Loremen Podcast - S5 Ep28: Loremen S5Ep29 - The Clutching Hands of Blakemere Pool, Peak District

Episode Date: April 18, 2024

James lures Alasdair back down to the water's edge for an Important Mermaid Update! The Hayfield Mermaid first appeared in Series 2 (get up to speed here). Somehow, the Loreboys managed to overlook yet another freshwater mermaid in a nearby bottomless pool. And the grasping creature that dwells in the waters of Blakemere has a heck of a backstory. It's Hayfield Mermaids 2: Mere-lectric Mere-galoo! Disclaimer: some of this episode's "breaking news" is at least 40 years old. 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. Boy, oh boy, Alistair, I've got some updates for you. Oh, yeah? I've got some breaking news from ten years ago. Wow! Yeah, we're going back to Derbyshire.

I can't wait, but also I don't need to. We're going back to Derbyshire. We're going back on the hunt for the mermaid. It's the clutching hands of Blakemere Pool. Alistair. Hello, James. How are you? I'm well, thank you.

How are things at your end? Very good. I've just been on a holiday. Oh, yeah? Yeah, I went to the Peak District. The top district. Yes, and it was peak rainy weather. Oh, yeah.

We did have a couple of days, and we went up a hill, and I tried to find the Mermaid's Pool again. Oh, James, when will this quest end for you when i find the mermaid's pool oh you've got that you get a little sort of cabin with all notes about mermaid's pool written on the wall question mark and then arrows and string you've got a family james you've got responsibilities you can't be looking for a mermaid's pool the whole time. No, I know. No, I found out. Yeah.

I think I got quite close to it. I'm getting close. I can feel it. But I didn't make it. But Alistair, in my research about the mermaid's pool in Hayfield, go and check out our previous episode about Hayfield mermaids from series two. Yes. And don't forget the field report where you fail to find it yes and there's probably a new one of them coming out soon spoiler alert oh sorry

spoiler alert but alistair can you hear that what's that noise is it the sound of ghosts over britain no it's it's breaking mermaid news. I forgot. I've confused our noises there. I think it's the same noise. Is it the same noise? Is that the mermaid ticker tape ticking? Yes, it is.

It suddenly sprung back into life. Oh, what's this? And all the mermaid watch computers have sprung back on because Alistair, I've found another mermaid in the peak district another moment in the peak in the same region there's a which has made your failure to find one more absurd yeah yeah a little bit if there's four of them i found evidence of of another the previous time we recorded about mermaids in the peak district i had a terrible migraine and I've re-listened to the episode and yeah, you can tell.

I didn't notice. But I seem to have missed this fourth mermaid. But a lot of people seem to miss the mermaids. They're miscounted as like there only being two in the whole of the area. But it seems there's four. Any number is impressive considering it's not

principally a water-based region yes it's peak not lake district yeah it's not the trough district but there is another pool do you endorse it no not endorse it well uh actually by the way that in just a quick note on my county blindness. This pool is reported as sometimes being in Derbyshire, sometimes being in Staffordshire. Now, as far as I can tell, the pool has not moved, but I think the county lines may have. I got a new pamphlet called, well, new to me, called Folk Tales and Legends of Derbyshire by A. Rippon. A stands for Anton. This is published in 1982 by Minimax Books, which is a great name.

They do small and big books. Nothing in the middle. If you want an average-sized book, look somewhere else. This is Minimax Books. Yeah, this isn't Midi Books. And the first chapter is Derbyshire mermaids and that first chapter it obviously has the story of the hayfield mermaid again check out the previous episode for that and again apologies for my migraine cut him some slack yeah this mermaid is located at the black mere of morridge also known as blake mere Pool or Blakemere Pond, and that has

a mermaid. Now, the story goes that this mermaid, unlike the Hayfield Mermaid, which can only be seen, as we know, on midnight of Easter Sunday morning, this mermaid can be seen any night at midnight, usually by single men who it lures to their death single men the pool is similarly murky with no fish in it refused by animals so animals are turning their nose up at the pool but single men are really interested exactly yes oh just i'll just scoop a little of that pond water into my pot noodle and then go home and warm it up. That's not how you make a pot noodle. No, you don't.

