the Birds Are Flying High Tonight

Last night I headed over into deepest Somerset in order to collect our Christmas turkey, which has been wandering around the farm, eating all sorts of interesting things, flying*  and generally doing turkey things, for most of the last 6 -7 months. 

Last weekend, it was called to its forefathers, and last night I went to get its mortal remains, which will be translated into glory on Christmas Day.

The drive over was fine - one or two icy patches on the roads, and some interesting patterns of drifted snow on some of the walls and hedges.

However, arriving in the village, things were a little different. There was absolutely no way I could have got up the lane to J's farm - it is narrow, twisty, and has very unforgiving stone walls and cliffs up both sides, so instead I walked up, and J, out of the kindness of her heart, walked down to meet me:

SCENE:  An Icy lane, by moonlight.

FIRST MYSTERIOUS FIGURE:        Hello
SECOND MYSTERIOUS FIGURE:  (Cradling a swaddled bundle) We must stop meeting like this.
FMF:         You know why I'm here
SMF:         Yes .
FMF:          Do you have it?
SMF:          I do.  (Hands over swaddled bundle) 

They part.                  

I wonder whether cold war spies did this. I felt I ought to be giving a password.                      

*Turkeys are not the most aerodynamic of birds, but if you have a turkey-house at the top of a steepish slope, and the kitchen garden at the bottom, they can show you one hell of a glide. There is nothing like being dive-bombed by low-flying turkeys to reconcile one to the prospect of eating them, I can tell you!