When is a military secret not a military secret?

When anyone with a brain can work the truth out…

The ’90,000 item Wikileak dossier’ has got some sections of the internet huffing and puffing like a highly excited bunch of huffing and puffing things.

There are flaps of outrage and indignation from the US and UK governments which, when subjected to logical analysis, are shown to be incomprehensible and meaningless.

William Gibbs, the US President’s press secretary said (and I quote), ‘these documents [being in the public domain] pose a real and potential threat to national security’.

My response to William Gibbs is twofold.

Firstly, can you please learn to speak English? Because, William, until you do, everyone on this planet is going to ignore you from this point forward.

Let me explain.

Something can either be a real threat, or something can be a potential threat, but something can not be a real *and* a potential threat.

And secondly, William, you obviously haven’t noticed yet, so it falls to me to point out to you, that the situation in Afghanistan is an *international* one.

You are in no position to put American national security before the international security of *all of the states* who are caught up in the conflict. No legal position at all!

The truth must out, it is that simple. No matter how unpalatable to our political servants (and let’s just remember for a moment that the people in The White House and Downing Street are working *for us*) the truth is, it must be our default position.

That there are high-level elements in the Pakistan government who are actively backing and physically supporting al-Qaida is blindingly obvious to anyone with a functional brain.

But the US Government doesn’t want to be *saying* that publicly because:

• it would cause a PR shitstorm in the US heartlands amongst the voters whenever a new raft of coffins are repatriated
• it would upset elements of the Pakistan government
• it would (rightly) cause distrust amongst the forces on the ground
• it would make many people in many countries ask what the fuck is going on, and question the wisdom of our elected politicians

To underline my point I bring forward Frank Askin, Professor of Law at Rutgers School of Law, Newark (USA, not the original Newark).

Professor Askin says (and again I quote):  ‘Transparency should be the government’s default approach to national security’.

The lack of transparency in this conflict is staggering. Under the sacred banner of ‘national security’ (which I have already demonstrated is a meaningless concept in this war), things are being unsaid, truths remain unspoken and massacres of innocents are being unreported.

All of these things are wrong.

What is the difference between 20 civilians being killed by the Americans, or 20 civilians being killed by the Pakistan-backed al-Qaida?

There is no difference.

Except in the former, the story is suppressed, whilst in the latter every single war reporter and every available photographer and film crew are ferried in to the area to record, in great detail, the once-human corpses, the blown-up cars, the dead livestock and the bullet-marked houses.

And come on, the only people who hadn’t figured out that the UK and US special forces have been operating under ‘locate and kill’ orders for the last couple of years, are sections of the UK and US public.

Does William Gibbs really think that members of al-Qaida have not worked these things out for themselves?

Of course they have.

I have downloaded my copy of the dossier and although I haven’t read it in detail yet, I have scanned most of it, and I have to say that all of the information I have seen so far would be known to the enemy!

All of it.

Yet the data has been withheld from the UK and US public.

The logical conclusion is that the governments of the UK and US see the public of the UK and US as the threat.

We are the enemy.

But perhaps we are not ‘the enemy’ within the context of this conflict in Afghanistan; just ‘the enemy of our elected representatives’ – by virtue of our power at the ballot box?

I’ll leave you with just one example of how the truth is being suppressed, and when it leaks out, corrupted.

When US intelligence analyst, Bradley Manning, leaked a video that proved that US Apache helicopters fired on and killed two Reuters cameramen in Baghdad – information that, until that point, the US government had suppressed – who was charged with criminal offences?

Was it:

1. Bradley Manning for leaking the video, or
2. The Apache helicopter crews for murdering innocent civilians?

Ah, I can see from your wry smiles that you know the answer. The casualty is, once again, the truth.

Monkey nuts and motorways

I know I haven’t blogged for two days, but I have just returned home after a long weekend in Leeds, and haven’t had a second to put fingertips to keyboard. Overdue blog posts are all lined up and advancing upon me like ants carrying chopped up leaves. It’s like a cyber horror movie. Even though I am running really fast, and the blogs are moving really slowly, they are still catching up. I have tried stopping and throwing something ineffectual at them (like a small twig), but nothing stops their terrifying advances.

So I have resorted to writing this post under the duvet, because duvets are the only thing able to stop zombie blog postings in their tracks. Cunning… yep that’s me.

