Iron Age settlements and playing pitches make me happy.

Some time ago, I blogged about the proposed development at the back of my house, on Tithe, in Chatteris. It is part of the wholesale plan to vastly increase the population of the Fens and build on the remaining "island" land in the Fen market towns. Where there is currently field, there will be 1,000 plus houses, probably all little horrible boxes labelled "executive". The huff and puff about Section 106 and how it will, of course vastly improve our town to have so many new houses plonked in it, at the same time as all our buses, police, and other services are disappearing, is huff and puff that doesn't impress me one tiny jot. I am a mother to a three and 5 year old, and I can tell when politicians are lying without even asking them to stick their tongues out (imagines Cameron sticking his tongue out, me going "Yes, Mr Cameron, you're lying!" to gasps from the cabinet and whispers of "how does she do that?!" Always impresses the kids, as do my bat ears). 

But the one silver lining about the development is that there has to be archaeological work beforehand. The investigative trenching on Tithe showed there were probable Bronze Age settlements that were possibly worthy of further investigation, and possible mitigation onec work started. However, the trenching and pre-build investigation was done for the corporation who want to build, and as such, the trenching done was the bare minimum, approx. 2% of the entire plot, and that it showed up anything, even using old finds as a guide, was a miracle. And this is why I am very pleased that the Secondary school are extending into the same plot. Their privately owned plot abuts Tithe, and is being made into an all weather pitch. Being school, and therefore Council owned, the pre-build investigation was not as commercially driven (although it IS being driven, very rapidly by bidding concerns: the project has to be completed within time frame for the school to get the money). Hence, many more trenches were dug, a vastly superior percentage to that on Tithe. And lo! They have hit what looks like an Iron Age settlement. 

Iron Age settlements in the Fens are a much rarer breed of post hole. Until 1978, and the Fenland Archaeological Survey, it was more or less believed that Iron Age settlers hadn't made it to the Fens. The water level in the Fens was at it's highest in the Iron age and hence the modern fen-edge essentially marks the lower limits of Iron Age settlement (c. 700BC-50AD).  Chatteris has already been noted as being fairly replete with pre-historic archaeology, having yielded some 13,000 Iron Age artefacts from a substantial prior digs at Langwood Fen and Stonea Camp, which also threw up Roman habitation finds, suggesting continuous habitation. ( a quick search of the Heritage Gateway will show you what they found). This latest find can only add to the information on the area. Iron Age peoples came AFTER the Bronze Age blokes mentioned a lot at the Must Farm site, and were in all likelihood different peoples from different areas. I'm not up on the latest methodology, but it used to be thought that the Iron Age people of Fenland were a "Third Wave" of immigrants of Celtic and Germanic stock, responding to overcrowding of their territories by expanding, upwards towards Peterborough, at around 50AD. A lot of the Iron Age finds in this part of Fenland are from that later period, merging with Early Roman.  But this site seems to be an Early Iron Age site, and so it's that bit rarer. Whether it marries up with the previous finds, I don't know. Either way, it's a joy for me to know that my back garden field now has a recognised Iron Age settlement on the edge of it, even though it will shortly be a playing pitch. 

So, to the find itself. the very excellent Stephen Macaulay showed me the site. He is there as part of the Oxford Archaeology East team, who are confusingly named, like much of the "sort-of" public sector now, in a fashion that makes it almost impossible to tell that they are in fact Cambridgeshire County Councils Archaeology Unit, and hence responsible for the archaeology remit prior to builds as part of the planning process. The mitigation given in this instance was, as i've mentioned, extremely limited due to tight time constraints on the build and bid money, so the team have had to excavate and work very quickly, a bit like the bods on Time Team, only without Tony Robinson being not funny and the shouting and fake relief after they find something. After the flash and unique pictures  from Must Farm last week, inevitably the Iron Age settlement found here is constrained to suffer by comparison, but it's no less beautiful. Much of archaeology is in fact scraping away at things that don't look much like anything in dire weather for shit pay, it's love they do it for. And what we have here is: 

Signs of settlement, postholes, and lots of little white notes marking where things have been found. 

 Iron Age pottery shards. Alright, they don't look much, but they're a little bit of pre-Roman in your hands.

 You can clearly see the dips and bowls left by the settlers here, along with postholes.

 More of the same, cleared areas, possibly used for storage.

 

A section of a ditch that runs in a line out past the site, towards Tithe. This could be Roman or Iron Age, if Iron Age, which hopefully before they have to fill the site, they'll pinpoint, it points to the settlement being quite large, with purpose built ditches.

For me, the sheer joy of having a bit of pre-history at the bottom of my garden is made all the more fantabulous by the fact that this clearly holds out hope for the archaeology at Tithe once the development begins in earnest being of some import. The fact that Iron Age finds have popped up here points towards this small section of Chatteris being constantly populated from Bronze Age to Roman times.The view I see from my window is less watery than the one they saw, but the skyline was no less long, and the outlook no hillier. Just knowing that Stephen has found this has started the ball rolling for me: now the trick will be to ensure that this site, and eventually, Tithe, get the publicity and support they deserve. Last week, it was almost galling for me to have to say that big business were supporting archaeology. At Must farm I was placed in the position of almost needing the expansion of building in the Fens to allow the dig at Must Farm to prosper. Here, I am again in the situation that the steamroller of Toytown houses must be driven across the fields by Melton, to allow us to access the wonder underneath the fields. I do find it difficult. I find it hard to accept that knowledge and learning about our pre-historical past has to be reliant on funding from business, and entrenched in planning and growth. But while it is, it's definately going to be my business to do my shouty best to keep the work of the archaeologists in peoples' minds, and to be an annoying person arguing, where there is evidence, for mitigation and community involvement. I have thoroughly enjoyed meeting both Stephen and Mark (from last week), and what shines forth from both of them is how utterly they love their jobs. How i'd love to be able to hand them both a big Lottery wad of cash and free them and their teams from their planning and business constraints. But in the meantime, all I can do is say watch this space, and watch the earth under you. Who lived there before you did?

Next blog (or the one after, hey, i'm disorganised) i'm hoping to write a little about the  Jigsaw programme of community archaeology. That's if son has got over the Pox.

Previous blogs on archaeology and Tithe:
 http://fenlandwittering.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/and-heres-some-artefacts-we-found.html
http://fenlandwittering.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/i-begin-long-kiss-goodbye-to-my-view.html
http://fenlandwittering.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/rabbit-stew-archaeology-and-melton.html

Must Farm, Whittlesey. Archaeological heaven in Fenland.

