my three years at Sparsholt studying fish farming and fishery management we were instructed that following some highly publicised famine in Africa we were going to feed the world via fish farming. I still have the T shirt from the fish feed company with the slogan " I can feed millions" across the chest. The fishery management tuition was also vastly different from what we undertake today.
I can only speak for myself but cast out onto the river bank alone with only my contemporaries and prospective bride for countenance I would seek succour from agencies and trusts who purported to have a handle on how things should roll along in a chalk valley.
We were advised to fence banks in one year and remove fencing a few years hence. A nearby estate won a senior conservation award for restoring hatches for flooding meadows, a few years later there was a push to remove all hatches from the river system. A six figure report by a company of international repute to formulate a plan for the implementation of habitat directive was cocked up and recommendations made for some beats (including one I am charged with looking after) were clearly nonsense, and derided by any as such.
Faced with such a chaotic lead, is it any wonder that a generation of keepers came to the conclusion that those in higher places clearly had no idea as to how to proceed and opted to trust in their own judgement.
Currently there are some good things being done on the chalk streams.
Today I manage the fishery in a very different way as to how I did thirty years ago,
You never stop learning,
But then it is a very different river from thirty years ago.
Biodiversity has undoubtedly increased, while flow, water quality and fly life has decreased. The river goes up and down a lot quicker than it used to and angler's expectations of a day on a chalk stream have changed. The number of oversize fish tipped in has reduced. Many keepers have bent with the wind and adapted to a changing chalk stream habitat. It's no a surprise that a supercilious tone emanates from some quarters, twas ever thus with a certain bunch of coves brimful of internet enlightenment who once filled my inbox with messages mentioning dinosaurs.
And hey,
I'll chuck it in again,
Following a visit from the senior fishery management strategy maker for the south east we received a glowing report for the way we went about our business.
Not bad for a bunch of small minded dinosaurs.
What will the current movers and shakers regarding chalk stream policy be remembered for ?
Well they've a fixation with genetic purity which is all a bit odd, and to my small mind, born out of some remarkably muddled thinking.
and they'd like to be regarded as the ones who gave woody debris to the world, they didn't, some keepers were using it before they could even raise wood
They have undoubtedly changed expectations as to what one can expect while fishing a chalk stream, so well done for that, but there is a complete failure to address over abstraction and water quality - the two principle threats to these rivers.
Come on all you trusts and agencies, to use contemporary parlance you're regularly" mugged off" on these issues. It all seems to get a bit cosy over the fine coffee and posh biscuits at some of these meetings with big business and corporations.
If the river dries up or becomes a fetid phosphate filled ditch, what will we have to fall out about.
With the current state of bate swiftly attaining the status of "fine" I shall now attend to the FA.
For several years I served on the committee of our local youth football league. The FA representatives who occasionally attended our meetings were everything I expected.
Ted Croker clones: blue blazer, gold buttons, grey staypress action slacks, side parting who enjoyed the status of sitting on committee
Following the revelations regarding the behaviour of some youth football coaches there has been a call to have a look at how the FA operates.
Hear hear to that!
At one meeting we spent more time sorting out who sat next to who at the end of season dinner than an issue I raised over the particularly poor quality of the pitches assigned for that years' junior cup finals; rock hard and elaborately bouncy they subsequently reduced each game to a lottery.
Fines from the adult Sunday leagues in the area have filled the county FA's coffers to the tune of six figures, and well done local town society for that, but there it sits. Grass roots facilities, addressing the issue of players dropping out of football between U16 and U18 (and yes, the way local town society conducts itself on a Sunday morning has much to do with that) training of officials, incentives for ex players to become officials.
During my time serving my local club we were required to fund raise and seek sponsorship for all kit and equipment. We paid to attend FA coaching courses but did receive a ffree poster to put up in dressing rooms championing the "Respect" campaign which was a joke because if the likes of Ferguson and Mourinho give it little credence it has little chance in the lower levels.
The FA has much to address and has been letting the "beautiful game" down for far too long.
The signs were there when your correspondent was declared Hants FA Groundsman of the year for 2011. A quick deco at google earth would have revealed the pitch was not quite the shape it should have been and the awarding of such a trophy to the incumbent of the groundsman's shoes was a farce.
Enough of the long run so we break for drinks and bring the spinners on.
What a shame about Adrian Gill.
Always entertaining, inevitably irascible it seems surreal that I won't be reading his reviews on the weekend. I never met him, although I know keepers who did, as he liked his fishing and all said what a top bloke on the bank he was. His final piece for the paper regarding the onset of his cancer was particularly poignant, made even more so with good friends going through a similar experience.