I must apologise because the blog postings are all going to be back-to-front, starting with my arrival back in Oxford today, continuing with what I did prior to that throughout the weekend. There is a good reason that I am doing it that way round, and it’s because I have a hundred million blog photographs to go through, and I am too tired to do it tonight. As Izzy would say, “I have got some tired inside my eyes”.

After a three hour journey from Leeds to Oxford, I finally arrived at Steve’s house ready to pick up Izzy and Naughty George, by which time I was feeling pretty knackered. I pressed the buzzer, and it was like I had never been away. Through the open window I could instantly hear a volley of Naughty George’s barks, and Izzy shouting, “Is that Mummy? Don’t tell her that I am going to hide under the bed.”

“Hiya,” I said to Steve as he opened the door, “do I really have to go through the rigmarole of finding Izzy’s hiding place?”

“Yep,” he replied, and then lowered his voice, adding; “she is under the bed.”

“She’s always under the bed,” I replied wearily, “do I still have to act surprised?”

“Of course you do, she’s five. That’s what five years olds do.”

Because I am like Mother Theresa, I feigned searching the entire house before ‘accidentally’ stumbling across Izzy’s hiding place under the bed.

“RAARRRRR! I’ve found you!” I shouted, tickling her feet.

She laughed uncontrollably for about 15 seconds and then emerged from under the bed, greeting my four day absence in the way that five year olds do; “I’m hungry,” she said.

I went to find Steve; “Izzy’s hungry, have you got any snacks to hand?”

“Yeh, sure,” he said before disappearing into the kitchen and returning with a handful of monkey nuts, handing them to Izzy.

Knowing that Izzy was preoccupied with her monkey nuts, I picked up the coffee that Steve had made me and turned to him to chat. Not thirty seconds passed before we heard an anguished wail coming from the other room; “Naughty George has nicked-ed [sic - it's past tense for five year olds] one of my monkey nuts!”

“Naughty George doesn’t eat monkey nuts!” I shouted, walking into the living room where Izzy was hollering.

How wrong was I? It turned out that Naughty George was the mutt equivalent of those Brazilian Capuchin monkeys who have learned how to use tools to access food.

He had the monkey nut in his mouth, and he bit it gently until the shell fell away and then he scoffed the nuts inside. Bloody hell, my dog was transforming himself into the missing link. Question one: how did he know that there was something edible inside the shell? Question 2: how did he figure out how to get the shell off?

There was only one thing for it. After discovering Naughty George’s ability to crack open nuts, I am going to have to pickle him in a jar of Formalehyde and sell him to some forensic Darwinists, making a huge profit in the process.

“Here, Georgie, Georgie…… here Georgie, Georgie…….”

My take on the abolition of the UK Film Council.

This is hastily written because I’ve had a long day, maybe later in the week I’ll rewrite it with less swearwords and more actual examples….

To everyone who’s bitching about the UK Film Council being abolished:

As someone who has been trained by, taught for, been through the funding process and had to attend seminars with the organisation, I’d just like to say this: THANK FUCK IT’S BEING SHITCANNED. It is without doubt the most ineffective, bureaucratic gravy train I have ever had the misfortune to witness. If you think that the organisation has been some kind of saviour for British film, you are HUGELY mistaken.

The UKFC was basically a place where a handful of people who didn’t seem to have had any obvious practical film-making experience lauded over all those who wanted to get interesting films made. For the best part of a decade, I’ve watched them waste money on lavish parties, regular ‘networking’ trips to L.A. and schemes which channeled money into the pockets of endless ‘experts’ and ‘consultants’ and not into films. Most of the films which have their name on it were actually independent productions which got off the ground completely independently and, at the point the film was looking like a sure bet, the UKFC would kick in a few thousand ‘completion money’ to get their name on the poster and justify their existence.

I’ve seen fantastic screenwriters have their scripts endlessly ‘workshopped’ until the script has no meaning on character and ends up not being made. I’ve seen huge amounts of money wasted on predominantly awful short films.

My main personal experience of them was that they spent a load of money training me to teach the screenwriting course – putting me up in hotels in London and paying my expenses, paying a guy to create and the course and train us to deliver it, then they never once asked for feedback. Not once. Not only this, they complained about having to spend money on script readers to find screenplays to produce but constantly ignored my offers to recommend to them excellent screenwriters who’d just spent 22 weeks doing their bloody course.

