We have all heard the expression and title of the book “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” but farm men come into their own. Usually brought up on the farm all their lives, they can find it hard to understand life from any other perspective, and if their dearly beloved is from a non farming background, allowances [...]
It’s easy to spot a farmer out and about when in their working clothes. Items like boots or wellies, mud splattered clothes, sitting in a tractor or jeep, the working dog alongside, bulging pockets (not with money but with nuts, bolts, baler twine, keys, receipts and a battered cheque book) and perhaps even the whiff of slurry or silage all tend to give it away without having to look too closely. But what about when they are dressed up and [...]
I have always enjoyed reading farm and rural memoirs. My copies of James Herriot’s books are dog-eared and have been reread many times since I was a teenager. The success of recently published farm memoirs proved that the rural memoir is as popular as ever, perhaps even enjoying a renaissance as various sectors of society (indeed, 47% of people in Britain) show an interest in leaving their city lives and dream of living on a smallholding or perhaps [...]
When I started writing my first book Would You Marry a Farmer? I was genuinely surprised at the number of single women who told me they really wanted to marry a farmer. Part of the reason for my surprise was because farmers definitely weren’t seen as a good catch in the 1950s when draughty farmhouses, lack of electricity and piped water, living with your mother-in-law and hard work were the norm for many. However, in the twenty-first century, farmers are [...]
I admit that between long and sometimes unsociable working hours, smelly clothing and scruffy vehicles not to mention the proximity of his entire family to your living arrangments, farmers have not always been seen as the best catch in marriageable material. Except, of course, for those madly in love, after the road frontage or looking at baby livestock through rose tinted glasses. We’re 25 years married next week (eeek) so I thought it was good timing to show farmers can [...]
