Farmer Writes: frying pan to fire – coping with 2018

I don’t know if 'feast or famine' or 'frying pan to fire' is more appropriate. Either way, with the succession of weather extremes we are getting this year, I’m on the point of googling how to deal with a plague of locusts.

We needed a family holiday to get away from it all; luckily it was to France where it was cooler.

I get the feeling I was looking forward to Disneyland Paris more than the family. I even wore my Donald Duck socks. Cartoons really need to be relabelled as adult, a cinematic experience totally wasted on toddlers and unappreciated by the teens.

Everything is colour coded – orange rated rollercoasters were to be the rides of choice. Now anyone who knows me would hardly describe me as a thrill-seeker. I’m the one who volunteers to take the photos of everyone else.

Rollercoasters

I found myself queuing for something called “Space Mountain”. The warnings looked pretty standard safety announcements – not suitable for anyone with back or blood pressure problems or for pregnant women. Small print said something about sudden starts and stops, and a 360 loop. Can’t be much worse than my experience of a DB996 and trailer of silage sliding sideways in a cliff field.

Luck of the draw gave me a front-row seat. We shot into pitch blackness interspersed with a few lights to emphasise the speed while the blood pumped from my knuckles to the top of my head.

Quickly I realised the experience wasn’t for me. However, in true dairy farmer fashion I was soon queuing for a ramshackle looking mountain railway with the exact same safety notices and small print. The difference here would be that everything was in broad daylight. Seeing the previous group go through the 360 loop convinced me not to try it but I ended up in the second row.

Training

Basically it was perfect training for farming. First time trying something you don’t know how it’ll go. You just about get away with it so you can try again but with more information. Preparation for the future means learning from this year’s rollercoaster so we can enjoy the ride and still be in business afterwards.

Storm Ophelia was just a breeze. Storm Emma was cool. The long winter was just queuing for summer. The drought saved a fortune on fake tan.

I’m hoping this runaway year is slowing into the station so we can all get off and back to normal. Must check to see if there are any deals on fake tan for next year’s summer wash-out … right after I search for extra winter fodder.

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