Loremen Podcast - S5 Ep23: Loremen S5Ep23 - The Black Dog of Devon and Dorset

Episode Date: March 14, 2024

[RECORD SCRATCH] I suppose you're wondering how we got here? Well, it all started when James told Alasdair the story of a spectral hound that dwells on the border of Devon and Dorset. (AKA In-Dorset and Next-Dorset.) A sighting of the black dog could be a bad omen, but it might just make you rich. (There is actually a third option, but that involves helium and a peculiarly shaped nozzle...) No dogs were inflated during the recording of this episode. Join us for another Loremen Live in Oxford on 25th May: https://oldfirestation.org.uk/whats-on/loremen-podccast/ This episode was edited by Joseph Burrows - Audio Editor. LoreBoys nether say die! Support the Loremen here (and get stuff): patreon.com/loremenpod ko-fi.com/loremen Check the sweet, sweet merch here... https://www.teepublic.com/stores/loremen-podcast?ref_id=24631 @loremenpod youtube.com/loremenpodcast www.instagram.com/loremenpod www.facebook.com/loremenpod

Welcome to Lawmen, a podcast about local legends and obscure curiosities from days of yore. I'm James Shakeshaft. And I'm Alistair Beckett-King. Coming at ya. Well, Alistair, I hope you're coming at me like a big, scary ghost dog. How did you know? That's exactly how I'm approaching it. Well, that's the subject of this week's tale.

It's a big, scary ghost dog from the county of Devon and Dorset. Convenient. Yes. It would be both. Yes. I do have, in the past, I have had difficulty telling them apart. This is the black dog of Devon slash Dorset. That's the howl of a dog who's not quite sure where he is you can't tell hey there alistair hi james how are you doing well, thank you. Thanks for saying hello in a really hip 90s way.

Hey. Hey there. I feel like a benevolent teacher today. How are you hanging, James? Oh, great, dude. After your recent episodes where you'd clearly done a lot of research and effort, I've done a lot of research for this story. Have you been shamed into doing research?

I have a little bit, yeah. And also, it was the Oscars at the time of recording, just the other day. I don't know if you noticed, Alistair, this is going to date the episode, obviously, Oscars 2024, Christopher Nolan won Best Director. Did he?

I mean, good for him. I mean, no. I don't accept it. He isn't. Sorry. Haven't seen the film. Not bothered. It's inspired me to... No! No! Who else

was nominated? Couldn't you have just... No, that would be less appropriate now that I think about it. Well, Alistair, I'm going to start with a flash forward and then we're going to do a bit of time stuff. We're going to jump back. Okay. But if it's the start, how can it be a flash forward?

That's a good point. I'm just going to do something reasonably modern day at the start and then I'm going to record scratch and go how did we get here like every christopher nolan film does as far back as i can remember i always wanted to be uh oppenheimer freeze frame and then it goes back doesn't it or just like the bomb going off and he's got the sunglasses on and his hair gets played by because i bet you're wondering how i got here uh yes okay so you're ready it would have been better to say as far as i can remember i always wanted to be death a destroyer of worlds the uh the smart reference as far back as i can remember i always wanted to become death the destroyer of the year, so on.

Yes, okay, good. It's good that we workshopped it, though, before recording. You haven't been very happy with where that ended up. Yes. Alistair, this is going to be what passes for modern times in the World of Lawmen podcast. It's 1959. Ooh! The swinging late 50s.

Yes. We're in a coastal town almost coastal town you can sort of smell the sea in the air and occasionally very coastal yes twit twit twixt to dip in the hills you'd say i can see the sea and the sea can see me that's what you say there's a young couple and their 10 year old son and they're staying at a hotel in a little town called up lime and they've had dinner and they're going out for a little walk down a little lane called hay lane and as they walk past it's the camera sort of zooms in on the road sign saying hay lane and then it falls down and reveals that it now says dog lane i know that's that's not really how street signs work they don't just put a new one over the old one but for the

purposes of this no they would they would replace it all together is it because is it because hey lane was a bit too 90s 250s yeah it's quite 50 oh is it hey as in hey dude i just like the way you started my introduction yeah My introduction, yeah. Yeah, maybe it is. I was just going back to the introduction. I'm sorry. I knew the answer, really. I was just being silly, James.

