Stone Clearing With Richard Herring - Chapter 8

Episode Date: January 8, 2019

Chapter 8: Ozymandius. The sun is coming up behind cloud cover at about 7.40am on 8th January 2019 and the secret stone clearer of Hertfordshire reluctantly leaves his feckless family behind for a more important calling. It's a technical podcast this week, not for beginners, which will give you guidance on how to choose the stone you clear from the confusing multitude. But it also considers why the stone clearers of old have left so little evidence of their work and how working at this job for so long changes your perspective on what must be done. Plus a thrilling incident involving violent dogs, and more of the chess game that is trying to avoid as many dog walkers as possible. Read more about stone clearing at http://www.richardherring.com/warmingup and see a portion of the field in the video intro to RHLSTP with the Fingers on Buzzers podcast (up on 9th Jan): https://www.youtube.com/user/Herring1967

Stone Clearing with Richard Herring Oh, I've got to do now. I'm gonna go now Phoebe. I'm just walking the dog, okay? Can you sing me a song, Phoebe? What about daddy? What about daddy? Oh, that's beautiful. All right, I'll see you. See you, Ernie. See you in a sec. I'm just literally walking the dog. Don't worry, Ernie. That's all it literally is. Okay, bye. Bye. There's Puffles. They have no idea. I wish I could tell them what was going on, but I think they'd be proud. But that's the Stone Clearing's lot. So here we go. It's the 8th of January. It's early. It's like maybe quarter to eight going about early.

Today you've got a few appointments. Not as early as I'd like, actually. Today's gonna be quite technical. Yes, the conditions are actually still a little bit dark, which is exciting. Conditions are okay. It seems like it might be a little damp. And that's not too cold. It's not been that cold really all winter, so that's quite good. There are other issues other than cold that will affect the Stone Clearing. Mainly on this field, there's a crop growing on it, of course, so that's kind of a girl, I apologize. And obviously that will make things more difficult. It'll be difficult to see where the stones are. But that is just one of the many challenges the Stone Clearing has.

I'm wondering if one year this field may be left fallow. That will be an amazing year. I'm already looking forward to a cloud day where the whole new family of stones will be uncovered from beneath the surface. Of course, it's not just the surface I have to clear here. It's every single stone. I mean, realistically down to six feet, something like that. I'm not gonna become obsessive and try and clear the stones to the centre of the Earth directly because that will involve removing the Earth's core, which I'm not there to do. That would be crazy. So today's Stone Clearing podcast, Stone Clearing with Richard Herring, is going to be, mainly for experts actually, if you're a newbie, we've given you quite a few podcasts just to wet your whistle.

I am going to be talking to people. I mean, I've seen most of you start at Stone Clearing right now. Just trying to dig up a bit of a slide. I want to look quite small for that. Oh, there we go. That was quite a big one. And, you know, I'm getting a lot of questions coming in. I can't answer them all. There's so many emails coming in about this from people who are clearing their own stones. I'll be like, well, if he's out right now there, she's doing a poof and then right in the middle of the field, it's fine. That will catch out some stone clearers later. Or if he's like a kangaroo, the way she's doing there. Yes, this is, today will be for more expert people. I mean, the number of emails I've had,

I've had an email from Ian Tree. He emailed him to say, hi, Richard. How do you select which stone you're going to pick? That's a very common question. Also, Simon Fentz has been in touch. He's asked the same thing. Gloria Pebble. She's been in touch to say good name for a stone clear, isn't it? I didn't make it up. How do you choose? There's a billion stones on my field. How do I know which one to pick? Well, I think the thing that I've learned most in my long time of stone clearing, and I think this will resonate with a lot of stone clearers out there. When you start, you just think, I've got to get every stone. I've got to get the more you try, you can.

You've got to put your arm towards the stones around. Obviously, we didn't reason to try not to get discovered by other dog walkers, etc., and so on. But in my vast experience from now, six or so months, you realise, hey, look, these stones aren't going anywhere until you take them somewhere. You don't have to get them, or if you just clear one a day, that's fine. You clear one a day, and then in a billion days, job done. If you clear two a day, you've just taken half a billion days. So, you know, it's not that much different, is it? So, that's my main tip. A lot of you will have gone out and very excited and tried to take out all the stones in a day or two, realise that's impossible, become disenchanted, maybe even give an upstone clearing as something that's ridiculous to do. And I pity the people that that happens to be there. Look, you could walk around the field, take one stone off.

