The House Husband

After a solid week of house related (and Science Museum) work, I had today off and spent it with Dawn. I hadn’t seen her for ages and was really looking forward to it. Imagine my surprise when she didn’t cancel at the last minute!

The day, however, did not begin very brightly. The weather was pretty foul with strong winds, evil clouds and drifting sheets of rain. Add to this a frantic and fruitless search for Mirinda’s bank cards and the day was looking decidedly glum.

Mirinda managed to only miss one train and I saw her off to a very important meeting with a leading provider of hat robbing engineers. As I walked back to the house, the sun started to appear and the clouds gradually dispersed.

Dawn was in the highly unusual situation of having Nicktor at home to attend to all the usual duties so she could spend as much time out with me as she wanted. Generally when we have lunch I only get an hour or so before she has to race off to collect, feed and water the boys. But not today!

We started off by driving down to Winchester Uni (where she’s doing her PhD) to see Julie (one of our tutors at Surrey so many years ago) who was sorting finds from a student dig. Actually, she was washing oyster shells. There are an awful lot of oyster shells on the site and it looks like poor Julie is washing all of them. She had a room full of students washing various other finds. She was at her usual acerbic best. And I’m convinced she had no idea who I was. Still, she knew Dawn and that was enough.

She gave us a tour of a few of the better finds from the dig. Some tokens (used instead of money as I’ve mentioned a number of times in prior posts), some wonderful Murano glass fragments and a tray of very small objects which Julie asked us to identify.

We tried a few guesses but couldn’t work it out. Apparently they had to send them away to an expert to find out what they were as well. They looked like tiny little lead weights but were shark denticles (also called placoid scales). These form the sharks scales and are similar to tiny teeth. Shark was used a lot by Medieval monks.

We were also shown a couple of jug handles with faces on them. Brilliant finds! Exactly the sort of thing I’d never find in a million years of digging.

After spending a little time listening to how awful a certain staff member is, we left for lunch in Winchester. We went to the Bishop on the Bridge and had a lovely meal (and beer…except Dawn has gone off beer and enjoyed an alcoholic ginger beer instead which she justified by saying it had ‘beer’ in the name) before going for a short wander and coffee.

We went into a lovely little cafe but they didn’t want to serve us so we popped across the road to the much more accommodating Maison Blanc. we sat outside and enjoyed our coffee and watched people strolling around, cameras in hand, enjoying the gorgeous day.

We then left Winchester and paid an unannounced visit to the dig site. Dawn wanted to talk to the bone expert (to do with her PhD) and we really wanted to have a sticky over the site.

We both felt a very strong pull to get out our trowels and start scraping away but, fortunately, we didn’t have our trowels with us and I had sandals on. Instead we managed to get a look at an exposed skeleton which one of the guys was excavating (actually he was drawing the plan and taking measurements while we were there but it’s all part of the process). I managed to get a photo as we discussed what was wrong with him.

The site used to be a Medieval leper hospital so our assumption was that he (Dawn said it was a ‘he’) was a leper though a person on blip said he was probably misdiagnosed as it looked like he had psoriasis. Anyway, he look jolly happy, like most skeletons do. This is because the lower jaw falls down after everything rots away from the bones, giving the skull an eternal grin. Death and happiness. Maybe that’s where the crazy stories of heaven come from, the cheerful dead.

Possibly a leper but definitely dead

We wandered back across the field to the car and drove back to Farnham where we had a brief detour so Dawn could see what the storage unit looked like – she’d never seen one before – as she’s thinking of putting Nicktor in one. Or, at least, his junk collection. Her verdict was that it wouldn’t be even close to being big enough for him.

We then enjoyed a lovely coffee on the patio while fussing with the dogs before she left. It was a lovely day, improved by the fact that Mirinda found her bank cards at work and had an excellent meeting.

After Dawn left, I decided the grass was dry enough to mow (for any prospective house viewers) and set to it. It always looks so much better after a mow and much more inviting. I then rearranged the lounge room to make it look bigger – no easy task but I think it worked.

So, a full and very enjoyable Monday. Tomorrow it’s back to the house improvement programme with, possibly, painting on the agenda.

So. My final Weasel adventure? Perhaps. These are my notes from the final day and the trip across the Channel.

What is wrong with these people? Clearly they’re not like me at all. Perhaps, after all is said and done, I am ill-suited to archaeology. Smart arse know it alls.

