Stone Clearing With Richard Herring - Chapter 102

Episode Date: August 2, 2021

Chapter 102 - Four Bearf. It's 7pm on 29th July 2021 and Richard is out for a calm intermediate stone clear on a spookily quiet evening. The conditions are tough as the crops are dense on one side and the weeds spiky on the other and not many stones can be cleared, but that's why we've moved on beyond the beginners' lessons now. Because stone clearing is TOUGH. There's some fun with diarrhoea and the chapter is slightly truncated as Rich received an email from a 1970s kids' TV star who he couldn't remember the name of and who it turned out at the end of the podcast (when Rich googled him) had died in quite an unpleasant way. I don't know how he managed to email in, but out of a rare burst of sensitivity we've decided to delete the portion of the podcast in which this occurred out of respect for this childhood hero. You can sponsor Rich's half marathon here http://justgiving.com/monoball

Stone clearing with Richard Herring It's the end to do the right little monkey boy come on whoopington are you excited oh come on come here sit sit down it's got two bag there Boombag Hello there my formed friends friends welcome to chapter 102 of Stone Clearing with Richard Herring. It's an intermediary stages now, intermediate stages, intermediary stages. So obviously if you're a beginner

go to chapter one. But if you're an expert wait for chapter 201. But the rest of you forget everything you learned in the first 101 chapters. Yeah and even chapter 101 we start again every time with the intermediate area. Feels like a long time since it's been Stone Clearing. It has been quite a long time. Taking a little break. The dog wasn't here for a couple of weeks. Working quite hard on other projects. The dog's just done a wee in the middle of the path. Oh, September. There's nettles as we head at the dockets passage. And August coming up this, oh, I should say it's the what is it? What is it even? The 29th of July is a 7.03 pm. So we have an evening Stone Clearing, but it's summer evening just passing through a cloud of midges now. Wow,

it's all here. I'm just going to go now. I don't mind it. I don't mind it. Yeah, evening Stone Clearing and very challenging conditions. And that's partly why we've gone into media. I knew this was coming. Basically nearly the whole field is covered by a thick sea of wheat to manage to pull up a stone from just the edge of the path there that goes onto the alphanomic again. The high thistles growing in the ground marking the fallen Stone Stasi. Not so many poppies, but a few still here. It's been a little while since we've been out here. The thistles are bigger than me. The wheat is taller than Wolfie. It's quiet out here. Debtly quiet. Spookly quiet. And

yeah. Oh, it's partly because I've got ear buds in. I can't hear anything I suppose, but also it's a bit weird. Wolfie's just on a wee, I think. I hope you can hear me. I mean, I've got nothing to say. Just it feels a little weird out here. It feels too quiet picking up another stone from the path that's just gone into the hedgerow. It's been so long since I've been Stone Clearing that even I need to probably go back to beginners lessons to learn. So I don't know why I feel I can teach an intermediate level right now. Oh, Wolfie's in a poo. Good news for dog poo fans. Bad news to me because I'm going to have to pick them up and carry it around in a bag. I can hear the bags there rustling. Good girl, Wolfie. Okay. Dicks in some page. You've done the thing. Oh yeah. Oh dear.

That's a bit diary. That's not a good sign. I could almost have left that. Got poo on the fingers. That's what you get for picking up diary. Oh no. I'm using some grass to clean it off with. This isn't what you signed up for, is it? You didn't sign up to hear a man get dog diarrhea on his fingers. Just clear the stone, but it will have some dog diarrhea on it. If you do touch dog diarrhea while you're Stone Clearing, try and wipe it on some grass, but also try not to touch your face. It should be a lesson you learned from COVID times. Try not to touch your mouth or face until you've washed your hands. Just up there, the place where they're building,

they've been building a new fence. That's it. They've just gotten a bit of wire at the back now. Oh, a nice little gazebo thing that leads to the steps up to the field. Very nice. They're doing a good job there. So three more stones ejected and a little bit of dog poo on them into there. Into the... There's a new door there. It's got a gate going out of the back. It's all happening up here. Into the hedgerow, and there's quite a lot of stones out on the path, luckily, because I absolutely cannot even see the field in front of my face, or even at the edge. All I can clear is the path. I mean, I could blunder out there, but this wheat is sharp. The thistles are sharp. They