You have to feel which stones want to come off. And the way you choose, the way the stone chooses you, I've taken off about six or seven stones just as we were talking in this little bit. So, you know, that's better than one a day, isn't it already? So, I'm up. The way you choose is, you let the stones choose themselves, I think. You go out, a stone will appeal to you, and you will say, yes, it's your time. It's like the stone is talking to you, the stone isn't talking to you. If the stones start talking to you, please seek medical assistance. That is, they can't talk. They have no mouths, no vocal cords. They have no brain to kind of, even if you believe they were psychic in some way, which sometimes they do seem to be, they still can communicate because they're just made of stone.

And as far as science knows, the stone isn't capable of any language. But they still speak to you in another way, which is to say, hey, it's my turn, and maybe I'll just be like this one. Bang, why have I picked this one? Because just the flat whiteness of the outside here just attracted my attention. Look here, there's a point, there's a hundred stones just here, but that one I like, that one I like. And what I'm trying to do now, especially around the edge where there are less big stones, I'm trying to pick five little stones out which, on each journey off the shore, I'll just drop one. There it is, that's lucky. Well, maybe it was all the same, but I've got five now anyway. And then that is a good sized stone that fills the palm of my hand, those five stones.

It's not just about size, Andy McCage is obsessed with just picking the big stones out. Yes, those are satisfying. Yes, it's great when you find a big stone. But sorry if this is getting too technical again, if you are a new listener, this probably isn't the place to start. I mean, you know, why not start at the beginning? What's wrong with you? But also, please feel free to skip this one till you have been to stone clearing like me for months, rather than for a couple of days, like, you know, somebody's going to come in and say, oh yeah, enough stone clearing. And then just become bored of it and you need the staying power, really.

So those five went onto the can in the corner of the field. The field, actually, that's a can if you want to see, if you watch the episode of Rohelistapa, Rohelistapa with a bunch of fingers on the buzzer's team. You'll see a little intro where I'm in this corner of the field and you can see how that particular can is developing. It's a city video, which is obviously a rarity. So here, along the path, we found three really decent sized stones. Sometimes that will be what attracts you. Sometimes it'll be like, hey, I've walked past this place a million times, I've never seen that stone.

That's the stone. It's come up, it's grown, it's come out of the ground, it's said, it's my time, it's my time. There's a dog walker, a little way away, so it's fine for the moment. Yeah, I mean, sometimes the size of a stone will attract you. Come here, woofie, woofie. And sometimes it will just be this shape. This one, this one, it's the size of the fingernail of a largeish man. And I've just picked that waffle on its own. Brown on one side, black on the other side, bit of flint.

It has to come off the field at some point. It's coming off now. I've taken three minutes just looking at it, familiarising myself with it so that I'll recognise it again. If anyone comes to me and says, well, this one is yours. I remember that beauty. And then, bang, that one's gone while it was driving me through the roots of the trees that lie in the split. But for now, I'm available this time. Missed there, but it landed where it wanted to go. That's the other thing. Another thing, I was just approaching a couple of dogs, so I might not want to get onto a brand new important point.

I'm just pretending I'm a regular dog walking out, so passing some nice stones and I can't take you. Coming up to the can at the other end of the path to the main can, you know what I'm talking about. So this guy's got his dogs under him as well. He's got two dogs, black one and a brown one. And Wolfie's haunches are raised in a way that would annoy one guy. Anyway, well, let's just pretend we're making a dog walk. He's heading across the field. He's moving his pants past. I think his dogs look crazy and maybe they will.

So he's speeding up a little bit now to get past him. Come here, Wolfie. Good girl. Good girl, you've been a good girl. Good girl. Morning. Wow. Whoa. Good girl. Well done, Wolfie. Good girl. Good girl. Good girl. That was a bit of excitement. That's one of the silent type of dog walks. He just sort of smiled to me with a...

menacing look on his face, really knowing he had two vicious dogs and stepped aside into the field, which obviously is something people should not be doing. And just stood there with his two dogs. He let us pass. They're still standing, looking at us like log dogs, but they're not log dogs. They're actual dogs. I'm pretty sure of that. Wolfie behaved very well at my little encounter. I think she recognized the danger. She stayed with me.