There seems to be a desire for nothing to change and for everything to be ‘as it should’. Why, for instance, was there such a negative reaction to the huge Roman style building at the top of La Gacilly? Why must everything conform?

Along the canal we spotted a chateau with a satellite dish. This was seen as some sort of crime against humanity! Perhaps we should have been rowing up the river in a hollowed out log. Actually, I’m not sure about all these structures. I think leaving the trees 50 million years ago was a mistake.

After all, what is the original home of Homo sapien? Pre-civilisation, pre-agriculture, pre-technology…caves, I guess. Well, that’s what I want to see. A landscape unblemished by the trappings of ‘civilised’ human-kind.

But who is the arbiter of how far back we should go? This is, of course, a personal issue and one that makes no sense. We sit in a modern vessel, eating a drinking the products of civilisation (we didn’t have to go and hunt or brew anything) and claim people shouldn’t have satellite dishes.

What has been painfully apparent on this trip is how negative everything is viewed. Too new, too old, too many tourists, not enough modern conveniences (how ironic), etc. None of them view the world with an appreciation of the new as something beautiful. If this is archaeology then I don’t like it very much.

When I see something I’ve never seen before, I am generally all wide-eyed and enthusiastic, wanting to learn about it. I don’t criticise things because they encompass different periods of human history. Ok, if I see something I don’t like then I’ll say so but I don’t just simply dislike everything because it’s painted the wrong colour. Art must be an impossible appreciation for these people.

I hope I am never so bitter and twisted that I see the world through ashen glasses. While I may kid myself with my rose tint, I am, at least, generally a happy soul.

This is why I need to go off on my own from time to time. At first I thought this was because I had fallen into the trap of the lonely but I am now convinced it is because I need to escape the negativity that seems to surround the group like a dark cloud, a thick fog of despair.

The boat could be Charon’s dark barge, cruising the Styx!

Why does Matt ALWAYS look so miserable? What’s that all about? He seems to take great care to make sure his mouth is set in a grimace at all times. This is all you see. Sort of like an anti-Gary. Maybe that’s what he is. My antidote.

I realise how independent he is – I’d be an idiot if I didn’t – but he takes it to ridiculous lengths…as if no-one else exists or even matters. I guess that wouldn’t be too bad if you had something to offer the world.

Why does he just leave the boat without a word to anyone? It’s like he doesn’t know (or care) how a group works. It’s like he feels as if everyone else should just do what his agenda indicates.

But Matt I could understand, after all, he’s just unpleasant but Sean? What was Sean’s problem? I thought I had a great relationship with Sean. He has always been wide-eyed, innocent and up for total fun. Why did he suddenly decide not to talk to me? And all of a sudden he becomes very pally with Matt.

At first I figured Matt wasn’t talking to me because of that night after the Globe when he acted like a child and Sean and I took Bev up to Trafalgar Square. But clearly that wasn’t it. Matt has some other problem with me.

Interestingly, the night at La Gacilly, Bev was up and awake when I returned from walking the streets. We had a long, hushed chat. She told me how she wasn’t enjoying herself, how she feels she can’t be herself. I get so sick of telling her how she’s in a ridiculously self destructive relationship that I don’t any more. What’s the point?

I guess I’m fortunate in that, if I choose, I can probably manage to never see Matt again. The same with all of them, really. Though it would be a shame to lose touch with Lorna, Darren, John and Tom. But maybe I’m wrong. Maybe they all just put up with me and Matt is the only one honest enough to ignore me.

Anyway, when all is said and done, I think my holidays should only be spent with Mirinda. We see things the same.

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A highlight of the trip was as we boarded the ferry back to England. Sean and Carlee were with Lorna and Darren. We cruised on ahead, leaving them at the border control. They never made it onto our ferry because Carlee’s visa was out of date.

This meant they all missed the ferry and had to try for the next one, leaving Carlee and Sean in France.

I have just returned (well a few hours ago) from a weekend in the big city, attending an archaeological conference with Dawn and lots of people I don’t know. It was called Archaeology 2010 and was at the British Museum, downstairs in the lecture halls. Ignoring the less than diverting discussion on coin moulds, it was a great weekend. Most notable was the lack of muddy poodle paws. Though we did have plenty of rain.