The times I have applied for funding have generally consisted of being sat in rooms with arrogant idiots spouting non-committal rubbish.

Back when film funding came through the Arts Council, they didn’t interfere. You applied, got some money, made your film warts n’all. That’s how we developed great filmmakers in this country.

In the decade that it has been operational, the ONLY filmmaker I can name who possibly owes their career to the UKFC is Andrea Arnold – director of Red Road and Fishtank. I don’t consider that much of an achievement.

The BBC today quoted Chris Atkins – director of the excellent doc Taking Liberties and Starsuckers as saying:

‘UK FILM COUNCIL ABOLISHED! Fabulous day! I wonder what 70 incompetent overpaid bureaucrats are going to do? I could use a couple of runners. [It had] far more misses than hits. Funded Sex Lives Of Potato Men, U2 3D, 4321, Rolling Stones, St Trinian’s, I could go on…’

I think you’ll find that to be the response from most actual film-makers.

I’m no Tory and I object to actual arts funding cuts but the UKFC was a gravy train for a bunch of arseholes and I’m absolutely chuffed to bits that it’s gone.

Blogging bullets

• 17th March, 2004
• My first blog post
• Over here
• I’m re-reading it all
• Sad git

Life Lessons

It was my birthday yesterday. 31. My 30th birthday itself was a surprisingly simple and elegant time, but the year that followed was punctuated by way too much personal angst and drama for my liking: loss, two grief cycles, isolation, moving rooms five times (moving house sounds too glamorous), uncertainty, and the tension that thesis boredom and repetition can create. There was, of course, a lot of stable, productive, and very happy times, but, on the whole, I think, during 2009-2010, I coughed up some pretty staggeringly high prices for some lessons that I guess I couldn’t just steal from the self-help aisle or pinch from a website. I feel better today, in most senses, than ever before, but I paid up, kiddies.

Here are some of those lessons:

1. Take charge. No one is going to get yourself out of situations you don’t want to be in, or help you into others, certainly not the right way, anyway. Those who love you can’t always be expected to push you off from the shore, even if you’re fretfully thinking, ‘Can’t they see that I need a push?’ This goes for personal and professional stuff.

2. Beware fear of loss and rejection. These anxieties mean that you can attach too early, fantasize at the cost of really knowing and caring for the other, become ungrounded, and ultimately disrespect your own personal standards and boundaries. Don’t foreclose early. Loss can be a breath of fresh air, and rejection is, for the most part, a benevolent thing.

   

3. Fear is contagious. No matter how sensible you think you are being in a relationship, there is nothing like a bit of fear (anger, defensiveness, dishonesty etc) from the other to taint and warp your behaviour. Goes both ways. Builds up.
4. Remember the love. Lots of people love and value me, and I adore them. I am absurdly lucky in this way. I just spoke to my twin. Last week, my parents treated me to a holiday in France in which we met up with our French family friends. Yesterday, a friend took me to late lunch at this nice French place in Oxford, then last night, a bunch of friends took me out for cocktails, dinner and nice chat. They also granted me my wish: to be sung Happy Birthday in a non-English language, in character. Included Latin, Dutch, Urdu, and Spanish. If that’s not supremely loving…well, I just don’t know…(fierce shake of my double chin)

   

5. Generosity emerges from unexpected gaps. A new friend made my birthday very special by taking me to dinner and out to a College party on Friday night. We laughed a lot and he just knows.
6. Adversity can be a good test. Crap situations test your ability to respond to life with creativity and self-composure, and this, I think, is a reflection of how much you know and like yourself, in the good way, not the narcissistic way (narcissism actually blocks these opportunities for growth). Of course, some situations are just crap and you have to just get through without any theorising.

   

7. Maybe just don’t say it. Not everything needs to be expressed. Wait and see what remains to be said. Equally, not everything deserves a response. I have realised over the year that I actually don’t like talking as much about things as I used to. I don’t need to. Plus, I am more practical by nature. I am hoping the next year is one big ’shh…’
8. Take your time. Giving yourself enough time and space for recalibration after set-backs is crucial. If you don’t consciously do this, your body and mind will take it from you anyway, in some form, which means that no matter what you’re intending, you simply don’t have enough of the right stuff to give.