Right at the last moment, they both came for her. Some force nearly toppling the burly, rotund gentleman who was holding them, smiling, gurning like a foolish yokel. That's what happened there for the people in this thing. It's for the dog walking bit. He's still standing in the same place, so he's afraid to let his dogs go, even whilst we're in sight, but that dog is looking at me. So there's been a whole four or five minutes here where no stone playing has been allowed to take place.

But I might risk bending down and picking up one just here as Wolfie does a wee. And this is the kind of mystical tree that has a scattering of stones. I'd just like to throw the stones towards that one and see where they land. See there? Oh, actually, that's quite interesting. I'd stone really grabbed my attention. I thought that's the one. See, that's when I knew it told me it was time to go. And when I bent down to get it, it was a leaf. So that's the way that nature tricks you.

This is the way that trees have probably survived. The reason why I'm just not a fan of that is that they use their fallen leaves as decoys, as stone clearers, and that gives them a purpose in evolution somehow. So, right, we're outside now. I mean, immediately, look, I don't know how these guys have not been picked up on a previous walk, but four or five nice sized stones, and sometimes they'll lead you. That's what I'm going to say. One stone will lead you to the stone that is time to go. You see what I mean? Oh, there's a dog, some dogs, and then some...

I have to be a little bit careful. Sometimes you'll drop a stone. There's some dogs through the fence. Just one of those dark walkers. You'll pick up a stone, it'll fall. But where it falls, there will be another stone, and that stone has led you to this stone. It's saying it's this stone's time.

So listen to the stones. Listen, nothing's random in this universe. These stones, the way they're placed, it looks too random. That's what I'd say. It looks like someone would say, how can we make this look like it's random? Let's make it look really, really random, but it isn't random. We're doing it for a reason, and the reason is... Well, I don't know what the reason is.

All I know is my... If I knew that, then I wouldn't be doing the stone clearing podcast. I'd be king of the universe, mate. So, what I'm doing... All I'm doing is getting the stones off. I know that's my duty. Well, the dog's out. This is the early hour. There's another dog coming, and this is slightly annoying, because this dog's coming towards us,

just as I'm approaching my forbidden corner of the field, which I wanted to talk to you a little bit about. A lot of consternation. At least one person who listened to the last podcast couldn't believe that I went into another field. And does it mean the fact that I've cleared some stones from another field that I now have to clear that field as well? Have I given myself that job?

Just saw a bit of grey there. I'm poking out from the side, the left-hand side of the shore, but I still kicked it into touch, just goes out of the way in again. Some nice stones here in the path, and I'm just going to kick them because we're being watched. Ah, but that dog is gone. The dogs, I think, had to come out this early. It may be a little bit more troubled,

maybe not the mentally ill dogs that we've seen in previous podcasts, but dogs with violent attitudes, that owner has decided, either he's seen me walking on, talking to myself, and thought, well, let's move away from this, or he knows his dog is troubled, and still can see through the fence, he's still coming into the other field,

which means I can't go there. But what is interesting about this corner of the field, A, it goes into the next field, where there's just stones littered. I imagine it's like being an explorer going to some island where there's just jewels all over the beach that the native people have no value for, and don't realise they're important,

maybe you can just pick up off the ground. That's what that feels like. But do I? I'm just telling you, it's just a bit of a gist at this corner, which I love to be in. Come on, girl, good girl. Good girl.

That's good. What do you think we've got away with that one? I might be able to just dawdle here a little bit, and that dog and her owner are heading up, up in that one right near to the field that we're talking about. I'm just going to dawdle in this corner so we can come back. I should just have a little check around here,

because this is an area that I do throw stones from a distance at, so there's often stones just lying. We haven't gone this way in previous podcasts, and indeed I haven't gone this way for a little while. I'm going to go out as a giant there. Oops. That may be one of the ones I've thrown. Okay, I think we're alone.

We'll be. Come in if you don't believe me, I think. Good girl. This corner is fascinating, not only because of this extra field. They're walking away, they're not looking there, so hopefully we'll get away with this. They won't think my behaviour is suspicious.