My main reason for going to the conference (apart from a great love of archaeology) was to hear a few of the speakers. Most notably Mary Beard (Professor of Classics from Cambridge and one of the 100 most influential woman in Britain), Chris Stringer (the foremost expert in evolution in the world) and Brian Fagan (Professor of Anthropology, University of California and the author of a few ancient climate books, most notably The Little Ice Age, which I recommend). Each of them was brilliant. Prof Fagan was particularly entertaining. But there was so much more than these three.

In fact I think it will be a long time before I forget the sight of Prof Fagan listening to a long involved question from Dr Julian Richards and then striding over to him, explaining he was going deaf and bending down to him in the front row, asking him to repeat the question.

I’d never heard of Sam Moorhead and David Stuttard. They have just published (like, so new, it’s not actually for sale yet, except at the conference where the copy I bought still had wet ink) a book called AD410: The year that shook Rome. It’s about the sack of Rome. So far (I’ve read one page) it’s very good. They spoke on Saturday and were very engaging.

They were followed by ex-Monty Python star, Terry Jones with his (now old) presentation about Barbarians. It was also a BBC series. While very entertaining, it was irritatingly unscientific and, therefore, annoying. So what if the Romans called anyone who didn’t speak Latin a barbarian? The word originally meant foreigner! Anyway, the previous talk by Moorhead and Stuttard was streets ahead and far more interesting.

Along with Chris Stringer, another chap spoke on Sunday morning. His name is Clive Gamble and he is a professor at the Centre for Quaternary Research at Royal Holloway. His talk was also on Out of Africa but in greater detail. He had a wonderful anecdote about his visit to an Australian palaeolithic site two days north of Alice Springs. He told the story of his first trip there.

He was sitting in the Landrover, next to the dig director. They had already been driving for a day and a half, through the wonderful red centre, scrub and desert all around, and he was wondering where the dig actually was. He asked the director who said he was looking for something. When asked what this was, he replied, completely straight faced, “a filing cabinet.” Clive digested this without any sign of alarm.

Suddenly there it was! On the side of the road. A filing cabinet. The dig director quickly relaxed and said, “we take the next right“. They left one track for another and sped off into the bush once more. Half a day later, they arrived at the site. The audience thought this was hilarious. I just sat back and thought, ‘yeah, that’s Australia‘.

Frances McIntosh from the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) was another person I’d never heard of. She is writing her Phd on a particular type of Roman brooch. Her presentation sounds like it would be dire but, in fact, she made it very interesting. She was followed by a guy who’s been working on improving the online searchable database for the PAS. The new site looks fantastic and I am going to use it for my dissertation.

All round, a fantastic weekend. And Dawn agrees wholeheartedly.

Spending the night at the flat was interesting and not a little odd. But at least I didn’t have to get up too early on Sunday morning.

Below is a photo of lecture hall #2 just after Chris Stringer’s talk on the Out of Africa proposal. I should add that it was packed and this is between lectures!

Lecture theatre, British Museum

Awake at 6 and walking into Alfriston at 7. Was joined this morning by Bev who did not get a lot of sleep last night and reported that the sunrise was lovely. It was nice to share my early morning ritual with some one else though I think she’d have preferred more sleep. It was drizzling with rain as well.

Upon our return I joined Tom and John in a boiled egg (one each, that is) and morning chat about the upper classes trying to annex Equatorial Guinea, for some reason which I appear to have forgotten.

We left camp at about 8:25. Terry the Trainee spent the night at the camp rather than the Hostel and said it was the best nights sleep he’d had so far which does not say a lot for the Hostel! Ah, youth! Give ‘em a blow up mattress and beer and they’re more than happy. Actually that’s probably true for us oldies as well. When we picked Emma up she said she wondered what had happened to him but figured he’d scored. He claims all he scored was an empty tent.

Today it’s Tom and me on the tea roster so first up the kettles went on (though John did it before we arrived) then it was on site to start sifting. Roy and Brian were battling for possession of the loom weight hole but, as the supervisors didn’t turn up until around 10, it fell to the experience of Roy and poor Brian slumped over to us at the ‘big pit’.

When Kevin arrived he told Roy to stop digging but didn’t give the hole back to Brian. We all cheered him up by saying that he may not have kept the hole but he DID find the loom weight and this would NEVER change.

