Ian Moore's Blog, page 6

On the Hoof

It’s my own fault of course. I rather smugly slip it into a blog a couple of weeks ago that I may, just may, be approaching a period of life contentment and since then things have, on an almost daily basis, risen up and taken a whacking great lump out of my backside. I know what it was and I can pinpoint the moment.
I had re-installed the well pump after its necessary winter hibernation and, for the first time ever, had managed it first time and with no recourse to visit, and re-visit, the quincailleriefor parts, bits, tools and non-shorn piping. This year it took twenty minutes.
It lasted two bloody days.
The well pump is vital. In the summer it feeds water all around the property from the stables to the allotment to the swimming pool; there is a vast, subterranean network of pipes and hoses so when the pump fails to retain its pressure the fear is always that somewhere underground there is a leak and we are buggered.
Getting the pump to work is a matter of re-wiring, re-plumbing, re-pressurising and hopefully rejoicing when the water eventually comes gushing out of the top of the pump like we’ve struck oil. I get drenched in the stuff, the kids laugh and winter is officially over. But after two days it broke down and though water was still reaching far-flung taps and irrigation systems the pump was straining to do its job and not holding the pressure. I set about the thing with sweary abandon, isolating this and tweaking that, so that every half an hour or so we had the gushing fountain, the soaking dad and the giggling kids which is all very well if it happens once or twice but after about eight times the humour leaves the situation entirely and the kids see their dad in a pitiful cycle of sodden pain, anger and misery that will stay with them always. Like You’ve Been Framed on repeat, it’s not funny anymore, it’s cruel.
On top of this the goats, en masse, had broken into the orchard again and I was ready to sell up and move into a bedsit somewhere that could at least promise running water and a livestock-free fruitbowl.  Natalie was equally too busy to deal with the goats as she was at that moment helping the vet file Junior’s teeth, and I don’t mean alphabetise them and store them away. There was an ominous silence coming from where I thought there should be lots of neighing and admonishing but when I rounded the corner I could see why. The vet, in truth larger than either of the horses, had attached Junior to what looked like an equine harmonica holder but which held his lips back and opened his mouth at the same time. It was a fearful contraption and while she set about Junior’s teeth with what looked like a pneumatic drill Natalie was trying her best to hold Junior back and his tongue to one side, even though the livid beast had been sedated. She was, in truth, struggling to do so and Junior, not used to such ignominy, was staring wild-eyed at the vet like the minute he was released he was going to tear her apart.
When I appeared, soaking wet and apparently covered in sopping rust, his demeanour changed and rather than the maniacal, swivel eyed look he was giving the vet he stared at me instead in a much calmer, much colder way. I’ve seen documentaries about how Mike Tyson used to beat opponents before a punch had been thrown just by the steely-eyed, murderous stare he gave them when they came into the ring; it was like that and I decided to back away and deal with the goats myself before I was roped in to separate Junior and the vet.
I wasn’t in the mood for goats. I’d arrived back home early that morning from one night in London and I hadn’t slept for nearly thirty hours and though I can normally manage this in some kind of good-ish humour, Poitiers airport had left its mark. The ticket machine for the car park was en panne again so I had to queue to pay at the electronic barrier where there isn’t an official car park attendant but an opportunistic tramp who will put the ticket in the machine for you while expecting some recompense. I don’t actually mind this, my car is right hand drive and the barrier designed for a left hand drive, so it helps smooth the process. The tramp though was in an even worse mood than me.
“Why have you got the ticket in your mouth you idiot? It’s a magnetic strip! You’ll break it!”
“What?!” I started, a bit taken aback to be honest.
“Take it out of your mouth! It won’t work!”
“Sod off!” I responded and proceeded to stretch myself across the passenger seat in order to cut him out of the entire process altogether.
“Well it won’t work!” He said again, “Idiot!” He was wrong, it did work but as I managed to try and sit back upright without pulling a hernia, stare him down triumphantly and give him the finger my foot slipped and the car went careering off onto a verge, narrowly missing a fence post as I grappled with the steering wheel and slamming the horn for some reason. I drove off with as much dignity as I could as the tramp, disappearing in my rear view mirror, shook his head like he’d known all along that that would happen.
I knew then it would be a long day and now with the pump playing up and the goats playing out it was getting longer. There have been only two responses to our adverts (pleas) regarding trying to re-home Chewbacca, the worst of the goats, both from people we suspect of being possible suppliers to the ‘value, frozen beefburger’ market. The goat vet was astonished we even asked if he knew anyone who needed a goat.
“Ha! You must be joking!” He laughed, “Goats are monumental pains in the arse – everyone knows that.”
It has reached the point where we cannot countenance spending any more money on goat security but that if we can just get rid of Chewbacca, the obvious ringleader, then the others will behave and can stay. As I approached the raided orchard, heavy of heart, Toby reappeared. He’d taken himself off when the vet arrived suspecting he was in for a good seeing to no doubt, but he’d returned with a prize.
On close inspection it turned out to be the lower leg of a deer but for one glorious moment I thought Toby, not hitherto known for his intelligence, had solved the escaping goat problem by simply disabling the creature in the same way that a cyclist might remove his front wheel.
“Good boy,” I said, “good boy. Well, it’s an idea old son...” Man I was tired.

 The book is out on now! Buy it here, make it a bestseller and the goat MAY get a reprieve...

