Stone Clearing With Richard Herring - Chapter 35

Episode Date: September 11, 2019

Chapter 35: Ashes to Ashes. It's about 5.30pm on 10th September 2019 and the village is still buzzing with talk of the fire. And whilst people count the financial cost of the damage, Richard is fairly jigging round the field as he finds stone after stone, each huger and more stony that the last. The plough has not made its official visit to the field yet, but what a harvest there is to come if this is anything to go by. The Brexit Ditch has its work cut out for it today, plus more emails from you, the listeners. We do read all the emails, but sorry, we can only read out the best ones.

Stone Clearing with Richard Herring Welcome to chapter 35 of Stone Clearing with Richard Herring. 10th of September 2019 is 5.31pm and I'm heading out to the field. I did actually record a Stone Clearing podcast yesterday. It went wrong, it began in the middle and it just felt boring. After the excitement of last week it didn't feel up to standard. I don't want to let you down with just boring content. So I decided to dump it and hope something more interesting would happen today.

Hopefully a meteor or something like that. We have to up the ante really. You can't have a fire and then just have a bloke walking around the field. Or maybe you can. We'll find out how it goes today. Hopefully we'll sort out what's wrong with my phone and ear pods. It's a perfect system for recording. Interestingly I've come out today without the trout. Because I found the hard ground is too hard to really get much out of and the soft ground.

Really there's just stones lying around out here. Like gold nuggets don't generally. So we'll see how it goes today. We'll see if this goes out. There is a lost podcast out there anyway that only the very determined who have managed to steal my phone and download the two sections. We'll be able to get to this one. Someone coming. Whoops, come here.

Whoopie, good girl. Whoopie stay here, stay here. Good girl. We're going to go this way and then we'll pass them quickly. This does mean I can't really stone clear this exact point. This is presumed sun. Two dogs. Whoopie, whoopie, whoopie.

Good girl. Come on sweetheart, good girl. Little bit. Yeah, yeah, it was nuts. I was here the afternoon. There was a fire engine on here and yeah, it was crazy. I think it's just the dry ground. Yeah, I thought they were burning the crops.

Yeah, yeah, because it was all over. There was like little plumes of smoke coming out over there as well. So it was, you know, they drove across the field and put it out. Yeah, yeah. No, it was pretty serious. I think they were just putting it out themselves while the fire brigade arrived as well. Come on, you doggy. So still the talk of the village.

The great fire of Richard Haring's stone field. I'm going to risk, just give my colleague a risk, freeing one little stone there while I'm still in sight of that. Man, I've never seen before. And his son, actually they're heading off the field, which is good for me. And his son in inverted commas. Not that I think there's anything going on between the two of them. I just think he might be, yeah. The agent out to try and, you know, try to trap me.

Just be friendly, talk about the fire. Then what's happened on the stone stand here? You know, that's the kind of way they work. So anyway, yeah, no trowel today because I feel like just bang, pick that out. Nice, meaty sized stone. I'll just go to the edge. I mean, I'm passing hundreds of stones here. I could stop and pick every single one up.

It would make this forecast extremely long. One day maybe we'll do that. But for the moment, we'll be. For the moment, and luckily my lucky fence was not caught up in the fire. So that can still act as a barrier for my stones. And yeah, just the work now. I thought I'd cleared this edge section of the field, but now it's been plowed up. And bang, huge amount of extra work for me.

I'm still not getting to the middle, which is obviously where I need to get to eventually. And the fire reveals a nice under tree section there where I have got quite an impressive little can having built up. No one else around as far as I can see. I'm not being paranoid. But it's good to see the stones having survived. I can see them, a lot of them just appearing for the first time for a long time. But occasional one with a little bit of charring on it. There's a good example.

Maybe I'll take a photo of that field. I'll risk doing that and stopping the recording. That's the worst example of charred stone. We're still going, hopefully. But yeah, it's still going. So that's still going if it stops, it's not my fault. This is the aftermath of the fire. But most of the stones not even burnt.

And of course, even the burnt ones that will wash off in the rain, I expect. And really just able to just get a handfuls of really good sized, medium sized stones with occasional whopper. These have all just been pulled up by the plow. Not something that I would do myself there. First rule of stone clearing, of course, is there are no rules to stone clearing. The second rule is you must not use any kind of mechanical tools to assist you in your work. That is wrong. But, however, if someone else uses a mechanical tool to offer something else,

you are allowed to take advantage of that. Oh, and as I talk, one of the nicest, biggest stones that have come out for a while. We're going to find a special place for that, which isn't quite so obvious. So, yeah, this is definitely on the large scale. There's quite a few down here, and these brambles are sticking down there. And it's certainly the biggest in that crop. So that's what I mean. There's just these, and that was a brown beauty.

