Sexing calves this afternoon.
Farmer: Is that one a boy or a girl?
Me: How the hell should I know?
Farmer: Lift its tail!
Me: [Lifting calf's tail.] I can’t see anything.
Farmer: Well, have a feel.
Me: I’m sorry, but you can fuck right off! This is where I draw the line. I am not about to start feeling up cattle!
(Not that I’d have been any the wiser if I had.)
Yesterday was the 90th anniversary of the 1918 Armistice. I spent the night at my parents’ house. We watched a documentary in which Rolf Harris visited the First World War battleground on which his father was injured and his uncle killed.
“They were very brave, weren’t they, the Aztecs,” observed mum.
She meant Anzacs.
Have you ever been to Sea World? It’s amazing. They have this killer whale named Shamu, and he does all these amazing tricks. He jumps out of the water, and he splashes everyone, and they’re all delighted because they’ve been drenched by Shamu. It’s fantastic!
I’ve seen whales in the Bay of Biscay too. They’re totally crap. They don’t do anything, they’re miles away, and you can’t see a bloody thing.
From a conversation between two Yorkshire farmers today:
“What were his name? Ralph or Matthew or summat like that.”
“Bernard.”
“That’s it!”
One of our friends has an adult son named George. George has a very broad Yorkshire accent and tends to talk quickly in a deep, mumbling voice, so it is sometimes difficult to understand what he is saying—even for his mum.
This week, George went to the supermarket to buy some beer. While he was standing in the queue, a bossy posh woman behind him asked him to pass her one of little signs they use to separate different people’s items on the conveyor-belt. George wasn’t at the front of the queue, so the signs were well out of his reach.
“I’m sorry, I can’t reach them,” said George.
“Honestly!” exclaimed the woman to the people behind her in the queue. “These foreigners are so rude!” Evidently, she had mistaken George’s accent for Polish.
Having paid for his beer, George made a point of thanking the girl on the till in the poshest voice he could muster.
“Hello, can I book a table for two for 7pm this evening please? Preferably over in the corner next to the loud-speakers.”
Jen and I spent the morning rounding up cows with our farmer friend.
At one point, I found myself walking along a track, talking with the farmer’s four-year-old grandson:
Farmer’s grandson: [Waving blue drain-rod around his head] I’ve got a walking-stick!
Me: That’s not really a walking-stick. Do you know what it’s really for?
Farmer’s grandson: Hitting cows with.
I must say, he’s a very observant young lad.
What Jen and I and most of Jen’s family misheard her (Irish) mum to say in the pub last night:
What’s the difference between a ship and a boat?
… Is it a yacht?
Me: Bloody hell! Do you know what that is?
Jen: What, the cow?
Me: It’s not a cow, it’s a bloody buffalo! You don’t see many of those in Yorkshire!
Jen: I don’t know… There’s another one over there.
A buffalo! Honest injun! No bull!
My mum on Tuesday night:
Oh! Van Johnson! I used to love him! He was only 4′ 6″, you know…
Oh no, I’m thinking of Alan Ladd.
From a late-night online chat with Carolyn during the transition between yesterday and today (slightly abridged for brevity):
Carolyn: We had [friend's name] to tea tonight and so we had to have sausages.
Me: So when are you inviting ME to tea? I’m not a fussy eater! But I do love sausages!
Carolyn: I do a good ham and treacle tart!
Me: Have you ever eaten muffs?
Carolyn: What are they?
Me: You come from Bromborough! You MUST have eaten muffs! They’re fantastic!
Carolyn: Oh yes, I thought it was a fancy pudding!
I tried to engage a couple of colleagues in a metaphysical discussion last week. Actually, it was more of a metabiological thought experiment:
“Stand still,” I said, “and imagine that you have suddenly sprouted a tail like a monkey’s.”
My colleagues looked at me sceptically.
“No, go on, I’m being serious. Imagine you’ve got a monkey’s tail. Now here’s my question: would you instinctively know how to move it about? Do you think your brain would be capable of sending a message via your nervous system to your new limb to tell it to move? Go on, try it now: try to move your imaginary tail. Can you do it?”
The sceptical looks turned to blank ones.
“Well I can!” I said. “I instinctively know how to move my imaginary tail around. In fact, I’m doing it right now!”
My colleagues told me I was weird.
I think about this sort of thing a lot.
My dad gave me a lift to the railway station the night I bought my defective railway ticket. As he was reversing out the drive in the dark, Dad made the following observation:
I remember when reversing lights were bright enough for you to actually see where you were going. You used to get two. Then some bright spark in London somewhere decided that two white lights on the back of a car looked like a car coming the other way…
Well they bloody well were a car coming the other way!
So now you know where I get it from.
“… They haven’t a clue what they’re talking about: one minute they’re saying meat is bad for you; the next, you should eat nothing but. Then they’re saying you shouldn’t eat carbohydrates; then they’re saying you should. As far as I’m concerned, provided it’s in moderation, you should eat whatever you damn well please.”
“It’s the in moderation bit that’s my big problem.”
“Oh, I know! I talk a great diet, but I can’t eat one!”
Conversation with Jen this morning:
R: I just saw a woman taking a ferret for a walk.
J: The whippet must be ill.
Jen: Do you want one of these satsumas?
Me: What? You’re eating satsumas in my car!
Jen: They’re really good.
Me: You’ll stink the car out. I’ve only just got rid of the fish & chips smell from two months back!
Jen: Don’t be such a kill-joy! Satsumas aren’t like fish & chips: they smell all Christmassy.
Me: So does reindeer shit, but I don’t want my car smelling of it!
During an instant messaging session with Carolyn last night, I drew her attention to a brilliant photograph I had spotted on the Flickr photosharing website, which I thought she would like. She did.
In return, Carolyn drew my attention to the following comment made about said photograph:
{wyethhouse} (pro) says:
it’s really great! full of life and expression
As Carolyn pointed out, the commenter’s own photograph is anything but!
Jen and I have been recording the new BBC2 series The Tudors so that we can watch it all in one go. Jen’s mum, on the other hand, has been watching each episode as it airs.
A devout Irish Catholic born and bred, Jen’s mum never did much Anglican history at school. Yesterday, she described the latest episode of The Tudors to Jen:
There’s this man who’s married, but he wants to get a divorce so that he can marry this other woman. So he’s going to set up a new church… Oh, but I shouldn’t be giving away the story!
Jen reassured her mum that she was pretty sure that the story was a matter of public record.
She then told her mum that I want to eat the pope.
Conversation over Jen‘s ever-excellent homemade chorizo and pepperoni pizza this evening (I made the dough):
J: Is this your favourite dinner?
R: It’s definitely up there.
J: What would you choose to eat for your last ever meal, if you were on Death Row?
R: The Pope.
J: The Pope?
R: Yeah. If I’m going to die, I’m taking that bastard with me.
J: This is my game: you’re not allowed to eat another human being.
R: Well he eats the body of Christ every Sunday!
Colleague: Is it just me, or is there a nasty niff in this kitchen?
Me: Oh, I’m pretty sure it isn’t you.