The Ganglion Tamer

“Daddy, please, when can we go home?” Samuel pleaded, holding his hands across his stomach in time-honoured ‘starving-waif’ style, his grey hospital gown adding to the put-upon 19thCentury orphan look he was trying to cultivate.
“We’re seeing this thing through son.” I responded strongly, though wilting myself, “we’ve been here seven bloody hours; I’m not going until you get the all-clear.”
It’s not often I get a Saturday at home and aside from the ‘The Voice’/’Ze Voice’ horror of the evenings (see previous entries for that carnage), it is a wondrous thing. Time spent with Natalie and the boys and just having a ‘weekend’ at home makes you appreciate that weekend even more, I hadn’t banked on this though.
The previous week Samuel had been rushed to the hospital with acute stomach pains which turned out to be nothing more than severe constipation from a lack of fruit eating, something he gets from me, and a lack of fluid intake, which he certainly doesn’t get from me. A week later and the pains were back and it wasn’t a blockage, something else was happening and he was in agony.
Now, I say agony. At the moment Samuel has two main interests, his ‘theatre’ (acting lessons) and watching football on television, both of which mean he has a tendency to ‘exaggerate’ any physical complaint, but surely this was more than play acting.
“So, are you in much pain?” I asked redundantly as he flapped about on the lounge rug like a fish on dry land. His returning tears were enough confirmation. As our local GP was on holiday one of us had to take him to casualty in the nearest local ‘big’ town, about half an hour away, and as the other  option was lawn-mowing, horse and goat husbandry and moving the ironing from one room to another, it seemed like the easiest option.
I remember the casualty departments in the UK from my time as a footballer and these over-stretched, barely financed, rundown, half forgotten hospital appendages tended just to be full of ‘blokes’, either suffering from some cut or sprain from ill-planned Saturday sport or just sobering up from the night before realising they had a cut or sprain from an ill-planned Friday night. The common theme tended to be the discussion of car parking charges, which united the room and is a clever, modern NHS tactic for distracting the patient. It helps saves on anaesthetic.
There are no car parking charges at French hospitals, and nor were there any queues, so Samuel, still doing his ‘I’ve been shot in the stomach at close range’ thing was ushered straight through once I’d gone through the bureaucratic necessities.  “Are you his father?” “How old is he?” “Where was he born?” These questions, all of which were on the Carte Vitale that I’d handed over to begin with, except the parental one which had to be asked a few times as firstly I couldn’t hear the woman because Samuel was by now giving it the full Carmen death scene and secondly she mumbled.
Everybody in the hospital seemed to mumble. Everyone. My French has improved, I’ve worked hard on it, but some people seem determined not to be understood, the medical fraternity especially. Is this the result of a more litigious public? I don’t know. But it’s like there may be hidden cameras around and they  don’t want any legally qualified lip-readers literally putting words in their mouth.
Anyway, first the nurses mumbled, then the Doctor mumbled and I’ll be honest Samuel had to help me out at times not just because his French is parfait but his hearing is better. Poor Samuel. The ignominy of the arse-bearing hospital was bad enough, but he was prodded and poked and pulled about. Early on we went for a radiographie which revealed he had a lot of ‘gaz’. “On a scale of one to ten Samuel, how bad is the pain?”
“Nine and a half.” Croaked Samuel, gripping his deathbed.
“Really?!” Said the Doctor, for once not mumbling, “Then we need blood tests.” He added.
Samuel looked at me, his bottom lip wobbling, “he says we need blood tests Daddy! Please no!” I knew that’s what the doctor had ordered, secretly I was very happy with my ability to cope linguistically thus far, what I wasn’t prepared for was being told that we’d have to wait in the hospital for another three hours for the results to come back.
“Really?” I asked, “we wait here?”
“Of course, we don’t know what the problem is yet.” Said the nurse like I was an idiot for asking.
You hear horror stories of waiting in casualty, particularly from the British press, MADE TO WAIT ON A BED IN THE CORRIDOR! Is the most often stated hyperbole. At least you’re on a bed and in the right place! It’s not like you’ve been stuck in a skip outside the library for crying out loud, and as the urgences department began to fill up it was clear that more room was needed and for more urgent cases. This was lunchtime in France, one can only imagine the culinary accidents taking place up and down the country as people tried to live up to their heritage. 
“I’ve been here since 5am!” Shouted the woman in the corridor trolley next to Samuel’s.
“She says she’s been here since...” began Samuel
“I know,” I said, “5am.” I really was beginning to feel on top of the whole thing, but boredom was setting in for both of us.
Lunchtime passed and Samuel was refused food until they could determine his ailment and I was refused too out of some parental solidarity, something which I was perfectly willing to forego. But once it became clear that the old woman’s conversation was limited solely to the 5am diatribe, and probably had been since the mid-70’s, we were moved back into our room where the supposedly welcoming children’s cinema posters began to take on a sinister form. Seriously, look at the Lion King 3D poster for too long and it looks like a horror film; and who is Jordan Whatshisname? Has the Karate Kid really been remade? Why?
“Let’s play hangman!” I said, trying to change the mood.
It became clear after ten minutes of pretty much a one subject game; the answers were BLOOD/TESTS , BORING , STARVATION , SANDWICH and CUTE/NURSE , that this wasn’t the distraction I’d hoped it would be. Then, four hours after the blood tests the Doctor and a consultant came in. This looked serious.
“Yes, hello!” Thundered the consultant.
“Wrong room.” Said the Doctor and off they went.
“Daddy,” Said Samuel, “please go and find out what’s going on.” He was right, it was time to be proactive and by now confidence in my French was such that I felt able to do it. I found CUTE/NURSE and was told that the results had arrived and the Doctor would be with us shortly.
“Mmmm...” said the disappointed Doctor into his shirt collar, “these show nothing.”
“Great!” Said Samuel, hopping off his bed, “We’ll go then.” The Doctor, for all his mumbling and laid back attitude was having none of it. “Echographie!” He declared. It was now five o’clock and we’d been there since 10.30, we were both starving and had been there so long we’d seen numerous shift changes. “I’ll book you an appointment!” The Doctor announced triumphantly.
Another hour we waited before Samuel was finally wheeled in for his echographie, by now his stomach pain had changed he said, it was now acute starvation. The echographiste was an elegant lady from somewhere in Eastern Europe (seriously why people moan about an ‘influx’ of East European immigration is beyond me, they keep us soppy Westerners from completely falling apart). Her French was impeccable and, as a ‘foreigner’ she enunciated every word clearly and perfectly. I understood everything, she guided us through the whole of Samuel’s stomach and intestine area and it was a pleasure not just to listen to her but to understand her.  Initially I had felt like I was the wrong parent for this hospital vigil but I didn’t feel that anymore.
“And the problem,” she continued eloquently, “is these ganglions here. You see these ganglions. They’re ganglions.”
“Ganglions.” I said to Samuel knowingly, “You know what ganglions are?”
“No.” He said, mesmerised by the screen like an expectant mother.
And that’s the thing, neither did I. We’d been there nearly eight hours and the whole crux, the entire raison’d’etreof us being there boiled down to this one piece of vocabulary.
Ganglions.
“Ah,” said the Doctor, the length of his shift and certainty of diagnosis bringing him out of himself, “Ganglions.”
Armed with a prescription that was now useless until Monday morning Samuel and I made our way home via the boulangerie.
“Well...” Natalie said on our return, desperate for news as I’d accidently left my phone at home and Samuel’s had run out of battery. “Is it serious? How is he?”
“Ganglions.” We both said in unison.
“Ganglions? What’s that?” She asked, like we’d made it up.
I’m trying my best with French, I’m ‘making the effort’ as they say, but when an entire day is reduced to one bloody word that even someone fluent in the language hasn’t heard before, what sweet chance in the name of buggery do I have? I thought I had the situation licked, I thought I was in control, but in the end it was one missed word that has caused me so much stress that my own stomach/intestine area is playing up. I may even have Ganglions*
*Ganglions, it turns out are lymph glands and Samuel’s are infected and swollen in his stomach, like an internal glandular fever. He is on the full road to recovery. My language skills however have taken what may turn out to be a terminal blow.


