Monday 28 January 2013

When Will We Have A 'Cows Disco' On The Smallholding?

"The weather outside is frightening..."

Gosh it's been wet and wild here in Southern Ireland.  Normally we get the Atlantic gales from November to around Christmas.  But this year it's going all the way through to March.  March  usually comes in like a lamb and goes out like a lion.

Any road.  Normally we get some great days when the cattle are taken to the pasture for the day.  I can then give their stall a thorough cleaning out and they have a 'cows disco'.  They dance and jump and run up and down hill and dale and generally act rather silly.  It's my favourite sight of the year: The "cows disco."

Still can't get on the old vegetable plot and I honestly think we are going through climate change.  A lot of the older country folk I talk to say exactly the same.  The seasons have changed for the worse.  Some say it's down to pollution from all the cars, households and industry.  I dunno, but I wish it would book up.  I have lots of jobs that I want to do.  I bet you have?  Perhaps we should grow some rice in the saturated fields?

Keep warm and here's to some sunshine.

18 comments:

  1. Not a farming person, Dave, so I don't know if you're only joking about the rice, but just out of interest, would it be possible?

    More relating to your previous post, politics is only ever interesting when Silvio Berlusconi enters the stage (love the way he tries to transform politics into comedy - comedy is much better than cynical self-interest and politically-'correct' brainwashing).

    Today, Berlusconi has said that Mussolini "wasn't so bad" on some kind of National Holocaust Day (hope this day is devoted to the Ukrainians and Armenians as well as the Jews) and the PC mob/media are out after him. As I know you're interested in comedy, Dave, has black humour been officially banned by the politically-'correct' in Britain?

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  2. Hi Pat, I was being light hearted about growing rice with all our saturated fields. I do believe it is commercially grown on a small scale in England. I don't know how warm rice seed needs to germinate and grow but it can't be too difficult to flood a field.

    Berlusconi is a charismatic character Pat. They certainly do things different in Italy, don't they? It's a lot more entertaining than the boring Eton educated statesmen in Parliament who sound like they are out of some nineteen thirties English film.

    I do love comedy and humour Pat. Especially the stuff before humour was banned and we all had to keep to an agenda and be told when to laugh and when not too. Course there is a question of good taste and not being too offensive.

    Somebody asked me the other day if I remembered Benny Hill. The person told me he was bankrupt when he died because the ITV had pulled the plug on his award winning show at Cannes. Then I told him that they no longer liked the idea of a bespectacled middle aged man being chased by scantily clad, beautiful young women. They said it was sexist. Sexist too who? When did you ever here of middle aged old men being chased around by gorgeous young women? Never that is, unless of course they won the lottery. I think it was a sad day when we weren't allowed to laugh any more.

    Is "wasn't so bad" an idiom Pat? Does Berlusconi mean Mussolini was bad, but not so bad? He obviously knows how to wind people up and have a laugh at the same time.

    Thanks Pat.

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  3. Wild here tonight too!
    Gales..... A dead turkey and the goose house roof has just lifted off
    Keep dry and warm

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  4. I think totalitarianism is wrong, no matter how worthy the cause Pat. Thinks it's time that people just ignored what other people tell us to do and live how we want to.

    I used to love watching British sitcoms that challenged the way we think and even allowed us to laugh at ourselves. I always though self deprecation was a fantastic British trait?

    Wet and windy here, Totally fed up with this awful weather.

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  5. Sorry to hear about the dead turkey and the goose roof lifting off. It's been horrendous here too. Can't see the cattle going out to pasture before April. A few years a go, you could let them eat grass in the fields during winter, so they weren't in the way when you mucked them out. Thanks for your comment John.

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  6. Yes, the "cows disco", know what you mean but never heard it called that, "spring madness" was what it was sometimes referred to.

    I thnk everybodys gardens / allotments are about the same, just waterlogged, lots of fields here with standing ponds, and no sign of better weather on the way.

    Political correctness, a good definition Pat, it's gone beyond reason, my son tells me that the playschool his son attends, "Baa Baa Black Sheep" is now banned as it was deemed racist.
    And any humour is basicly "taking the piss" out of somebody, if we banned all ethnic and sexist humour there wouldn't be much left.

    Wouldn't know about the universities, I never attended one, but I know that just about 100% of our MPs did, and although they might have achieved some sort of academic success, they appear to leave any common sense they might once have been blessed with back in the corridors of learning.

