I get annoyed at myself for falling for celebrity names trying their hand at writing a novel, but I was a little bit sucked in to Clare Balding’s debut. It’s not a bad piece at all, the writing is very careful, but engaging nonetheless. The story isn’t exactly a stretch - farming, horse racing, LGBTQ+, etc. The characters are fun though and you’re rooting for good things to happen to good people, so it’s worth a look.

Matt Baker is a beloved household name at this point, I knew him from Blue Peter and very much enjoyed his commentary on the gymnastics. I’ve not really been much of a One Show watcher but you can’t avoid seeing him around and about if you ever scroll through the BBC channels. This book is a memoir of sorts, but structured around a year on the farm that he loves so much - it dives back into history and his career up to now and how that informs or has been informed by his love of nature. It’s a good read and made me curious about the farm programme he’s made for Channel 4, it may be worth a watch!

If you had asked anyone a few years ago who would be shining the best light on what a brutal and thankless job farming is, who would have put their hands up and said Jeremy Clarkson? The guy continues to cause controversy but when it comes to this programme, he’s got it right. Showing the heart and soul of the farming world, the community, the animals, the care and the love that go into making this a vocation. It’s just perfect.

I was in two minds about watching the second series of Clarkson’s Farm. Some of the recent comments by the eponymous presenter are no good at all and he never really seems to show any motivation to think about what he’s said or change his ways. However, this show is one of the only ones out there that’s really managing to highlight how difficult farming is at the moment, in a way that is accessible to people who don’t know the first thing about life in the country.

A couple of weeks ago, I went to the Gillingham & Shaftesbury Show as a family catch-up day out. It’s a farm show located between those two towns and it’s been going for a long, long time. It’s not a huge show but it’s well stocked with cows and sheep being judged, lots of tractors, some old steam engines, plus plenty of independent stalls from people selling their high quality wares. I loved having a good nose around the various stands, and I think I was quite self-controlled to only come away with a couple of arty animal postcards.

Like many, I adored every episode of Clarkson’s Farm, enjoying as the host was told off every other minute by people that really do know how to farm. You always got the feeling that whilst he was being classic Clarkson, he also wanted to learn and do his bit and actually listen to the people around him. Unfortunately, this book - a collection of newspaper columns he wrote along the way - wasn’t quite as much fun, as he didn’t have the people to bounce off. It’s just a bit too Clarkson for me. But I did like him re-evaluating his own writing as we went along. ‘What was I thinking when I wrote this?’ he says at one point.

Since The Grand Tour became more of An Occasional Jaunt, the three presenters have been trying their hand at other things, usually turning their hobbies into business ventures. James May learned to cook and bought a pub, Jeremy Clarkson got into farming in a big (tractor) way, and Richard Hammond ploughed all his time and money into a classic car restoration business. All of them have made TV shows along the way, and somehow, despite enjoying all three of them, I haven’t written about a single one.

I’d sort of only heard of Open Farm Sunday from when I used to listen to The Archers. But finally I have tracked one down and attended. Cute animals, robotic milking machines, a walk through the fields. What’s not to like?

I’ve wanted to go to a ploughing match for ages - ever since I heard the antics from one on The Archers. I like country and farming stuff, but I couldn’t quite imagine how a ploughing match would work. My parents have been keeping an eye on when and where ploughing matches have been taking place, and finally all the stars were aligned (read: I got myself organised) so that we could go to one together.

Mr C is often surprised, no, actually, the word is aghast, at the number of podcast episodes I have to listen to and how far back some of them are dated. I recently tried to play him a TWiT episode from March. Actually, even I think that is a bit extreme, but in some cases, it doesn’t really matter how old the information is. I listen to Farming Today, and over the last week or so, I’ve been catching up on some old shows. These are some of the things I learnt, and had a subsequent conversation with Mr C about. I would not have been able to do this had I just deleted the shows as he suggested.