 The book is released on May 6 and you can order it here. Or not. Think of the children.

Sliding Portes

The late evening sun bounced off the ancient ramparts of the old town of Antibes and once again I felt like I belonged. I’d first come to the Côte d’Azur when I was 11 and knew even then that this was where I wanted to be, my spiritual home.
That first holiday was memorable for so many things, the drive through France, my first trip ‘abroad’, the beaches, the clear blue water of the Mediterranean and the women. I had my first ‘sexual’ experience on that holiday so I was always likely to be marked by the place. I was snorkelling off the beach in Nice and dived down to the bottom to investigate some movement, though to be honest there wasn’t much movement as there is little to be seen that close to the beach in Nice. Feeling proud that I’d made it to the ‘depths’ I rested briefly and looked up at the sun filtering through the sea and that’s when it happened. A tanned, slender woman front crawled right above my head and it wasn’t just that she was topless – though she was, to my 11 year old eyes, magnificently topless – or that she wore skimpy, leopard print briefs; to be honest I don’t know what it was exactly, probably just ‘the moment’ but I suddenly became aware that I was running out of breath and so made a dart for the surface and got there coughing and spluttering like I had the bends. I felt fantastic.
I went back to the south of France when I was 21, an unhappier person, troubled and lacking confidence. I’d just graduated, and I mean just, the last six months of my degree course a blur as I failed to make any lectures that coincided with pub opening hours. I had no idea what to do with myself. I wanted to work in Film and Television starting off as a runner, but no-one would give me the chance because I didn’t have ‘experience’. “Really?” I asked, increasingly frustrated at what I saw as a closed world, “but I’ve made tea before?”
We were staying in La Turbie, which is in the hills just behind Monte Carlo and which I’ve been told is now Monaco’s premier dogging site, but we went to Antibes ostensibly so that my step mother, one of thousands ripped off by the late Robert Maxwell’s laissez-faire attitude to other people’s pensions, could abuse his huge yacht which was still moored there. I’ve said before that I love a port. The sense of possibility, of another world, anonymity, of even running away always gets me but on that holiday especially it seemed to offer a solution, a way out of my then depressing world and into a newer, more exciting one. I trawled the yachting job centres, answered adverts pinned on café walls, even walked gang planks brazenly asking for a job. Nothing. Again, I ‘didn’t have the experience.’
All of this came flooding back to me this week as I was gigging in Antibes. The audience was largely made up of exactly the young, yachting type that I’d so desperately wanted to be and whereas I think once I may have resented their bronzed, smiling faces, I didn’t have a sense of that at all. Maybe I’m mellowing, but I felt almost paternalistic towards them, envying them their lifestyle yes but genuinely hoping that they were enjoying it too and inevitably wondering what kind of life I’d be leading now if I had had that opportunity. Of course there’s always the possibility that I wouldn’t have lasted five minutes, that the first time someone had tried to insist on me wearing a ‘fleece’ I’d have been off, back to the world of sartorial enlightenment. I don’t know though.
As I sat at the bar and watched the boat people of Antibes I really tried to imagine what my life would have been like and I couldn’t. And the simple reason for that is that it always ended up the same way, my life now would be exactly like my life now. Surely that’s a sign of happiness, of contentment? I wouldn’t swap what I (we) have now for anything, I wish the ‘journey’ (sorry, horrible phrase) had been different at times, don’t we all (?) but I genuinely surprised myself that possibly for the first time in my life I wasn’t hankering for what’s just over the horizon.  I don’t want anything other than what we’ve got. Maybe I’ve stopped fighting? Maybe I’ve given up? Maybe I’ve grown up.
I never even envisaged having the life I have now and in a week like this one where I have to take time off work so that we can, as a family team, loosen the belt of winter and let spring spill forth around the place, it’s very full on. The well pump has to be re-attached; the stable had to be re-built again (thanks Junior); the dead wood literally chopped away to allow new growth. These are full-on, tiring days; physical and long. But as I enjoyed a well-earned Ricard on the terrace late one evening, I thought back to the night before and the entirely different life I’d watched, and tried to be part of, in Antibes. Not with envy, but with warmth.
I moan often about the life I have here – partly that’s my job – but I wouldn’t change a thing and I know that sounds horribly smug, but sometimes I just need to remind myself.
“Daddy! Daddy!” Maurice shouted, still up despite the late hour and looking even more feral than usual, “One of the goats has escaped again!”
Well, there are some things I’d change obviously.

If you want me to recapture that bloody goat, pre order the book here. No pressure.