    Gales and torrential rain here yesterday, just a breeze this morning and dry.
    Raggy cat in early, got a soaking yesterday but now fed and back on settee.

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  7. Hi Cumbrian,

    We christened it the "cows disco". There isn't a more funny rural sight than when the cattle go crazy, running around the field with their heads and tails in the air. All because they are free to eat the grass. It just shows that locking them in a slatted house is no good for them physically or even psychologically.

    The wet weather is relentless, Cumbrian. A lot of people are saying that they think it will never improve. Somebody asked me recently if I wanted to buy an haybob. I told if that I don't think we will ever make hay ever again.

    The political correctness philosophy is crazy. Fair enough we don't want our children to be bigots and offensive but at the same time we should all be able to "take the piss" (great expression) now and again. We must just make sure we do it to everybody.

    I think the politicians think everybody is middle class and they don't live in the real world. They don't have to muck out the cattle out in a gale and feed them when they are feeling ill, depressed or even hungover. That's the real countryside isn't it?

    Sounds like you got our weather Cumbrian. Terrier fast asleep on sheepskin rug.

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  8. Dave, in my experience, there's nobody more bigoted and offensive than the politically 'correct' e.g. in their tasteless selection of which minorities are 'correct' and other ones which are, according to them, 'incorrect' (for me, the PC mob/media echo the kinds of logic that were put forward by Nazi Germany or Stalinist Russia here).

    Cumbrian, even though it's obviously mad, I'm not that surprised about 'Baa Baa Black Sheep' being banned. More cryptic perhaps, the word that seems to 'offend' the politically 'correct' most is the word 'normal' (the politically 'correct' have replaced it with the word 'mainstream', but still don't seem quite satisfied with the latter, as for them, this word still sounds too 'perjorative' or 'offensive' towards minorities). In contrast, I know that the Polish equivalent of 'normal' (normalny) still functions normally and I guess its the same with most other continental European languages. Thus, this is one small example of how the politically 'correct' are twisting English language to (linguistically) brainwash people.

    About British universities, I would say that Stalinist concentration camps is a pretty accurate description of them.

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  9. Dave, I think you need a poly tunnel. I think we all need a poly tunnel.
    Terrible weather here today, gales and rain. I blame climate change on all the bloody foreigners with their outrageous demands on our water supplies! It is nature adapting, :-)

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  10. We had a polytunnel John and it blew away. The insurance company told us they don't insure them. I think we should live in the Eden Project in Cornwall. Forget the high speed railways,put everything under glass or plastic. Perhaps nature is adapting. You have got a fantastic sense of humour!

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  11. Is it only America and Britain that preaches PC, Pat? I never hear anything about it here in Ireland. Think I would rather live in isolation on my windswept smallholding than have listen to political correctness every day.

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  12. Australia is also terrible for it, Dave. For years, Christians from Lebanon entered into the country and there was never any trouble. Then, one day, some politically-'correct' fruitcake shouted out the 'D-word' (discrimination) and Lebanese Muhammadans started flooding in. Needless to say, these haven't behaved in the same manner as the Lebanese Christians (with immigration there has got to be some degree of cultural compatibility, of course, but the PC mob don't recognise this).

    From what I've heard, Canada also suffers from the politically 'correct' disease, although I would guess that New Zealand is pretty well insulated against it. Ireland is probably still okay, because, despite its recent sexual scandals, the Catholic Church offers some form of protection against PC (it's the same case in Spain; Portugal; Italy etc.).

    In Eastern Europe, PC is commonly viewed as some kind of strange totalitarian ideology from the English-speaking world where the interests of 'strange' minorites are placed well ahead of normal people (the concept of being 'normal' has never been banned in Eestern Europe).

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  13. I have said it before Pat. You see the Western world completely different to what everybody sees in the Western media. I also think cultural compatibility is important with immigration.

    I honestly don't why there is such a paranoid totalitarian ideology from the English speaking world. Who cares if somebody is different? Why does it matter if they are so politically correct? What ever happened to live and let live?

    What do you think about the Mali conflict Pat? Is there a serious Islamic terrorist threat or does the West want to police the world? Somebody I know who's relative lives in America. Was told by them recently, that America needs a war every ten years to keep it's economy ticking over. Cynical or realistic?

    I often complain on this blog about the lack of real opportunities, a social life and infrastructure living in rural Ireland on my smallholding. Yet when I watch the news and read the newspapers, It some times better to make your own world in the countryside.