It was a good bit of silliness, actually. But on this lane, Hay Lane, there are hedges. Dog Lane. Well, aka Dog Lane. There are hedges on both sides, tall hedges. And as the family walk along, they suddenly stop because from one hedge emerges a black dog which floats past at eye level. At eye level?

Yes. That's not the height a dog would normally be. From one hedge to another and it disappears silently into the other one. What kind of speed are we talking? Float speed. Float speed. Standard float speed. Standard float speed, which I guess is quite slow, isn't talking? Float speed. Float speed. Standard float speed. Standard float speed, which I guess is quite slow, isn't it?

Nothing floats fast. SFS, standard float speed. Exactly right. So it's not a dog jumping from one hedge to the other. No, it's floating at eye level, presumably to the adults, because a dog being at eye level to a child is that standard dog. That's standard. And now we're going to... The the family are shocked they're gasping and the camera pans around to the hotel that they've just walked out and it's called floating dog hotel is it called that no it's

called the black dog inn but that is a better name that is better actually because that sounds more like the name of a hotel if you wouldn't stay at a place called floating dog hotel you will happily get that name go down that lane don't touch the road sign it's loose the paint's still wet so alistair yes we're in upline we're flashing back now we are geographically right on the border of devon and dorset i want it to be known that this tale justifies my county blindness james nobody ever argued that that they weren't near each other let's be clear about that but we are so we're on the the very cusp twixt Dorset and Next Dorset. Yes, according to Devon Ghosts by Theo Brown. This is a great book. It's 1982.

I'm going to pop my camera on to show you the cover because it's one of the best covers for these sort of spooky books that I've seen. Can you see that? Oh, yes. I mean, there's a little bit of crackle going on but i can see a figure glowing beam is that a ghost emerging from the darkness of a woods it's kind of like he's sort of looking over his shoulder it looks like a man startled in the woods looking over

his shoulder you know is he the ghost or is he is he the haunter or the haunty great question but because you can't see his hands it's possible that he's just looking at his phone yeah because there's a sort of unearthly light about him yeah yeah that might explain the unearthly glow yes so i got put onto this from friend of the show laura the land and that referred me to the work of theo brown who she was a a folklorist who collected lots of stuff from the south coasts one of her books is devon ghosts which features the story of the black dog so is theo short for theodora i'm guessing so yes she's an honorary research fellow in the department of theology

at exeter university that's just a little fact. Yeah, she says the Black Dog story is often claimed for Dorset as the boundary runs past the pub, but actually the building stands in Devon. What building is that, Alistair? Is it the Floating Dog Inn? It is now, or in

the 50s, it's now a B&B with some very good reviews. And some bad ones. But I don don't we don't need to go into that um hey james look even our podcast gets some bad reviews i know some people are just evil some people are just bad people some people are simply wrong, that's what it is. Some people are all just awful, bad, wrong people. And they listen to a couple of pals getting their friend, Chris Cantrell, onto the show just to help him out. Yep.

They listen to four-fifths of an episode. They listen to most of the episode. They put up with 30 minutes of Chris Cantrell, and then they flip out and give a low review. Understandably, really, actually. I've talked myself into sympathising with them. Yeah, I'm more on their side now as well, yeah. Yeah, no, I do see that point.

But let's get back to Devon and or Dorset. Yes. To the Black Dog Inn, now currently a B&B slash tea rooms. But back then in the 50s, it was a pub called the Black Dog Inn now are currently a B&B slash tea rooms. But back then in the 50s, it was a pub called the Black Dog Inn. You do want to be clearly pausing between dog and inn, James. Yes, yes. Very good point. Going down a lane and some floating dog inn.

