Rubbing It In It is a rash man who claims
to speak for the agricultural community as a' whole; but, looking back over a summer of almost continuous frustration and disappointment, there is one mat- ter on which I am pretty sure that all farmers and farm-workers would agree, and that is that they would 4adly have done without the broad- cast called 'Your Holiday Weather,' which the Light Programme puts on at 8.55 a.m. This dis- penses auntie-type advice ('better take your macs, you hikers') to holiday-makers of all categories, from gliding enthusiasts and yachtsmen to spec- tators at sporting events and would-be sun- bathers. The broadcast tends to coincide—in my part of the world, anyhow—with a short break for what we for some reason call 'lunch,' and nowadays there is generally a car radio or a tran- sistor in the barn. It is not only the farmer's pockets that suffers in a catastrophic summer; his men's morale suffers too, because they hate not being able to get on with things, they miss the rhythm and the feeling of achievement which haymaking provides under reasonable conditions. 'Your Holiday Weather,' with its underlying assumption that holiday-makers deserve a sort of VIP meteorological treatment, has in these cir- cumstances a particularly galling impact, and in the last months I have heard some harsh com- ments on the programme—none, alas, printable.
Previous page