Finding Your Voice

‘He needs to find his voice’ is one of those comedian sayings that old hands say in the dressing room when confronted by the threat of a talented open spot. In short it means you have to work out your ‘stage persona’ so that your performance is consistent. It sounds like utter nonsense but has a ring of truth to it even though it only really crops up when old hacks, like me, are asked for advice – which we hate.
“You’ve got some nice stuff,” we’ll say sagely, “but you need to find your voice.” It’s our way of saying ‘Please leave me alone.’
I always found that the best comedians were those who knew who they were offstage, they’d ‘found their voice’ in life and so the performance was just an extension of that and it showed in how natural their stand up was. Some people have a natural confidence, most comedians certainly do not.
Samuel is twelve now and seems to have pretty strong ideas already and he’s not afraid to express them. People who know me may be surprised to learn that actually I don’t like confrontation all that much unless it’s a battle I actually want to fight; most of the time I’m just nodding at what people say to me, not through tacit agreement but because I’m probably not actually listening. Maybe it’s an age thing, but I just don’t have the energy to jump all over every statement that I disagree with – and I disagree with a lot – but then, I’m not twelve.
Samuel's confidence is causing problems though, not at home where open discussion is actively encouraged, unless I’m tired, but at school where articulate and enthusiastic debate apparently needs to be quashed before it can turn into dangerous intellectualism. I know! In France!
Samuel had his 2nd term school reports this week and while the marks were very good, his ‘comportement’has been called into question. The teachers, and it seemed to be pretty much all of them, were full of praise for his willingness to help others but he also has, they chorused, a cocky streak, he doesn’t suffer fools gladly, he has a sharp tongue and can be quite moody. Natalie read all of this out and peered at me over the damning document.
“I wonder where he gets thatfrom?!” She snorted.
The teachers’ main gripe though wasn’t this side to his behaviour at all but his enthusiasm! Which he certainly didn’t get from me. He’s always putting his hand up, one said. He’s always got the answer, said another. The maths teacher is apparently so exasperated that he’s threatened to ban Samuel from his class unless he stops calling out the answers. Yeah, it must be really hard having pupils take an interest in class, what you really want as a teacher is a bunch of violent plasticine eaters at the back who’ll just let you get on with your job and not worry too much about being educated. What an absurd complaint! What am I supposed to do, tell him off?
“What’s all this, Samuel? Good marks, intelligence and taking an active interest in the learning process – I’m really disappointed in you, son.”
He has opinions and he’s not afraid to share them, but by far his biggest bugbear is languages and he’s something of a purist. Saturday evenings at home follow a pattern; firstly watch ‘The Voice’ (UK Version) and then switch over and watch ‘The Voice’, pronounced ‘Ze Voice’ (French Version). Thankfully I’m not at home much on a Saturday as I just can’t contain my own comportementwhile this dross is on but basically the differences in the two versions are these. ‘The Voice’ is certainly of a higher singing standard than ‘Ze Voice’ and has an interplay between the judges which is playful and tongue in cheek. ‘Ze Voice’ is utterly po-faced and takes itself oh-so seriously. That is essentially the difference between the French and the English though, why is there no culture of stand up in France? Because they don’t know how to laugh at themselves.
What has Samuel jumping up and down at ‘Ze Voice’ though is the use of English by the judges. It’s constant and it winds him up magnificently. At the sing-off stage of the show the contestants go into battle with each other singing the same song so you would expect to hear expressions like 'se battre' and 'la bataille'.  Last week one of the judges (Florent Pagny) told one of his duelling pairs that he felt they were ready to 'bien vous fighter pendant la battle '.The presenter of the show introduces each sing-off with the same expression: 'Que la battle commence!'
And this has Samuel screaming at the television, “Why can’t they get their own bloody language?”
It doesn’t annoy me quite so much obviously, I like to think the French are trying to be so accommodating with me and my own struggle to speak their language that they are, as a nation, all learning English to make it easier for me. In England if you drop French into a sentence, for example, “Do what you want, I give you carte-blanche.” You are deemed pretentious. In France, if you drop English into your sentence, simple words like 'yes' and 'news' are becoming commonplace, you are either cool or guilty of dumbing the nation down, depending on which generation you are.
We were watching the lunchtime news and in a report on something or other, I can’t remember what exactly, it’s French lunchtime news though so it would have been food related, the correspondent used terms like ‘le packaging’ and ‘le marketing’. Samuel went apoplectic, a full-on meltdown railing against laziness and stupidity. It was magnificent stuff and I felt quite proud of him actually, passion for language in one so young is a good thing in my opinion, a full-on hissy fit is even better but as the tantrum went on Natalie just peered at me again with her ‘he’s taking after you again’ look on her face.
Maurice is different. He has a sensitive side that needs protecting and sometimes it takes a physical toll on him. He’d been having stomach aches all week and in order to rule out appendicitis we’d taken him to see the doctor.
“It’s nothing serious,” the doctor said, “but he obviously has very fragile intestines, prone to acid build up...exactly like you Monsieur.” He said to me over his glasses. I had my first stomach ulcer at the age of fifteen. I looked at Natalie who againhad her ‘he’s taking after you’ look on her face.
There’s an inquest going on at home now and has been for the last week. Firstly we are trying to determine exactly what my good points are and see if any of those, should they exist, have been passed onto any of my offspring. The early signs aren’t good. Thérence over-indulged in his favourite tipple one afternoon this week and belligerently urinated on the hall floor. I got thatlook again.
The book is out soon, and you can pre-order HERE

No Pain, No Gain

There are many good reasons to my mind why the French word for bread is ‘pain’. There’s the serious chance of gum damage from some of the more fashionable and rustic ‘newer’ breads like the croquise; you could easily batter someone to death with a three day old baguette and, because the stuff is so bloody tasty, the resulting weight issues from three times a day consumption cause genuine discomfort.


Okay, fair enough, it’s not just the bread. There’s wine and cheese too, lots of the stuff. Everyday. And now, even when I’m away from home working, I’ve started hunting out French restaurants and patisseries to fill the temporary gap. It used to be that when I was away I’d deliberately eat the kind of things I couldn’t get in France like Fish and Chips, sausages, carverys and the like. Now I’m poncily wandering around Waitrose looking for decent goat’s cheese and choosing my wine not by price and ease of opening, but by grape, region and year. I don’t mind turning French, far from it, and in a week where, once again in the UK, knowing what class you are is an issue, I’m not actually becoming more middle class through seemingly pretentious food choices. No, I’m French now and good food is classless.


The result though, and something that occurs about this time every year when the winter jumpers come off and the extra ‘bulk’ is more visible, is that I need to exercise. It does seem to be the only option now. The other option of course is to cut down on my bread/cheese/wine axis of evil consumption, but firstly what would be the point in living in one of the richest gastronimical areas of the world if I did that and secondly, I like them too much. Exercise really is the only way forward. Two years ago I was a 30 inch waist, I’m now a 34 which is just about the mod-1960’s-Italian-cut-suit limit. Something has to be done.


I gave up football 21 years ago and that was the last exercise I did with any regularity at all, and I gave that up because my body, made more for the arts I feel, couldn’t take the strain of 90 minutes of running around once a week. I like cycling around here but since the mad neighbouring farmer threatened to shoot any member of my family who trespassed on his land, and his land surrounds us, the enjoyment has somewhat gone out of the thing. I bought one of those elastic exercise rope things, which came with a huge set of instructions, and set off one weekend optimistically thinking that I would spend my downtime not in a pub for once, but in various positions and stretching various muscles and ‘feel good about myself’, which seems to be the exerciser’s cliché of choice. I didn’t. Even though I was on my own in my hotel room doing all these stretches, pulls, jumps etc. I got so embarrassed that I couldn’t carry on. The whole thing just seemed so absurd and although no one could see me, I dropped the ‘equipment’ and sidled away from it, pretending it wasn’t mine.


My embarrassment may have had something to do with the fact that I didn’t own any gym wear. I had a T-shirt on but I don’t own sports shorts, tracksuit bottoms or anything like that; clothing shouldn’t have an elasticated waist, so I was in my pants and in the mirror I just looked like a mental case trying to beat himself up.


I bought some running shoes last September and for the life of me I don’t know why. I have a rowing machine, but it has an irritating squeak and Thérence ate all the foam off the handlebars.