Quite, yeah, quite. Let's not get silly here. No. quite let's uh let's let's not let's not get silly here no let's uh let's go back to the 1600s when such a thing was a um a thing of the future yeah people didn't even have cars then so in the in the late 1600s early 1700s this was a farmhouse actually i'm not too sure what the year is that this happened to be honest okay it's just before 1959 and before they had like telly and stuff okay so so at any time it's post it's definitely after the civil war i think it's probably the 1800s uh is a farmhouse and now

back definitely before the civil war that used to be this farmhouse used to be a wing of a mansion that was destroyed during the Civil War, and just a little bit was left, and that was turned into a farmhouse. Lots of farmers came and went in that farmhouse. One of the features of the farmhouse, because it had been a mansion, was that it had a very impressive hearth. Now, a hearth is, for any of our more modern listeners it's a big fireplace basically with a big chimney and you can sit around it like you imagine people

did in the past before they had you know telly and twitter and that just staring into the flames yes and that's what our farmer did who lived there. Every evening, he'd go and sit in his big comfy chair on one side of the hearth. And then one night appeared a big black dog. And it went over and sat in the other big chair on the other side of the hearth. And the farmer didn't do anything about it. It climbed into the chair? Yep. On the furniture the others yes i can't see a farmer of roughly the 18th or 19th century

putting up with that sort of behavior from a dog and then the next night he came and sat in his big chair again and the next night the dog appeared again and sat in the chair and this went on for weeks and weeks months and months can i ask you one question about this, James? Yes. Did that farmer have a dog? No. Okay, that changes how spooky that is a lot. This was a phantom dog.

Now, and as I say, according to English Fairy and other folktales by Edwin Sidney, it went on for months, and it at first cast a gloom over his evening, but he grew accustomed to it and his neighbors knew about this he they must he must have mentioned it you know as you do in the pub when you go like oh you know what it is when a big spectral black dog comes and sits in your in one of your chairs in your in your living room guys and they'd be like uh no that doesn't happen doesn't happen so much high five don't leave me hanging here yeah they did leave him hanging and some of them thought it was a bit weird

and they thought it was perhaps potentially a demon or some sort of devil dog but he was like he was all right with it you know so and his neighbors urged him to get rid of the dog get rid of this demon dog that comes into your house literally every single night for months and months and he said the farmer said why should i he cost me nothing he eats nothing drinks nothing he interferes with no one he's the quietest and frugalest member of the house wow burn on everyone else in the house yeah ouch yeah and then some of these people down the pub started to take the mickey out of him and not for what you'd think the reason being like

oh you think you've got a ghost in your house you you're a silly person for saying things like that stop talking about your imaginary dog people were taking the mickey out of him they called him chicken they said he was too afraid to chase the dog out of the house too afraid to confront the dog yes they marty mcfly'd him oh he would hate that exactly marty mcfly would if back to the future two and onwards not mentioned in the first film he doesn't seem that bothered about it in the first film yeah it doesn't come up but yeah they successfully marty mcfly'd him because he was like right nobody calls me chicken for not chasing away a big black spectral ghost dog that lives that comes in my house every night and he probably had a couple of beers because he came home from the pub

dutch courage they call it don't they yes they do is that because you're at a weird angle just a little joke for anybody who went to film school there. That's very good, yes. Clever little joke. Not funny, but I think we all appreciated it. Gives you the courage to walk up what was a level street, but now seems like a slope. Yeah.

I guess is how it would work. So he gets home from the pub, the dog's already there in the chair, and the guy snatches up a poker from the fire and lashes out at the dog which runs away come here you come here dog and the dog runs upstairs and he chases it it goes all the way up into the attic before the ghost dog evidently remembered the fact that it was a ghost and jumped through the ceiling yep that is the way of the samurai just as he's swinging at it with his poker and he donk smashes into a bit of the paneling bit of the plaster in the in the roof and out falls a box of gold and silver coins at the exact spot the dog jumped out a big chest full of gold and silver coins. Ooh. At the exact spot the dog jumped out.

A big chest full of gold and silver. This is almost the second time a dog has led someone to find a big trove of gold in their attic on our podcast. This is a little cleaner than the other time because I think that... Well, the last time it was inside the body of a dog,

which was horrible. Someone just was poking around in their ceiling and then a dog corpse fell on them. The silver lining being the dog was lined with silver and gold. In this case, a ghost dog jumps through the ceiling and just a standard normal box full of gold and silver from the time of Charles I falls out. So presumably this was in the mansion when it was still a mansion before it was a farmhouse they hid some of the stuff up in the civil war yes and the guy the farmer took the money and he turned his farm into a pub and he called it the black dog inn so the dog was actually a good member of the team really kind of yeah and i don't know if you know this but in the in the sort of 70s and 80s when a footballer would retire or the 60s and 70s when a footballer would retire they'd open a pub and

