The spaniel curled up in her basket with one of my shoes, one of his socks and a packet of biscuits, as if stockpiling. Every time I give her a treat she rushes outside to dig it into the garden. Tucking some essential treasures into her bed with her, she peeped back at me with
‘Get me Heygates on the phone! I need that order of pony nuts now, damn it!’ It was like a scene from a disaster movie, only at the country store. The owner’s son was yelling at staff. The car park was a seething mass of battered 4x4s. Men with walkie-talkies were corralling the panicking horse
The most exciting place on earth I have ever been to is the village where I live. And I don’t think I’m boasting to say that I’ve been to a lot of exciting places: Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza strip, Egypt, Korea, Crossmaglen, the Somerset Levels at high tide… My favourite dateline
The game was up when I put on a pair of size 14 jodhpurs at the country store and they almost fit me. ‘No no no no no no no!’ I said, backing away from the mirror. The builder boyfriend looked over from where he was taking the blonde wig off a mannequin and putting
One of the many technological things I don’t understand is, how come I’m paying to watch television? I know why I used to pay. I used to switch on a box in the corner of the room and marvel at the choice of three quite interesting programmes and something slightly racy on Channel 4. It
Nice of the NHS to send an advisory text about coronavirus, because I was wondering. Is it possible to have a touch of coronavirus? If so, the builder boyfriend and I suspect we may have had it, and fought it off. Out of nowhere, I suddenly felt like I couldn’t get any air into my
Mr Benn has been in touch because he wants a right of reply to an article I wrote about my horse insurance. Yes, I am aware that sentence makes no sense, but this is the world we live in. You may remember I was surprised to receive my insurance documents for Darcy the thoroughbred with
Being told I am now both short-sighted and long-sighted feels like someone is playing a very bad joke on me. I would say I’ve always been as blind as a bat but I don’t want the Bat Society to complain. Lately, every time I go to the optician a different practitioner has what feels like
The builder boyfriend fell off a roof. He didn’t tell me until he could no longer leave unexplained why he was staggering about the house groaning, crawling up the annoyingly steep cottage stairs we have not been able to alter, and sleeping on the floor beside the bed clutching a packet of anti-inflammatories, as the
Some might say it was a typical over-reaction on my part to erect hidden cameras at the horses’ field. First the theft from the barn of some broken old horse rugs, then the stolen feed, then a load of fly-tipping in the gateway, making it impossible to get in or out until the council came
‘Time to begin your adventure with Mr Benn!’ said the letter that came through my door, in a big loopy red font, beneath a picture of a smiling, waving, bowler-hatted Mr Benn. And this would have been fine had I been a five-year-old whose mother had sent off for a box-set of classic Mr Benn,
My tech guy Andy appeared on the doorstep in a puff of smoke. I had just texted him to ask if he was still coming and as I typed the words I heard his footsteps outside. I raced to the door and opened it to find him standing, wizard like, amid a cloud of vapour.
‘This is the one I was thinking of for you,’ said the lady I might feasibly call my mother-in-law, in spirit at least. We were standing in her stable yard in a dingley dell corner of the south of England which is frozen in time. After driving down a winding track between well-tended paddocks, we
The bonfire burned and burned, choking out black smoke, and when my headache got so bad I could barely see straight, I decided I would have to look into it. I say this at every year’s end: I am so tired of fighting. I sometimes wish I could lose this supernatural gift I have for
‘Oh, it’s you!’ said the builder boyfriend to the Tory MP in his shooting jacket, as he made his way down the street handing out leaflets. The BB was standing outside his builder’s yard in suburban south-west London where he enjoys a good argument at election time. During the referendum campaign, he fixed a placard
‘Thank you for calling Surrey Police. We want to help you with your inquiry as quickly as possible. Did you know you can go online…’ That is probably the most depressing sentence in the English language. It is not only preposterous to suggest crime will be better dealt with by a website, it is insulting.
My attempt at being Columbo was only taking me so far. In solving the mystery of who raided the barn, I was going round in circles. All I knew was that the thieves took a weirdly useless assortment of items, including four wrecked horse rugs, a broken lunge line and a wheelbarrow with a completely
The night after the fireworks display the barn was raided and our horse rugs were taken. Good job I’ve watched a lot of Columbo because I was able to quickly rule out a reprisal attack for us disagreeing with the fireworks. I believe I can categorically prove it was nothing to do with that, although
Remember remember the 5th of November, when Britain’s most controversial pub chain stages a massive firework display in the middle of fields full of horses. I get the feeling that if my local were any other pub owned by any other chain, the fact that dozens of horse owners have been ringing up to plead
‘This is your captain speaking, welcome aboard this flight to London Gatwick. As there is a passenger on our flight today with a severe nut allergy we will not be serving any nuts or nut products for the duration of the flight.’ That was the first announcement the pilot made, ahead of anything about flying