Looked like soil was solid, chunk, large. I mean, it's difficult to be the large because I haven't seen the largest possible stone, the large medium, I'd say, and then maybe some more. I don't want to go too big too soon because then you'll have to maybe add extra large. If we find much, much bigger stones, which might as we go into the middle, I think, I think slightly, I'm working on an area that another stone clearing may have worked on at some point in the past. He may have got the real nuggets out here, leaving me to pick up the pieces so to speak.

But there's still plenty here. And who knows? Oh, yeah, look, there's a nice old can. It's just finding loads of old cans here. There's one built around another similar sized chunk of earth that just added a few stones. So it's very exciting in this part of the field. But last week we recorded with Chris Evans on that one. And his son, Ben Evans, is passing on the business for a win.

I mean, he's, I think he's like nearly 45 or something, Chris Evans. So obviously he's a Welsh man that is extremely old, passing on the secrets of his DVD empire to his son before he passes away. And they were here filming. And it's interesting because there's this plowed area. It has a break for the fire. Very useful for me. And very lucky it happened the week it did for me.

Not for all the other people. I thought that was a stone. I think there's just one. It is a stone, or is it a mud? I think it's a stone. The retreat is a stone. Very fortunate for me that all these people lost their fences and their gardens and costed their lives.

I didn't look into that because otherwise it would have been a very boring video because most of this field is about to see is rock hard covered in hay straw, whatever, which is why it went up. I thought it was the farmer burning off the crops. I think I said last time, but it was not that. It was just an excellent wire starting up in the heat. So, yeah, we've been just walking around with me saying, yeah, I can't really do any stone clearing because of the conditions.

But luckily for that video and people who have subscribed to that, I don't have to be rubbing their hands with Glee and other people's misfortune. Because, yeah, it meant we could just clear some stones. It meant we've got a lot of stones to clear. I'm actually going to take a deviation. It's no one around. I'm going to take a deviation off the path. It's sort of all right now.

The crops have been taken. I'm going to follow around the centre of the field where the cloud has been. See if there's anything out here. It would be nice to clear a little bit from the more central part to see what's going on. I am a pretty long way from the shore here, but I think I can probably still throw a few stones if I'm careful and watch out for the path of the Bible if you can treat that as well. That one's gone more or less onto the path, so that's good.

I think these are big old stones out here as well, of course. There's a burnt one here. Maybe I could have done with my... Oh my goodness. This is the biggest one ever. It's burnt. This is the biggest one I've found. I'm going to carry it to the side.

I cannot fling that to the side. No way. No sir. This is the size of Wolfie's head and bigger. I can't believe it either. It's like a brick really, just not quite as square there. Looks like it might have been part of the dwelling at some point actually. And yeah, the edge is burnt.

Might have to get a photo of this one as well. But the rest was underground. I think that's probably part of a Roman Diller or something. It doesn't matter to me. It's coming off the field. I'll take a photo of it just for any archeologists out there who I hope are not listening. Because it would be inappropriate.

So who knows which photo you'll get as the... Maybe when that doesn't really give an idea of the size, I'll put my foot next to it to show how. That's a size eight foot. It's much bigger than that. So still going... Still going to start. Cool.

Yeah, well that was worth a little transgression across that. I think it's the biggest stone. Certainly in heft, it just was big in each direction. The size of like a good portion of a breeze block. You can't imagine what a size eight foot looks like if I show that as my picture there. So that was a great excursion. We'll go back into that.

And that's what I think. I think the centre of this field might just be filled with that kind of treasure. Or superior in any way to any stone. But mine is exciting and better to find stuff like that. I mean, I'm amazingly cool and calm. Given what I've just found. And yeah, there's just tonnes of this stuff out here. Literally, literally tonnes.

Oh, dropped a couple of them. Just picking up some mediums ready here on a small scale. But it's interesting to have a look and see what's out here. Bloats, I mean just tonnes of stuff. As I said, and... I mean, I know how Tony Robertson feels on that occasional time-team dig. But I should find something. It's just every step.

