Room 101

No, really.

But it's got TV, a shower and no rats. It could be a lot worse.

The news-introspection-misery-bomb

My granny was old, and I mean old like Victorian-old. She remembered ‘the Old Queen’ dying. And in case you think I am talking of Quentin Crisp, I mean Queen Vic and if you think by Queen Vic I mean the pub in East Enders, I mean:

Her Majesty Victoria, by the Grace of God,
of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
Queen, Defender of the Faith, Empress of India.

Strange syntax, but Gawd bless ‘er nonetheless.

Anyway, the thing is, my granny lived through some of the Boer War, two World Wars, the Great Depression and a whole load of other difficulties, most of which were instigated by politicians, bankers and arms dealers who stood to make a lot of money. The end result for ordinary people being the usual: premature death for some and poverty for most of the rest.

Like most prudent Victorians, Granny was very wary of borrowing money. Had she not died in the 1970s she would have tut-tutted loudly about the ease with which people were getting credit in the 1990s – and she would not have been alone.

 

After the second world war, she also experienced the growth of American influence on the world stage including the Korea and Vietnam wars, most of the Cold War, the creation of Israel, and a whole array of US based events such as race riots, the shootings of Kennedy and Martin Luther King, the moon landings and much of Watergate. US cultural imperialism did not pass her by and she was as swamped as anyone by Hollywood films and  imported TV shows and the new language they brought with them, and more. And no doubt at some point she may well have thought ‘they are making trouble for themselves’.

What these things had in common was an element of predictability. Many of us thought ‘almost unlimited credit will end in tears’. Most of us probably thought that ‘someone’ was keeping an eye on the apparent folly of the finance industry. Few of us expected that it would involve the banks, financial institutions and regulatory bodies behaving quite as badly as they did, and (at the time of writing) the near collapse of the Euro.

And I think many of us have thought at some time or other ‘those American cousins are getting a little pushy, there’ll be tears before bedtime’. Though, having avoided nuclear war with the Russians, none of us expected it’s most brutal realisation (to date) to take the form of the spectacular destruction of the World Trade Centre and the emergence of suicide bombings as a regular feature of the news.

Which brings me to the point: The News. I find news coverage is making me more concerned about  financial and political issues I can do nothing about. The sheer number of hours of news devoted to pundits picking over 'events' is going to have unintended consequences. It must effect the thoughts of those with power and influence as well as those egregious tossers speculating on the financial markets with greed as their only motive.

And what effect will it have on rest of us who so often feel we can do nothing? In the short term people will just become more paranoid. The long term tangible result is likely to be that most people will become poorer and gap between those who have and those who have not will continue getting wider. This is seldom a good thing.

So what are we doing about reducing the amount of bad news? Sod all, that's what. In fact BBC Radio 4 has just announced that it is extending its lunchtime news programme, The World at One, by 15 mins. I listen to a lot of Radio 4 (you can tell by the very little information I have on a lot of topics) and the thought of yet another 15 mins of daily misery is little short of depressing.

Radio 4 already has three hours of Today, half an hour of lunchtime grimness,  60 minutess of the PM show, followed immediately by another 30 minutes of much the same at 6pm (but this time the presenter is wearing a suit), and the 3 minute news hits every hour. To those you can add the regular current affairs programmes including Question Time, Any Questions, Any Answers, Today in Parliament, The Westminster Hour, The Week in Westminster, What the Papers Say, and a load of one-off political and news based shows.

There is also the print press, other radio networks, innumerable bulletins and rolling news channels on TV, Internet news and campaigning sites at home and abroad - a veritible tsunami of (mostly) bad news. All these channels need to fill their schedules with something, but as there is not enought factual information, much of their content is 'speculation' or what most of us would understand as unfounded tosh.

We have all heard the fanatical probing of interviewers, fairy-footed evasions of politicians, denials of bankers, distortions of industrialists, speculation of pundits, arguments between experts and the plain bollocks contributed by anyone who just happened to be passing the broadcaster’s microphone. And most of us must have thought ‘just take a break, give us some breathing space’  or maybe ‘this is not helping’ or possibly ‘stop picking at it, it’ll never get better’ or even ‘this is going to end in tears’.

Our media cannot generate all this information (think of it as light) without producing a lot of nonsense (think of it as heat).  One day it will ignite. No one knows how or when the news-introspection-misery-bomb will go off or how the detonation will manifest itself, but it is likely to be in the political or financial sectors triggered by a significant number of people looking after number one... leading to a societal breakdown brought about by mass public discontent with the unfairness of it all resulting on some form of anarchy. And I don’t mean  the fun sort of anarchy with a nice logo...

which relies on a functioning brewing industry, dogs on string and the welfare state in order to exist, but a rather more unpleasant one where a big bloke takes all your stuff, kills your family and enslaves you to work in his salt mine.

Or it could be a very scared political class, led from behind by a wealthy elite closing ranks and instigating martial law. Or both.

But whatever and whenever, most of us will say ‘I knew that was going to happen.’

I know I will.

Stonewalling

We bought the barn at Poulet ten years ago. In some respects it was a barn.

In other respects it was a pile of stones...

..with a fabulous view.

An autumn evening

During the building process we generated two massive piles of stone from bits of the barn that had fallen down and were not going to be rebuilt, and from the 20 metre  manger which was just surplus to requirements what with not having any cows an' all...