But there is also a wall here, and that's a broken wall nonetheless. We found that big bit of it the other day. But at one point there was a wall along here, and that is interesting to me. It's fallen now. It's like Ozymandias, a feat of that wall. And I'm now in the next field

and picking up a couple of stones and throwing them towards my can. I just can't resist, even though I think this is wrong. I know many of you do. But I can't resist the beauties that are here. They're much bigger and better. I mean, not that size is important, and I can't be in the cage then.

They're just here. It's difficult to avoid them. And now the one way of noticing what I'm doing is what I'm going to have to do. No, of course, the wall is here. I'm actually standing on the base of this wall, the feat of the Ozymandias Street, if you will. That wall was made with cement.

Someone cemented together, I think, stones from the field. They look like it. They created a wall, and perhaps thought that that wall would stand for generations, for years, and be a testament to them. But the wall is gone. The wall's fallen.

Now, I will use the foundations of that wall in my wall. I'm not stupid. That is historically what wall builders have done. You just have to go and see any ex-Roman city in this country, or probably where you live, in America, where they've probably won that many Romans, I don't know, I'm not a historian.

Look at the size of this beauty. I'm going to get the trail over this one, just checking the ones around. Now, what attracted me to that one was partly the size. But it's in the middle of a field. This part of the field is just festooned with stones. And so, look, I'm just picking up four or five. I might take these back with me,

or rather than go and start crossing the field. What attracted me to these four was part of the size, but there was equally big ones all around. I don't know if some's coming. Of course, I'm going to have to be quick. I've got the bush to hide us a little bit, won't be. And let's go onto that corner here. Let's go, Wolf, quick.

Someone's on the way. So, yeah, I don't know. It's hard to know. It's hard to know what the egg factor is, because you're going to have to go back, and you're going to have to get all of these stones, and the ones that are far out into the stone ocean. Of course, there's just a little clump of three or four,

just small to regular sized stones there that have attracted my attention. I'm going to try and throw those as far towards the shore as possible. It looks like a game. One of them's gotten onto the par. One of them's made the run all the way home, and a couple of them, it's just a little bit closer to the way from the pool,

and a bit of distance to throw there. I've got to be in a bad arm, because I'm really not quite good to stone kick. So, yeah, so obviously we build on that board of the past, but that wall of the past also reminds us of the folly. It's interesting, I was thinking about this, that obviously stone clings have been going on for a long, long time yet. When you walk around fields, where are the walls?

Where are the walls made by those people in the past? I think partly stone clings in the past were seen as weird, vagrants. There were nude men walking around fields picking up stones, and people were doing as secret as possible, but that's difficult when you're naked. And they were chasing, and in those days could be killed. And though that is still a danger, I'm not denying, certainly come out at night time,

if people in the pharmacy are clearing stones from this field, you may be enraged and shoot you. That is still a problem for modern-day stone clearers. But where are those walls? Where are the walls built by the men of yore? And I picked up this just to think of a little stone here that looks a bit like a bone or something. It definitely isn't a bone,

but that is the factor we do to its quirky shape. I'm obviously crossing the field now, so I'm limiting the number I can pick up. I've got now three stones. This one, just the whiteness, it's standing up and it's ready to go. This one, I mean, again, this is probably all stone.

This one is picking up a light brown spearhead like stone. It just calls to me. I'm not literally, I'm not mad, so don't start thinking that. I'm just thinking about it and see if I need to jump up and cross the field there, don't they? There's one in the far corner over there. He's the guy nearly found me. A lot of dog walkers out there,

they're not friendly ones, seemingly they're all keeping their distance. It suits me, suits me, but it's fun to talk to them on the podcast. Oh, there's another guy over there. Yeah, so this is, it's returning to a bit of a military operation today. I'd both keep the dog safe,

which is one of my responsibilities. That guy, then I'll have to pick that guy up. He's just lying there black as night. I thought, let's give him a go. And none of these particularly big stones, there was lots of big stones along here. I'll kick that one for Wolfie to go. Yeah, what, the point I was trying to make,

