Awards, Attitudes & Untrained Dogs

Sounds wonderful.

This week, we are going straight in with a story from a few years ago when I was picking up on a shoot.

I had met a chap over the summer, or my husband had met a chap over the summer.

We were taking a couple of days with him, and he was a young guy, and he was just kind of like, "Do you know what? I'm gonna do everything.

I'm gonna run the picking up team.

I'm then gonna run up the hill, and I'm gonna deal with the beaters.

I'm gonna run back down, I'm gonna put the guns on peg, and then I'm gonna run back up the hill." And, um- Smart ...

my husband kind of said, "I, you might die partway through the season.

You might die partway through the season." Um, so he offered to help him out by doing some hosting, and I said, "Look, if you need a hand, I'm very happy to run your picking up team." So I took on the role, but I didn't know anyone in the area.

And he said, "Well, I've got a few people that have come to me, so I, I'll put your initial day one team together." Mm-hmm.

Said, "Yeah, that's fine." He said, "You turn up, meet them, see how you go.

Any you like, keep, and any you don't like, then we can, you can find some more, and then it will be yours to go from there." Said, "Yeah, not a problem." And I turned up, and we'd all parked in a car park at the back of the beater's shed, and I hadn't met any of these people before.

And it was a, it was, um, a motley crew, but they were all seasoned pickers.

Like- Mm ...

they, they all definitely knew what they were doing.

So it was fantastic 'cause it was a case of, like, walk in, "Oh, hi.

This is this.

Hi, this is this," et cetera.

And a couple of them knew the ground a little bit.

And this chap I brought along, it, he was slightly more random, his wife and daughter.

Wow.

And they were intending to sort of split the dogs and stand in two places, but it never really quite happened.

So when we got there, I s- I basically said, "Oh, hi.

You know, I'm Celine.

I think I'm sort of, like, running it." 'Cause obviously you need one person that's sort of on the radio to the keeper that's got half an idea of where you're going, when you need to be there, when the drive is starting, when you're supposed to be having lunch and all that stuff.