When you teach history at school, it starts with the Normans, in the main. You might get a little tickle of Vikings and Saxons in primary school, but History Proper starts with William I, and he was French. There's a necessary nod to the Romans, but they're, well, the Romans. You can't ignore them. They built the roads. But the rest of British Pre-history is swept aside in a gallop that lasts three years from the Normans in Year 7 to defeating the Nazis and living a Cold War in Year 9.  Even Schama, who professes to tell "Our island story" and , along with Niall Ferguson, declaims a desire to re-introduce a love of History and narrative to history in schools, relegates pre-history society to one measly chapter in his 4 volume story that is 10% mesolithic-iron age and 90% Romans. Think about it. Neolithic-Bronze age equates to 8000-800BC. It's a LONG TIME to ignore. But it's just people in loinclothes eating mud, right? Till the Romans came along?

Er, no. But most assuredly, apart from that tranche of people who admire that long haired Scottish TV historian who pops up for pre-history on the odd occaision,  for varied reasons, this is what a large amount of people think. Civilization, farming, clothing, probably speech, started with the Romans. Except not. Complex communities, trading between countries, wars, farming, were undoubtedly happening before togas appeared. And Fenland is uniquely placed to show just how amazing these pre-history societies were.

Bronze age scythe. I love the screw hole.

A fantastic combination of geology and business has combined to preserve, and then explore, one of the biggest Bronze age and earlier archaeological sites in the UK, if not Europe. Must Farm, in Whittlesey, is owned by Hansons, the brick makers, who use it as a quarry for the Fenland Blue Clay. Hansons are able to dig deep, way down below the usual scoping trenches offered in a planning application, and way, way back, the first inklings that Must Farm held something special were proven correct when the Bronze age platform, a bridge between islands, was revealed in 2006. Since then, the dig has thrown so much pre-history wide open that academia will have to seriously reconsider some of the perceptions of Bronze Age life. The site  is a gigantic 3D experience, with a Bronze Age River channel, and digs revealing land back to a Mesolithic base, sloping seawards.  The dig aims to push further back. What becomes apparent is that Fenland was not ever thus: it was once dry and forested, then wet, then dry, then wet.(I think i've got that right....) In the Bronze age, the (vast) time period that the majority of the dig currently focuses on, the population existed on islands, with bridges between them.

Riverbed, showing fishing traps.

It is at once clear, as soon as you walk into the dig area, that these people were canny workers, exploiting the landscape. The river channel, although dry, is nonetheless clearly indicative of a working community, and you can see instantly how the river was utilised. The boats lie there, the channel is regularly dotted with fish traps and weirs. These could be contemporary, a mediveal, early modern and aquatically inclined fenlander of today could recognise, and use the fish traps, and probably make them. Effective then, effective now. It feels, in fact, as if the river has simply drained away, and if you whipped round the bend quick enough you might catch the last Bronze Age fisherman paddling away in his longboat. Of which there are many.

Longboats had been found, in Bradly Fen, and Peterborough, but not in this joyous amount. 8 so far and counting, this is clearly a race of water babies, and possibly seafaring ones (much of the Bronze age finds here relate to those found in Norway, there may well have been a link betwen the cultures, they may well have been, in fact, one culture). The boats are dug out, not fired out, mostly oak (with 2 ash) and carved. The flotilla contains probably one of the earliest examples of a log boat made from a single trunk, with a separate panel for the rear. Even to a complete novice like me, they can't fail to impress.

A great deal of domestic pottery, textile and implements have been found, including farming tools and cookware, all beautifully preserved, due to the clay and, a ruddy great fire. (The pot to the right shows food still carbonised in the pot). The platform bridge and the surrounds were quite clearly burnt in a huge fire at some point, and what we can't know, of course is why.Cooking gone wrong, or attack? When you look at the huge array of weaponry found, you can't help but think that the times were perhaps less calm than "Time Team" might have you believe. Less building bridges to meet and trade, than to attack and defend. There are hundreds of finds lining the dig,  some swords nicked and clashed with signs of battle,and this, combined with the amount of bone found in  the river channel, may lead you to conclude that it wasn't always farming and fishing the community concentrated on. No burial chambers or sites have been found, but plenty of bone and ceremonially broken swords in the river,  leading you to ponder whether the river was also a cemetary as well as dinner source.

Rapier. Not for playing with.

After a stomp around, and an enthusiastic commentary from Mark, the CAU chap, it was impossible to feel anything other than awe at the site, which is surely unique in Europe. Nowhere but Fenland has such a geological past, and nowhere else can you go back this far and cleanly to the past. The mussell shells I picked up from the river bed were from 800BC, but fresh. The gravel we trod on at one point was mesolithic. The clay pits have preserved it all. And industry has made this dig possible. Without our modern expansion and pressing need for brick and new housing, the quarry would not be here. The history would remain buried. And we need the development to go on for the dig to go on, which is funded purely by Hansons, as part of the dvelopment procedure. And they more they find, the more it costs. The more they find, the more important it becomes to continue. There is an almost impossible balancing act between the needs of business and the needs of the dig, but thus far it's holding. Mark was openly grateful to Hansons for the efforts they had made to accomodate the archaeology, and when you are onsite it's not hard to see why; it's a massive undertaking and the costs of keeping a Bronze Age boat preserved are not small.  But Hansons need people to keep buying bricks (and have recently laid people off) and need development to continue, for the quarry, and the dig, to continue. There is much much more to find, so I found myself in the unlikely position of wishing for some more toytown housing pods to pop up merely so I can see what else they dig up.

Oak longboat

What they dig and have dug up will be, eventually, housed in a variety of homes, most likely Cambridge archaeology and anthropology musuem, Whittlesey museum, and Flag Fen musuem and centre, so you will be able to see a lot of it. What I would like to see is a co-ordinated effort to ensure that the finds are part of an overview of Fenland aracheology, properly promoted and funded, so that tourists visit and locals are proud of what they walk on. I'd like to see the research published, and academia interested. Academic and business money is needed here. Fenland, lord knows, whilst a beautiful place when  you've got a ken for it, is not a universally acknowledge visitor attraction, it's no Norfolk Broads, but in Must Farm we see a frankly amazing heritage that is little understood and unexploited. I'd like to see schools on board, the local history section of GCSE focusing on the Bronze Age. I'd basically, just like to see it again. And catch a Bronze Age fisherman out of the corner of my eye.



 Map showing the platform (bridges) between islands, and the river channel in blue. Sword deposisitions are marked in yellow. Quite a bit of defending and fighting round bridges going on, I surmise !



You can see my flickr set of the visit here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/55291255@N00/sets/72157629598981121/

And here's some artefacts we found earlier.....

This week I've had the pleasure of finding out a little more about the archaeology at the bottom of my garden. Thankfully, I didn't have to have that annoying Mr Robinson in, I merely exercised my rights as a nosy bolshy person and invited a consultant round for a cuppa. The consultant in question was a Mr Rob Bourne, of CGMS, a firm that works for developers, handling the pesky archaeology requirements before huge swathes of teeny tiny executive homes can be hoisted up.He conducts the evaluation reports for the County Council and reports back, to say whether there is anything there worth looking at or not. You can see the interview with him here. http://chatteris.shapeyourplace.org/2011/08/18/archaeologist-reveals-the-secrets-of-the-tithe-barn/ It was eye opening in more ways than one.