The coal face of the NHS is manned by some remarkable people from many nations who are perpetually frustrated by meddling bureaucracy.
Recently I had cause to accompany a neighbour to our local A&E.
It was Sunday night post Songs of Praise and a fall had occurred, it was nothing to do with Songs of Praise but a head was bumped and a large gash resulted.
Madam was magnificent and administered first aid (she's trained in the art) until the blue lights arrived. A blue light delivery of the patient and myself (with the opening salvo of the evening's wine already on board) to our local A&E and the patient joined a four hour queue of trolleys in a corridor before her head wound was attended to. Thirteen stitches later she returned home an hour before dawn.
Yesterday I paused for conversation with a newly retired local farmer. He'd recently had a stroke and ran me through the chain of events. Sunday evening (again!) he'd felt a little peculiar while watching the TV (again, nothing to do with Songs of Praise) he shrugged it off (he's a farmer) and braved it out through Countryfile (who doesn't) before confessing to his wife that he couldn't lift his left arm. Off to the same A&E where it was confirmed he had suffered a stroke. Apparently time is everything with a stroke, and if a particular drug can be administered within a certain time frame the patient will be up and about and dancing the funky chicken within a week.
He missed the cut off point for the administration of the drug while waiting in the corridor.
But thankfully made a complete recovery all the same(he's a farmer)
I've had great faith in the NHS up until now,
My own recent bumps bangs and hernias have always been well attended to by staff from many nations, some of whom didn't appear old enough to be let loose with the knives.
But crikes it all seems a little stretched at the moment.
Oh yes, it's Christmas, best lighten the mood.
The river remains close to its end of summer level and we need much rain,
No that's not lightening the mood.
Oh yes, Otis returned to the field of shooting last week picking up a dozen or more birds on a local shoot. A fun crowd, I learned of a game farmer who was charging £160 for a Turkey and had lengthy discourse with a pig farmer who sends his sows for slaughter in Germany bringing the carcasses back to a butchers block in the UK because it comes in twenty five percent cheaper than the slaughter house a few miles up the road.
This isn't lightening the mood either
Vista creation continues with Lord Lugg, which isn't exactly soothing and my back has been playing up, but the view from the loo in my employer's pile of bricks improves with each week.
Yes the mood's definitely turned a corner there.
A keeper from downstream whom I have known for thirty years dropped in this morning. After twenty five years employment the estate on which he works grants an employee six months leave. He'd just returned from two month antipodean odyssey and had popped in to drop off a Christmas card, completely forgetting that he'd sent an identical card two weeks ago in the post.
Mood on the rise, good old Neil.
Child A and Child B are both in residence and the flag on the roof flies at the appropriate height. We have a house full of people for seasonal festivities and both fridge and larder assume the status of "well stocked"
All will serve as balm to a year that has overflowed with poison and spite and seen too many good people exit stage left.
Live from the settee, I can report that sport has seen me pile on a few pounds these past few weeks. Successive Saturdays (think Frankie Bridge et al doing the conga) have begun with Test Cricket until late morning a brief pause to undertake tasks assigned or pop out for messages, a flying lunch before back to back rugby matches, an early evening of dancing and then off to the jungle. This kind of thing would never have happened in the day of the Test Card, It's the stuff of students and I'm on the cusp of signing up for a course......
Possibly of tablets, as it's been an emotional roller coaster.
Not the sport, I've a lifelong habit of that kind of thing and am relatively inured to all but the highest of highs and lowest of lows in the sporting arena. No, two glasses into the dancing and I'm unable to control my Tourettes and a succession of "F$£K you Ed Balls" comes flying out whether we are in company or alone.
Thankfully he has failed to make the final and will now return to politics where others can take up the cause of my heckling.
I am normally comfortable with The Jungle and we all delight in the tremendous talent that is the Ant and the Dec, but this year Prodnose has entered the fray and my nerves were in shreds with each passing episode. Since Old Tel shuffled off Prodnose is my favourite broadcaster (and is only on once a week, come on BBC) I'll own up to a dozen or more contributions to his show via the medium of email ( as I did to Tel in his final years) but have always declined the invitation to ring in and make a personal contribution as I'm afraid I'd be incoherent and lose the power of speech as its quite a skill taking your ease on the radio, which is partly what makes Prodnose such a genius of the airwaves.