So what I’m looking for is an exercise regime that doesn’t threaten either my dignity or my wardrobe and I finally think I’ve found it. Natalie suggested that I go out and dig the allotment but things haven’t got that bad yet, no this is all indoors and it’s fun. I play the wii. The tennis game on the wii, according to my brief internet research is a decent calorie burner as is the boxing and so I’ve taken to spending an hour a day getting all sweaty playing both. To be honest, I do more tennis than boxing. The boxing game, while clearly more beneficial to me, keeps pitting me against women characters and it just feels wrong to be trying to knock them out. The tennis on the other hand I seem to be really good at (I won Wimbledon last week), so it ticks all the right boxes.


Natalie watched me for a while, “Your opponents don’t seem to be very good.” She said.


“Yeah, or...” I hesitated while theatrically gathering my breath, “maybe I’m great.”


She wasn’t falling for that. When we first met I had told Natalie that I’d actually won Junior Wimbledon and she’d believed me. For about five years she’d believed me. She’s believed nothing I’ve said ever since.


Samuel was doing his homework on the kitchen table and, without saying anything, wandered over, took the wii remote from my hands and pressed a few buttons. I started my next match and didn’t win a point.


“What have you done?” I whined.


“You were on the easiest setting, it was too easy for you.” He replied.


“It’s no fun anymore.” I stropped and turned the thing off.


I determined not to play the thing while anyone was watching in future but to carry on anyway. Then I found an option in ‘Wii Fitness’ where you could determine your ‘Fitness Age’, you would do a few exercises and the machine would test your stamina, reaction speed, energy levels and so on. Perfect, I thought, find your level and then you have something to aim for as well.


Seventy-Three.


Seventy-Three! How can a wii determine that I have the physical capabilities of a 73 year old?! And why just say the numbers so coldly? Why not just put a message up saying ‘All this used to be fields y’know’ or ‘In my day...’ Seventy-Three! I haven’t touched the wii for a fortnight now, for all I know I may now be, in wii terms a medical phenomenon, a 120 year old who still picks up his, probably wooden racket occasionally and is helped on to the court by nurses.


And now this, Easter, and the annual boulangerie delicacy of Paté de Pacques. The Paté de Pacques is a cross between a scotch egg and a sausage roll and it’s absolutely gorgeous; high quality meat topped with hard-boiled egg and wrapped in deliciously light pastry and about a metre long sitting on top of the counter asking you, almost coquettishly, how many slices you want. It’s around for about a month and I can’t resist the stuff.


I may as well hand in my mod cards now, but you know what? I’m Seventy-Three, I’m allowed to treat myself.

The book, A la Mod, is out shortly. You can pre-order it here. Go on, please, be your best friend...

Another Manic Monday

There are two things that last week’s blog should have made quite clear, firstly goats are now up there with horses in the ‘animals that are ruining my life’ top ten and secondly, Mondays – and in particular Monday mornings – are sacrosanct. I need my Monday mornings. Once again I hadn’t slept on the Saturday night last week because of travelling and so to lie in on the Monday morning knowing that everyone else was going to be at a school somewhere...
“Come on! Get up! You’re going to be late!” At first as Natalie sadistically opened the shutters I thought it was a dream. Get up? Monday morning? Ha, nice one! “Come on!” She repeated urgently. Far from being allowed to gently recover from yet more sleep deprivation I had, it turned out, been ‘volunteered’. I was due at Thérence’s school for 8.30 to ‘help out’.
“Help out with what?” I asked still half asleep, “Surely they can eat their own plasticine? What do they need me for?” Apparently it was the annual defilé, a procession around town by the youngest in the Primary School, all in various fancy dress costumes and Natalie had, in a fit of guilt that she couldn’t actually be there herself, volunteered my services as a general fancy dress dresser and walker, holder of hands and traffic cop; forgetting of course that I have almost as much patience with four and five year old children as I do with escaping goats.
It looked like a riot in the wardrobe department of ‘Time Bandits.’ Of about 100 children there were probably 30 Spidermen, including a couple of girls which is either progressive or the direct result of lazy parenting and an older brother. There were also about 50 Princesses, some who’d been dolled up like one of those sinister Beauty Pageants for little girls and some who clearly had the grace and etiquette of a Fergie-type Princess. Either way tears were permanently being shed and at an alarming pitch too. Thérence, I noticed, was keeping his own counsel in the corner, his ‘Yoda’ costume lending him a gravitas that the proceedings didn’t deserve.
I entered the room nervously and stood out like a... well like a Yoda in a Spiderman/Princess mash up to be honest. In a sop to what I hoped was finally spring, I had on a light, ‘Ipcress File’ mac’, grey dog-tooth trousers and a pair of Loake’s Chelsea boots. “Glad you’ve made the effort.” Said Thérence’s teacher looking me up and down, bloody cheek, “Now, put this on.” It was a bright yellow ‘Hi-Vis’ jacket making me look like I was off to fight the Cold War but only within the parameters of Health and Safety. It all added to the ignominy as I was not only separated from Thérence but had a Spiderman on one side and a Princess with a serious mucus problem on the other.
The first stop in the procession was the next school up, Maurice’s school. Unfortunately he wasn’t there as he’s away on a school trip, his footballing friends were though.
“Look at Maurice’s dad!” They said pointing; clearly my costume was getting more attention than any of the kids’, “What is he supposed to be?”
The next school on the route was a good five minute walk away and as we wound our way around the streets we were accompanied by the only other male who’d ‘volunteered’ and he got to carry the music. Once of course someone would have played an instrument on one of these jaunts but this was an enormous, 80’s style ‘ghetto-blaster’ and was being used to pollute the quiet morning with some appallingly inappropriate classical music, ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ to start us off and, at one point, ‘The Stripper.’ The bigger school was waiting for us and the children were already lined up in the playground opposite us as we entered. It looked like the start of a battle, a raggedy-rawny army of 9 year olds about to unleash hell on the Midget Spider-Princess People from the other valley; Thérence, ever sensitive to these things, stepped forward from our group and administered some pretty aggressive light-saber manoeuvres in their direction which seemed to break the ice a little.
It was getting colder and the children were feeling it. Fortunately Natalie had insisted that Thérence wear his coat under his Jedi Master garb but some of the Princesses in particular were suffering and as Princesses do, weren’t keeping it to themselves. Even the Spidermen were feeling the chill too. One, and he was even smaller than Thérence and incongruously was wearing a cast and arm sling, ran into the boulangerie and refused to come out.
On we went, a bizarre sight, wending our way through the town stopping startled passersby and getting them to dance. This wasn’t my job I hasten to add, this was the role of people who’d helpfully brought along a large dollop of enthusiasm and had seemingly left their dignity in a jar by the door, Eleanor Rigby style. My job was to stand at the back, frown a bit and give the whole thing a bit of a moody presence which otherwise it would have lacked. I watched the teachers and some of the mums frolicking about to the music, obviously enjoying it far more than the freezing kids, and wondered what on earth this whole thing was in aid of. Is it a charity thing? I had no idea. I had been roped into something, surrounded by whooping, swirling apparently drug-free adults all dressed as tits frankly and nobody seemed to be collecting any money at all. Utter madness.
Then we stopped at the Mairieso that the ‘press’ could take pictures and just as I was about to sneak off to a camera-shy corner Thérence’s teacher once again collared me and gave me a huge bag of confetti! For the last twenty minutes the kids had been docile, rendered inactive by plummeting temperatures and skimpy costumes but blimey, you show a bag of confetti to a French kid and all hell breaks loose. I stood there for a second with the bag and there was a brief pause and then all of a sudden it was like holding a bag of chips on Brighton beach and they swooped. I got covered in the stuff which of course only added to my overall merriment but which only fuelled their spirit as what seemed like a Lilliputian Mardi Gras just kicked off.
Finally, warmed up and spent, we moved off to our final stop, la maison de retraite. The old folk, and I mean old, had been wheeled out in their beds and wheelchairs to view this vivid, bizarre procession as it wound it’s way around their TV room. Some of the people were barely conscious, some clearly resentful of any whiff of youth and all as befuddled by the exercise as I was. The children recognised the change in mood, for some it must have been utterly terrifying, as they would suddenly be grabbed by bony, yellow hands and cuddled against their will by people who quite possibly may have been abandoned to this wretched place by their own grandchildren. In order to keep the childrens’ spirits up though, they had been promised sweets. Promised sweets. Seriously, who dreamed up this exercise? The old bloke from Family Guy?
This final visit did appear to be the sole purpose of the event and for that I suppose it can’t be knocked. The local schools are very much a part of the fabric of society here, teachers and education respected as they should be. What might seem old-fashioned in the UK and – sadly – dodgy from a certain point of view is everyday life here; children are to be seen and to be seen to be enjoying themselves too and even an old cynic like me thinks that’s a good thing but having said that I have to say that as we finally made it back to school there was a lot of tiredness, frozen hands, hunger and a quite a few tears. The kids were fine though.
The book 'A la Mod' is released on May 6, PRE ORDER HERE!