The pit is starting to develop in Dick

I have to assume that my sectioning was not up to par as Dawn is now doing ALL the features and I’m sieving and hauling more barrows. There are lots of finds coming out of the big pit but nothing to indicate what it actually is. It went through a lot of changes of opinion the deeper it got.

Why is it that young female archaeological students are all such sulky girls? It’s like they’re trying to be sophisticated and knowledgeable and I find it totally annoying and not a little contrived. Actually the males are pretty bad too. Very critical about everything and negative to a point of irritation. I find myself having to walk away from them all. And it doesn’t change when they become supervisors, they just get louder and unreasonably confident. I mean, come on, they dig holes for a living and live like animals…I’d mention the mess tent at the camp but think I may just vomit.

I spent most of the afternoon pot washing as Owen only wanted 6 people in his pit, making me immediately redundant. It was a nice relaxing end to the day. Sitting with Brian and chatting over sherds and bones. He said he and Nigel were going to the Cricketers for dinner and would I care to join them. And I realised I would, having not really seen a lot of them. Dawn said she’d like to come as well. The others are making dinner at the camp.

So more sausages, eggs and Harvey’s. We chatted about history and the interconnectedness of things, Nigel’s new grandchild and a little bit about football. it was a nice night with the pub full at one stage. It’s a lovely pub which I recommend to anyone in the vicinity.

Upon our return to camp, the round table discussion was once more about weasel milking and voles to which, naturally, I added much nonsense. Matt had foolishly partaken of a Broadside and kept drifting off to sleep. Of course, we all took the piss out of him but as he was asleep, he didn’t notice. It has to be noted that Bev did not. I find her restraint and loyalty, admirable. We all thought it particularly funny when…but that would be telling.

When the ‘kids’ returned to the camp we had a visit from someone called Emmy who’s clothes were all wet, or so she maintained. To be honest she was extremely drunk and didn’t make much sense at all. I guess she’d have to be to come and talk to us. I’d talked earlier about the divide between students and volunteers with John, saying what a shame it was. He agreed. Maybe they don’t think they can learn anything from people who volunteer.

At about midnight we broke up, except for Lorna who, like a good little weasel-ette bravely went into the mess tent, vanishing into it’s dark and menacing maw.

The weather turned chilly.

Walked down to Alfriston this morning to get the Telegraph so I could work out the football scores which I rang through to David. Everyone thought I was mad and, upon my return to work, I found out that David had NOT passed on the results since he didn’t win so my efforts were a waste of time after all! Sorry I doubted you, Dawn.

At the dig this morning it was another series of gravel barrows to the carpark as last nights rain and the cars had managed to squish it all up again. After many trips I made my way back to the trench where we left off yesterday but was surplus to requirements which was all Kevin needed to steal me away (with Darren & Brian as well) to section some features in Dick, the 2nd trench.

Sitting drawing sections

Although my feature was not particularly convincing (and indeed had nothing in it but dirt) it was fantastic to do something new. Sectioning involves a number of steps. First up you halve the feature with string and nails and trowel (if it’s small and delicate) back the rubble from one half. Once this is completed you fill in a context sheet for the fill (the rubble or whatever, fills the cut or ‘feature’). You then section draw it. This is an end elevation plotted from measurements down from your level string line.

Having drawn your half section, the string line is levelled using the total station in order to plot the position of the feature, relative to the rest of the world. It is then time to clear out the other half of it.

My, at first, unpromising hole became a slightly more interesting feature when completely cleared as a slot appeared in the bottom, giving the impression of a post hole in a post hole. The completed feature is then given a context sheet for the cut and roughly sketched in plan, relative to the sides and other features in the trench.

We were shown how to do all this by Kevin and Rob, both of whom were very patient teachers, especially given my crap drawing skills. It remains to be seen whether I get another one to do, however.

There was great excitement late in the day. Brian had taken over a feature from Roy (who leaves the dig at 3 to walk his dog) and found a loom weight. Actually he wasn’t sure what it was and we conferred (I was sifting his loose). I rinsed the dirt off what we figured was a light flint to reveal something that was clearly man made. Brian showed Kevin and suddenly the site burst into excitement. This threatened to become a riot when Kevin pulled out a complete one a little deeper down the pit.