Firstly, I discovered a little about the planning process. What amazed me about it is the sheer hugely deadening grey aspect of it. It is impenetrable unless you are a) a planner and b) a councillor who is essentially, a planner or developer (and oddly, Fenland is awash with them), or c) a nosy bolshy person who won't shut up until it's explained to you. The whole system of planning is based around a "need to know" attitude which basically means that unless you ask, and ask again, and then ask again, crossly and with threats, you won't find out. If I hadn't asked and asked again about the evaluation dig at Tithe Road, i'd have been told nothing, and known nothing about it. Because I harassed people, I have now been told that i'll be mailed the evaluation report by the nice Mr Bourn. Anyone can read it apparently, but first you have to know it's there. And then there's the whole maze of applications, developers, people in peoples' pockets and so on and so on. You need a mind with the tenacity of a starving Jack Russell in a warrent o keep at it. Luckily, I don't have much to do of an evening.

Secondly, I found that the system of recording finds, and deciding whether something is worth digging or not is tenuous. I've no doubt that Mr Bourne was a nice man with the interests of everyone at heart, but the fact remians that a consultant employed by the developers is not the most partisan of people to write a report about the findings. Whilst I trusted him, I do wonder if this system is open to abuse. Of course it ruddy is. Luckily, Mr Bourne has flagged up finds and is recommending further excavation in the case of Tithe.

Thirdly, where does all this stuff go? So much is found, so much, then, vanishes again. Every build has an evaluation dig. Every dig has a report. (or at least, *should*, despite Mr Melton's protest), but where do they end up? In the realms of grey literature. Processed somewhere and stashed away in the archives, unasked for, unpublicised, unwanted by anyone, least of all the planners. There they sit, in Cambridgeshire or wherever archives, full of tasty info about the history of where YOU live, and nobody knows they are there, unless they are nosy and bolshy enough to ask. Sensing a theme here?

Fourthly: There's a huge amount out there! I recommend to you a visit to the Heritage Gateway, here, and if you are Cambridgeshire, search the Cambridge Historical  Environment database. You will be astonished by the huge amount of STUFF found on your doorstep. In  Chatteris alone, there are Roman encampments, Bronze Age canoes, shields, urns, barrows, Iron age barrows and burial grounds,  coin hoardes, medieval settlements sites, Roman farms, it goes on and on. Over 1116 reports and records that you can access. Of course, you'd need to be nosy and.... you see. You need to know this stuff. Because most of these reports come from evaluation digs, prior to toytown houses popping up.

Fifthly (is fifthly even a word? It just sounds wrong, doesn't it?) This week I have learnt so much. I'm treading on history. Much more than I ever suspected. Why don't we know about it? Why don't we have fabbier, fatter local museums that know about this? If I can spend 2 hours reading through this stuff and build up a rich picture of where I live in history, why can't you? Because you have to be.....
You have to be in the know. You have to be a pain in the bum. So go, go to your local planners. Ask about developments. Keep an eye out for those yellow signs on lamposts conviniently located above normal eyelevel that tell you a major development is coming. Read the boring notices in the back of the local paper. Go to council meetings. Harass people for reports.
I now know that the site for major development at the back of my house has 3 settlements, Bronze, Iron, and Roman, alongside a glacial feature that was in all likelihood water filled for the majority of the year. There are bones, postholes and eveidence of longterm settlement.  All over the fields there's ridge and furrow, possibly one barrow. The settlements lay where the road will go, and for this reason the consultant has intimated to me that his evaluation report will ask for mitigation to pursue an extensive excavation. Now it's in the hands of the developers as to when. If they choose, they can do it all at once, and then be able to "sell on" a "clean" site that has it all done. Or, they can choose to develop up to the sites, sell the houses, and do the dig at the last minute. So we could get a dig this year, or in ten years, when presumably they will be hoping i've moved by then. Either way, those who are interested will have to be nosy...etc etc to keep an eye on it.

Here's the political bit. Leaving aside the HUGE ALAN MELTON BOO BOO that he has been using a private email address to conduct Fenland business, and most especially, that this Freedom of Information Act request has stated that, because of this, info about Melton and development cannot be released (, oh yes, more of that next post, and you can see the application for the FOI here), politically archaeology and development are both in this together with the localism bill. The localism bill plays fast and loose with planning, making it easier than ever for developers and nasty fat little councillors to make their bucks and ruin communities, and whilst it *says* it gives locals a voice, it really does not. You can comment on websites, surely, but there's not much you can do.And we do need to do something. The East of England Development plan, and the Fenland section in particular, sanctions MASSIVE development of the Fens.(17,000 houses in ten years) The report, which can be accsessed here, details the major housing expansion in the area, and asks to comment. If you are local, please do. But do more than that. Ring and ask them about how they are addressing the "locals" section of all this. If there is anything you read that concerns you, contact them. In other words, be nosy, annoyed and persistant. Email is easy to ignore.

 And in terms of the archaeology? Southport group report recommended a number of moves that would enable archaeology and the developers to, in trendy report speak, "enable" each other. (You see what I did there? Do you feel warm and cuddly now?). It's a good report with some good ideas, and the main thrust of it seems to me to be goodhearted, and sensible, placing the onus on public participation and publication, getting the info out there. It's worth a  read. And anyone local who is interested in putting some of those ideas into place in the Fens, particularly around major new developments that are coming, is welcome to mail me and we'll sort something out.

Council brief summary of Chatteris history. Pretty basic.
Heritage gateway: ruddy fab

I begin the long kiss goodbye to my view

At the end of my garden, there are fields. Lots of them. A flat eye view all the way to Ely. I love them. This week they have given me 10lbs of blackberries and the same again of wild plums. In the Autumn they give me sloes, hips and crabapples.  The view encompasses an old Medieval Tithe Barn, a working farm, and as much as any human eye can take in, it being the Fens. Sometimes the landscape is more Kansas than Cambridge. I watch flocks of crows, seagulls, and the odd Red Kite circle round the fields. There's a pair of Barn Owls in the barn, as there should be. I've seen hares, rabbits, lots of voles and mice, and an abundance of wild flowers that love the drainage ditches, lillies, marsh plants and marginals. We use the field edges to walk to the park, so much nicer than going roadways, and to ramble, daily, insect spotting. Son makes believe he is "off roading" on a Honda, daughter is in a jungle. Horses thunder by the end of the garden, people stop off the footpath to pick blackberries and chuck weeds at my hens. It is one of a few footpaths in farming country, in a town seriously deproved of green space. (Crazy: so rural, yet so hard up for it: it's the farmers). And it is going, all going, to build the supposedly essential 1,000 new homes. I am incensed, upset, angry, tearful, and worst of all, utterly, utterly hidebound. There is nothing, nothing, I can do. It's done. It's in the Fenland Development plan. The "consultation" on it was a derisory 2 hours of a display board in a community centre, unadvertised, for 2 hours one weekday. The letters to residents were sent out over Christmas, when we were mostly away. I will attend all the meetings I can, and shout as much as I can, but councillor after councillor has told me, "This will happen".