know what they're doing with these farmers trying to protect their stones. So it must be shall for all way. Oh, I hear a bird now. Really quiet. I mean, just deathly quiet. Usually quiet. Maybe too quiet. Lovely fluffy beard on this thistle. It's gorgeous out here, and maybe this is the time to come stone theory, if there were any stones. Oh, just put one down there. Sort of off the field already, but it could be further off for safety's sake than it is now, too. There was brothers, siblings, I should say, in this day and age. You all right, woofy wolves? Oh, dear. Diary is not a good thing to have just before bedtime. But it's good news for you, because I'm going to take her on a bit

of a longer walk in order to make sure that nasty gunk is outside of it. It was just, you know, it was solid enough to have a goat picking up, but then there was grass in it. The grass got my fingers. And nasty, weren't it wolves? For the first time in ages, the everything's dry. So even rubbing against grass. I couldn't get that stone out. I've got one stone for the... You might think this sounds like a beginner's lesson, but it's very different. Very, very different. We didn't get into dog diarrhea, did we? I'm chapped. It's probably hardly at all. I can't even see this cocaine in the corner field. It's so overgrown out here. Sort of a fly guard. It's tough conditions out here today. Easy jet coming into Luton.

Or maybe out of here in the distance. So I haven't got much for you today. I'm just going to enjoy the walk, you know, just to talk all the time. Just enjoy hearing my footsteps upping through my ears. Enjoy. At least it's not beaten. Once this is harvested, we're going to have quite a lot of snails around me. It's going to get difficult. Is it worth going the long way around? I don't think we're going to be able to see anything. I think we might head to the stone pole. That's my non-traditional route. I've got a couple of stones just in the path I'll get for those. Both small. I'm about to just disappear amongst the trees there. I can't really aim them.

There's nothing to aim for. I'm just like there's a tiny narrow pathway through. This is like a maze made of corn nettles, thistles, other miscellaneous weeds. There's some thistles just bending down. Trying to grab me like purple just in snow. I'm getting stunned by the thistles, getting stunned by the nettles, getting flies in my mouth. And this is when sometimes it gets difficult, my friends. This is tough. It doesn't get tougher than this, except when there's lightning and hail and stuff. That's quite tough. And volcanoes. This makes it really tough because that's putting more stones on the field as well. Volcanoes. Let's head across here. We're going to head across between some kind of corn circle in the field there. It just looks like the nettle is

just falling onto the field. So a very little stone, just a bit of flint on the path. I'm just going to throw that back into the head a little close enough to do that. I'll get a picture of a thistle for you. This isn't the biggest one by any means, but I've got to give you something, haven't I? I've got to give you something my fan friends. This is a pass wider here. A bit more manageable. It's got a bit hairy, isn't it? They're having literally with the thistles, the hairy thistles, but I'll be dashing out into the sea, disappearing beneath the wheat. I've got a tiny stone here. I reckon I can get to the shore from here. Let's see.

Oh no, very bad misthrow. Very bad. One of the worst misthrows you'll have seen, even if you're watching the Olympic stone throwing that's on at the moment. That one veered off. It didn't even have the distance. It just went to the left rather than straight on, further onto the field than it was. That might not get cleared for several thousand years. What are you doing? We'll be maybe pooing in the field. She's stock still. Hard to tell her stance. Come on. Oh, we're having a nightmare. This will happen, especially as you become intermediate stone theory. Things get harder. There's less stones, fewer stones, more like nettles and stuff. I'm going to carry this one even on miles from the edge I've picked up.

I think it's sort of like a penis shaped stone about the size of my flaccid penis on a good day. If you can imagine that, they've just kicked up another stone wearing some Paul Smith trainers, they're old ones, but you know, very expensive, but where could have kept a medieval stone clearer, fed probably a year with the value of these shoes. And here I am using them to kick up stones. How my forebears would derive me. I've got forebears at home. I don't like me wearing designer labels. I think it's waste of money. There's a mommy bear, daddy bear, baby bear and grandma bear. That's what I've got with my forebears. What's become of this podcast? Has it really come to this?