You'd think a single man would know that. You don't put the water in cold and then heat the whole thing up. And you don't just get it from random pools in the countryside. You tend to get it from the tap. Very judgmental of you, James. Well, so according to a rip-on in Folktales and Legends of Derbyshire, there is a story that many, many years ago, and as this pamphlet was published in 1982,

I'm going to put an extra many, there is a story that many, many, many years ago. I've got to say, I don't think the 80s was many years ago. It was 40 years ago, Alistair. I don't think it was. It can't have been 40 years ago. I've done the maths twice and it checks out. Impossibly, it can't be more than 40 years.

Okay, well, I'm sure we'll be getting letters about that. Letters. I briefly pretended not to be old there and then I said letters. So there is a story. Many, many years ago, some folk were drinking beer in the cock inn. And that's how the story begins. Yeah, I'm not just going to leave the name of that pub. I'm not going to try and make a joke. Lister can think of their own jokes i'm not gonna do everything on the pub sign game it either scores zero or two legs depending on how you interpret

it so the guys were chatting about this mermaid that that draws you to your death and this one guy was like, yeah, I'm not bothered. There's nothing there. I tell you what, I'd go there tonight. And this was a stormy night, Alistair. It wasn't a standard night. Oh, not a stormy night.

And the drinking companions were like, fine, let's bet. They bet five shillings, which I'd say it's tappable, but you might have to put your pin in. It is, actually. The original state pension in 1908 was five shillings a week. And currently the basic state pension is £102.15.

So that equivalent. It's about £100. Okay, wow. So it's about £100. Asda, what's to stop him just going around, splashing in a couple of puddles, waiting an hour and coming back in and saying, yeah, I've been there, didn't see anything? There is an automated ombudsman.

What he said he'd do is he'd go there and he'd stick his stick in the ground and come back and then in the morning they could go see and see that he'd been there. That's quite a clever little way of thought. Where did this mermaid come from? Let's just flash back to the mermaid origin story shall we and let me go to a little website i like to call wickedpedia it's wikipedia it's wikipedia no yeah oh it's not a reliable source james the local legend of blake mearpool tells of a beautiful young woman who rejected the advances of a local man named joshua linnet now he was not happy with the rejection of those advances.

I've started to editorialise now. And he managed to convince the entire town that she was a witch. Oh, Joshua Linnet. And basically, she was tested to be a witch. She was dragged by a horse, and they did the old ducking in the pond. And she, of course, as is the way that you prove you're not a witch, died. Right. Well, nice work, Joshua Linnet.

Well done. Took that well, mate. But with her dying breaths, she muttered a curse against Joshua, and three days later, his body was found. Dead body was found. Dead body was found. Whoa. Twist. Yes.

I assumed you meant living body. To the pond. Good. No, it was his dead body. It was his dead body, actually. Wow. Good. Finally, justice.

Found by the pond with claw marks all over his face. Good stuff. Citation needed. That is the wiki so that is the lead that is one of the origins of the mermaid and i've done a bit more digging i went to the blog imagining staffordshire.org imagining isn't a verb that suggests thoroughly researching, but okay. Blakemere Pool, or Blakemere Pond, is the scene of a number of mysterious drownings over the years. And in 1679, a body was dumped there by a local serial killer. A serial killer in, like, 1679?

A serial killer. In 1679, a serial killer dumped one of their bodies that they'd serially killed. That they'd serially killed. And the people of the 17th century went, oh no, a serial killer, a concept we have. I think there's a serial killer out there. All right. Okay, well, I mean, far be it from me to question

imagining Staffordshire. I am questioning, footnote, I am questioning it. Yeah, I know. The subtext there was that i do doubt whether that's accurate whether there was such a thing as a local serial killer in 1679 at least they were local at least it wasn't one of them serial killers coming up from london to its second i don't know hunting ground oh yeah call it are you like holiday homes is that so they're buying up all the property

so the local serial killers can't get a look in. One of the other origins for the mermaid in the pool is that it was a few hundred years previously, a sailor from the nearby town of Thorncliffe had fallen in love with a mermaid whilst at sea and brought her back and put her in this saltwater pond so one of the origins of the mermaid was that she was already a mermaid she was a different mermaid one of them outsider mermaids that moved in and forced out the local mermaid population placed them out of the pools

so she's now a so she's now a freshwater mermaid having previously been a seawater mermaid well i believe the pool is mysteriously brackish is it not a brinesome pool it might be just that it's very peaty because there's a lot of peat peat bogs all around not the baseballer and a third origin story is that it was a witch trance that transformed into a water nymph after being thrown in in the middle ages but that sounds like a bit of a mix up of the old um the old linnet story yeah that sounds like a variation on the same theme but what is seen there is curtains or pillars of light floating above the water so it could be a willow the wisp oh yeah the wisp willow the w Yeah. I was waiting for you to finish. I heard willow, but it could have been a willow anything.