So, it's a case of how it will happen. The plan shows the usual uniform array of toytown houses, crushed into a space which would be reasonable for half the amount of houses, and with the usual exec homes and about 2 housing associations ones chucked in the margins. The green credentials appear to rest on "green corridors" (for which read :pathways that the development corp will soon shuck off responsibility for, and will soon descend to teen fumbling areas). The supposed play area is where the fields flood every year, for 3 months. There are no regulations to stop paving over gardens, the green space is risible, and the risk of run off, in a below sea level area, to my mind, high. Although not according to the planners. This amount of extra houses (and people) gives us, in return, a few shopping units, a redirected bus route, a primary school (no increase in intake to an already overcrowded secondary though), and a vague promise from the developers to donate some money to the town. Added to this, the policing levels are being cut, the Fire service is being cut, the bus service has already been halved, and the GP and school systems are already overloaded. But hey, there will be a ruddy big Tesco out of town.

I have seriously never lived in an area with a worse, more shortsighted, self gratifying council in my life, and this is REALLY saying something, considering I used to live in Hackney. The Councils response so far has mostly been about the increase in council tax money they'll be getting. Which just about says it all. And considering our esteemed leader, Mr Alan Melton, is only just above the level of an amoeba when it comes to doing anything except line his pockets, I was naturally concerned when I saw diggers this week. A lot of diggers. Digging trenches. My first thought was "ARGGGH! Surely the permissions hasn't been granted yet?" and the second was "Where's the archaeology?" This was very important as a second thought, as Mr Melton was widely acclaimed/ laughed at/ spat on last month for his name calling of archaeologists ("Bunny Huggers") and declamation that he would, as leader, do away with all of those silly rules about preserving the rights of archaeologists to dig prior to development.  (I blogged it here) So, I took up my keyboard and phone and did some digging of my own.

And lo, it is a real dig. They are doing the Bunny Hugging digging in my back garden. And whilst I will regret, deeply, the loss of my view and wild places, (although it's not over yet, Melton) I am pleased that it's going ahead properly and we'll get a chance to dig deep on a large plot of , I hope, serious worth. Bronze Age, Iron age, Roman, a 10th Century manor house, and more. I am hoping to interview one of the archaeologists soon about it all. Watch this space for that. And take a look at the pictures of a part of England that is going.

Ask your MP for a lift.

When you live rurally, it can feel as if you are forgotten by the London-ite government. So it's nice to see that our local Fenland MP, Steve Barclay, is here to fight our corner. As a (currently Stay-At-home-Mum: gotta have those capitals, it IS a job, you know) secondary teacher, I am extremely concerned that the students of Fenland have some of the lowest attainment, and aspirations in the UK. Few of them go to college or university. Many of them leave with few qualifications. The last review, in Dec 2010 concluded that things were still in vast need of improvement. Here's the Fenland Citizens take on it. So I was overjoyed to read on Mr Barclays' blog that, as a first in the family to university, and now a successful legal chap and Conservative MP, he is very keen to encourage more Fenland teens into tertiary education. Here is is on the subject, doesn't he sound real? And as if he cares, like, a lot? http://www.stevebarclay.net/ (click on campaigns)
It's interesting that he talks about apprenticeships as being the way forward. Interesting because this is the party line, and there are, of course, many more things that impact on students here much more keenly than the lack of apprenticeships, that he hasn't mentioned.

• Like the increase in tuition fees, that will affect Fenland students (all students in fact), particularly harshly, Fenland being one of the areas in the UK with low income, and high unemployment. Families are highly unlikely to encourage students into tertiary education if the debt they will come out with amounts to three times as much as they earn in a year. But Mr Barclay, with his huge personal earnings and lack of comprehension about the local area has presumably missed this fact. Maybe he thinks the loans are a good idea. I would think so. The Conservative party stands to do rather well out of the changes in HE.


• The reduction of the Building Schools for the Future fund from Cromwell school, Chatteris, leaving it overcrowded, oversubscribed, and with 1,500 students stuck in a building built in the 1920's. And of course, the complete removal of it from many other schools across the country.


• The changing of the curriculum to enforce the 5 core subjects, something which is manifestly suited to the independent sector and selective schools. Hence,local schools will slide down the tables. Students here are suited best by a curriculum which offers GNVQ, NVQ, as well as GCSE and the usual AS/A2 routes. The schools here know it, yet they will soon be forced into the Bacc, against independents and selectives that have been priming for it for years. This would be ok, if there were sufficient college places, technical colleges and sixth forms in the area. But there are not. And places in those remaining, and funding for them, are being squeezed. Plans to extend the College of West Anglia further into Fenland, are, as ever, hot air. Currently students in my home town have to travel to Wisbech or Cambridge. Fine, if you have a car or kind parents. Bugger off if not, because, well, the buses. See after.


• The establishment of Free schools, funded from the central education budget, thus taking away funds from comprehensives. Funding that was supposedly ringfenced, pre election. Free schools, under the banner of freedom, will essentially be selective, with personal guidelines on selection that are nothing like comprehensives. I think we all know what will happen here. Middle class parents, faced with the comps and Goves' little meany face squealing about them (just DON'T LOOK AT HIM! No, really, don't, it'll make you boak) and too knackered by the economy to pay private fees, will plump for Free schools for their Kates and Williams and thus create yet another tier in the education system. SEN students, students with projected lower attainment, and those from the wrong sort of background, won't get into them. This is already the case in many academies (wait for an explosion of them, too), and faith schools. I know whereof I speak: I have taught in both, in London, and lo! even though surrounding the schools there were estates (and not of the leafy kind) and deprivation, inside the faith schools there were no SEN, no poor, just a lot of kids of parents who had suddenly found God and faith at the last minute. And what happens to the local schools? The good kids with pushy parents leave, the SEN and leftovers get bunched together, funding dwindles along with numbers, and results, and there we have it. Why don't they just call us all Morlocks and be done with it.