maybe this is kind of like the farmer just living that dream like oh i've got a load of money what shall i do i think i'm gonna open a pub yeah i did i didn't know that oh that was a big thing that was a big thing now they become pundits and i don't know get. Oh, that was a big thing. That was a big thing. Now they become pundits and, I don't know, get massive documentaries on Netflix and stuff about them. But yeah, there's the Black Dog Inn on Dog Lane, which, as we know now, is now called Hayes Lane. And yes, this lucky farmer became a landlord. And according to my sources, Law of the Land, Devon Ghosts,

the first instance of this story is from 1866 in larwood and hotton's history of sign boards because the sign on the pub pictured the dog i quote in all its spectral frightfulness oh yeah so the pub had a ghost dog on the picture yes yeah by by 1866 it definitely did and the lucky farmer became a landlord with his pub the black dog in but what alistair became of the ghost dog well if you were to go to the pub now you you first of all you'd be disappointed because it's a it's a b&b and tea rooms i wouldn't be disappointed i tea room. Well, you would be pleased to see it's a B&B and tea room. Yes, get in. You'd be disappointed to see the original building has now been knocked down.

It's a different building now to what it was originally. So you wouldn't even be able to sit by the fire of a night timer and await that dog. That would be a fool's errand. Don't expect that dog to come nozzle you while you're inside. It never appeared in the building again. Presumably unsurprisingly, because last time it was it was there got chased out by a man with a poker but it is said to haunt the lane behind dog lane now hayes lane is also said to cross the county boundary at midnight dragging a rattling chain because the hayes lane dog lane is on the boundary of your friend of mine dorset and

next door sit yeah and and dogs famously pay no regard to administrative boundaries they're like you james that dog has no idea where he is politically i don't know why i don't know if it's because i've muttered about this it within earshot of my phone that many times but i got served a story today about how the change of berkshire berkshire and oxfordshire county boundaries in 1974 or 72 was a real big thing and everyone was really annoyed about it so do you think there's a there's a profile somewhere out there with facebook or cambridge analytica that has you down as yes doesn't know where county boundaries are interested in stories related to confusion around yes maybe yes i think it is yeah i guess that's the only explanation it was a very interesting article that i did read well you would say that

if you could make any sense of it. Well, do you know what? The county line of Berkshire and Oxfordshire was almost right through the centre of Oxford. What? It's the East Berlin of its day. I'm entirely on your side, James. I mean, I'm sceptical initially.

That's absurd. I know. The Uffington White Horse used to be in Berks. So there was a big shake-up of counties in 1972. I think it was put through in 1972, but it actually happened in 1974. And a lot of our books slash pamphs are from the early to mid-70s

when these county lines were blurred. Yeah. Not the only lines that were different in the 70s. Yes. Good point. I'm doing a serious face. No, that's a good serious face. I'm quite right. Hold on a minute, James. Are you saying because we don't really know where the county boundaries were, maybe everything

you've said wrong in the past was actually right in those days? Maybe. Yes. Maybe Hastings was in Kent back then. Well, that one's... No. Right. That was definitely wrong. That one was definitely wrong. That one was definitely wrong. Mysteriousbritain.co.uk also repeats the story and adds that a phantom coach driven by four horses

can also be seen there. And there's a comment from Ian Topham, potentially pronounced Ian Topham, but I'm going with Topham. Topham, not Topham. No. Not Tofam. I'd say Topham. I'd say Topham. Topham, not Toffam. No. Not Toffam. I'd say Toffam.

I'd say Topham. You'll have Ian hopping all over you if you get this wrong. He cites the 1866 history of signboards and that there was a sighting in 1856 by a lady who was walking with her husband and she became aware of a dog walking close to her giving off a cold dank feel she looked and she saw a black shaggy dog with fiery eyes and here is here is a eyewitness testimony i think this was connected collected by edwin sydney as mentioned earlier

i saw an animal about the size of a dog meeting us within two or three yards the size of a young calf and it passed by I could not help turn him round to look after him and I saw him growing bigger and bigger as he went along till he was as high as the trees by the roadside and then seeming to swell into a large cloud he vanished into the air

wow are we 100% sure the dog wasn't moving towards her? Just getting bigger and bigger. That might explain it getting bigger and bigger. Yeah, that is standard perspective, isn't it? Well, Alistair, in this case, why don't you ask the husband who was with her? Okay, put him on.