I'm still aware that there's dog diarrhea on my finger, don't worry. That finger has not touched any sensitive orifice of myself or the dog. I mean, it's touched. The diary has touched the dog's anus. Of course, I've been on the way out. I haven't been touching the dog's anus. I wouldn't do that during a podcast. I saw it all. Just kicked up another nice. That's the biggest of the day. I've actually only done about seven stones today. And it's barely even in the medium category. I think just medium, it's medium small. Let's call it medium small, just for my ego. Just no stones though. They're not expecting me. And perhaps they've enrolled into false sense security. I haven't been out here for several weeks, like at least two or three weeks,

since maybe I've even stepped onto this field. I'll accept what I've been running. I have come up here when I've been running, but I've not cleared any stones in that time. It's hard to do when you're an elite athlete. So a pathetic haul of three stones, one medium, one flat of penis, one somewhere, that's going to say probably the size of my entire scrotum pre-operation, full scrotum onto the central ken. How do we cope with all these weeds? How do we cope with these plants? With difficulty, that's the answer. It's very hard. We just get more flies in our face. This is, you know, they're

really, the stone gods are really showing you how tough they can get out here. Some people might I work in a mine. Nine hours a day, I'm building cars in a factory, blazing lasers and sparks coming off stuff welding, but no one can know what this 30 minutes of walking around a field. Do you have dog dory in the mine? I don't think so. I've got my ammo for the stone pole here. There's a lovely bit of scree here that I found that's sort of just about on the, just about counts as being on the field, just the edge of the field as I walk along here has not got any plants on it and there's a lot of stones. There's a lot of scree. I don't hear enough about scree in this podcast. That's one of the things that will be coming up in this next hundred chapters. Forget all rules,

that's the first rule of intermediate stone clearing. Forget all the rules you know. Even the rule about there being no rules, but then the second rule is there are no rules. And the third rule, dog diarrhea on your finger. Don't put it in your mouth or eye. Wash, have a wash. If there's no damp grass around, careful with that grass. It could be just more dog wee on there and want to get out or find a brook. This is the kind of gold that those beginner idiots would never, would never see. We're at the stone pole. I think I can't really, it's very well hidden today. My goodness, we're out. This is even the stone pole is tough conditions, right? Woops. Right, I'm going to go dark style overarm and it's an immediate one out of one.

It's an immediate two out of two. This is the way to do it. Dark style. It's three out of three, tiny one now. Can I get four out of four? Oh, just missed. Can I get four out of five? No, that wasn't the pole. That was the pole next to it. Still three out of five, not bad. Let's get back. Woops. What should we go? Should we go there? Should we go to the can in the centre of the field? So we haven't been walking that long, have we? Let's go this way then. Okay, we'll go. There might be something for us this way. Remember you can sponsor me justgiving.com slash monoball if you want to increase your luck from that three out of five, three in a row. That's always special.

Darts. Darts grip. That's what I went for that time. And more flies. What a big patch of this all here. Maybe this is a better photo for you. Let's try this as the photo. I'm not sure it is. It doesn't look as quite a beautiful one of the sky. We'll see which one we end up using. It's all happening. It birds up on the telegraph wires. We've got to get past these thistles. Oh, it's going to be hard. Oh, ow, got a little bit, but they're pricking me through my clothes. That's how

picked up a tiny stone that I'm going to put on the central can. One of the smallest of the day. Maybe second smallest of the day. Don't know one offers me a big doughnut now and I forget about the dog diarrhea. Oh, yeah, yeah, nothing. Nothing much. I mean, it's been exciting, right? We have a lot of incidents. We don't need to falsify anything. A lot of incident given I'm out here alone. Oh, I can see. No threat. And tractor tracks. Even the tractor tracks, they're still covered with fallen wheat. You can't see anything. A few stones very much embedded in the ground. I don't have a

trowel with me. A narrow pilgrim path to the stone pole. Tell you what, I might take a right here and go down the path that I've rarely been down. Completing the diagonal across the full field. I would usually do. I've done a little triangle. I'll be turning right. Usually I come in from what is left is there. If you picture in the field in your head. Good to be back. There's good saddle. Literally in the saddle. It's good to be unencumbered by humanity. Literally, I can see the whole field. There is not a soul out here, apart from me and Wolfie. The whole world may have been destroyed