• The loss of the EMA for all but the poorest of the poor, and then with conditions. The EMA may not seem very vital to those who have not needed it, and indeed, some who have had it, but round here, with low earnings commonplace, the EMA was a real lifeline in allowing students to stay on. It provided money for buses to college, for equipment. For the Tories to say that it wasn't necessary is a lie: not just disingenous, a LIE. I have taught many many students for whom the EMA was vital, allowing them to stay on and study in the face of parents who were not supportive, allowing them to bus to college, allowing them to pay for project equipment. Paper, pens, books, all of these are very expensive when you are 17 and you can't nick them from Westminster.( And hey, books? It should be that the schools and towns and villages should have libraries, but guess what...... no stautory provision for school libraries (despite Clegg having it as an aim, prior to Camerons' back pasage becoming his home), less libraries all round, in fact. Please check yours is still there).It is very clear, that in taking the EMA away, they are shoring up the tiered education system they so, so want to return to. Brideshead, floaty boatered men only need apply. Aren't the rest of you down a pit or something? We what? Well, a factory then. In other words, oiks need not apply. If you haven't got the money to 4X4 it to college, naff off. (And you won't be able to get a bus there. There are none left: see my next blog)


• A cut, in real terms to education funding. A cut that would be entirely unecessary if they were to, say, make Vodaphone pay some tax. Or even make Osbourne pay his moral fair share. But, no. So, teachers, tell you what, you work for longer, for less money, and less pension. And some of you, we'll lay off. Quite a few of you, actually. And don't even ask about Teaching Assistants. Even the Lollipop lady has had it.


• Special schools? Really, we need them? You wouldn't know it from the rate they are vanishing. SEN statements? Hmm, be ready to see them go.Now it will be up to YOU, as a parent to sort it, provided of course, the council agrees, now it's all been handily devolved. And good luck to you in Fenland, where unless you are elderly and a farmer, they basically look blankly into the middle distance behind you and pretend they are deaf. Transport to Special school? Gone. Pupil Referral Units? *puff* vanished. Read here. Parent liason posts: whoosh. In short, if you have a "problem" child, don't live here.


• Transport, in fact, to ANY school out of catchment, gone. This may seem reasonable until you live rurally, and catchments are nonsense. If you cannot get into your catchment school in my town (Chatteris), you must go to Ramsey, or Neale Wade. The school in Chatteris is small. It cannot take all the applicants from Chatteris. Some must therefore go to school outside of catchment. But now, the Council does not have to pay for it, under the brave new world of ConDem. Especially if you have a lovely, all tory Council like ours (who votes these people in? Seriously? I haven't met ANYONE who voted for them). So now we have a situation in town where all students at Ramsey school, have been denied transport to school. Notice given: 4 weeks. Parents? Angry, upset. Students? Angry, upset. Schools? Angry, upset. Council? Couldn't give one. A bunch of parents got together to lobby the Council and pointed out, quite reasonably, that 4 weeks notice of a change of this magnitude was NOT compatible with, say, REAL LIFE where parents need to work the hours of school pick up and drop off, or might not be able to find a job, buy a car and so on in 4 weeks. It says a great deal about the Council and this government that all it takes, to alter 10 years worth of school bus service is, well, 4 weeks notice and a government that won't tell them off. Will applaud them, in fact. As I write, the parents have lobbied and made a nuisance of themselves to such an extent (and good on them) that they have secured a temporary reprieve until the end of the academic year. After September, expect parents who dare to have children who couldn't fit into the local school to be up the creek without a paddle. Wait a minute....I know someone with a car.......
  

So, I am a little sceptical of Mr Barclay. But you may not think this all amounts to anything. I managed in my day, you might huff. I don't see why they shouldn't pay for the bus themselves. I didn't need paying to go to school. Huff puff. Course not. But think about it. I, Like Steve, was the first in my family to go to uni, even, in fact, to finish school. My parents had no cash. In fact, they were very badly off, under the last Tory government, inches away from repossession, my father having the misfortune to work in an industry that Thatcher decided she would like to smash into tiny bits. I went to uni because I got a grant. If i'd have had to pay anything like the amount students now will have to, I would not have gone. People who are well off to start off with do not grasp the fear that a debt that high can strike. If I had come from a nice family with decent amounts of money, I'd maybe think that much debt was ok. But if I came from a nice family where that proposed debt per year was the annual earning of my father, I might think twice. That's what it's like in Fenland. I don't think Mr Barclays' dad worked in an onion packing plant.

Likewise, if I owned a socking great 4x4 and lved in a big pile outside of town, in a nice bit, I might not see that people do, actually, need buses. Contrary to Steves' belief, aired in the local rag, that buses here are empty, I have never been on one that is. Possibly he just doesn't notice people whose incomes are under 40K pa. Because I regularly see students, the elderly, and yes, workers, on the bus. The bus whose service has been halved. The buses that can take students from one town to the other now don't exist at all. This is fine, maybe. Maybe you have a car. But maybe you don't. Maybe your mum can give you a lift to college and back. Or maybe she is at work. So maybe, now, you are a bit stuffed, having to take 2 buses to college, and back, the whole journey taking over an hour each way and costing you a small fortune, which you now don't even have the EMA for. If you miss the bus, that's it for 3 hours. And,( here's the funny bit) if your last lecture is after 4, you can't get back home again! The bus has stopped running! Hilarious! So much fun in the Winter, walking over 30 miles. (The ghost of Tebbit wails weakly: on your bike! In Fenland winds? ) If you want an even bigger laugh, just take a look at the whole run of bus timetables for the area (read my next blog: as I take a bus to March and fail to get home again, ever). Maybe, here's an idea, you should email Steve and ask him for a lift. stephen.barclay.mp@parliament.uk If you see him, stick your thumb out.

Conservatives smash childhood dreams shocker, and a cushion.

When I was little (or young, i'm still pretty little, height wise at least), I was desperate to be a showjumper like Harvey Smith, then I went through a phase of being a librarian and forcing mum to take books out all the time while I stamped them and fined her (none of my childhood books are untouched), and finally, a teacher phase, bossing my sister around and criticising her efforts. "NO! Do this NOW! No, no, don't cry, Mum will come, here is a biscuit".) And you know, apart from the showjumping, I DID do that. I was a childrens librarian for years, and then retrained as a teacher, which I loved, for years. I did what I wanted to do. Son is obsessed with levers, gears, mechanics. My dad is an engineer, In Law dad is an engineer, there is a clear obsessional path for him. Daughter is currently limited to doing whatever pees son off most. But whatever they want to do, I will say, "You CAN do it". Because really, they're bright, they're funny, they have drive, they can. Even if he still wants to be a policeman.

Except they can't. We will never, never, never have enough money to pay for degrees for our kids. Read that again. NEVER. This country now has the most expensive education in the world. Kids that are bright, from less well off families, will never get to University. The Conservative blurb may say "It's merely a debt...." blah blah" , but people who have no money do NOT get into debt. Imagine being an 18 year old from a poor background, and being told that your debt on leaving will be 40K, 3 years work for your dad. You wouldn't countenance it. Of course, it's probably different, if , like David Cameron, you are worth 19 million and you think this makes you Middle Class. I won't even mention Clegg, nobody can hear him from the cavernous recesses of Camerons passage anyway. Cameron just excuses any noise as being "something he ate".