I didn't go much on him on the TV and I'm not sure a life in the Jungle requires the same qualities as king of the airwaves and each evening I watched peeping through my fingers hoping that he didn't give off too many sparks, because when he goes he goes, albeit eloquently.
If the term "pin headed weasels" is uttered you can be sure that things have taken a turn for the worse.
To my relief, he's out now and set up on the beach. The sooner he's back on the radio on Saturday mornings the better.
While we're on the Jungle, Madam and myself would like to pitch an idea to Nick Park of Wallace and Gromit fame. I know he visits this parish from time to time and it occurred to us the other evening while in wine on the sofa that an animated "Creature Comforts" type of film centred around the animals in the bush tucker challenge could have legs. The toads and frogs would bemoan the star status of the spiders, the eels would be in the Hello/OK magazine demographic and would be star struck at every celebrity who entered their tank. There would be a lonely crocodile, a camp snake, rats with a fear of he who should not be named (Gino DeCampo who famously caught and cooked one on the show)
The story centres around a Witchetty Grub who lives in fear of the SS ( Stacey Solomon) who eventually catches up with Brer Witchetty during a bush tucker challenge, at which point I'll issue a spoiler alert.
It's just a thought, and remember you heard it here first.
Don't be a stranger Nick.
Back at work, it rained the wind blew, the river didn't flood and no trees fell over. Normal stuff for November along with the requisite media over reaction to a weather event that is not a hot day in summer. We continue to nurture a burgeoning urban based generation whose understanding of the seasons extends no further than the decision as to whether to sit on the pavement or in the shop to take Mocha Cocha Latte and pastry on board.
The river has risen an inch and there is now enough water on the spawning gravels to accommodate sexually mature brown trout. Although they are particularly thin on the ground . What hens we have are fattening up nicely and redds are beginning to be dug, but cock fish are few and far between. Ten years ago the weeks preceding spawning would see cock fish charging about in shallow water aggressively competing with fellow cocks over any fat hen who kicked up a redd.
Walks through the wood betray a number of Woodcock which suggests low temperatures in the east, I put three up this afternoon while bumbling about with a bucket full of corn.
I'm slowly putting the river to bed. Years ago this task would have begun as soon as the trout season ended with the fringe knocked off, edged in and weed cut in order to carry out and complete electro fishing before all present were summoned to the hatchery for egg picking duties. Today I still knock the fringe off and edge in, although not as hard as I once did. It helps maintain the maximum marginal growth and remains a viable habitat for beasts of the bank throughout the winter. I also engage the forces of Willow with my big orange store (If you want a mention on here Stihl you'll have to offer some incentives)
Doh!
It makes sense to prepare the river for winter only when there is sufficient flow. Leaving as much cover as possible to decrease the impact of avian predation on fish in shallow water until the river starts to rise. Once the river is on the rise and carrying a little colour then the fringe can be attended to. With spawning done and the trout off the shallows the willows can then be engaged. Sympathetic management with an eye to both habitat and flood defence by a full time keeper. Could a contractor or part timer be allowed such flexibility. The decline in the number of full time keepering jobs on the chalk streams is both a concern and short sighted,
fingers crossed it's a fad.
Chainsaw work has begun and the solemn procession of one (Still waist deep in Wodehouse and one of the trees we must address is a beech) that is the ermine clad Lord Ludgershall has presented for work in the wood via the medium of sedan chair. We are currently employed in the business of Vista creation. There's three months of chainsaw work and myself and all the woodland creatures are honoured by his presence. Poplars at the moment, young trees that didn't look very well. Dissection by chainsaw confirmed the diagnosis with rot set in at the base, which was a shame as we only planted them twelve years ago
Is it me or are the papers obsessed with the ageing process at the moment. My weekend papers that I perused on the sofa between cricket, rugby, dancing and jungle where full of "Life after fifty " features and with the event a mere sixteen months away for Madam and myself, we are told that we will embrace lycra, ride more bikes, discover yoga, go to University and achieve a level of life wisdom that Confucious would covet. There was no mention of more time on the sofa in front of sporting events, a bad back, creaky knees, embracing the postprandial ziz and completely forgetting why you have gone upstairs.
Cheltenham last week, the perennial trip on countryside Friday with fifteen to twenty thousand other souls to take in some tremendous racing at what is now a tremendous sporting venue. The new work is complete and my ire at being charged five pound for a pint and five pound for bacon roll was tempered a week later when on the 18th November we entered the legions of shiplap sheds that serve as the Winchester Christmas market where sausage from the Teutons and a thimble fill of Grimm gluhwein was on offer for a comparable price.
