It was a big fort, with delightful crenellations, and many flags, and it had the shiniest portcullis outside of Navarre. This was Fort Hoity, sister fort of Fort Toity, and an extremely interesting fort in its own right. For underneath Fort Hoity ran the Puckington Tunnels, those tunnels you may have come across in your [...]

 

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In his later years, Blodgett amassed a collection of inky puck stampings, kept in an album bound in the starch-stiffened fleece of a lamb. The fleece was spotted with unexplained bloodstains which Blodgett made no attempt to remove. He could have used a patent bloodstain eradication spray goo as manufactured by Don Federico’s Royal And [...]

 

 Hooting Yard, 12th Feb 2009 [29:57m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (705)

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The Cow & Pins was a singularly squalid tavern, much frequented by human scum. Once, long ago, it had been a coaching inn, but the construction of an efficient canal system destroyed the coach trade, and bargees passing by aboard their barges upon the canal were a salubrious lot who drank tea from flasks and [...]

 

 Hooting Yard 29th January 2009 [29:27m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (843)

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Bluestocking polymath Dot Tint has a new book out next month, a magisterial study of aquatic birds entitled Dot’s Ducks. There are two very curious things about this hefty hardback, and I think it right that you are made aware of them before shelling out your cash for a copy.

 

 Hooting Yard 22nd January 2009 [28:59m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1371)

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If you have a dinghy, be sure to maintain it properly. Like all seagoing craft, dinghies can suffer from wear and tear which, if allowed to continue unchecked, will imperil their ability to remain afloat, especially in choppy seas or when sucked into a maelstrom.

 

 Hooting Yard 8th January 2009 [00:29m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1412)

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Timothy appears, & flies come-out.

 

 Hooting Yard 26th December 2008 [00:41m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1512)

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There was once a woodcutter who had a burning sense of injustice. He dwelt in a cottage deep in the forest, where there was plenty of wood for him to cut. A day’s walk to the west was the cottage of a charcoal burner, and a day’s walk to the east was the hovel of [...]

 

 Hooting Yard 18th December 2008 [00:29m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1375)

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Splat is a tiny, stricken village in Cornwall, and it was here, on a muggy summer’s day in 19–, that a peasant pushing his barrow of countryside filth along a lane was astonished to encounter a small child roaring and spitting and growling and scrabbling in the muck. Its gender was indeterminate, but its savagery [...]

 

 Hooting Yard 11th December 2008 [00:29m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1405)

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Prince Fulgencio had a heart of stone and his palace was a palace exceeding glum. No, no, it was not a palace, it was a castle, turreted and towered, with many flags and banners flying, every one of them showing blasphemous heraldic devices.

 

 Hooting Yard 4th December 2008 [00:30m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1375)

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You’ve got to search for the hero inside yourself, particularly if you are the sort of weedy milksop who gets sand kicked into your face by musclebound beach bullies of pronounced homoerotic tendencies. The search for the hero must be addressed with rigour, and you must not allow yourself to be distracted. That is why [...]

 

 Hooting Yard 13th November 2008 [00:30m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1663)

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