This is what this government wants: education for the elite, the ones who a 40K debt means nothing to. Their dads earn it in a few months. I was the first person in my family to get to University, indeed, even finish school. I managed because I had no fees, and a grant. I repaid that generosity by doing public sector work for years. The State helped me, I help the state. I believed in the State. I put something back. They more than got their moneys worth from me, from the teaching in the East End alone, believe me. ("No, pupil, I cannot come and pick you up from Budgens for shoplifting. I am not your mother. I am your teacher. Oh. Alright. She's with you. And caught shoplifting. I'm on my way.")

No more. This week we learned that the local (and only) secondary school has lost it's Building Schools for the Future money. 9 million. This was to provide for more space and facilities. The school was built in 1938 for 500 students. It now has 1,350. The money has gone. Not needed, says the government. Not needed , says local bigwig Martin Curtis, and minister for children, no less, who also said that "screaming and shouting" won't do anything. Fine. We'll all just accept it then, shall we? And the fact that you've just more or less told our kids that they're worth much less to this government than the kids of the small enclave of wealthy Free school parents. And the 1,000 homes you've just agreed will be built here, to add to our hugely overcrowded school and village with no facilities and schools that are too small. ( Strange that all the local Conservative councillors are so keen on the idea, possibly it has something to do with the huge links to the building trade many of them have. ) This government sucks big time.

The students round here already perform terribly. Fenland has the lowest tertiary education take up of ANY English area. It has the lowest parental tertiary take up. It is a rural, on the land work, area. And a safe, very safe, Tory seat. Nobody votes, apart from the landowners, and me. Everyone else is too apathetic, working on the land they don't own, or in the middle of the Fens picking leeks for minimum wage, for 14 hours, while the voting goes on. So why should the local MP Mr Steve Barclay care? He doesn't. He went to Rugby. He is a golden boy who replies to my letters with the party line and never holds a surgery in my village, knowing full well there is no bus on earth that will get me, my kids and my hatred to his actual surgery. So i've written to him. (Again. See previous posts to hear about my effort to build up enough asinine replies that I can furnish my chicken coop with them. And they can shit on him. I know it's childish.) Would he like to come and tell my son that his local schools are falling to bits, with the government sanction? Would he like to come and explain why my kids will never get to tertiary education? Would he buggery. He goes to the opening of a crisp packet, but he won't come here.

And because i've made myself really cross again, here's a picture of some stuff I sewed last night: a taggie for an upcoming baby (NOT mine, dear me NO), a pot stand, and a pink(ish) cushion for daughters room. I'm getting into the swing of the machine now. I even wound a bobbin. (clap, clap, clap) Once I get good enough, I may even attempt to sew a tiny mannikin of our MP as a pincushion.

The Anchor Inn and tomatoes

Evenings out have been few and far between since Husband and I had the kids. In fact, even the wedding got put off, twice, by each of them respectively, so that in the end getting married was really almost about having a night out. But this weekend was out first wedding anniversary, and we went OUT out. Admittedly, I was nor expecting wonders of the local hostelries. But I reckoned without a little local gem at Sutton Gault, The Anchor Inn. I won't be reviewing often, and I won't be going out often, but if I go out again this year, I will try to go out to Sutton Gault.

As I go out rarely, when I go out I want maximum entertainment for my pound. Nowdays this does not mean what it did in my youth (when it would mean all manner of wonders and weirdness,in London, invited and univited), but an entirely different thing. I want, on my child free evening out, no children. I want good food, and I want it a bit fussy, the sort of fussy I can't be bothered to do. I want meat I rarely cook, wine I rarely buy, and a nice setting with good beer on tap.

The Anchor Inn is perched on a drove road between Chatteris and Sutton. It presides over the river Bedford, aka as the 100 foot drain. In its' Fen incarnation, straight as a die and contained as far as the eye can see, it is Vermuyden's vision incarnate, although he probably wasn't holding the big glass of rose wine I was. The pub garden is riverside and offers a Fen view which is as pleasing as it is unusual. I sat and sipped my wine and watched the sun go down, and pondered the menu, which was extensive, and not (too) expensive. I settled on the duck, husband had pork. The duck was as perfect as I could have wanted it, just the right side of rare and beautifully presented with gorgeous gravy, or jus or whatever and a potato cake of the sort I cannot make. And in a generous portion that didn't leave you feeling short changed. We ate, and drank, and it was all, very, very good indeed, and the service impeccable (even removing a wasp from us as it blundered into our meal, and locating a rare taxi back). I urge you to visit, but book, it's busy!

Oh, and tomatoes. FINALLY, they are coming, and the best ones are yellow. Here they are, in a bowl, while I figure out DOF on my swanky new camera.

minature gardens, puffers and spanakoppitta

A frantic weekend here already.

I have a fasting blood test designated for Thursday, so I had already planned to make 2 spanakoppitta to gorge on prior to it. Having thyroid disease and some (as yet unspecified ) other autoimmune disorder is a bit rubbish and as far as i'm concerned a weekend of eating cheesy spinach things was my just and right due.

However, before I could crack open the wine and eat more than the crunchy middle bit pictured here, I was on the phone to the ambulance men and women of Fenland to come see to son, who went from ok to REALLY not ok within about 45 minutes. He developed extreme asthma in March for no apparent reason, and this was his second big and very scary attack. The ambulance man and woman were fab, fast, kind, professional, and extremely glad not to be in Peterborough city centre on a Saturday night. They stayed till he was stable and safe, and what lovely people they were. So Sunday was spent in the FANTASTIC cottage hospital-ness that is Doddington, as the paramedics had advised, while son sat so good and sweetly under the nebuliser mask that I wanted to weep. So awful to see a child so willingly submit to a mask because they know they need it. But he is well now, albeit due to steroids and puffers for weeks ahead, and we spent the afternoon making mini gardens and hosting fairy tea-parties. So much fun, making mini-wee things.

And now i'm going to eat ALL the spinach pie.

The recipe is here: and very fine it is too, if I say so myself. You can't just have a little bit. Probably not authentic, and no specific amounts, but this is how it's made in this house.

Ingrediants:

1 pack spinach (usually about 250g)

I pack filo (thawed, usuallu about 6 sheets)

1 pack feta

pine nuts to taste

1 sweet onion.

2 eggs

a good glug of double cream.

nutmeg, pepper, oregano.