Getting my Goat

There are times when it gets to you. Times when the travel, the work, the weather, the never ending child illnesses and the sheer relentlessness of parental responsibility just piles up and if you try to take a step back, a five minute breather, you’re out of the game and any, admittedly vague, semblance of control is lost. The circus now controls the Ring Master and it’s chaos. It’s the same for any parent, or any non-parent; it’s the modern world and we’re all plate spinners now.
The secret is not to add to your burden, recognise what will create extra work and just say ‘No. I don’t want it. I have enough to deal with.’ Any sane person can see that’s just logical self-preservation, right? Right? Natalie is not a sane person.
I made it very clear when we got the goats that I was dead against the idea, they would be trouble I said. Mark my words, I said, no good will come of it, I said. They are, they didn’t, it hasn’t. Maybe the length of the winter is getting to everyone; Toby, normally such a placid dog, took a chunk out of the Queen Hen Tallulah’s backside last weekend for getting too near his bone. Vespa, an affectionate cat in many ways wouldn’t let anyone go near her all week until we finally realised she had a painful tick in her ear that was so big it looked like she had a hearing aid. Her brother Flame now returns from his night-time sojourns increasingly beaten up, this week he has a cut lip to go with his split ear but rather than hide these scars he parades them like a barroom drunk pleased with his medals.
The goats though, are the worst. One of them head-butted Vespa the other day leaving her even more dazed following the traumatic tick removal but Chewbacca especially, the least sociable of the goats, is an increasing problem.
Monday is my weekend. I don’t sleep on a Saturday because of travel so I go to bed early on a Sunday night, lie in on the Monday and laze about while Natalie is at work and the boys are all at school. I don’t answer the phone or the door. It’s me time and I guard it preciously. Thérence though was unwell again this week, his cold now lasting almost as long as winter itself, so he stayed at home. Then I got a call from Samuel’s collège late morning saying that once again he had fallen over on his head, and on an old scar too(as if there are now any scar-free areas) and was complaining of dizziness. He needed to come home and as I picked him up I was tempted to swing by Maurice’s school and bring him home too as a pre-emptive measure.
Clearly my ‘weekend’ was ruined but, you know, parent stuff and all that, can’t be helped. As I got the boys back in the phone rang, which isn’t exactly unusual as for some reason we are getting about a dozen sales calls a day at the moment and so we’ve stopped answering the thing. This actually hasn’t deterred them and so the next tactic is for me to answer the phone and ‘pretend’ not to understand. This was the boys’ idea and is a little hurtful but it may work. Anyway, I ignored the phone. Samuel was gingerly laying down on the sofa and groaning, Thérence was streaming with a cold and also groaning and then the doorbell rang.
“What now?!” I yelled as the dogs went berserk at the front gate. Maybe my new suit had arrived so I allowed myself a brief moment of optimism as I went to answer the bell. It was a young man with very definite Parisian looks, maybe the sales calls had just got personal.
“Bonjour,” he said a tad warily I thought, “erm, have you lost a goat?”
I sighed heavily and let my head drop. “I don’t know,” I answered, “but it’s certainly possible.” The man had come from a neighbour, our immediate neighbour, who is an old lady of 90 plus years who values her roses even above her independence and who had instructed one of her visiting grandsons to see if I’d mislaid any livestock. I followed the man next door and there indeed was Chewbacca munching perilously close to the young rose bushes. The young man was joined by his brother who may even have been his twin and then they looked at me. As Parisians they were clearly unsuited to the task of goat recovery and in seeking help next door I think they’d expected to find a man of the soil, a handy goat man not a man in Prince of Wales check trousers, a cravat and tassled loafers.
For an hour I tried to trap that goat, an hour. I tried tempting him with food, I tried lassoing him with a dog lead, I tried shouting obscenities at him but I couldn’t get near him. At one point he ran close by and I tried to rugby tackle him, missed and hit the driveway pretty hard. I lay there for a minute to gather my thoughts.
“Are you okay?” asked one of the brothers
“No.” I said. “I think I’ve torn my trousers.”
It had all begun in standard comic fashion. We had all three of us, tried trapping Chewbacca or grabbing him as he sped past, but it had now got beyond a joke and the Parisians were seriously wondering if it would ever end and whether in fact I had any plans for catching Chewbacca at all beyond waiting for his eventual death from old age. I had no plan, that was obvious.
“Have you got a gun?” I asked, half jokingly.
“No.”They replied rapidly and in unison, not seeing the humour and seriously worrying for their Grandmother’s safety with this strangely dressed nut-job living next door. I think by this point even Chewbacca was getting bored. I couldn’t contain myself any longer, my shoes were a muddied mess, my trousers were ripped at the knee and in a fit of genuine anger I tore off my cravat, folded it into my pocket and then as the goat made another flypast I howled in primeval anger and took a flying leap at the thing. I landed on him, put my arms around him and rolled a few yards, finally coming to a stop dangerously near to the precious roses. The two men stared in disbelief, their cigarettes hanging from their open mouths.
I stood up still hugging a shocked Chewbacca. “Open the gate!”  I demanded, choosing loud orders over genuine composure. I carried Chewbacca back round to our house and fortunately he didn’t struggle in my arms or I wouldn’t have been able to hold him. I even managed to open the stable door with one arm and hold him with the other, from a short distance we must have looked like a really angry ventriloquist and his dummy. I threw him into the stable, swore at him again and locked him in.
Even after dinner that night I hadn’t calmed down. Maurice had come home from school feeling sick making the place look like a children’s ward and I was now limping after damaging my knee, which I had done I pointed out to Natalie, while ripping my trousers, while catching your bloody goat! I was laying it on thick that’s for sure, but I was very annoyed.
One by one they left the dinner table and without actually saying they were avoiding me reconvened upstairs as a group where they were playing songs on YouTube and enjoying themselves. There was laughter and happiness but I frankly wanted no part of it. I stayed at the table with the wine.
“Daddy?” It was Maurice venturing nervously halfway down the stairs.
“Yes?”
“Mummy wants to know...”
“What?”
“ Elvis Presley?”
“What about Elvis Presley?”
“Was it the top half or the bottom half they weren’t allowed to film?”
Really, is it any wonder my life is such chaos?