All right, mate. How are you doing? I'm from the past. I'm quite confused, if I'm honest. Don't worry about it. Just a few questions. Can you get you a cup of coffee or a cigarette, anything like that?

I don't know. Do I know what either of those things are? Well, 1800s. Yeah, I probably would know what those things were. You probably would know. Well, don't get used to them because I'm about to slap them out of your hands and go bad cop on you.

Oh, no. What did you see? Tell me. I saw nothing at all. All I saw was a bit of vap coming from the sea are you calling your own wife a liar oh no i'm not uh i wasn't interviewed originally this far so this is where this is where the recreation breaks down right okay yeah it was like that bit in the hollow deck simulation but yeah you had to become self-aware towards the end there it's like where data when

data's on the holodeck and he makes himself a stand-up comedian. You remember that one? Of course. You and I talk about it about once a month. We do, actually, yes. We both watched that when we were teenagers and thought, I could do that if a robot can do it.

Yeah, if Data can do it, and he's not funny. The other guy, Kane, what was his brother called? Law. Law. As in lawmen, but we're more Data called? Law. Law. As in law men. But we're more data men, really. Whoa, I never realised that. Yeah.

I thought you meant Joe Piscopo. Joe Pasquale. It's pronounced Pasquale. Joe Pasquale was not in TNG. It was in the original series. This is the hill I'll die on. Joe Piscopo was in that episode of Star Trek The Next Generation. Oh, was he?

He played the comedian oh right so yes that is the eyewitness testimony from that lady in 1856 she you're right she either saw the dog coming towards her getting bigger and bigger a bit confused and then suddenly vanishing or maybe she saw a dog-shaped balloon either way how do we explain her husband seeing nothing a baffling mystery he just saw some vapor coming from the sea that is the home of vapor so that alistair is the story of the black dog of devon slash dorset what a story james yeah very spooky little boy yes very spooky pupper yes i know yeah so it was seen as recently as 1959 because that was when the the bit started at the beginning remember the cold open i'm trying to do a dog hovering

in audio form it would be confused and scared i think but that might i mean i'm just i am leaning more and more towards the balloon theory now. It does sound like, but a balloon would have run out of air. Over 200 years. Yeah, over a couple of centuries. In 103 years, yeah. So someone's got to be refilling this dog. Yeah, good point.

You mean it's a conspiracy of dog, balloon, helium fillers. Who could it be, bearing in mind that there is a nearby inn named after the ghost who who would have an incentive to keep this story alive the b&b the b&b it's the b&b yes at nights you can hear the noise of and sort of squeaking stop you're letting it out keep your mouth closed. Wait a minute, Alice, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Are you inflating an actual dog?

I may have inflated a living dog there. Oh, not for long. Oh, dear. Yeah, obviously, over several centuries, we're going to get through a lot of dogs. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not going to be the same one. This is like a much funner Hound of the Baskervilles, isn't it?

Yeah. Yes, yes. A fun Hound of the Baskervilles. It doesn't fly in the Hound of the Baskervilles, does it? It does glow. It just glows because in that one, they simply get a dog and paint it, whereas... I've never been satisfied with that part of the solution because there's a glowing dog on the moors, and the solution to it was it was a dog,

and we just painted it with magic paint that makes dogs close. Which, that isn't a thing. You can't invent that in the solution. They got through a number of dogs because the glowing paint was highly toxic. They painted it with willow, the wisps. What we actually did was we took a dog and we covered it with ghosts. Absolutely plastered ghosts onto the dog to make it glow. Dogs love to roll in a ghost, don't they? Oh, they do. Come on, come on glow dogs still love to roll in a ghost don't

they when they're out of bed come on come on ah he's rolled in a ghost he's got a ghost all over him not again is that what white dog poo is is it ghost is it a ghost of dog poo this this episode has checked off some of our classic subjects to return to white dog poop and back to the future in one episode yes many times and a christopher nolan inspired time mess up your thing yeah so there you go again i'm going to keep saying it there you go that's the story thank you are you ready to score yes yeah like someone staying at a b&B, you might score the B&B. I will. Oh, good.