A loom weight is a big fired clay disk which is hung from the loom when weaving in order to keep weight on it. These two are (apparently) quite small at about 300-400 mm in diameter. Gabs got a bit toe-y when Liz ran off with it. Her allergies obviously do not extend to loom weights. This was the end of a very enjoyable archaeological day – the antithesis of yesterday!

We were undecided whether to eat at the campsite or go to a pub tonight but after the rain started we went for Chinese instead. Braving the wrath of the owner of the New Dynasty where previously Lorna had destroyed the ladies loo, we barged in and took a table for 10. The food was OK (if a little overpriced) and the company clever and witty, though not as funny as last night when it was manic. Gabs was so tired he kept nodding off into his rice. Lorna went in his car with him back to camp in case he went off the road. Darren reckoned this was actually a reason NOT to go with him.

We returned to the camp quite early so we all piled into Bev and Matt’s rumpus room for some drinking and high falutin’ chat about general rubbish including the possibilities of milking a weasel and making cheese from the produce. It was decided we’d ask Martin (a cheesemonger in his spare time) the next day for his expert opinion. One thing that was decided was that you’d have to get a vole to do the actual milking as weasel teats are quite small.

Then Owen joined us and raised the tone a tad. He even consumed a bottle of Broadside, showing no ill effects whatsoever. John claimed this was because he’s English and his system is used to it, while I was raised on that ‘pissy Australian stuff’. That is a serious misquote however I believe it was his intent.

The rest of the camp stormed into the mess tent to begin 15 conversations at once as we all left for our respective bedrolls. Before dropping off, I had the odd experience of hearing loud conversation then nothing but howling wind then more loud conversation as the wind dropped. It was like intermittent deafness. And then I heard nothing at all.

Up at 6, bright and bleary eyed. Drank my coffee up the hill overlooking Alfriston. The camp started coming alive (well, almost) at about 8.

Dawn and I left too early for the trainees and ended up watching Terry eat his breakfast.

At the site I found a wheelbarrow and took a load of gravel from the spoil heap down to the carpark entrance to try and give purchase against the mud. Ended up taking quite a few barrows down there. Made me consider changing careers for something on the roads. My broken toe convinced me otherwise.

Visiting the portaloos near the finds rollalong, I was greeted by a couple of surprises. Firstly the smell – ok, not really a surprise but you have to wonder what these people have been eating in the past week – and secondly a lovely piece of work whose name I haven’t bothered to remember but whom I shall call the Non-Flush Student Girl , as she seems to have no idea how to perform this simple task. Not only didn’t she remove all evidence of her visit but she had the audacity to then say how disgusting the portaloos were. Well, duh!

We were once more set to work in the new trench, looking for the natural with Martin supervising us and Dave (he of the horrendous tattoos) occasionally jumping in and going insane with a mattock.

Health and safety is NOT a big issue on this site. Dave, for instance, is quite happy to mattock away in thongs (flipflops), splattering everyone with bits of flying debris as he chungles up the ground at a rate of knots. Also tools are just dropped on the ground allowing people the opportunity to trip over them. Fishbourne was such a good training ground for all things safe that I found myself continually moving dangerous items. I must stress that this was merely because I am very clumsy and not necessarily philanthropic.

The supervisors seem more gung ho than careful and not particularly free with advice, preferring to criticise rather than suggest. Mind you, I guess you could say they merely follow the example from on-high. It was with a grimace that I watched the Site Director leap down into a grave and start vigorously shovelling wearing only a pair of open sandals. And JUST after it had rained as well.

Tom with yet another barrow full

While I’m having a moan, I have to state that today was not a good day for me. As the barrows and buckets fill up it seems that only Tom and I notice. Trouble is, when you jump up and take them to the top of the spoil heap, by the time you return to the trench you’re suddenly redundant and end up back as a barrow monkey. Not sure how Tom felt at the time (he agreed with me later) but it irritated the shit out of me. Everyone likes to play with their trowels but the dirt HAS to be removed as well.

Bev, Matt, Lorna and Darren were working in Tom and Dick on features all day – lucky bastards.

The trainees do not get any practical experience till the last day here, otherwise they’d be doing the shit work. At Fishbourne, trainees were the bottom of the ladder, at Bishopstone it seems to be the volunteers.

We had a couple of vicious downpours which drove most of the others running pell-mell (that famous comedy duo) for the cover of the mess tent. I just got wet with a few dedicated others. It was also very windy and I ache like a son of a bitch!