The book published May 6 is called - A la Mod: My So-Called Tranquil Family Life in Rural France and can be pre-ordered HERE!

The Best Laid Plans...

Natalie and I have been looking forward to this week for months. The second week of the February half term was marked in our diaries in bright, red ink. In management speak we had a ‘window’ and it was ‘ring fenced’. The boys would be away with Natalie’s parents, and various other assorted aunts and cousins, holed up in a ski chalet somewhere in the Massif Central while we would have a week – a whole bloody week – on our own. For the first time in twelve years we would have time with each other, much needed time, and we were, to put it mildly, looking forward to it.


Plans had been made for doing bugger all. The odd long walk with the dogs here, an intimate candlelit dinner in a local restaurant there, making wild plans for the future and generally just relaxing in each other’s company for a change. Cold days spent browsing antiques markets, long evenings just relaxing in front of a log fire...


In time-honoured cinematic cliché fashion this is now where you hear the soft, stirring strings of a romantic lullaby crudely interrupted by the violent scratch of a record.


It didn’t happen.


Prior to their skiing trip Natalie had taken the boys back to England briefly; ostensibly to see her sister, who she hasn’t seen for a year, but in reality to pile themselves up with more germs than a dirty protest in a Beecham’s laboratory. First Samuel got sick, then Natalie and finally Thérence. Maurice doesn’t get sick, that would get in the way of his constant need for physical exercise. It was obvious therefore when I met Natalie et al at the airport that ‘our week’ would be compromised somewhat.


Samuel and Maurice were fine to still go away but little Thérence definitely could not, though even as a three year old he was aware how much Natalie and I had been looking forward to some time alone together and was convinced that he would be packed off anyway. When we told him that no, he was definitely coming home with us he beamed a sickly smile of relief, like a Dickensian waif told that he’d been sprung from the workhouse. That may have been the week’s high point.


I have to confess that one of the reasons for wanting Natalie home was that I could relinquish my farm duties. By the end of the week alone with the beasts a kind of uneasy truce had set in but they were obviously missing her even more than I was. Chewbacca, while not actually managing to escape further, had taken to walking the entire length of the paddock fence and actually leaning into it hoping to find a weak spot, like a furtive thief trying car doors. Junior, now completely recovered and back to his simmering, poisonous best was now jostling me aggressively when I tried to feed him. The cats had decided that litter trays were obviously too bourgeois and now preferred rugs instead.


Natalie though was too ill to deal with animal upkeep so the look of resentment that Junior gave me when I carried on feeding him, even though he knew Natalie was about, was positively evil. Then the snow fell. Three or four inches isn’t much snow obviously but when one of your daily animal chores is horse poo collection, it’s a definite hindrance. There’s an art to horse poo picking up and Natalie had given very clear instructions: which tools to use and which pile this week’s collection needed to go on. And so, with as much dignity as I could muster I was, every afternoon, in the field digging out horse excrement from the snow drifts and, croupier style, raking the stuff into a shovel. The whole task is ignominious enough as it is but when the horses, working as a team, are literally dive bombing you as you do it, it’s also quite dangerous. Junior was definitely trying to tip me over while Ultime would go charging around and then run straight at me, daring me to stand still instead of diving through the fence like a rodeo flunky. All the while Natalie watched from the warmth of the lounge, grateful for my stepping into the breach no doubt, but also bewildered by my incompetence.


Even Toby, normally an oasis of good humour, is joining in the revolt. An evening glass of wine, thoroughly bloody deserved I might add, is now a target for his new party trick. I’ll sit on the sofa, glass in hand and he’ll creep up and ‘nozzle’ my drinking arm therefore tipping the wine all over me. It’s an act of pointless mischief, like an aggressive pub drunk deliberately knocking your pint over. The cats, while continuing to find increasingly more obvious places to defecate, have decided that the supermarket own-brand food that I bought in haste is beneath them and are camped out in the kitchen demanding an upgrade. Gigi, seeing that the cats are on some kind of go slow, is killing mice on their behalf and bringing the cadavers in with her of an evening.


In footballing terms I have, it seems, ‘lost the dressing room’. I have no authority whatsoever. I have a three year old who is obviously quite unwell and therefore stroppy with it and Natalie, equally unwell, has decided that the only medicine that will make her better is to watch a live Take That concert DVD adding further to woes.


