March hares (mad as...)

March comes in like a lion and goes out with a lamb: Not this year, as we had heavenly weather until this week but now we have very high winds and wintry showers. The wind gets inside our heads and makes us behave wildly. You can see this in any school playground. Wildlife is affected too and has been specially observed in hares. In England we say "Mad as a March hare" because hares run around skipping and singing , and they pick a fight at any opportunity. The Stevenson males (often born in March) are mainly the skipping and singing types; but don't cross us!

I celebrated my 59th birthday a few days early, and a day late, just to be sure it didn't go un-noticed. I took my annual day off to go fishing at Ravensthorpe which is an old Victorian reservoir. (I know all Victorian Reservoirs are old, but this one seems ancient,OK? Stop interrupting.) I was rewarded with a big rainbow trout weighing over 7 lbs, which makes it my biggest for about ten years. It was so big that.......(fill in the blanks).. I had to get someone with a bigger net to help me get it in. I caught a bunch of average sized fish as well.

Hanna with an old flame at Wicken Fen.

On the 18th Hanna and I went to Wicken Fen Nature Reserve, where she used to work. It was a really beautiful day and we saw quite a lot of wildlife before going into Cambridge for supper at Carluccio's restaurant.

It was Nick's birthday on the 19th and he celebrated by playing a concert in the cellar of The Grapes in Hereford. It was quite a party with an audience of about 50 art students and friends packed in to a small space. I went along and really enjoyed seeing Nick perform with his new band for the first time. I even got to play the mouth-organ on stage. Historic!

Afterwards we adjourned to The Barrels, which is the Ledburys' (Nick's housemates from Ledbury Road) usual haunt. I turned up there via the front door and found myself serving behind the bar! Apparently I was supposed to open one of the anonymous doors to the left or right. They both looked like toilets or broom cupboards to me, but in fact they both lead to bars, both of which were jammed with people taking part in a pub quiz. 'No sign of the art crowd or Nick anywhere. I joined a charming Glaswegian philosopher at the bar and ordered a "Butty Beer" thinking we might in fact be in Hogsmead, just over the wall from Harry Potter's school. "What is the main ingredient in lava soup?" was the next question. I almost shouted out the answer because I knew that lava is a kind of seaweed found on rocks around Swansea in South Wales. My advice is to leave it there, but some people insist on peeling it off and frying it up with bacon and probably leeks. I'd never heard of it being made into soup. Anyway the chief ingredient in lava soup is probably lava, isn't it? Or is it water? I bet there's more water in soup than anything else. We may never find out. Who cares, really?

By now, you should be getting a vague idea about the confusing sort of place I was in. I had a look out the back and found several more bars in the courtyards and stables, each inhabited by different groups of people such as old rockers, young rockers, students, nurses, drunks etc, and art students, including Nick who was into his fifth pint of Guinness and opening presents.

I eventually dragged him away at 11 and we got almost home by 1.30 am before a diversion sent us off to Leicestershire for an hour. Friday was a bit of a blur after that.

Saturday was pretty pleasant, revolving around a trip to Cambridge to get Nick his birthday present; another guitar. I know he has almost got the full set now, but he didn't have a child sized classical guitar with nylon strings did he? He has now. As I said, "Mad as a March hare."