But the wisp, you say? Yes, of the wisp. The reason it's shunned by the cattle is because it's this bog water, which is not very tasty. I can't believe the cows don't want to drink this stinky, horrible, stagnant, peaty, salty water. What's the matter with these cows? Hoity-toity. They're getting ideas from all these London cows. That are pricing them out of the fields? Yeah. peaty salty water what's the matter with these cows hoity toity

they're getting ideas from all these London cows that are pricing them out of the fields yeah unbelievable they want a latte

a peaty latte the poshest drink I could think of a drink you can buy anywhere in the United Kingdom you could buy it from a petrol garage

a latte can you imagine that milk in coffee can you yeah you can buy it from a petrol station on Orkney. How sophisticated.

How metropolitan. Another source. This is from wordpress.com. Ludchurch is the name of this blog. These are some of the worst sources we've ever had on the podcast. I'm sorry. Some blogs are very good. I apologise.

I mean, this is a podcast, so. I'm sorry, some blogs are very good. I apologise. I mean, this is a podcast, so... This is from ludchurchmyblog.wordpress.com forward slash, and imagine the hyphens, places of other local interest forward slash The Mermaid of Blakemere forward slash The Mermaid of Blakemere update.

And this is from 2014. We've got new information 10 years as of 2014 still breaking mermaid news so what it describes is two white hands that are said to rise out of the black waters and draw people passing by into it, known as the clutching hands of Blakemere Pool. Ooh, nice. Yeah. So I guess Blake comes from black. Yeah, Blakemere or Blackmere Pool.

And mere is the water. Yes. So it's just black water. It's not a mere pool. It's bottomless. No, it's very much the opposite. So the clutching hands of Blakemere Pool, there's a tale of a man who was walking near Blakemere Pool

and he saw the face of a woman with lace lapets around her face, because it's something to do with like a bonnet, over the top of a hedge. And he followed her and it turned out to be a woman in 17th century attire and she plunged into the depths of the pool and then the clutching fingers arose but and this is a quote here but the man managed to fight the desire to plunge into the water sounds like someone let a cosplayer drown the hands reaching out are reminiscent of jenny

greenteeth doesn't she have very long arms that reach out she does but these are particularly these are these are two white hands. And the Lud Church blog cites an article from, I quote, an old newspaper dated 14th of April 1958. So they've done very well on the dating there. Yeah. Yep. Very vague.

An old newspaper. Yeah. In our house, we always take an old newspaper. Yeah, I've got the an old newspaper up and now I have to pay for it. It used to be free. Solving the an old newspaper crossword. So I think they just had the top corner of an old newspaper, which just had the date on it.

And it says that Mr. Philip Davis of Stoke-on-Trent, who was a member of the north staffordshire branch of the british sub aqua club had decided to dive to determine the depth of the pond once and for all and apparently the dive was made on the spur of the moment but he had full frogman gear on he was wearing it he just had it with him that's that's how ready he was. Yeah. Wow. And Alistair, the pond, the bottomless pond, was found to be approximately six foot with a muddy bottom. We've all been there. So it was bottomed.

So it was be-bottomed. It was a be-bottomed pond. Yes. So did you say it was about six feet deep? Yeah, and he dived in in full frogman gear. I recently found out that's a fathom. Yeah, me too. Did you do that quiz where it's like put them all

in order of depths yeah i did that i did yeah on the guardian and it also mentioned that two sorry we were reading a newspaper 20 000 leagues under the sea is is deeper than the entire planet yes yes because jules verne chose the wrong measurement for the title of the book so yeah fathom not that deep the lud church blog had their hands on an an other old newspaper probably from a day or two later because peter c.s cox wrote a letter in reply to that article saying sir i read with interest your article in the paper referring to the depth of the mermaid pool and how the legend has finally been exposed. This, of course, is not new, since a gentleman named Robert Plott plumbed it 274 years ago and discovered it to be little more than 12 feet deep.