sorry, it's easy to get distracted of what we're doing this, I hope you're keeping up. Presumably some of those ancient stone clearers, they were successful, they managed to hide what they were doing, they managed to build walls. And there are walls around fields,

they don't look like stone clear walls to me to be honest, mostly, but maybe some of them are. But I wondered, maybe, and maybe we'll find this out on the course of this podcast, some way down the line, I have to say, once the field is cleared of stones, once you break the wall,

maybe you learn something at that point, maybe you realize this isn't about your own glory, maybe you realize, shit, that was a waste of time doing all that stone clearing, I've got all the stones off. Maybe once the stone clearers built that wall,

they just feel like succeeding in that mission. Perhaps, what I'm saying, the reason we don't see those walls, Wolfie, is maybe, because stone clearers want to complete their mission, put the stones back. I don't know, Wolfie, I'll have to wait until we get there.

But it's interesting that that wall, now some distance away, we're now at the Telegraph Pole, and I've only put five or six little stones there. This is quite a good place to come in, for nighttime stone clearing. Just obviously, no one around,

also there's just a ton of stones around here that you can just have fun, chug, lobbing around. You may be able to find a place like that for yourself, and just, there you go, just throwing three little ones towards the centre, they roughly ended up being there.

So, oh my goodness, there's a guy walking across the road without a dog, that's weird, what's he doing? There's a lady, sorry if it was a lady, I apologize, maybe it's an invisible dog. There's two dog walkers,

colliding on coming, for one who's likely to intersect with me, or the other going in the other direction. Wolfie! I'm just like, it's so busy out here. The goons are out today, trying to stop stone clearing.

I'll just use this opportunity to, put Wolfie on the lead, to pick up a couple of little stones that I'll hide in the crevice of my tiny hand. So, coming down the hill, there's just a lady, I think she's walking across the fields. I mean, is that a stone clearer?

You can back off if it is, this is my field. I'm just trying to find a way so I don't intersect with this guy. Not because I don't want to talk to him, just because it will make our stone clearing a bit easier. And there, look, this one, I mean, this is stuck out to me.

Hey, it's just laying on the ground. Somehow I'm noticing the many passes I've done. Being just as white, as quite an off-white thing, just the size of, say you've eaten half a tub of chewing gum, which I have done, and clumped back together

in one big piece of chewing gum. Yeah, those tubs are getting garages now. Sometimes I just eat loads of those. Not tubs, the actual stuff inside. And if I were to clump together, I'd say 20 pieces of chewing gum that had been chewed, that's what this looks like.

Just to give you an idea of the stone I just picked up, just in case you've seen this stone in the future, wonder was that one of which is, anyway, the dog walker is heading off down the path off the field. The path I'd rather go down,

because it's obviously not part of the field anymore. It doesn't lead more directly to my house. But why waste the walking time not picking up some stones, that's what I say. So just as he's gone now and picking up just a little area, there's five or six stones,

lots of stones there, I picked up five or six. There was a couple of big dog pees there as well, which I avoided. So not a massively successful day in terms of stone clearing so far, partly due to interruptions, partly, I think a lot of the bigger stones

are gone until the next plough. But there, look, weirdly, a little, just a little orangey stone, it's not big. I want to compare it to the size of the chewing gum one, but it's not the same right colour. So it's about the same size

if you're trying to get an idea of that in your head. If you can't get an idea of it, why don't you just go and buy one of those tubs, eat about half, just chew up about half of it in your mouth. Not the tub of the stuff inside, and just kind of get all the chewing gum out, look at it, that's the size we're talking about,

if you want to get an idea of how big that stone was, please do that. So this can, just doesn't seem to get any bigger, however many stones I put on it. You've seen them walking for 26 minutes, I think now. I know this is a good lot of you like this little place,

so I'll have to get a couple of stones here just for the fun of it. That's a tiddler handyman cage, that one's so small. Actually some good pieces, and those are very close to the edge. We're coming to the post that I'm trying to throw stones at.