Oh, highly please. Well, it might be high or I could be a bad person. I might score it low. Okay, first up then, names. Names. Well, I like Black Dog. Good. Do you like Ian Topham?

I do, actually. Now, Ian is not a particularly jazzy forename. But somehow, the combination of Ian and Topham. Ian Topham. Topham, Ian. Edwin Sidney. Edwin Sidney, lovely. Theo Brown.

Lovely name. You can see him, can't you? Edwin Sidney. You can just... He's another round spectacles. Who wrote English Fairy and Other Folk Tales. Yes, his sort of lacquered hair. Mm.

Dainty handwriting. You can see the guy. Yes, great name. Absolutely. He's turning up on a bicycle to collect these stories. Did he really go around on a bicycle or did he just make that up? No, that's what I'm picturing. Okay, yeah.

Maybe even a penny farthing. Oh. I imagine his shoes curled up at the toe. Oh, yeah. Are those Mr. Sidney's shoes? Of course they are. Don't you recognise the toes? Those shoes belong to Mr. Edwin Sidney. Theo Brown? Yeah, bad, bad Theo

Brown. She's got a good name. Yep, yep, yep. The baddest folklorist in the whole darn town or county in the exeter um theology department yeah yes the baddest honorary doctorate honorary research fellow she was a member of the psychical research society is that different to the society of psychical research it's it's gotta be that oh. We could be in a ghost club. You'd think it would be the same, but we could be in a real ghost club situation. The real ghost club busters.

Something tells me it would attract similar personalities. Could be an offshoot. Well, I think those are really good names, but there's just not that many of them. I think it's like a really good three. It is a good three, isn't it? It's like a, it's a high three. All right.

All right. It's not, it's not Top Ham, but it is. Dog Lane. Dog Lane. I mean, that's just, that's quite bad. It's quite bad. I wouldn't, it sounds smelly. Right.

Okay then. So second category, Supernatural. Supernatural? Boom. James, you opened with a floating dog. Oh, yeah. And then you freeze-framed on the dog, and the dog said, I guess you're wondering how I got here.

As far back as I can remember, I wanted to be inflated and floated across. I wanted to float at eye level between two hedges no it's got to be high for supernatural it it walked past that lady giving off a cold dank feeling it was a black dog a black shaggy dog with fiery eyes eyes there's so many sightings of it it appeared at the fireside for months on end you told months on end it was just chilling by the fire and then there was the sort of the magical money raining down from the sky that yeah actually yeah i'm not sure why the dog chose to reward the man for

chasing it through the entire house with a poker i don't know not sure what the moral of that story is just sometimes these things happen well maybe we'll get to that in our later in our later Pacing it through the entire house with a poker. I don't know. Not sure what the moral of that story is. But just sometimes these things happen. Well, maybe we'll get to that in our later categories. Oh, by the way, I'm sorry. There was also a rumour that it brings death to humans that see it. Oh. And it causes non-ghost dogs to disappear.

What? Yeah. A dog that makes other dogs vanish? Yes. It's like an anti-dog. Not die, but just vanish. Disappear, yeah. You're just left holding a lead like an absolute mug.

Oh, that'd be horrible. People really like their dogs. Although, if this dog is being sighted and dogs are disappearing, it really does add credence to my inflating numerous real dog hypothesis because the dog supply where are they coming from oh local dogs vanishing meanwhile dogs full of helium floating past tourists i don't know just asking questions you are just asking the questions i think they yeah what does a dog love to do more than chase a balloon? Chase a dog-shaped balloon. You never notice balloons.

They're not warm, are they? No. They're cold and damp. Yeah. Because of the bits of spit in them. I think pressure, maybe. Yeah. Once you've eliminated the impossible.

Go on. Whatever remains, no matter how improbable, even if it is the inflating of living dogs with helium for marketing purposes, must, James, must be the truth. Yep.

Not just one person. It's like a long family line of people inflating a long family line of dogs. It's a family tradition. This is how we do things here on the cusp of Dorset and next dorset it's always been this way now inflate your dog so there'll be no dinner for ye such as the devonshire and

dorsetshire way we're in no man's land here them city folk in exeter wouldn't understand. As long as you're under my roof, which has a small hole in it, you will inflate dogs and like it. And if I'm honest, that small hole is problematic as I am inflating, I am using helium to inflate dogs. Some of them are getting out.