by a mystery virus, I wouldn't know. Oh, so here we are. So the diagonal leading back to the corner of the field. If I turn left, I'm going to turn right and go down the road less traveled. I think we have been down here on some podcasts. I had to dump a big lot of stones I never found again down here. Maybe I'll find them today, but it's unlikely. The wheat, very low here, actually weirdly. Wolfie now higher than the wheat. Don't know what's happened in this part of the field. Put a dog poo in the path that way there. Just at least try and pick it up guys. Come on. I know you can get a dog poo on your fingers, but that's just how it goes. The sun is still in the sky. It's 7.22 now. Still, I'd say a good couple of feet away from

the horizon. That's just based on where I'm standing. It's probably hundreds of thousands of miles. I don't know how the sun works. I'm cloudless. I can sort of look at it. And picking up a few little small mediums. Maybe not even small mediums. They're all pretty small. I've got three in the palm of one of my tiny hands, but there's a room for more there. Going to go on a ken that has not had much love. I'm heading for it now. I've done a kilometer now and 20 minutes and 41 seconds. Not too fast. All counts. If you're trying to get fit lifting these stones, I'm just doing a little little thing with the three little stones now in my hand. I look like Gareth Hunt,

making coffee. It's a nice small medium, large maybe. I guess the bunch has room for one more on this carousel. Who would it be? Is it going to be you, little Y shaped stone? That must mean something. You've got to look out for the ones that are letters. Often it's like scrabble. They won't necessarily spell something out directly, but if you work together, you can collect it enough. Literally not a soul out here. Actually quite scary. I'm going to go for six. I've got two hands. Coming back for the dog poop. By the way, I put it down. I know where it is. So I do have two free hands. It was covered in diarrhea, but there was a way to

carry it. Gingely. Poison in the distance of middle-aged people playing tennis. I assume they're older than me, but probably not. I feel like anyone with grey hair, 20 years older than me, when I look in the mirror. I remember who I am. Just pick up another. All small stones, all in the small category, put together. If you lump them all together, probably medium small. That's the way you've got to look at it. There's nettles around this pole that I'm going to put the and there are some stones from long ago just at the bottom of there. You heard them clinking blank together.

As we head back home towards the ditch that stopped Brexit, the main can will pass that again. It's been a relaxing one, isn't it? Dogs on the lead. I think I've probably wiped all the diarrhea off on stones now, so I'm probably safe to put it in my mouth. I'm not going to risk it. You shouldn't put your hands in your mouth on the field anyway, because you're picking up stones. You don't know where those stones could have been in the gut of a pterodactyl at some point. So watch out for that. All kinds of dinosaur diseases that could wipe out mankind could come another dog poo on the field there, on the path. Nice work, dog owners.

Good girl. How are you feeling? Yeah, I never even asked if you were okay, did I? After your terrible experience of doing a fairly soft poo. I don't want to come down to the kitchen to write another dog poo on the path. What's going on in this village? The monsters live here. Honestly, I have no care for the shoes and Paul Smith's shoes for the people walking around here with their dogs. They're coming up to the Dominic Cummings can, which again hasn't had much love, because the path towards it pilgrims stopped coming to it and the path has been eaten up by

crops. You actually have to walk along the edge of the field to get to it now. This was one of the desecrated cans, but largely okay there doesn't look as good as Ed's. Dominic Cummings scarf has gone. Passing the stone pole. I'm just thinking that three out of five. I was thinking that three out of three. How exciting that was. Then just jinxed myself. It's difficult when you're an Olympic athlete. You've been training for years, then you just lose it and you have to walk away sometimes. All right wolves, come on darling. There's none of the urgency of the morning walks here.

None of the fear yet. Maybe the stone starsy. They'll have a surprise up there. The smocked arms, but it's looking nice. Just clearing a few of the stones along here, just into the edge. There's a fence there and it's also grass growing on it. So it's a beautiful little cat jelly stone. You throw at it and if you get enough there while the grass is there, that's a wall. Big weeds to my right. Where are you going? What's going on? What have you seen? Another weak throw there actually. I'm afraid it did get the stones off a bit then and basically off the field anyway, so it's pretty impressive. Pretty impressive to miss.