There's another one with a definitely large side of medium. There's another one in there. That's not that big. Drop the small one and pick it up. I might just walk across and take these over to the can opposite the major can. Yeah, and actually this, I'm obviously on the field now. And even looking between the hay on the unburnt and the un-plowed bits, you can see just the scale of the task that I've set myself.

Even through this hay, I can see hundreds of reasonable sized stones. And remember, I'm wanting to go two metres down, complete soil, so that there's not really any chance in a lifetime in the hundred generations that there will be any stones at all on this field. However much it's ploughed and furrowed. It's a dream. And I will achieve it, especially with a day like today, where just every one of these stones that's coming off here is big.

The size of mine, I cannot reiterate that enough. So yes, do you remember your rules of stone clearing? Please, I hope you're writing these down. People who do the kick starts will get a list of all the ones that I've done up to that point. But that one about the machinery might be new. I don't have the property to make sure. And just add a little stone on top of the tiny, this one, but I'm going to get that off.

I'm going to skim it off the station. Ah, it still hit the station. It didn't skim very well. Oh, and there's someone coming. So it's going to have to be a little bit quiet. I'll get much back on the lead, so she's not too excited. That's a shame because we're coming up to crossing the field to the main can. And there are lots of picking here and probably going to have to let go because there are lady and red trousers.

There are two donations there. Some kind of dogs there. Not donations though. I hope that's not another fire. All right, good girl. There we go. Look at that old fella. Come on. Good girl. Come on. Good girl.

I mean, I can see some smoke coming up. It's not my field, so I don't really care. But from the next field, just, oh, God. This is just like having to me. I don't know if you can sense it in my voice, how excited I am. But just went down, picked up a lovely chunky medium there. Another one here, a little bit smaller, but still not insignificant. And I'm walking past ones that I just know I won't be able to carry underneath of the things.

They're just on top of the soil. It's literally unbelievable. And to think this isn't even the proper plow yet. The harvest is yet to come. There is so much more of this. This is just like a little gift to me. Oh, there's someone coming. There's another brilliant one just there.

Come on, good girl. Come back from where we may have to come back another day. So there he goes. I've got a shame. I can't get away, can I? Well, mate, don't be a tree. There's a lot to pass through the mountain back here. Let's see.

Hi there, you guys. Good girl. She's very playful today. She's quite a few dogs today. There we go. Come on, sweetheart, good girl. Good girl. Come on.

Actually, we haven't been up to the stone pole recently, have we? I don't feel we have. They haven't been doing the long morning walk with you. Just this short. I mean, it's not much fun to do the long walk, because there's no stones. That may have to wait until the proper plow, which will be coming.

It's just this little extra plow we've been given thanks to the gods of fire. You know, I think I certainly understand God's side. Oh, I can't believe I have to leave those beauties behind. I might have to go back for them. It's all right, wish. Calm down. There's time. You have it.

Time is on your side. That's all you have out here. I've got us trying to stay alive for 30, 40 years, so I can get as much of this stuff as possible. I don't know if that'll be everything, but at least now my life has purpose. I'm going to pick up a couple of pebbles from this path, because that's all I can see. Trying to hit the stone pole, which is still some way away.

I've been really useless for so long here. Comparative to what we just had to leave behind is that man in his hat for this stupid dog ruining it on purpose. I'm not stupid. I'm not stupid. We will be passing the ditch that stopped Brexit. There's some controversy about whether that is working at the moment.

I mean, it is working at the moment, but will it be working by the end of October? We will see. The ball is in your court. The stone is in your court position. And he's hit the pole straight away. I didn't even tell him he was going to hit one out of one. One out of three now.

Well off with the fourth one, but I hit the first time. And let's go home and put the kids to bed. Been a decent little walk. And yeah, I cannot complain. I cannot complain about what I have pulled out of the earth. The day I was pulled off the top of the earth. And sure, this podcast only has some smoke in the distance that may be the beginnings of another major field fire.

Probably should ring 999 and tell someone about it, but doesn't look like it's my problem. I think it's probably just a proper fire. Who knows? But we don't, that's the thing. We don't need that kind of excitement here at the Stoneclawing podcast. Just the...

I don't know. My number one dad. T-Chains come apart. Oh, that's a lot of rubbish. My daughter made me a thing that says, my number one dad looks just fallen apart in my pocket. There's the bit. I might be able to mend it.