   

9. Chin up, and just keep going. Even if you have to start again at your beginnings, you’re wiser for it, and it can be quite a light time anyway.
10. Give yourself more credit. I have proven to myself over and over that I am kind, dependable, optimistic, pretty self-reliant, and definitely resilient. Lock it in, AH. Also, I like the fact that I would go for a run along the promenade of a beach in the Riviera to then decide to strip down to my underpants and dive into that unclouded blue water because my bikini was back in my bag in the hotel locker, and because dolphining about is better than any land-based exercise.

    

Please tell me a life lesson or two that you have acquired over the past year…But only if you feel like it. ; )

Life Lessons

It was my birthday yesterday. 31. I remember my 30th birthday being a surprisingly simple and elegant time, but the year that followed was punctuated by way too much personal angst and drama: big decisions, loss, two grief cycles, isolation, moving rooms five times (moving house sounds too glamorous), uncertainty, and the tension that thesis boredom and repetition can create. There were chunks of stable, productive, and very happy times, but, on the whole, I think, during 2009-2010, I coughed up some pretty staggeringly high prices for some lessons that I guess I couldn’t just steal from the self-help aisle or pinch from a website. I feel better today, in most senses, than ever before, but I paid up, kiddies.

Here are some of those lessons:

1. Take charge. No one is going to get you out of situations you don’t want to be in, or help you into others, and certainly not the right way, anyway. Those who love you can’t always be expected to push you off from the shore, even if you’re fretfully thinking, ‘Can’t they see that I need a push?’ This goes for personal and professional stuff.

2. Beware fear of loss and rejection. These anxieties mean that you can attach too early, fantasize at the cost of really knowing the other, become ungrounded, and ultimately disrespect your own personal standards and boundaries. Don’t foreclose early. Loss creates space, and rejection is, for the most part, a benevolent thing.

   

3. Fear is contagious. No matter how sensible and sincere you think you are being in a relationship, there is nothing like a bit of fear (anger, defensiveness, dishonesty etc) from the other to warp your behaviour. Builds up. It becomes very hard to listen. Goes both ways.
4. Remember the love. Lots of people love and value me, and I adore them. I am absurdly lucky in this way. I just spoke to my twin. Last week, my parents treated me to a holiday in France in which we met up with our French family friends. We also won pretty big on Neptune’s Fortune at the Casino of Monte Carlo. I like that I’ve now been to a casino with my parents. They go all the time so it was nice of them to finally include me (wink, wink). Yesterday, a friend took me to late lunch at this nice French place in Oxford, then last night, a bunch of friends took me out for cocktails, dinner and nice chat. They also granted me my wish: to be sung Happy Birthday in a non-English language, in character. Included Latin, Dutch, Urdu, and Spanish. If that’s not supremely loving…well, I just don’t know…(fierce shake of my double chin)

   

5. Generosity emerges from unexpected sources. A new friend made my birthday very special by taking me to a lovely dinner and out to a College party on Friday night. We laughed a lot and he just knows.
6. Adversity can be a good test. Crap situations test your ability to respond to life with creativity and self-composure, and this, I think, is a reflection of how much you know and like yourself, in the good way, not the narcissistic way (narcissism actually blocks these opportunities for growth). Of course, some situations are just crap and you have to just get through without any theorising.

   

7. Maybe just don’t say it. Not everything needs to be expressed. Wait and see what remains to be said. My friend says to put things through the ‘necessary and kind’ test. Equally, not everything deserves a response. I have realised over the year that I actually don’t like talking as much about things as I used to. I don’t need to. Plus, I am more practical, outward, and flexible by nature. But I did hurt someone I love with too many words. Fortunately, we had enough in the bank. I am hoping the next year is one big ’shh…’
8. Take your time. Giving yourself enough time and space for recalibration after set-backs is crucial. If you don’t consciously do this, your body and mind will take it from you anyway, in some form, which means that no matter what you’re intending, you simply won’t have enough of the right stuff to give, and you’ll probably be giving it to the wrong thing or person anyway.

   

9. Chin up, chaps. Even if you have to start again at your beginnings, you’re wiser for it, and it can be quite a light time anyway.
10. Give yourself more credit.

    

Please tell me a life lesson or two that you have acquired over the past year…But only if you feel like it. ; )

Ha-ha, fooled you!

