The sheep fiasco

Me and farmer Toby and one of the said sheep

There has been much confusion surrounding the events of last summer and no one seems to know the real story. I get hounded everywhere I go by people wanting to know the truth, I have even had letters posted through my letter box claiming that they know what I did last summer, although I haven't heard any more about the subject since.

But, at the request of Toby the farmer I have decided to finally spill the beans and release this tale into the 'electric moors'. (inter-net) and you will finally understand why I love farm, but I don't love sheep.
It was summer last year- a good year I recall. Carrots were at their finest and my tomatoes were large and plump like a series of swollen glands. The cows were doing well and I had already had 14 new calves added onto my little spot of heaven in the rolling hills of Devon. They all were doing rather well and were still in high spirits despite the room (or lack of) in the cow pen. The only thing wrong with my idealistic life was a slight problem I had with my arms seizing up occasionally but it was nothing to worry about according to the local "doctor" (old farmer Bill), So all was well really.

It had been a hard day and the darkness was creeping in, so I went indoors and rested my feet beside my open fire -nearly burning my new cords in the process- and lit up my pipe. I was just staring to nod off when I heard a knock at the door. I though to myself 'who the devil could that be at this hour?! it's half bloody seven in the evening!' and I grabbed my air rifle. (you can't be too cautious in these parts. Oddly enough we seem to get a lot of door-to-door salesmen, god knows why but I most certainly do not want to buy another Box Jellyfish for £3.20! The last one killed 13 of my beloved geese)

I cautiously opened the door to see a dark figure approach. I aimed straight for the genitals and fired my round narrowly missing. I frantically tried to reload the gun as the figure flinched and started to raise his hand up towards me. 'probably trying to give me a leaflet on discount cruises to Malta in a rubber dingy' I thought to myself. 'I'll get the bastard'. Then the figure spoke what I first took for as Latin so I fired another shot, but it was actually my good friend Toby who owns the farm up from mine. Turns out he was shouting some nonsense about me almost castrating him, not Latin like I first thought. I apologise and invited him in for a game of Backgammon or 2 but he insisted he couldn't stay long and the he didn't have time for a Backgammon tournament. He informed me that he needed my help the next morning and that we would discuss it further when I got there. I agreed and said I'll be up at his field by half 7 (I practically had too seeing as I almost blew away his manhood). He then headed on his way and I returned to my sanctuary of comfort by the fire and then dozed off into some dream about getting a new rainbow coloured John Deer tractor.

Now you are probably wondering where the wife was throughout all this, well I'll be honest, I hadn't even met the old haywench back then. I was just a young rogue farmer with nothing but a pocket full of dreams and pipe tobacco. I was setting sail for the glory of farmdom and I couldn't let a woman get in between me and my grand fantasy of owning an A-Z farm. Artichokes right through to Zebras. Yes yes, i know, not entirely legal to own a Zebra in Devonian fields but what the hey, i felt like John Hammond from Jurassic Park (minus the steady income and trendy cane)

Anyway, I woke eventually at 7 and prepared my breakfast by boiling away some chicken stock left over from Sunday lunch to make my oats and gravy. I put on my favorite tweed vest and cap and headed up to Toby the farmers field and what i saw when I entered took a little while to sink in. I saw Toby himself sat atop a large keg of Scrumpy, pipe-in-mouth and balancing a sheep on his lap whilst pulling a calf right from its rear.

"woaap, there she goes. That's another one for the troop, hop along you little goblin" and he placed the sheep onto the floor along with the lamb. I know it is bad, but all I could think of at that point was how nice they would both be boiled up in a bag with some of my lovely potatoes and tomatoes. At that stage in my life Boil-In-A-Bag was all the rage, everything was boiled in a bag; custard, stews, sandwiches, scones.etc the list goes on. if you can't remember this pinnacle of human endeavour then you were probably out or something.

So I greeted Toby and he said that all of his lambs are giving birth (47 in total!! Plenty spare for the old 'Boil-In-A-Bag') and I was needed to assist. I enquired as to why the scrumpy was there

"well we can't do it sober now can we!"

I told him that he was most certainly right as I had no experience of lambing so I couldn't even do it sober let alone 'scrupmed'. He told me that it's as easy as lambing a lamb which reassured me somewhat so i though I'd give it a blast. Toby grabbed me a glass and poured out the nectar of the gods; the cider started to flow.