It's almost like I'm not the number one dad. Didn't think I'd put my keys out with me today. And sort of left them at home because, you know, it's safer in it. Oh, what a disaster. So that's all of the things that the Stones can do. I don't know if that was even the Stones' fault, because maybe my phone's fault. I don't know what I was saying, but...

I am the number one dad. If anyone wants to dispute that, I do have a broken keychain that does express that sentiment. I brought here a jingling of jangling in my pocket as we walk along now. Hope you can. So I might just have time to go back

and pick up those four mammoth stones that I didn't manage to get to the... to the central can. Well, the main can around the central can is probably the one by the telegraph pole. You know the ones I'm talking about. I don't need to walk around and draw a map. A few little ones here.

I'll just toss in so at least I've done something. If I don't, I'll just get these boys out. I don't know where that guy went. It's a bit weird that he's just totally disappeared, I would say. Maybe he was the agent. You know, some of these people might be innocent dog walkers. Weird how so many of them I haven't seen before. Oh, that one's smashed on the can as a trust.

Do be careful not to start a fire by triangle. Your stone's around too much. So back crossing there, burnt. This must be where the fire began. This is black beneath me. A few stones here. That one as if for warfare. It's actually not too badly.

It's too fast to throw to the edge, but I got it quite near. Let's see if we can relocate there. I mean, the thing is, there are so many big ones that I'll just have to pick up some different big ones probably. Was it these two? I don't know. Was it these? I mean, there's either group too, and they're suspiciously. I think it was these one.

I don't have my coat on today, which makes it slightly difficult to transport these big ones. Just looking around. I'll just take a few extra big ones, just in case they were the ones, but I think I found the right one. There is another dog in the distance, I think, too far away. Did see all of this particular round. Yeah, I've got five or six nice sized mediums here.

That will really make a difference to this main can, which has, there's been some significant slideage. I don't know if I mentioned that last time, but that was in the forgotten pot coffee. They're not spud gas, but it is transforming into more of a wall. It's a long, slithery snake. It's stoned. It definitely is subsided somewhat in its glory days,

but I think that might be a good thing if I was not drawing too much attention to myself. There's so many stones I'm just kicking, some of them. So wards over that one broke as it fell, interesting. And yeah, that's a nice addition. That's going nicely down the hill. Again, there's a lot of, well, I kicked it on there and Wolfie managed to basically kick it back on to the field,

but I think I've got it off this time. And I've just had one of my centric ones. I got on that little journey to this little area where I'm trying to basically block a animal path, so quite a few of the stones have rolled down either accidentally or been pushed by the animals. They're not only trying to stop their progress, but I will defeat them.

Stone beats animals in the game. Paper, scissors, stone, animals. It also beats scissors and it beats paper as well, because the paper can cover the stone, but for how long? What if there's a fire? But if there isn't a fire, how about just like the old rot? So, you know, don't take on stones. That's what I'm saying, don't take on rocks.

I don't take on scissors either really, just as a general rule, but if you've got a stone, just try and hit the blades. You probably get stabbed as well, but the stone will be okay. And that's the main thing about that game. I think we can all agree. So, I'm approaching the ditch that stopped Brexit. It's already the ditch that's been topped for exit. I've already picked up quite a few little minis.

You know, small mediums in that kind of area. Nothing fancy. The Brexit ditch does not require ceremony and fancifulness. It just requires stone in any form. And that is definitely what it's getting today. I'm going to lay out into the field just to see if there's anything more substantial out there. The ones that culture aren't always the big ones, and there's just two more joining this merry throng of Brexit ditch stones.

I do feel I have to put more than one in just at the moment. There is quite a nice size one just out here, which I think I'll collect as well. I might not put that in the ditch. That's just the kind of guy I am. The small, large, that one. In any case, there's plenty to pick, so I'll kick a few down towards the ditch. But here come, hopefully you'll hear the click-clack there, isn't it? Stones entering the ditch that stopped Brexit.

So far, no Brexit. And I think with these stones, I wouldn't like to be Boris Johnson tomorrow. Even without a parliament, I'm just kicking some more in as well. Crazy, just so full of stones. Makes me happy. It should make me really sad, because just what have I achieved? Nothing. How long will it take me to do what I'm trying to do forever?