    Thanks Pat.

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  14. I have said it before Pat. You see the Western world completely different to what everybody sees in the Western media. I also think cultural compatibility is important with immigration.

    I honestly don't why there is such a paranoid totalitarian ideology from the English speaking world. Who cares if somebody is different? Why does it matter if they are so politically correct? What ever happened to live and let live?

    What do you think about the Mali conflict Pat? Is there a serious Islamic terrorist threat or does the West want to police the world? Somebody I know who's relative lives in America. Was told by them recently, that America needs a war every ten years to keep it's economy ticking over. Cynical or realistic?

    I often complain on this blog about the lack of real opportunities, a social life and infrastructure living in rural Ireland on my smallholding. Yet when I watch the news and read the newspapers, It some times better to make your own world in the countryside.

    Thanks Pat.

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  15. Eastern Europe and many of the non-English speaking parts of Western Europe have, thankfully, not been brainwashed with political 'correctness' yet, Dave. The difference is that Western Europeans, like Italians and Spaniards, generally only view PC as some kind of imbecilic linguistic nonsense that afflicts the English-speaking world, whereas Eastern Europeans can still remember communism, and recognise some of the chilling similarities (e.g. diagnosis of 'speech crime'; 'thought crime' etc.) between PC and Stalinist-type communism.

    Don't really know what you're getting at with the question "Why does it matter if they are so politically correct?". Don't know who you mean by "they" exactly? However, reading between the lines, a lot of people (many British people included) are frightened of PC as, like Nazism and Stalinist-type communism, it is an absolutist-type secular thought system geared towards a full on ideological conditioning of people at the expense of whatever free will individuals may have.

    Political 'correctness' is often viewed as an imbecilic linguistic comedy rather than as a dangerous totalitarian ideology, as it appears to be 'bloodless'. However, like a lot of Poles say, if you view abortion (the PC prefer the expression 'elective termination') as murder, and a significant enough number of people seem to do to treat this idea seriously, then, the PC mob have murdered far more people than the Nazis or Stalinist Russia ever did.

    About the Mali conflict, the French are usually pretty shrewd, and I guess they have only intervened as somebody really needed to. About America regularly having wars, I guess it's true, but "It's a dirty job, and somebody's got to do it" (really wish it wasn't like this, but I'm much happier with the US doing this than, for example, China).

    You seem to ask a lot of questions but don't really seem to offer many opinions on politically 'sensitive' issues (perhaps another chilling symptom of political 'correctness'), so here's an interesting question for you, Dave. What do you think about the Russian government's attempt to stop the spread of gay propoganda? Obviously, this has lead to the PC mob having kittens.

    Writers like Paul Edward Gottfried; Dinesh D'Souza; Roger Kimball; Allan Bloom; Roger Scruton etc. would give you much more detailed accounts of the dangers of PC, Dave. Yes, you've already guessed it, the PC mob simplistically label/stereotype these writers as 'right-wingers', '(ultra-) conservatives' or 'reactionaries' (central stigma labels are commonly used in PC brainwashing process).

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  16. Hi Pat, all I mean by the question:

    "Why does it matter if they are so politically correct?"

    Is that you think and believe what ever you want. Yours is a traditionalist point of view. Nothing wrong with that. The PC people's is a modern compromising point of view.

    Since the EEC was formed members have had to sing from a similar sheet and share similar viewpoints to make European laws and to communicate. For example contraception was made available in Ireland because of European laws. Ireland was told they had to carry out the European laws. The same will no doubt soon happen with abortion and eventually euthanasia. I don't think people realise that these laws are made by faceless bureaucrats and they can never be changed, unless they leave the EEC.

    America always seems to be involved with wars, either providing the intelligence, money or weapons. They don't argue with Saudi Arabia who provide the oil and bankroll countries like Iran though. I think the threat from Islamic terrorism and economic bankruptcy from emerging countries competition; China and India, Is far more frightening and worrying than the PC mob spreading their propaganda.

    Been a great day today. Managed to clean the cow stall of tons of fym and old straw and split lots of logs with the tractor. There's a lot to be said for a nice day.

    Thanks for your comments Pat. I always appreciate them.

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  17. Strange notion of associating political 'correctness' with compromise, Dave (I wonder who gave you that idea?).

    Also see that you never answered the question about the Russian government fighting against gay propaganda.

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