20 metres of stone manger

The bits of barn pile

The manger pile

After five years these two piles had been moved a total of five times, twice by machine and three times by hand. The hand-balling confirmed that I did not want to move them again. So I started 'building' things so that at least they would look deliberate and I would not have to move them again.

I started with the manger pile and built very low wall which started out as a visual reinforcement of the path which divides the meadow - but also turned out to be quite useful as the start of more extensive terracing.

Not very elegant but it works

There was still a lot of stone left so I constructed a septic tank cosy, thus using more stone and hiding the cuvee de merde.

The septic tank cosy, under (mainly) geraniums

But there was still some left and I was not going to take it very far. Looking around I thought the adjacent telephone pole could do with some protection.

Telephone pole cum lighthouse foundation

The second pile was by the road and taking up the only shady place where we could keep the car out of the sun. Most of this pile was rearranged into half a gateway and later into a... what? I don't know, I don't want it to become a flower bed but Mrs. PJ may have different ideas. I prefer to think of it as a very regular pile of stone.

Half a gateway? Flower bed? Pile of stones? Who knows?

The last of the bits-of-barn pile is in the process of becoming another terrace wall.

Work in progress

When this wall is finished I will have just about run out of stone - which is a pity as I am beginning to like the stuff, especially now that I know how to move it without breaking my back and can put it up so that it stays up.

Of course the whole of Chicken Hill is made of stone, so I suppose all I have to do is dig up some more.

I'm not sure I am quite that enthusiastic...

Men and Motors

It is a generalisation, but men tend to like motors more than women.

Oh, the joys and ambiguities of the English language. I mean that women do not like motors on the whole and not that men prefer motors to women - though there are always the like of Fred Dibnah whe certainly exhibited a tendency in that direction... but I digress.

Few people really understand why it is that men feel this way about the intenal combustion engine, and, to a much lesser extent, the electric motor. But I think I have found the answer. It is because the motor reminds them of their beloved spouse. Why? Because the sound of a motor driven device is often mistaken for the voice of herself - and everyone knows that there is no sweeter sound than one's wife calling "Hey you! Stop that and have a beer." Though it is fair to say that these are seldom the words one thinks one hears from the ghost voice of the machine, we live in hope.

Fanciful? I think not. Ask any man if, while standing by his cement mixer, mowing the lawn, trimming the hedge, pressure washing the [insert whatever you think may need pressurewasing] or using almost any other type of motorised equpment if he has ever thought he heard his wife's voice, turned to look only to discover that she is not there. She may just not be there in an 'I don't know where she is' sort of way. Or she may be out shopping or on holiday with her sister in New York.

But he will swear that he heard her voice. Funnily enough, I don't think this works for any other female relative. I have a theory about this too, but that's for another day.

TractoRap

While geeking around Tractomania I found this guy who I thought may be on his way to a 1990's Rap Revival party.

He did not seem absorbed in things tractorial, and spent most of the time 'impressing' his girlfriend.

I suppose just having a girlfriend helped distinguish him from most of the other chaps there.

I was trying to get a photo of  him as I first saw him, full face and dripping with bling, but as I raised the camera he turned round, looked right at me, and zipped up his hoodie, concealing the VW pendant on a silver chain and God knows what else.

Nonetheless, I was determined to get a better picture and a little subterfuge was called for. I got in front of him and from the shelter of a stall took this picture:

The stall holder was giving me funny looks and I assume he was wondering what I found so fascinating about the product he was demonstrating. Focussing my attention on the foreground I saw that the product being sold was the improbably named 'Glanzol',  a proprietary bling polish - brilliant!

And then to add to the joy, the call of the bling proved too strong to be ignored for my subject. The rap chap headed toward the stall and stopped to watch the polishing demo:

I lost interest and wandered off. When I returned about five minutes later he was still there.

This was a true meeting of disciplines and I left them to it.

Tractor Rap, now there's a niche market...

Tractomania

A splendid festival, boot market, and celebration of all things agricultural, provided there is an engine attached...

As its name implies this is mainly about tractors, however the observant among you will have noticed that the event is called Tractomania (not TractoRmania) which is why I, who am obviously not that observant, could never find it on Google...

...but "Tell us more about the tractors" I hear you say. OK here are some used tractors:

And a rather nifty 5 seater coupé that looks as though it has never seen a muddy field.

There were big engines:

with  spark plugs to fit

Small engines:

And specialised engines for push bikes:

There were also bikes waiting for an engine transplant.  This one had been waiting for quite a while:

While this one had a certain elegance:

There were boxes of chainsaw parts:

Boxes of valve stems:

Boxes of  'miscellaneous' items

More boxes of 'miscellaneous' items

 

Piles of 'miscellaneous' items

A collection of claxons and headlights

Some pretty dreadful painted plates

Several steering wheels

 

And some rather handsome Meccano.

Having missed the Black Madonna in San Sebastian I was deighted to find her secular partner here in Caussade:

His Golden brother was not far away 

 

And their bagpipe playing cousin had dropped in:

In fact the little fat man was everywhere:

And the girls got a look in. Funnily enough some seemto have forgotten to dress properly and others appeared a little on the skinny side:

and there was a girlie oil drop...

There were also some idealised earth-mothers too, so all was well with the world.

 

Everyone had a wonderful day looking at rust in all its forms.

Speciality of the house: 'Saucison de Tractor'

In fact there was something for everyone (yes, Phil, I am talking about you and Mrs. P)

Roll on Tractomania 2012, it will be the exactly the same stuff, but a year older.