Then, in 1905, two young men named Nithsdale and Sheldon ventured into its frozen surface and drove a stake into the bottom of the pool. and sheldon ventured into its frozen surface and drove a stake into the bottom of the pool a more recent survey was carried out in september 1957 by john hill david thompson and peter cox the finding of which included depth the surrounding flora and fauna which have now been charted this chart is now in the process of being embroidered to make a permanent record of these facts well sorry this information is so crucial you've put it on a quilt yeah yeah basically that is evidently the old print to pdf is quilting just just standing standing on a frozen lake with a stick shouting measurements to someone who's embroidering them as fast as they can

before it melts you're gonna have a special reader annoyingly just to be clear without wanting to imply a conspiracy going on here could the peter cox writing this be the very same peter cox who carried out one of those investigations in the list wait a minute i think it doesn't say and myself no could it be a daddy cox well there's peter cx cox and then he and then peter cox so maybe he just signed it cs cox and uh yeah you're right when he says the process that the chart is in now in the process of being embroidered but they had to stop to write to a correct a newspaper perhaps oh yeah the thing about this pond is the level of the water does mysteriously always seem to stay the same,

even when there's, you know, a drought going on and everywhere's drying up. This pond doesn't. And... Well, that is interesting, especially since it's been measured four times and they all got different results. Yeah.

So the top stays the same, but the bottom keeps moving. Is that what we're saying? I guess so. That muddy, muddy bottom. So it says, while the dry grass was on fire and in danger of spreading, the fire brigade pumped approximately 90,000 gallons of water out of it. The fire chief, however, claimed that the level hardly varied. So maybe there is some other source of water there.

Wow. They only wanted nine gallons, but there was a miscommunication the lud church blog finishes by saying in 1933 two local businessmen swam across the pool despite the warnings from friends the two men experienced nothing unusual and reached the other side unharmed without having witnessed anything untoward i mean they must have experienced at least one thing that was unusual unless that's how they always get to work. Like swimming across a pond is quite unusual for a businessman, isn't it? I'm imagining in full business suits, bowler hat, umbrella, briefcase.

That's unusual. Yeah, that's a good point. They're not frogmen, they're businessmen. The two genders, business and frog. And then because this is an archived article, it's just got a little thing that says loading, which I know is never going to load. James, do these websites have visitor counters? No, but they do have comments.

Do have space for comments. I will tell you one of those comments because it's quite a nice way to end after I tell you about the last viewing of the mermaid. So the last recorded sighting of the mermaid was in the mid-19th century. Yeah, sighting is a more normal word. You said viewing like you're an estate agent.

Yeah, viewing. I said viewing. Yeah, it sounds like she's for sale or something. It's a very spacious pond. The level never changes. Come rain or shine. It's got a muddy bottom. That's convenient. It has got a muddy bottom so some people like that in the mid-19th century a group of locals

attempted to drain the lake to see if it was bottomless they began digging a drainage ditch which can still be seen to this day and at that point the mermaid appeared from the lake and threatened to flood the nearby towns of leek and Leekfrith unless they stopped immediately. And presumably they did because those towns are currently not flooded. And Alistair, I promised you a beautiful

ending. It's a poem. Yeah, you did. You ready for a little poem? Yeah, there's a poem about the pond. Written by Harriet Byrne, aka Hattie Bum. There is a bench there with an etching that reads, In the summer at Mermaid Pool, as the grass grows all around, I think I sometimes hear her sing, for the mermaid's home I found.

That's the poem. That's the end of the poem there. Oh, it's quite short. It's quite a short poem. That's the length of poem you like, James. Yes. A really short one. In our clear rhyme scheme, lovely stuff. No messing around.