Fry the onions till soft and clear. Add the pepper, oregano and nutmeg. Meanwhile, wilt the spinach and squeeze as much water as you can out of it till it is pitiful looking and you wonder what you paid for. That's the way of spinach. Crumble the feta and beat the eggs. Mix the whole caboodle together and shove in the fridge for a bit. Find a nice dish. Butter it. Then melt some more butter, more than you think you will need. Place one sheet of filo in the bottom of the dish, the edges over the side. Your aim is to place 4 layers of spinach / cheese mixture on top of 4 sheets of filo, so divide your mixture into 4. After you've spread the spinach mix, fold the overlap sheet down over it, like making a bed, then lay another sheet down. Brush some melted butter on each sheet as you go. Your last layer, you have two sheets left over to scrunch on the top for topping, add liberal butter to these so it's nice, tasty, and bad for you. Bake in the oven for about 40 mins at Gas 6, or until the middle has set and it's nice and crunchy on top. Eat it all secretly by yourself, or with lambchops.

gravel animal mounds, rabid Tory hating and fat quarters

Since my nan passed, the kids have been obsessed with the idea of burial. Every day this week I have found another farm animal that's succumbed to the toytown Foot and Mouth and has been haphazardly buried in the driveway with a ceremony involving sprinkling bits of my best thyme plant onto its' plastic corpse. Of course, they are children and it's an imporatnt element of play to use it to come to terms with things but finding half interred animals everywhere is beginning to freak me out.

Otherwise, I have been restraining myself from waiting in the Budgens newspaper aisle and shouting at Daily Mail readers "IT'S YOUR FAULT!". I've exchanged emails with our one of two Lib Dem councillors who is optimistic that the coalition will work, but really, where do the two councillors now stand in a sea of blue? I really don't think they'll be upholding the left-leaning (as was) principles of the Lib-Dems (as were) now they're in bed together. It depresses me looking at the new cabinet, grinning to themselves. Nick Clegg has effectively overseen the death of the third party. The new push to alter the number necessary to dissolve Parliament strengthens the Tory hands, not to mention the proposed boundary changes and alteration to the number of MP's, both of which seek to ensure a Tory stranglehold for the forseeable. And for this Nick got, what? A few cursory measures agreed, a cabinet seat, and a positive surety that Cameron will dump him as soon as, leaving us with no credible third party at all. Over 3,000 people rejoined Labour in the past 2 days, and I am betting this defection from the Lib Dems will run and run. If he had listened to the Lib Dem peers and pursued a policy of supporting the minority government in applicable measures, he might have have some credibility left. As it is, he is Cameron's fag.

Anyway, nice things. This postcard sent from sweetiepie50, a fellow fenland blogger. How nice to recieve parcels and post from other Fenland ladies, it makes ones cockles warm. I have found it hard settling here after the bustle of London and Cambridge, this has quite perked me up.

And new fat quarters for sons quilt. Suitable dinosaur, tractor and plane motifs with some nice brights and seagulls to boot. I am thinking of doing large pieces this time round, and maybe I ought to hold off till I get my machine. There is a nice freebie pattern on the Michael Miller page with chunky squares that seems doable, the Paula Prass one. Otherwise I might go freehand again.

Finally, (bit of a curates' egg this post) a recipe for a frugal supper that does just as well cold the next day. It's called Briam and is Greek.

Ingrediants: potatoes, x 2 bigguns

6 garlic cloves, crushed

2 courgettes, sliced

3 assorted peppers, sliced

1 red onion, sliced

as many tomatoes as will cover the top of your dish

can of tomatoes

thyme and parsley

Plonk a layer of potatoes on the bottom of your dish. Slice them first, using the slicing bit of a cheese grater so they are thin slivers. Add some garlic, some thyme and parsley. then add everything else in layers. Between each layer add garlic and herbs. Top off with a layer of sliced tomatoes and a big glug of olive oil, then add canned tomatoes to the top, spread and seal with foil. Plonk it in the oven for 2- 2 1/2 hours at gas 4. I like to add some feta and parmesan to the top and brown it before eating. This tastes lovely cold too. I like aubergine added to the mix but the kids definately do not, so, heigh ho. Smashing with a lamb chop or on it's own with some spinach. Makes enough for 2 adults, 2 kids, and 2 adults and 2 kids the next day too.

Kickstart kids

I spent this morning in the fog and damp at Mepal Motocross track, thinking about just how crazy i'd have to be to allow my son onto a small bike when he's five. This after seeing 20 5 year olds (yes, really) rip around a track at full speed and cut each other up like crazy, exhausts firing. Some of them were girls, too. Son remains transfixed by all things motocross, and this morning has merely added to his obsession. I was transfixed by the parents of the kiddy motocrossers more than anything else. How on earth must the mums feel as they strap their kids into their leathers and helmets and then send them off in the sand? Presumably they feel ok about it, if the yells of encouragement were anything to go by, although there were fewer mums than dads watching.


But it set me thinking about risk and children and how things have changed. Remember, in the 80's, Junior Kickstart was a national obsession and it was seen as a healthy pastime to send your kid off on his motorbike and let rip over obstacles. Now of course, health and safety and fear of kid injury have put paid to this kind of programme, and we have instead the nonsense of kids trying to get on X factor. Personally, i'm thinking the kids who aimed to leap over cars on their bikes in Kickstart were better off. I used to disappear off for whole days on my totally unreliable pony, once returning to the yard unconscious slumped on it's neck, after a rear had knocked me out on a tree branch. To the horses' credit, he did bring me back without tipping me off, but only after roaming for hours. The roaming around and freedom from adult involvement, and also the element of risk (Shall I attempt to leap the fence? Shall I ever be able to stop the sod from bolting toward the new bypass? Will I die if he tries to cross it? ) enlivened my days and encouraged me to dare to do things that i'd never have done under supervision. Sometimes the encouragement of adults isn't helpful. I've watched my kids get up from falls when they think they are not observed without a peep that , if watched, they will often weep copiously at. Maybe the chance to damage ourselves through risk taking is what helps us form parts of our character.



Of course, this is all so much hot air when you see your kid plummet from a motorbike, i'm sure. One small rider fell today, and got the biggest cheers as he plonked himself back on a finished the laps regardless, 2 behind everyone else. The sort of strength of character I'm not sure I have. Maybe being 5 helps. I was reassured by the ambulances at the ready, but not enough to ever encourage son to do it.



It's also too darn expensive. There were some serious spenders in evidence. It seemed to me to be the socio-economic lower levels version of formula 1, it's very very expensive but people make do to do it. It's defiantly working class too, there are no plummy accents in evidence and no healthy food outlets, it's successfully resisted any middle class incursions. People watch from the backs of their quad bikes and the girls reapply make up continually in case they catch the eyes of any young male riders. Accents are strong, cars are big and swearing colours the air. There are no dogs smaller than mastiff and none less scary looking. Dress code is relaxed. "Fen Massif" for young men, with the obligatory can of Red Bull and fag, and for young ladies the hair is never less than blonde and the foundation generous. Men are big with relaxed stomachs and mums stay out of the way in the trailers. There is one burger van and it's a quid for a cup of tea. In short, it's not televisual. This will never get onto tv again, at least not the terrestrial channels, because the only working class people that are allowed to show their faces are on soap operas, laughed at in X-Factor style shows, or sniggered at in Channel 4 sitcoms, "Shameless style". Poor people are allowed to be good at football, as long asthey're grateful and pick up a WAG, thus supplying the tabloids with fodder, but that's the only sport (aside from maybe snooker? If that is a sport? ) that they'll get seen doing. The other local sports round here, shooting, trapping, and driving your souped up car into the forty-foot drain, will of course, also never get on tv. It's a shame, because the sight of these lads and young men (and ladies) ripping round the track was exhilarating, very skilful, and brave. The young girl pictured here, flew round, and then proceeded to strip her bike. It might have been abit dangerous, but I think a 7 year old girl who can strip down a motorbike, is a girl i'd like to meet.
fen glossary: forty foot drain: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forty_Foot_Drain

While the husband is away......