Yesterday Soph and I drove in to London, parked the car at Queensway and caught the tube to Mile End where we met Ash for lunch.

Ash is a unique guy. Genuinely talented and blessed with an abundance of creativity Ash chooses to spend most of his time working in the public sector; providing valuable services to some of our fellow humans most in need of assistance.

With his free time, Ash indulges his creative talents as a composer/musician of serious ability – we have shared just a fraction of his musical talent with our podcast listeners, under the names of artists ‘Warning! Heat Ray!’ and ‘Unsound’.

And he writes; as a music analyst/reviewer, Ash is one of the few muso-writers whose opinions – and writing – I hold in genuinely high regard.

Lunch, with Ash, was brilliant; that’s a measure of what a genuinely nice guy he is.

Later in the afternoon we went back to the West End, had lunch in an Italian restaurant in Berner Street then walked to the place where we were to meet up with author Alex Marsh and renowned blogger Jonny B.

Alex Marsh and Jonny B are the same person, obv.

The occasion was an informal launch of Alex’s new book ‘Sex and Bowls and Rock & Roll’, or as Alex put it ‘Not a book launch, just a drink in a pub with a few friends’.

Sitting next to Alex was the deliciously gorgeous Catherine Sanderson (aka internationally renowned author and erstwhile blogger, Petite Anglaise).

So that wasn’t very intimidating at all, was it? Jonny B and Petite Anglaise sitting next to me.

Erm, yes. I may have slipped in to idiot mode.

More people arrived.

Mike Atkinson (aka influential blogger/journalist Troubled Diva) was followed by a pair of very influential internet characters, bloggers, writers and podcasters, Cliff Jones and Mr Angry.

The very lovely (he did me a favour by personalising a copy of his book for Soph) Andrew Viner.

And there were others!

People whose names I can’t remember; intelligent, articulate people who said bright, witty (if not outrageously funny) things.

It was a fun, funny evening.

We bailed out, leaving the survivors to carry on, around 8pm.

By the time we got home, watched Big Brother drank tea and fell in to bed it was midnight.

This morning Soph and I are teetering around the house like a pair of newly-dead zombies.

Because we are not the grown-up people we pretended to be on two occasions, in front of all those folk, yesterday.

We are a pair of kids  who went out and successfully fooled them all.

Ha-ha, fooled you!

But not only was it really nice to meet everyone – from lunch with Ash to Jonny B and all of his friends – it was very pleasant to meet such a thoroughly nice group of people.

Ha-ha, fooled you!

Yesterday Soph and I drove in to London, parked the car at Queensway and caught the tube to Mile End where we met Ash for lunch.

Ash is a unique guy. Genuinely talented and blessed with an abundance of creativity, Ash chooses to spend most of his time working in the public sector; providing valuable services to some of our fellow humans most in need of assistance.

With his free time, Ash indulges his creative talents as a composer/musician of serious worth – we have shared just a fraction of his musical talent with our podcast listeners, under the names of artists ‘Warning! Heat Ray!’ and ‘Unsound’.

And he writes; as a music analyst/reviewer, Ash is one of the few muso-writers whose opinions – and writing – I hold in genuinely high regard.

Lunch, with Ash, was brilliant; that’s a measure of what a genuinely nice guy he is.

Later in the afternoon we went back to the West End, had a meal in an Italian restaurant in Berner Street, then walked to the place where we were to meet up with author Alex Marsh and renowned blogger Jonny B.

Alex Marsh and Jonny B are the same person, obv.

The occasion was an informal launch of Alex’s new book ‘Sex and Bowls and Rock & Roll’, or as Alex put it ‘Not a book launch, just a drink in a pub with a few friends’.

Sitting next to Alex was the deliciously gorgeous Catherine Sanderson (aka internationally renowned author and erstwhile blogger, Petite Anglaise).

So that wasn’t very intimidating at all, was it? Jonny B and Petite Anglaise sitting next to me.

Erm, yes. I may have slipped in to idiot mode.

More people arrived.

Mike Atkinson (aka influential blogger/journalist Troubled Diva) was followed by a pair of very high-profile internet characters: bloggers, writers and podcasters, Cliff Jones and Mr Angry.

Then the gorgeous Girl With A One-Track Mind rocked up.

The very lovely (he once did me a favour by personalising a copy of his book for Soph) Andrew Viner followed on behind.