10 hours into the day and 36 lambs later I started to get either very good at lambing or drunk enough to convince myself that I was. Scrumped up and "in the zone" I had a moment of drunken bravado where I bet Toby -who was elbow deep in sheep- 8 of Martha Brights prize pumpkins that I would succeed to lamb 2 sheep at the same time. He removed his arm, raised his glass and said 'your on' while nodding slightly and taking a swig. I then grabbed the 2 nearest plump looking sheep and placed them either side of me. Then I began to squeeze the two sheep with each hand in an attempt to induce the lambs out in a technique I can only describe as the "squeezing-the-last-bit-of-toothpaste-out" method, but sadly it came with minimal results except a lot of complaining from the animal in question. I decided the only option was to do it manually. I downed my cider, rolled up my sleeves and plunged both hands deep into the abyss.

What happened next you would never believe. My arms had somehow became lodged in and had seized up completely. I rolled around on the floor in an attempt to get my arms free but was unable to. In a fit of panic I ran towards farmer Toby with arms locked and spread wide with sheep placed atop each appendage looking like I'm about to start, enter and win the Devonian version of The Gladiators. I frantically explained that my arms had seized up and that my hands were stuck.

"Well, look at it this way, at least its not 2 male sheep. Go on, have another scrumpy!" he told me
"Are you insane?! That's the last thing I need. I need to see a doctor" I said

Well, 7 scrumpy's each later Toby and I had completely forgotten about the 2 sheep attached to my arms and the barrel of cider was dry, so we decided to go to the pub. I remember walking through the village singing at the top of my voice, one of those classic everyone loves, you know, something by the wurzels. Anyway, people would look at me with the most horrified expression and at the time I hadn't a clue why -the cider had gotten the better of me- but regardless, I continued onwards towards my Mecca.

On the way we struck up a conversation on Star Wars as it had always been a favorite of mine, I'd always liked Tokyo and loved how it was set in the heart of such a vibrant city; so for me it was a favorite. We were discussing who you wouldn't want to be a celebrity guest on the next series of Autumn Watch. You'd have, say, 5 characters and you'd nominate each one up for eviction in turn until you had your final character left who would be whom you'd want to lure out some badgers or just generally converse with Bill Oddie during the calm bits as we all know it can get a bit intense some times!

Just as we approached the pub it was my turn and I said that I'd put Han Solo up first because of his Carbon Footprint. So we stumbled into the pub and I entered the door of the tavern.

"I can't believe you put your Hans up first. There's no holding you back is there" said farmer Toby rather loudly

Needless to say, we got thrown out immediately and told to "Bugger off you sheep interferer's". Somewhere along the way I had lost Toby, so I decided to try and take a shortcut home through the square and past the hall. As I was walking/stumbling past all of a sudden my cords loosened above my waist and fell right down to the floor revealing my tweed undergarments in all there entirety! I tried but was unable to pull them up due to my seized arms, so I had to act fast. I saw the empty hall and ran towards it as quickly as I could.

I opened the door with my foot and headed in. I turned around to search for a means to pull these ruddy cords up only to be greeted by the silence of a whole entire hall of shocked onlookers. Whats worse was that it was a commemorative do for war vets and that's the last thing I needed, a room full of hardened veterinarian's who have probably been through far worse lambings in the war. I thought that all they'd do was complain about my obvious lack of  "code of conduct". Sadly it was far worse than that, I stood there absolutely scrumped, half naked and for some strange reason decided to say a wise piece of information that Toby had given me earlier.

"whadd?! well at least it ain't 2 male pigs is it!!" I said whilst struggling to not spew the oats and gravy from my gullet.

I then got called a 'baaa-stard' by one man and a few other names by the more unreasonable veterinarian's. 'Frisky Farmer' was one of them, 'Sheep-Fister' was another... Then i remember ambling towards one of the tables, vomiting on a war Vet and then collapsing through the table in front of me.

I awoke in A&E some time later and the man upstairs hadn't gone easy on me, he left me with the largest hangover available to man. Farmer Toby was next to me  and he said that the sheep were removed and are all doing fine. He had explained the whole situation to the doctors and I was free to leave. I left them a gift of Farming Weekly that i brought from the in-hospital shop to thank them for there support and I then later went on my way after a few words with "the fuzz" about the whole fiasco.

So there you have it, I am NOT what you youngsters call a 'Ram Rod' or anything of the sort, it was all just a hideous mess. I just hope the wife can forgive me. Oh the shame...

Signing off for today.

Happy fi.. *cough* er... farming