A lot of you love to hear the clunk of the wood. Let's see if I can do this stone first time, I'm going to kick one first, see how that does that, I don't know any. Right, missed, or hit the fence though,

the second one down here. I've got loads here, so I might do more. Oh, well a one hit out of five, that's not bad. I hope you enjoyed that, fans of that, but it's just a bit of fun,

a bit of levity. It's just not a fairground thing. Right, we'll take you off the lead now of course. Come. So yeah, I don't know if I've really, I mean we're coming towards the end of the walk, and it's been quite quick

because I haven't been able to stoop down and pick up too many stones. Look, you're trying to get all the stones off, right, that's the important thing. You're not trying to do it quickly, you're not trying to beat any world records, you're just trying to do it,

hopefully within your lifetime or the lifetime of your children or their children. It's just, I don't know, it's an indescribable thing that makes you think this is the stone. See look there,

there's just, all along the edge of this field, it's just pebble dashed. There's some poo there. Don't touch that, try not to touch the poo, I've been quite successful so far. And I've avoided most of them,

but just these two here, I like to, I don't know why. It's not in your, it's not really your choice, I think it's the truth of it. Sometimes you can get like, stone madness and start to pick up everything.

But I've got a more than I'd use, I would usually sort of limit myself to five stones, and when I'm picking up little ones, unless I'm coming across the field, in which case I will, oh look at that, there's a really big one,

just I wonder what that's doing there. Where do those come from? That's the question. Let's just drop one of the little ones, I'm going to kick that to touch. It obviously felt like it wanted to be there. There aren't really any cans along here. I thought there's a little tiny one,

there's a nest here. So I'll just deposit, oh someone's coming up behind me, but there's far enough away, to be wondering what I'm doing but not hearing me, I hope. So let's pick up the pace a little bit, Wolfie.

It's a red-hatted, yet the old lady. No interactions really so far apart from those dogs, trying to tank Wolfie. So I'll put this one around the path. This was again, it doesn't look like it's part of a leg bone, it's not,

it's definitely made of stone, it's not organic, or there would be no need to panic. So that one's going to go, I'm trying to extend this central can to a two-direction wall. And I think that person's coming this way. I was going to do a little bit

of housekeeping around here, but we mustn't move on. Come on Wolfs. So heading down, down the hill to the ditch. Again, this area, as you probably know, if you've been listening for a while,

not festooned with stones. I'm looking out, and this is the problem I'm talking about. When I started doing this, you could look out, and I could hassle off, I could see a stone 50 meters away. I think I'm going for that one

to swim out into the ocean, pick it up, bring it back, rescue it. It felt good. Now I can't really see, all I see is green, a few occasional tire tracks. And there were never,

loads of stones down here anyway. Here's one in the path, I'll just pick that up. Just come loose in the path. That one's quite near to a little nest. I've got there quite big stones. There was occasional big ones down here. That's what's frustrating.

I'm just popping out to pick up. Yeah, I mean, when you go out there, there are these small stones. But you have to go and look, and then the dangers and the daytime you get seen out in the ocean. That's suspicious. Also, you're just going out for,

it's obviously easier when they're just right by the path. And you, you know, I think it will take a year or so just to clear up the ones that are that close. There's a lovely big one in that. Mini Cairn.

Massive. One of the biggest ones I've found. Always loved seeing that boy. And I think that one is a boy. And not being sexy, it's not because it's big, it just gives off a masculine musk. And there's some big female ones as well.

And in fact, I think the great white stone that I'm searching, I'm sure is a female. But the nice thing about stones in this modern world is they are largely without sex. And so it doesn't become confusing

for old men to try and understand what's going on. So re-approaching the ditch, as you know, if you, if I don't throw a stone in here every time I pass something terrible and what happened in the world, I kind of wish someone had been doing

this walk during World War II. I wonder what the things that they might have stopped. And, you know, I think, oh, sorry. You're right. Just clattered Wolfie in the face with the lead.

She's okay. I mean, you know, the world's bad enough, so God knows what terrible things will be happening. And I'm just down on my knee here. There's a slightly, oh, slightly whiskey mover.

And again, that's what that's the beauty of stone clearing. Just when you think you've got it and you understand it, it will surprise you. That literally six inches from the edge of the shore.