Matt earned a little of Gabs’ wrath when he inadvertently put a lovely (huge) piece of pie crust pottery in the spoil. Gabs (un)fortunately found it and said loudly “What’s this?” or something sarcastic. Mind you, it wasn’t small, about the size of a mature vole, actually.

At lunchtime the sun came out and I went and sat in the churchyard for a lovely half hour of silent contemplation…and journal writing. The church was locked up tight against, I assume, assault from archaeologists. It remained so all week. After lunch it was back to the new trench.

Some interesting but unclear features are appearing. Martin thinks a lot of it is plough damage, making it difficult to work out.

I’m going to have another moan! The supervisors are not real keen timekeepers. Tea, lunch, going home – these things are not called very regularly. The cries of “clear up your loose” are more whimpers, if at all. Not that I get a coffee at break-time anyway as some bastard nicked my mug. How hard is it to recognise that something doesn’t belong to you, I wonder? Obviously very if you’re a student or supervisor. I naturally assume it was not a volunteer as we have our own.

Today I brought my washing stuff so Dawn and I set off (I’m certain Matt breathed a sigh of relief) for the leisure centre for a delicious shower then on to Safeways for a couple of new mugs and lots of beer and crisps. Back at camp we rang assorted loved ones then the heavens opened up sending us all scampering for the relative dryness of our tents. This happened a few times and eventually Dawn, John and I took it upon ourselves to invade Bev & Matt’s palatial tent – they were still out shopping – and set ourselves up in the conservatory. Upon their return, Lorna and Darren joined us, followed by Tom who had just spent the best part of 15 minutes blowing up his rubber companion in his tent. His pump wasn’t working very well so all we could hear was his valiant puffs.

The biggest highlight of the day is the new portaloo, instantly dubbed the ‘Turdis’ though I’m not sure I’d like to explore all time and space in it. Even so, it’s a vast improvement on the other versions. Dawn, who has an unhealthy fixation on all things amenity related, took this wonderful picture of it.

The Turdis arrives

Bev and Matt finally returned and it was decided that tonight we would walk to the Cricketers, after John assured us the path was passable given the various deluges we had been party to throughout the day. So it was off to Berwick across a wet, sludgy, mud-ridden track. It was during this unforgettable walk that we became weasels. I’m not sure why but it seems very apt. I had made the big mistake of drinking a bottle of Adnam’s Broadside prior to our departure which means I giggled uncontrollably for the entire trip. This vicious brew is 6.5% and guarantees that any beer afterwards merely dilutes it.

We arrived at the pub, leaving our boots at the door which were now so high with mud that we all had nosebleeds, and ordered a few gallons of Harvey’s. Nigel and Brian were already there, waiting for us – they’d driven. We ordered lots of sausages and eggs – yumbo – and many, many pints of beer. The locals (of which there were many) didn’t appear none too impressed with our general air of party-ness. Between the evil Santa look-a-like and the murderous WI girls, we were the victims of many dark looks.

It’s a little known fact that the Harvey and Son brewery won Beer Mat of the Year in 1990, a fact that the Cricketers is trying to redress by scattering copious amounts of them over the tables. The reason they won, I think, is because they are printed like postcards. It is for this reason that we played the ‘Postcard Game’. The rules are simple: Someone starts by writing a salutation then it goes from person to person, each one writing one word until the card is full. Breaking the sentence is an instant loss so no full stops are allowed. Commas are, however, actively encouraged to aid understanding.

Playing the postcard game at the Cricketers

This game is very, very funny if you are very, very drunk. This applied to the end of the table where I was sitting. The other end seemed to be embroiled in a heavy discussion about the state of the English education system which halted only long enough for a word to be added. Tom laughed so much he had to recover in the toilet for an hour. Fortunately there’s nothing funny in the Cricketers’ toilets or he may never have returned. I have included a scan of our postcard which can be accessed here.

We left late, John saying he’d take us the paved way back. Yeah, right! Paved means ‘mostly muddy while narrowly avoiding a slurry pit’.

Back at camp it was all very quiet so we decided to be nice and not make a lot of noise. Eventually we went to bed just before the rest of the camp arrived back, making a lot of noise.

It rained like Billy O, through the night. Anyone who knows who Billy O is, answers on a(nother) postcard, please.