Lord of the Manor and That Wheat is Dangerous

The Lord of the Manor – Ted Barclay

As I mentioned in the last post, we were invited, along with Ted Barclay, to dinner at Jo and Woody's house. Ted's family, which spans generations in this area, owns significant tracts (2000 acres) of farmland. In rubbing elbows with the local aristocracy, I got a sense of one of the unique characters of British high society. Ted attended Eton and then Oxford. By appearances, however, you would not necessarily know that he was part of the elite. His hair could use styling but from what I saw at the cricket grounds, he’s not alone. He had on a well-worn shirt and bright green chino trousers, also well-worn. He talked here and there about his ancestry. (I can’t recite the details as it would have been rude of me to take notes and to ask him to repeat facts.)

After Woody asked him about his farming, the price of wheat and how he was faring – he was crying poverty - the conversation took a dark turn to local criminal history, initiated because of a recent arraignment in a local murder. We then heard about other gruesome murders in the area: someone who fed his wife to the pigs, people hanged without a trial (albeit in 1848, according to Ted), and other strange townspeople. It turns out that our little villages (The Pelhams) are more dangerous, per capita, than London or New York. Now I know why Sarah was surprised I didn’t lock the door of the house in Northampton at night.

After hearing these stories about twisted townspeople, I started to feel like I was in an episode of Scooby Doo and Thelma would soon reveal that Ted was responsible for some of these murders to scare people away from his inheritance. How’s that for a literary reference? I guess, to be more literary, you could say he has certain Dickensian qualities. Uriah Heep, maybe?

Ted has an encyclopedic memory about townspeople, local events, wars, and English history but the validity of what he remembers is highly questionable.

He told a story about military strategy with an aside about Hannibal marching elephants across the Alps. Then later in the conversation, Hannibal and his elephants appeared again for another purpose. You see, 2000 years ago, Hannibal brought elephants across the Alps. (True.) How did he do it? There was no snow. 1000 years ago people were farming in Greenland. How? There was no ice in Greenland. The glaciers had receded. You see, there are natural, or normal, fluctuations in the earth’s temperature. According to Ted, all of our pollution is not good for the planet but is not responsible for global warming. At the end there, he hedged his bets. (For more on Greenland being green, see: http://www.skepticalscience.com/greenland-used-to-be-green.htm)

Lastly, Lord Barclay on British-US relations: Why does Obama keep “England at his knee”? England has information on Obama’s father being a terrorist which must be supresessed. I was afraid he was going to say something about Obama’s citizenship. I gave him Bill O’Reilly’s email address.

Okay, enough about Ted. He’s actually a sweet guy (nice of me to say now, huh?) but a bit daft. He lets the kids in the village swim in his pool and he is generous in helping with village events.

The Reaper. I realize that because the roads are so narrow, everyone who drives here must have raised blood pressure. Lorries (trucks) barrel down the country roads, trimming hedges along the way and cutting corners with disregard for others sharing the road. Yesterday, Sarah and I were driving into Bishop’s Stortford (say that name five times fast). I mentioned in an earlier post that they are haying the fields periodically this summer. A huge tractor forced us off onto the shoulder which here means onto someone’s banked lawn. But worse, the tractor was pulling a reaper (almost a grim reaper) wider than the tractor and sticking out into the oncoming lane. We saw the blades heading for our windshield (windscreen here) so I ran the car further up the bank till we were tilted at about 30 degrees. Sarah’s mouth was running a blue streak, this time not at my driving, but at the terrible, frantic, and careless rush the farmers are in to get the fields harvested when the crops are grown and the weather is good.

We survived, luckily, and are now heading for a two-week vacation in the states (where we can drive on the right side of the wide roads). Most likely I won’t be keeping the blog going during that time. The two dedicated readers – Hello? Is this mic on? – will be able to resume their summer reading. Actually, it's been nice to hear from people who've been reading. Thanks for the encouragement.

'Til next time, be well.