Ed Halliday's Blog - Posts Tagged "mid-summer"

So tomorrow is the longest day of the year! Or to put it another way it's the shortest night of the year! I've never quite understood why people celebrate this event. Why would you want to dance around a pile of ancient stones stark naked to mark this annual occasion? Certainly I can't think of many things that are less appealing, and having looked in the mirror this morning I don't think anyone else would want to see me doing that either! And all this to celebrate the fact that the sun will start to sink a little sooner and will come up a little later. Once tomorrow is over, in the words of George Martin, "winter is coming", so save the celebrating for December 21st, when it's too cold to jump around outside with no clothes on and the celebrating can be done with something drinkable and alcoholic in front of a log fire, with a significant other (and you have a very long night of celebration!), because that's when the days start to get longer and it starts to go the other way again!
Cheers, Ed Halliday

ps. For a very short time The Grinning Dog is available for $0.99 instead of $3.99 on Kindle

author of:Burnt Toast and Bent Noses, The Almost Perfect Plot, The expected demise of Bernard Fish, The Grinning Dog

So here we are in Autumn! I could have sworn that Spring only started a few weeks ago. Never mind, Spring will be back soon enough and then I can miss summer completely once again. In the meantime, however, we are in the midst of that very dangerous season called Autumn. Why is it dangerous? I hear you ask. Well it's probably not dangerous everywhere in the world, but here in the little corner of France where I live it is exceedingly dangerous at the moment. This is due to a very French obsession which manifests at this time of year shortly after heavy rain. You can drive round any blind bend in any country road at the moment and find a car, abandoned rather than parked, stationery at the side of the road. There are thousands of cars littering the smallest roads making driving a bit like being in a demolition derby! The reason for this? Champignons! otherwise known as mushrooms. The quest for freshly picked fungus is a major pastime here, with knowledge of particularly fertile patches of forest guarded like Fort Knox! As locals abandon their cars near their favourite spot there is much fervent glancing around by the pickers who want to make sure no one is following them to their treasure trove.
Don't get me wrong, I like mushrooms! I just don't fancy scurrying about in full combat uniform to find them, and this is something that really confuses me. Why do the mushroom pickers wear Khaki camouflage? Do they feel the need to sneak up on the mushrooms? Do Fungi have legs and run away if they spot someone coming? If anyone has knowledge of running mushrooms please let me know!
Anyway, winter will be here soon and they will all go back to shooting wild boar, so the mushrooms will rest easy and the roads will become driveable once again!
Bon apetit, as they say over here!
Cheers, Ed Halliday

Author of:- The Expected Demise of Bernard Fish, The Grinning Dog, Burnt Toast and Bent Noses, the almost perfect plot, pigs in paradise