I saw a little bit of stone poking up over what passed this place. I mean, God knows how many times in my life. And I've discovered, if you imagine a house brick and then sort of cut it along one side and then cut it at the bottom,

and it's about a third of a house brick sitting in size now. But if you're imagining that, that's what we've got. So, like, I knew this would be, oops, put that on the can. It's toppled one of the big stones. That's the problem with the big stones

at the top. There's actually a tennis ball on this can. She's made a rubber. I'm not sure if it's actually there. I'm not sure if someone put it on the can or whether it's just come from a nearby tennis court.

I'm leaving it there for now. I don't like the way that stone fell. It's kind of come off the can. That's one of my favorite ones. That's the one with the nice color. So, it'll go on the top, but where it's precarious, these things do roll off.

Be careful. So, yes, this was a more technical podcast. I hope you've enjoyed it. It was more for the, as I said, the experienced stones. Closers, I think, will have got more from it. Though, I didn't really,

I feel sufficiently explained how I make my choices or how the choices are made for me by the, let's say, sentient stones. I don't think they're able to communicate directly, but I think they have a, even though they don't have a brain, I think they have a sense

of what they are and their place in the universe. But it's more of a shared sense because they all want one big stone. Any scientist will tell you that's how it all began, one big stone. Now, billion, billion, billion, billion stones.

Probably a trillion. I enjoyed it. They're not all going to be gold. These, you know, they're not, we're just trying to work our way slowly. But that's my point, okay? Not every podcast has to be great. Not every stone clearing session

has to clear 10,000 stones. We've done our little bit. Even if I walked on that field, got one fingernail stone, threw that onto, not even onto a pile, just out into the bushes. That would be one stone less.

That needs to be cleared. That would be one stone closer to our mission. Whether our mission then becomes to put all those stones back again, we can only discover once we have completed phase one. Or whether after phase one I move on to the field.

That field map is partly my responsibility. Oh, we're going to take him off the hook. It's going to take us the lead there. We're in the road. That would be the worst time to do it. So, yeah, I hope you enjoyed this. Do keep listening to the podcast. Do keep emailing us questions in.

Simon Carr has been in touch. Another Simon. He's been in touch. Just to say, Well done, Rich. This is great. Love the podcast. Actually, all of the...

All of the... Hello, Rich. I love the podcast. They all love the podcast. I've got this. It's the best podcast ever. I can't. Simon.

I particularly like the bits where you clear stones. Come on, Simon. Get to the point. Stop flattering me. I think this is probably in my top four Stone Cream podcast of all time. Come on.

I mean, that's slightly insulting. How do you keep this from your wife and children? That's a good question. Simon, I'm going back home now. And luckily, the kids are no longer in the kitchen. So, I think we're going to go,

Okay, good girl. Let's get some breakfast for you. It's difficult. You want to tell them. That's the truth. You want to tell them what you're doing so that they can applaud you, be proud of you.

I know my wife would be so pleased to mention me what I was doing. I tried something I'd say to her. Oh, you know what? Imagine a bloke was clearing stones off the field. How would she feel? And she looked at me like, I'm crazy.

Why are you asking that? And I just said, that's hypothetical. Would you think he was amazing or would you wish you were mad to him? She doesn't really answer that question properly. My satisfaction.

She just walks away. Sometimes just shaking their heads and looking in their eyes. What did I do when he was 40? When I met him, he was quite good looking. And not when I thought fairly normal. Who will be?

Can we get your breakfast? Do keep those emails coming in. Trevor Donkage. He's just literally emailed in just now just to say, love the podcast, Rich. Keep up the good work. So thanks for that.

And another one's coming. Another one's coming from Simon Kibble. Like the podcast, Rich. Could you do more stonkering? That's good. Could there be more about stonkering? Well, I'll try. Could they be an hour long on the podcast?

That's just another podcast that's coming. Another email's coming from a chair breakfast item that's coming from. So I hope you enjoyed the podcast. Do keep tuning in. See what happens next time. See how crazy things get. Sorry, there weren't many encounters with people.

I'm sorry. I didn't really talk about my satisfaction about how you choose the stones. Anyway, I'm really looking forward to this one. Let's stop in that place. You have been listening to Stoneburn with Richard Herring and my guest, Wolfie the Dog, also featuring those two crazy dogs

and the weird man and also some people in the distance. Thank you to Mike Cosplay for composing this beautiful music and to our mystery voice. You've not got it yet. Hardly anyone's got it. Thank you.