Why do seeing more stones make me happy? Less stones should make me happy. You know, if I succeeded in this job, I think I might just put the stones back, because, you know, I realized the stones were the journey all along. We'll see, I'm going to finish. For the moment, we seem to be a little away from that eventuality. So, a lot of emails have been coming in, of course. If you keep them coming in, sorry, I can't read them all out.

There's just too many people emailing about this, too many people listening. I haven't checked the figures for the downloads, but it's got to be a lot. Brian Bramble taking this much like sabbatical from Stone Clearing as well at the moment. It's partly due to his podcast having gone stratospheric. He has some work in New Zealand where he lives. Big media stuff working on some movies. But that doesn't mean that there's a gap in the market for me, so hopefully Brian Bramble's listeners are coming over to me

and staying for the Superior Podcast. I think this is the best Stone Clearing podcast available, but some say I'm biased. Anyway, we have had some emails. Ivy Holly, those are two first names of Blackberry. They don't have to say much. I'm quite disappointed by the standard of questions on the podcast. They're almost like the people sending in who haven't begun to think about what they're going to put,

and then they just blurt out the first thing they say. And it's often quite a dull question that doesn't need even answering. What can we do about it when it's someone going to ask an interesting question on the email facility? It's a good point, Ivy Holly Blackberry. Yeah, I've noticed that too. Just like very dull questions, badly thought out. And these are the ones I'm getting that you have to remember. So, well, that was a good question.

So, well done to you for getting that one together, because that was a good one. But just for the rest of you all, I can say please try and understand a little bit of the stuff you're sending in. Yeah, just out of the light. It's really neat. So Conker AU. No, Ago. Sorry, I haven't read it. It's some kind of car as well. They just mentioned that in their email. Conker. They've been in touch.

Is it Binde today, Rich? Really, is that going to waste your question on? I mean, it is Binde today. Yeah, I'm just, the bins are just here. I'm going to bring them in. But I mean, really, why waste your question on something like that? And also, it might not have been Binde. I've read it out today, so you've got lucky Conker.

But, you know, don't waste my valuable time. I've got bins to get in and stuff. So, bins of bin. Remember, bin men won't take stones, and nor should you put stones in the bin. You mustn't take stones off the field that are cursed. Alright, well, it's a good girl. We can come off then. It's a good girl. She was going to have some dinner.

Well, yeah, I think that's about it today. I think that was a debt podcast, and the one I did yesterday. So, you have locked out. My wife was in the kitchen when I returned yesterday. Luckily, she didn't suspect anything. I suspect she's just running about now. Just about to. Come on, Morse.

Come get your dinner. Do keep listening to podcasts. Do keep subscribing. Tell any friends you think might be interested in a podcast about clearing stones. That's what it is about. There's nothing else to it. Don't start looking for metaphors and political comment in this. That's not what it's about.

It's about a man. It just does what it says at the beginning. A man clearing stones from a field and explaining how you can do the same if you're interested. The dog has its food. Brian Nature's menu has been in touch. To say which is there are more metaphorical significance to the podcast. Then it seemed at first glance. Listen, I just said, do I listen to it?

I mean, you know, obviously when you emailed that, I hadn't said that. But I literally just said that. So don't email in with things I've just, you think I might just have said. It's a waste of my time. I'm a busy man. I don't have time to waste. I've got sitcoms to write for all sorts of stones to clear. I don't want to waste time answering stupid questions I've already talked about just that minute ago.

Sorry to blew my top there a bit at Brian Nature's menu. It's been an emotional day. I mean, when you see that picture of my foot next to that big stone I found, I think you'll be amazed how much I kept that in and didn't go nuts. Because that was a big day for me. I think it involved you. Just in maths. Anyway, 32 minutes down.

Let's leave it there. Thanks for listening. We'll see you again next time on Stone Clearing with Richard Herring. Thanks to all my fans. Keep those emails coming in. Keep it down, Wolfie. I'm trying to do this thing. Bye.

Stone Clearing with Richard Herring starred me, Richard Herring, and Wolfie the dog. The man with the son and the dog, and then that lady with the dog, and then that man with the dog. The music is by Mike Coffgrave, and the voice of the Photones is Michael Faheen. Do you want to know what's really spooky? After the walk, I looked in my pocket, and my key fob was back together, unbroken. Even though it was broken when I put it in the pocket, and I didn't put it together. And Wolfie's just come across to lick my hand because she knows it was magic. It's fine.

Even though it was broken, maybe the piece just slipped back into place and it locked in there. Or maybe it was magic. The magic of the stones.