I'm torn now because I was about to say it was a 5 out of 5 but now I think it is definitely a long-running helium-based scam. Oh, no. So I'm just going to knock one off for that and call it four. Forget it, Jake. It's upline. Okay, then.

Sorry. I'm sorry, James. You talked yourself out of that by going along with an extended helium dog riff it was a good one though i mean come on what a that were what a lovely riff okay then my next category is rich with metaphor because oh yeah until you brought the the helium dog riff it was quite a deep metaphor because don't people well well, Winston Churchill be quite famously referred to as depression as a black dog. And this farmer, it seems is all on his own in that farmhouse.

All he has for company every night, he sits down in his chair and the black dog comes there. Yeah. Lopes in. Yeah. Sits down. Yeah. People start bullying him about it. just get on you know just you

know give us a smile as in chase the dog away just simply chase the dog away simply stop being upset it's not that simple james or depressed it isn't that simple was picking up a poker and chasing the physical manifestation of your depression into the loft and finding immediately receiving a box yeah and turning your life around starting your dream career as a as a pub landlord that inflates dogs it turns out this this ruined my metaphor breaks down a little bit towards yes it ruins my metaphor this this bit that i'm definitely committed to a great sad serious metaphor up until that point it was until you start bringing in important points a long line of farmers slash landlords inflating a long line of dogs over years i mean a long line of dogs but they probably also did a physical long line of dogs because you would so that was the rich with metaphor thing that's really good and he actually

became rich he did actually become rich so that's clever wordplay as well that was unintentionally clever wordplay because it slightly bleeds into the next category well in in in this in this age of having a better understanding of mental health i can't not give it five can i yes without looking callous yeah and don't let's not to look too deeply at this metaphor. Much like a Christopher Nolan film, it probably doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Yeah, just don't think about it. And if you did look at it hard and think about it, it would probably be a bit sad.

Probably make you feel a bit sad. Right, okay, final category. Cash in the Attic. Oh, very good. Which actually... Did we use that category when there was the dog in the attic? Maybe we did. If not, we should have.

Yes. It was very many, many years ago now we did. If not, we should have. Yes. It was many, many years ago now. It was. That was like series one or two. I'm going to say... Before you give your judgment, there is obviously the literal bit where he hits the attic and cash appears, rains down on him.

There's also the cash cow that is inflating a number of dogs with helium and using them as marketing for your in slash B&B slash tea rooms. I'd like to point out we are not accusing any of the current people that run any B&Bs of inflating actual dogs with helium. Nor are we saying they don't do that. Okay. That's for the courts to decide. Yes, we do need to give a balanced viewpoint.

As a category, I don't respect it. As a TV show format, I don't respect it. I don't let the TV show format trouble you with this. It's too late. I'm troubled. But nonetheless, it's got to be five out of five. The cash in the attic,

because a guy found a lot of cash in his attic. A lot of cash. From Charles I era, it's pointed out. Yeah, I didn't realise I'd done that pun with the rich in metaphor thing. Yeah. I didn't realise I'd done that pun.

You double-dipped a little bit, James. I feel like I've doubled done that. You double dipped a little bit James. I feel like I've doubled, yeah. You've double dipped. To some extent I think these scores have been inflated. Much like a line of dogs. Much like a living dog.

Much like a series of alive dogs have been inflated. Or not, we don't know. Or not, or they definitely haven't. You decide. But it has happened. A lovely story and only slightly undermined by the idea of inflatable dogs. Yeah.

Well, thank you very much for listening, everybody. Thank you. And thank you, Joe, for editing this week. Cheers, Joe. If you would like a bonus material, add free feed, and access to the Law Folk Discord, please join us on patreon.com forward slash lawmen pod join us one of us what county boundary is this this is the this is the second episode in recent times where we've there's involved forcing air into a dog because we had the last post played on a beagle look i i

don't pick them. You keep bringing me these stories. It's like that when you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail or whatever. Yeah. But with putting air into dogs. You've got a pump with an appropriately shaped nozzle. With a dog nozzle. Every dog looks insufficiently inflated.

Every dog looks under-pumped.