Wife is doing the DIY (a toddler bed, a chest of drawers, and 4 pictures hung, with nary a swear word or drop of blood. Efficient, but not as exciting as Husbands way, born of a determination never to read an instruction booklet), while Husband is in the USA, Florida round about now. Basking in 75 degree heat and cooking whole hogs at the Lakeland Pig Fest, a barbeque competition of more than 30,000 strong.

He is there with the Bubba Grills team, (pictured, with their many trophies from last year) http://www.bubbagrills.net/index.html to pursue a business venture which hopefully will result in big pieces of pig in our chest freezer and some kind of Southern cooking thing going on in the Fens. The Bubba Grills guys are great, they've already been on tv with Jamie Oliver, as he used a lot of their recipes in his last book, and dedicated an episode of the tv series to their cooking style. He gave them a signed copy though. They'll be able to ebay it for some of the millions he made from the book sales.
Husband has plans for world domination with them. He is in his element, shooting guns, eating pork and talking barbeque sauce, in a place where his bulk is positively skinny by comparison to the Georgian norm. He has been overwhelmed by their generosity in inviting him and sharing their ideas. Speaking earlier, he proudly informed me that he is now a Redneck, on account of failing to 30 factor his lily white neck.

He's roasting whole hogs today, and in his brief telephone chat informed me of his devoted wrapping of 3 thousand jacket potatoes in foil. Hopefully they will have a successful competition, they did last year. By all accounts, these men know how to roast a hog. I can't see why people Fen-wards wouldn't like to eat a pig that way too. There's certainly enough USa airbases and, of course, the fabtastic Peterborough Truck Fest. (

3 types of rain is not enough

There are 3 different types of rainfall. This jolly tutorial explains them.

http://worldlywise.blogspot.com/2008/01/types-of-rainfall.html



3 types is not enough.



In the Fens, you can see the rain coming. Curiously, you can often see it better than the Ramsey MET office, which persistantly and stubbornly refuses to believe the weather it can see coming. For miles. You can quite clearly see the beginning and end of the rainfall, the darker, sometimes glinting tunnel of rain from that cloud 30 miles away (yes, you really can see for thirty miles from my garden). And yet, some wayward synapse in my head will tell me, "You don't need the umbrella. Like you can carry it with the buggy anyway".


So I am a familiar drenched figure in the town. The woman who remembers the raincover for the children, but who resolutely shuns hats. And has eyebrows insufficient in density to channel the fall of rain away from her (once) mascaraed eyes. As such, I have knowledge of rain and these are the rain truths.

• All rain is worse when pushing a buggy.


• Tiny wee droplets of fairy like looking rain get you bone wet faster than anything.


• "Mist" in the Fens is "rain" anywhere else.


• You know that washing line? Fenwomen, put it away. From September until May. Below sea level, damp is damp.


• When it says "Flood Warning" it really means it. And quick.


• No matter how hard the rain, how flash the flood, the amount of dog shit in the town will not have decreased by 9am the next morning. It will still get on your buggy wheels, but hey! Now you have puddles to push through instead of scraping it off over the sink.

On the other hand, when the floods freeze, you can do this....

Welney Marshes recently held ice skating festivals. If I could do it, i'd have gone. Maybe as a Fenlander I should learn.

This little clip is a lovely video from the Guardian website of the skating December 2009.http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/video/2010/jan/14/cambridge-fen-skating

The politics of Toddler groups when you are an incomer.

I think, here in the Fens, you stop being an "incomer" when your grandchildren have died in the house you lived in, or thereabouts. For such a wide open space, the Fenlanders themselves are very closed in. So much so, in fact, that the first mothers prepared to risk talking to me at the local toddler group were themselves incomers of a mere years standing. they had come from the far reaches of the NEXT VILLAGE DOWN, and were therefore unused to the ways of the natives, and desperate enough for a chat that they risked scorn in talking to me as I scanned the room to check my kids were not hitting anyone.



Everyone knows the rules to toddler groups. (Note these rules apply only to village or small town toddler groups of a predominanatly White British character. Other more multi-cultural groups have their own social strata )Or at least, mums do. There are never any dads there, and if there are, nobody must talk to the poor sod. Each toddler group must include the following social groups.



A) The posh mums who attend merely as a social function. They do not work, drive 4X4's and ignore their children as they bite and scratch others, sitting in a small huddle talking about tanning salons while their offspring rip their OshKosh jeans fling babies out of bouncy chairs. They do not get their haircut in the town/village, but the nearest city, and pay more than £50.00 for it.

B)The younger mums who nip outside for a fag and have several children fathered upon them by the nearest Barracks. These children are impeccably dressed and extremely violent, giving rise to many shouts of "KYLE! Get your arse here NOW!" They too ignore their children and cluster together discussing her down the road who got pregnant with her over theres' squaddie.

C)The small seam of middle class mothers in whimsical dress who are the only ones playing with their (always) one offspring, trying to stimulate them with the Roatry club funded group toys. They say "Erm, Kyle, please stop doing that. Where's your mummy? Kyle? Kyle?"

D) People who have moved from London to have a better way of life. They stand confused, shocked, and shunned.

E) Childminders. They sit and drink coffee and direct the 4 16 year olds they employ to look afer the 10 crazed kids they "childmind". They are fat and smell of dogs.

F) Everyone else. The three people who are too busy breastfeeding, chasing 2 or more children, or weeping to talk to you. They are the only other normal ones and it will take 8 weeks for you to exchange 3 sentences, because it goes like this:

"So, whereabouts are you from?"

"Oh, really? That's really interesting, I used to...hang on....what, now? ...a poo? Ok. I'll be back in a minute..." (gone for 2 weeks)



Other sundry rules include:

• Paying to enter means as many biscuits as you like


• When you smell poo, you must say loudly "I can smell poo" and sniff your own childs nappy before loudly proclaiming "no, it's not her". The actual culprits mother must be outside having a fag and arguing over maintenance with her squaddie partner.


• No toys must be complete.


• There must always be a sign up saying "IF NO-ONE OFFERS TO HELP THIS TODDLER GROUP WILL CLOSE!!!!!!!!!" but nobody ever does help.