I bumped into Child B and one of his associates by the Cheltenham parade ring. Over the course of the following four races our fortunes took different paths. Child B picked three second place horses on each way bets and was 55p up when I left him, his mate backed one winner while I dipped out after two races to conserve funds as Madam had one of her card club days on the morrow and I had been made aware of the need for ready funds for the event.
River reports are written and dispatched (sent to the intended recipient as opposed to being put out of their misery, although....) and final deadlines for magazines before all involved down tools for the Christmas break are impending. I'm supposed to be chucking some other guff together but things don't seem to be progressing as intended.
Easily distracted?
Undoubtedly,
and the internet doesn't help here with minds that are prone to drift. But a bit of a break from deadlines and questions and the shame of failing to produce feature pieces promised may serve as tinder to chuck up further guff.
I had to pop up to the smokery this afternoon to pick up the final tranche of smoked fish for 2016. Unfortunately I had omitted to pay when dropping the fish off for smoking and my bag of smoked fish had been placed on the shelf of shame and their position in the walk in fridge displayed on the wipe board outside.
I received top billing with my name displayed in the largest lettering (Stephen Toast teaches us that this kind of thing matters) above a leviathan of UK comedy and someone of whom I have been a lifelong fan,
An honour to share the shelf of shame with you sir,
That's not him
nor that one, that's Dave Angel that is
That's him,
Brilliaaaant!
Made my day, and a lesson to all you prompt payers out there.
I'll begin this latest puff of guff with a little reminder as to the FA's response to an invitation to visit the Somme on the centenary of the battle during their preparations for the England football team's hapless campaign in the European championships.
No thanks, the forty minutes in a coach to visit Thiepval or the memorial at Deauville Wood to the many professional footballers who died on the Somme would disrupt our training programme
Only now, when it is convenient do they remember, and make great play of kicking up a fuss with FIFA over poppies on armbands.
Oh yes, how did that competition go after all that careful preparation?
Note to self, treat ninety nine point nine percent of supposed noble behaviour in top flight football, on and off the pitch with contempt. Morally it's rarely a beautiful game.
P: Remember this?
we'll be right back after a brief word from our sponsor.
The Fleet St Hotel in Dublin is the ideal location to visit all that the capital of the emerald isle has to offer. Situated in the lively Temple Bar district the Boutique hotel is an oasis of quiet calm. Trinity College and the Book of Kells are two minutes walk away and the shops of Grafton St and O'Connell St a mere five minutes, fall out of the door and you are in amongst the numerous bars and restaurants of Temple Bar.
That's the Fleet St Hotel Folks. www.fleethoteltemplebar.com
Anyway, spawning is a little slow to get going and our fears of fewer sexually mature brown trout in the river seem to be borne out. The river remains low and we have just received word that command centre central are worried about aquifer levels. You can take it as read that we need more rain.
A couple of sharp frosts have provided the requisite full stop for vegetative growth and leaves have been sent a tumblin, although somebody needs to tell the nettles in the wood as they retain some of their spite.
I've not picked many mushrooms this year, which is a shame. Not sure why but fungi in general seem a little thin on the ground. The first skein of geese have arrived to take up residence on the water meadow upstream, around thirty in number their arrival usually means that it is cold somewhere else.
Work for the winter is upon us and once the last of the topping is complete it 'll be into the wood with the chainsaw while what few fish remain go through the process of spawning. There are many willows to be attended to along with some malformed poplars and a cricket bat willow that mysteriously cashed in its chips in the middle of summer. I've a new chainsaw to take into the wood and I'll not raise the P at this point as Stihl declined my offer of a mention if they reduced the price a tad,
Doh!
By way of balance, the previous Husqvarna gave sterling service and has been retired to two stroke Valhalla where it sits to at the right hand of the two stroke Thor that was my Honda long handled hedge cutter.
Research shows that more purchases are made on ebay late in the evening when wine has been taken.
So why no bar/complimentary drinks during Flog It or Homes under the Hammer?
Assuming the guise of community champion ( I can't find my photo of Esther Rantzen so here's one of a chicken to which I have become attached) I'd like to issue an alert about the scam that is The Virgin Wines Club.
I received through the ether a voucher for a case of cut price wine delivered straight to my door. The Wine was reasonable and swiftly consumed and I thought no more of it. This week I received a paypal notification that Virgin Wines was taking a monthly payment of £25 for my membership of their wine club. A quick call to Mike Oldfield confirmed that Branson is notorious for this kind of thing so a call was put in and the accusation of "sharp practice" made. Yes the wine had been reasonable value and of reasonable quality but at no point was I made aware that I was joining a wine club and regular monthly payments would be taken via the medium of paypal.