That just didn't go where I was intending to go. That's why you have to stone clear every day. That's why you can't have a holiday from stone clearing. So I will be having a holiday in August and then another holiday in August. We may not have a stone clear for a couple of weeks, maybe a month. You can wait. I mean, can you wait for stuff like this? Man with a bit of dog diarrhea on his finger. Clearing stones, field, talking to himself. No one around. Let's see if there's anyone around. There's quarterwolves. Anyone there? Nope. Right. Pigeon. Shocks as both. I've thrown that stone onto the main cairn. Wolfie's off again. She's on the lead, on the long lead.

Got to pick up that dog poo on the way, Wolfs. You know where it is. Oh, I'll hold it gingerly. I'll get it. I'll get it home. It's a peaceful reverie out here. I'm having a lovely time. I feel that maybe I accidentally took some opiates. Maybe there was opiates in Wolfie's poo that have gone through my fingers. I feel very relaxed. Do you see the stone? This one looks like a claw. Look at that. It looks like a lobster claw. Wolfs, what do you think about that? I'm a lobster. Off it goes. It doesn't matter if it looks like a lobster's claw. It doesn't matter if it's made of solid gold. It wasn't.

And let's get some ammo for the ditch to stop Brexit. We really need it to work. Brexit's going so badly. I do believe. I do believe. Get on to your emails in a sec. Everything's fairly well stuck in the ground here. It's hard to get anything. Obviously, another stone headed me. It's tiny, but it'll do. The Brexit ditch doesn't care about size. Size isn't important. Tiny you are. The better it says. Always have all. Let's make it three. Hard to see the Brexit ditch because it's absolutely jammed up with nettles. Hard to remember where exactly the stones go. Let's have a listen. Yeah. You never forget. Look at that clink, clink, and clink. Three more stones. Find their home

and Brexit one step closer to ending. Let's get a couple of little tiddlers for the Alford-Omega Kin, and then I've just got to pop and pick up that bag. Four tiddlers for the Alford-Omega Kin. Then let me time for your emails, and then we'll be home. A lot of flies. That's why I landed on my moustache. All right, so I'm going this way quickly and just pick up that bag. Oh, and now I think it does the Alford-Omega Kin. I haven't left the field. I've carried on. I've gone around the field to pick up the bag. Here we go. Just around here. There it is.

And we'll just carry that gingerly home. Come on, Wolf. There you go. No, no, no. Wolf, come here. I think I'd better just give another stone to the Alford-Omega Kin. Come on, darling. Oh, look at that. That looks like a hot fisherman's hook. We're getting some really good-shaped stones today, because our letter could be an R. Y-R. What does the lobster claw look like? Another Y-Y-Y-R. I don't know what the stones are trying to tell me. They might be speaking in a different language. Of course, those little tiddlers have gone to the Alford-Omega Kin, and let's have a look through your emails. I'm not going to touch my phone due to having pierced my fingers, but luckily I can remember. I did memorize a couple of the emails.

And sadly, I have to end the podcast there, because the email I got turned out to be from an actor. I couldn't remember the name of the actor, but I remember the character, and then I talked for quite a long time about them and nearly got their name remembered. It was from a children's show from the 1980s. And then when I googled them on the podcast, I found out that they died in quite a sad way, and I didn't know. And it didn't seem appropriate to put that out. It sort of funny, but it was just a bit too horrible. And just in case anybody knew him, I've decided to not include that part of the podcast in a rare moment of sensitivity. So I hope you enjoyed that. Sorry we missed a little bit at the end there. There

was lots of classic stuff, including me washing my hands and recommending baling and hard soap, bales and harding soap. I think it is for getting off dog diarrhea, which I will still do. I think that's their main advertising campaign. Sorry you missed that bit. And I thought about putting it out because the humiliation is mine, but it's just a bit too sad as it turns out. See you next time on Stone Clearing with Richard Herring. Stone Clearing with Richard Herring, Sidney Richard Herring and Wolfie the Dog. The music is by Mike Coffgrave. The voice of the Patones is Michael Faheen.

The music is by Mike Coffgrave. The voice of the Patones is by Michael Faheen. The music is by Michael Faheen. The voice of the Patones is by Michael Faheen. My fine friend.