This isn’t how it was meant to be and I feel cheated and exhausted, where is my week with my wife? When will we get another chance? In another twelve years? I’m actually on my way back to work now and looking forward to the rest. I’m on a train, trundling through North Wales, surrounded by a large hen party who are slurping vodka jellies through ‘willy’ straws and planning their weekend around various levels of alcoholic oblivion. It’s just about the most peaceful it’s been all week.

To pre-order the book, click HERE.

Seul Man

Be careful what you wish for – I don’t know which patronising children’s story that is the moral of and I’ve always rather discarded it as utter nonsense, but now I know different.
I was always going to miss Natalie and the boys this week, there’s nothing new there, regular readers will be aware that, with monotonous regularity, I’ll write a blog that basically says ‘woe is me, I miss my wife and kids blah blah blah.’ Only this time I’m at home and it’s they who are in England, which means that, yes I miss them enormously, but because I’m at home I can get on with stuff other than wind up hotel receptionists or browse TK Maxx for hours on end. And anyway, it’s only for three days so like any good fusspot left to their own devices I’d written a list and was rather looking forward to it all, especially the meals, I could cook what I wanted to eat for a change.
The drive back up from Limoges airport was without incident, a lovely sunny evening, the cold wintry sun lighting up the beautiful Limousin countryside and I gently pootled along knowing, from experience, exactly where the speed cameras are located. I knew something was up though as soon as I got out of the car at the gate, the sheer amount of noise coming from the animals was like they were all being attacked at once.
First I noticed that Chewbacca, the least sociable of the goats, had broken into the orchard where the hens also live. This meant the hens were making that low ‘I don’t like this’ long clucking sound, exactly like the slow-motion parts of an Inspector Clouseau-Cato fight in The Pink Panther films. This however didn’t bother Chewbacca in the slightest who was happily raiding their coop for any leftovers. Popcorn, a friendly but skittish goat, was attempted to mount Bambi, the small goat newcomer in a highly forceful manner. I’ve no issue with goat gayness in the slightest, live and let live and all that but no is no and Bambi didn’t look like he had acquiesced at all. On seeing me Popcorn dismounted and started running around bleating at the top of his voice the goat equivalent of ‘Run, it’s the Rozzers’ which also disturbed Chewbacca who started doing the same.
It was not the gentle start to my few days alone that I had envisaged. I eventually managed to lure Chewbacca out of the orchard and back into his paddock all the while trying not to snag my suit on a tree or tread in anything untoward.
That evening I dined heartily on Pancetta wrapped Chicken breast with Tarragon Cream sauce and Lemon Cous-Cous.
I woke early the next morning and began goat proofing, or should I say, re-goat-proofing, the orchard fence. I hammered in dozens of tent pegs so that Chewbacca couldn’t force his way under the wire meshing. It took hours in the freezing cold wind and by lunchtime I could hardly move my fingers but I stood for a while thawing out in front of a roaring log fire and felt relatively pleased with my work. I sat down to lunch and almost as soon as I had, the doorbell rang. Nobody turns up at your door during mealtimes in France, it’s sacrilege. It’s just about the most ill-mannered, anti-French thing you can do. It’s a mealtime! You don’t disturb French people during food!
I sneaked a look out of the upstairs window to see who this heretic might be and recognised him immediately, The Pudding Man. He’d been badgering me since Christmas about getting him a Christmas Pudding from England for a party, I had told him that I would try and I had to, but with no success. Natalie had told him this already but clearly he wasn’t taking no for an answer. ‘Sod him’, I thought, ‘It’s lunchtime, he can bloody wait!’ He got back into his car and drove off and I went back to my lunch.
Then the phone rang. Again, for the same reason as you don’t knock on anyone’s door during repast you don’t ring them up either. I ignored it and allowed the answer machine to kick in.
“Monsieur? Monsieur?’ Said a voice, either unsure of answer machines or aware that I was there and just hiding. It was the bloody Pudding Man again! He could only have driven about 100 metres down the road before ringing! Again, I just ignored it.
Part of the routine I’ve now set myself at home is an afternoon nap. Yes, I know what you’re thinking, he’s getting old etc. But actually it’s for the good of everyone. If I can rest at some point after lunch I will be less cantankerous by the evening, I might also be able to stay up later and enjoy some quality time with Natalie after the boys have gone to bed and not, as has become the case, get tucked in by my eldest son. I think it’s a good idea and I was determined to try the routine out this week.
Fat chance.
I had maybe twenty minutes sleep before the doorbell rang again and this time in my sleepy fog I went to answer it. It was The Pudding Man, again! Anyone would think I was supplying him with a necessary heroin fix! I looked at him and didn’t bother to hide my displeasure. I admonished him for disturbing me during my lunch and now my nap, but the irony of an Englishman telling off a Frenchman for not being French enough was lost on him and all he could say was, ‘Do you like my car?’ It was a Mini Cooper. ‘Very English!’ He added smiling.
I explained that I couldn’t get a Christmas Pudding and his face fell. I don’t think he actually believed me and he looked a little hurt, ‘Come back in November.’ I said and I expect he will too.
That night I dined heartily on Sautéed Chorizo and Noix de Saint-Jacques with a Lamb’s Lettuce salad.
I hadn’t planned to get up as early as I did but something told me things weren’t quite right. I went downstairs almost collapsing at the stench coming from the cat litter tray, and saw that once again the Steve McQueen of the goat world was in the orchard and harassing foul.
It was freezing and blowing a gale outside and I was in my dressing gown, pyjamas and initially my Oxblood Tasselled Loafers as I couldn’t grab anything else. I ventured into the orchard and immediately slipped on a pile of chicken poo so went back to the house and put on my Wellington Boots. This time Chewbacca seemed to know my every move though and would not, would not, go back under the fence. It took ages, my swearing volume going up at the same rate as my body temperature fell. At one point I even stopped and looked around for a lasso and then tutted at the lack of lasso type equipment on offer. I mean, what was I thinking? I’ve never lassoed anything in my life! Like I would know where to start. I eventually cornered Chewbacca and he slid back under the fence he had crawled under and as he did so, all in one move, he took one last bite at the longer orchard grass, it was the goat equivalent of Indiana Jones just rescuing his hat in time.
Finally I thought, and turned around in time just to see Gigi the Chiweenie, who seems to be regressing obedience-wise, scurrying across the terrace with one of my discarded loafers in her mouth.
“Nooooooo!” I wailed, “You little shiiiiiiiiiiiit!” And went chasing after her.
That, Ladies and Gentlemen, is merely a precis of the week thus far. Next time the animals can go to England instead and we’ll all stay here. Tonight I shall be dining heartily on Orchard Stuffed Curried Goat in a Puppy Jus, and then having an early night.

The book is out in May, pre order HERE