An Agricultural experience

Relationships being particularly important in the country, I thought that I’d go and cheer on my grandmother’s cousin’s son’s second wife (may have forgotten a twist in the lineage there so don’t quote me) and her step son at the large show in our nearest big town.   They breed Herefords and had a steer entered in one of the classes.  Having never been to an agricultural show before, I dressed with particular care.  The show was in a big town and in the international exhibition centre, so involved no outdoors experience, what would you wear?  The horsey lot had make-up and lippy, (which is sort of weird – sorry horsey lot in my audience), there was a maximum of 3 skirts allowed at a time in the halls (yes, this was obviously a rule), although one was a pink neckband, so didn’t really count and only logoed baseball caps were worn if at all.  I had black clumpy boots, purple wool Monsoon skirt, skirted wool coat and a black beret with eyes and Diva lippy.  The poor chaps on the tractor stands were diving for cover.

Everything one could possibly have on a farm was there.   I morphed into a forest owning entrepreneur and got all sorts of free gifts, whilst having no idea what I was talking about or what was being said to me.  All sorts of words that I had no idea existed!  My vocabulary would have been impressively improved if I could have remembered the words long enough to look them up.  Still, I didn’t sign anything, so that’s OK.  I didn’t need to buy lunch either as there were lots of food stalls in one of the halls, selling stuff that was made on farms, so grazed on apples, sausage and cheese and then fell madly in love with a JCB mini tractor thing, which is the technical term. 

I think that I’m right in saying that in the UK it can be difficult to tell if someone has money.  I have used this to my advantage in Bond Street many a time.  That’s so not the case here.  The moneyed look really, really different from the hoi polloi (checked shirt and tee) and the trailer trash (checked shirt and Croydon facelift).  Their hairstyles are of a certain type, the skin glow is different and they all wear blazers and moccasins.   Given that social equality is like a religion here, I find it interesting that the visual difference between the classes is so marked, whilst in a class riddled society like the UK, it’s more difficult to tell the difference.  

Anyway after that particular musing in the coffee shop, I got back to the show ring in time to see the King’s entries, which were two Simmental bulls.  They were MASSIVE.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  They each weighed 1.5 tonnes and had balls the size of footballs.  They would not have been able to mount anything without squashing it flat, if indeed, they could have raised their front legs that high. Pure sperm factories.

GB’s steer was 3^rd in the class.  Marvellous day.