With some relief I am now blackballed from the club but will not be welcome on the isle of Necker at any point.
We seem to be jumping around a little here, but goodness there are a lot of little egret about. It's common to see half a dozen in a day at the moment. The few grayling fishers who have been attendance have enjoyed reasonable sport. Two today caught twenty odd fish with the biggest an 18inch torpedo a smidge under a pound and three quarters. Roach are not quite as abundant as they were a few years ago, but their numbers seem to be on the up and the two grayling anglers today even had a go at bothering a few perch. Big Pike are conspicuously absent.
Oh yes Ed Balls, hopeless hubristic hoofer whose place in Strictly is being maintained by a left of centre campaign to produce a populist contender to challenge Jez. Expect a denunciation of anything to do with dancing by comrade Jez sometime soon.
Freedom for Tooting!/Islington.
P:
This last weekend we caught a plane to Dublin from what is widely acknowledged as the world's best airport,
Ladies and Gentleman I give you,
Southampton airport.
Our tickets with the world's leading budget airline that eschews all things green or orange cost the equivalent of a return train ticket from our local railway station to the capital of Britain and well done the trains of the south of England for that. Our bedside alarm sounded at home at 5.00am, at 8.50am I was plonking our case down on the bed at The Fleet St Hotel in the Temple bar district of Dublin.
Book of Kells first.
Fast track tickets had been purchased and we were first through the door and ran past the book and up to the library, which is stunning and within twenty minutes was rammed.
Back down to the book where I was admonished for preparing to take a photo, twenty years ago I'd have been stripped of my film, so the camera was put away and we spent an hour perusing the exhibits.
Out into town and the shops of Grafton St for an hour or so before seeking sustenance (beer) at The International bar also known as O'Donohue's. The bar features in the festival of bonkers that is James Joyce's Ulysses or possibly Dubliners. He frequented the establishment once upon a time, along with Michael Collins, Ronnie Drew and Dara O'Briain who had all popped in for pints at some point.
We shared the bar with a trio of locals and the current member of the O'Donohue clan to occupy the front of house shoes.
There were several posters on the wall commemorating the centenary of the 1916 Rising and as is always the case in a Dublin bar we were swiftly enrolled into general conversation which, despite our best efforts at "easy and light", rapidly turned to politics, both national and international.
I'd commented to madam earlier in the day that there is something lyrical about the Irish brogue, every letter is pronounced, no words are omitted I have come across few that you could accuse of lazy speech. Despite this we emptied our glasses and left, we have both had our fill of politics for this year, but thanks all the same for an entertaining half hour and a far richer experience than ice cream at the the deli across the road.
There were no rods packed for this flying visit and this stretch of the Liffy never looks that productive, but I may be wrong.
Back to the hotel and a bathroom big enough to park your car in (should you eschew the aforementioned cheap flight provider) before hitting the town for an excellent meal and a night at the premier comedy venue that is the Vicar St Theatre. We'd seen Dara o'Brien here two years ago and were drawn to another Irish comedian with the same initials.
David O'Doherty is his name, and you may have seen him on shows such as Would I Lie to You, and Eight of Ten Cats. He was accompanied by Aisling Bea who also appears on such shows. Both were on top form and it was another memorable night at this intimate venue.
A twenty minute walk back to the Fleet St Hotel and an undisturbed night in one of the best beds we have slept in.
Breakfast was a triumph and replete with sausage, bacon egg and a suitable volume of yoghurt we hopped on the airport bus outside the hotel and were back in Bransbury for Sunday lunch.
We're going back in February to take in Jack Whitehall. It's an effortless trip to a terrific city and if you do give it a go, stay at this hotel (but please mention this house/parish/my name) The "Elegance" rooms are particularly swish.
Back in Bransbury, having done the hedges I'm just finishing some topping. Alan Partridge's new audio book - Nomad has been my companion throughout my thrashing with the swipe,
It is a brilliant addition to the canon of the bard of Norwich.
Walking will never be the same again
Other reading has seen me retreat to Blandings, where Emsworth and Psmith et al provide sanctuary from a world that, as 2016 progresses, continues to lose some of its lustre,
Although well done David Attenborough for restoring some sheen to planet earth with his tales of baby lizards being chased down the beach by gangs of snakes.