And there were others!

People whose names I can’t remember; intelligent, articulate people who said bright, witty (if not outrageously funny) things.

It was a fun, funny evening.

We bailed out, leaving the survivors to carry on, around 8pm.

By the time we got home, watched Big Brother drank tea and fell in to bed it was midnight.

This morning Soph and I are teetering around the house like a pair of newly-dead zombies.

Why teetering around the house? Because we are not the grown-up people we pretended to be on two occasions, in front of all those folk, yesterday.

We are a pair of kids  who went out and successfully hoodwinked them all into believing that we were grown-up.

Ha-ha, fooled you!

But not only was it really nice to meet everyone – from lunch with Ash to to the afternoon/evening’s meeting with Jonny B and all of his friends – it was very pleasant to meet such a thoroughly nice group of people.

A very Spanish show

This week’s digital broadcast (or podcast, if you prefer) is out and bouncing around every corner of the interwebs.

It’s a very Spanish affair – intended to celebrate a few of the *many* peculiarities that Bren experienced when he lived in Bérchules, a tiny, remote, high-mountain village in the district of Granada.

The music is Spanish (and yet it isn’t), and the facts are all true – even the one about Bren getting arrested when he lived there.

1. You can listen by streaming the show straight from our website: just click here!
2. Or you can download the show to your computer – or your mobile phone – so you can listen whenever you want, and in the privacy of your own home: just right click here and use the ‘save’ or ‘save as’ option in your browser
3. Or, if you have iTunes, you can get the show from the iTunes store (free of charge!): just click here and listen to it on your iPod, iPhone, iPad, your computer or other iTunes-compatible music player. Better than radio!

Naughty George goes mentalist

Yesterday morning, I woke up and went downstairs to find that Naughty George was acting oddly. When I say oddly, I mean that he was standing on the sideboard in my kitchen as though he was an ornament. He was stock still, the only movement being his nose twitching.

“What the bloody hell are you doing on that sideboard?” I asked him, before remembering that he could only speak ‘woof’.

He looked at me contemptuously (yep, my own dog), and then turned away to carry on …. well…. standing. How come I always end up with the strange dog? Someone should write a book called ‘Dogs are from Pluto, and Humans are from Earth’, it would be an international bestseller, and I would earn loads of money for coming up with the concept.

Anyway, I decided to leave him to his own devices and get on with some work.When I returned to the kitchen an hour later, Naughty George had abandoned his position on top of the sideboard and was now wedged in the small gap between the sideboard and the fridge.

“Right that’s it,” I said to him, “if you don’t stop acting all weird, I am going to send you to a mental institution for dogs, and they will probably give you electro-dog-therapy.” He backed out of the small gap, looked at me blankly before proceeding to start sniffing away at the bottom of the sideboard.

That’s when it dawned on me; some food had probably dropped down the back, and he was trying to get to it….. hence the freaky behaviour. No problem, we could solve this one easily. I grabbed hold of the sideboard and pulled it away from the wall, only to be confronted by a bloody great rat sitting there.

I screamed and shot out of the back door, the rat squeaked (I didn’t realise how loud they actually were) and shot back under the sideboard, and Naughty George tried to follow the rat, barking frenziedly. 

I stood in the garden and contemplated my dilemma with that old UB40 song spinning around in my head. ‘There’s a rat in mi kitchen, what am I gonna do?’ I peeked around the kitchen door and saw Naughty George lying on his side with both front paws under the sideboard trying to get at the rat.

I mean, just how is one supposed to get a rat out of a kitchen? Bribe it with lumps of cheese (or is it only mice that like cheese)? Ring up a rat charmer….. I don’t know.

All of a sudden my dilemma was solved. Upon seeing Naughty George, the rat had decided to make a run for the open back door, and at breakneck speed (I didn’t realise how scarily fast they were), ran past me with NG in hot pursuit. 

Needless to say, Naughty George 1 – Rat 0.

“Naughty George, you are my hero!” I said to him as he reappeared looking pleased with himself, “I’m sorry I threatened to send you to a Mental Institution.” He wagged his tail vacuously and climbed into his dog basket. Drama over.

P.S. I just want to add that I haven’t got a rat in my house because of slovenly housekeeping standards or anything like that. It’s because I live next to a farm, so they tend to be an occupational hazard.