Yeah, come on. No enjambment. No, no, definitely not. No internal rhymes. Just put the rhymes at the end of the lines so we know where they are. Was that the internet comment? Hold on. No, that's the end of the lines so we know where they are was that the internet comment hold on no that's the end of the internet comment oh so was the was the the poem a comment just so i understand the poem was the comment yes the poem was the internet okay and this is a poem in case oh that's nice internet comment oh how sweet so that is the tale of the clutching hands

of blakemere pool really great good title as well. A.K.A. Mermaid 2, M'Electric Moogaloo. Duh, duh, duh, duh, duh, duh. Oh, no, Alistair. I absolutely haven't finished at all. Sorry, is this some late-breaking mermaid news? Is someone handing you a sheet of A4? You want to know what happened to that guy that went looking for the mermaid pool

at the beginning of the story from the cock inn? I forgot about that guy. Yeah. Do you want to know what happened to that guy? Yes. He went there on this wintry, stormy night. He was within a few dozen yards of the spot when, to his absolute amazement, he heard the cries of a woman, apparently in some distress.

Could this be the mermaid luring him to his doom? Or was it some sort of trick by his friends? You know, they were like, oh, yeah, yeah, of trick by his friends you know they're like oh yeah yeah you go do that and then they like ran around and we're gonna scare him but he could see through the wintry storminess there were two figures by the side of the pool a big man and a woman and the man was dragging the woman into the pool and she's screaming so he shouted hey hey what are you doing get out of it get out of it and it says here thinking quickly the man called out as if to his companions like oi lads what's going on here so that's quite

quite a clever little trick this guy's smart yeah yeah that's quite quick thinking well you i used to do that when leaving the house when we were all leaving the house and it like there was there'd been a spate of burglaries we we'd sort of, as shut the door, shout as if to someone who was still in the house, like, I'll see you in a bit. Yeah. Sharpening your knives. My lover and confidant used to work with a lady in a shop and the lady, whenever they were alone,

just two women in the shop would call upstairs to a fictitious third male employee who I think she mistakenly chose to call Harold, which is not a name that suggests Burley McKissack. That's not a striking young book. No, it's not, is it? You want it to be called like, yeah, Book or Clint or even that. It's not.

Chad or something. crime hater batman that's just our co-worker batman but harold i just pictured the guy off neighbors i don't think he'd take a while getting down the stairs to the and it'd be to the sound of a tube that was in york and he he did he York and he did come to York, the guy who played Harold from Neighbours. Ian Smith. Maybe not accompanied by any umbrellas. Yeah, I believe,

and don't check, I believe he volunteered at the Cats Protection League in York for a day for some reason. That is the sort of person who could easily protect a cat, but potentially not a small shop. Yeah, yeah. I could see him protect a cat but potentially not a small shop yeah yeah i could see him protecting a cat but perhaps not two two damsels that's him coming that he always used to

come into the sound of a tuber on neighbors it was terrible for comic underscoring at that time neighbors so yes the man and and the and the big guy dragging the woman ran away he fell for the he fell for the ruse and the guy he fell for the old harold gambit yes the guy went over to the woman and and and like was like trying to see if she's all right and stuff and it seemed that there'd have been some this was the woman's previous lover, and, you know, we can fill in the bad story there, but basically this man was trying to murder her. But the guy took her back to the pub, took her to the local pub, the Mermaid Inn, and she made a full recovery.

Well, good. So she was rescued, the mermaid, in a way. Yes, and as it says here, on this occasion, a Derbyshire mermaid had saved a life instead of causing one to be lost a lot of bad guys in this story a lot of terrible terrible men we started looking askance at single men and i haven't shifted no come on come on fellas do better come on so that is the tale of the clutching hands of blake meir. An excellent tale. Great title as well. So you're ready to score those hands?

Yes. Yes. Okay. First up, Supernatural. But a boom. It's highly supernatural. Splish, splash. There's a mermaid in a pond.

But not just a mermaid. There's all kinds of special industrial light and magic visual effects going on. Curtains of light. Columns of light. Which appear to be the same thing. Could be the same thing, just seen from a different angle. Extending pale hands. Clutching and grasping.

Frogmen. A man who is a frog. A man who is a business. Most mysterious. And a fire brigade. Very hard to explain. A fire brigade. A fireman. A man who is a fire brigade. Yeah, very hard to explain. A fire brigade. A fireman, a man who is a fire. Yes.

Ooh. 90,000 gallons. Of water. Of water. And it's still there. Mmm. I mean, I have no idea how much a gallon is. I only just found out how much a fathom was.

I think it's five out of five. It's quite right. Excellent. I'll take that. Thank you. Yes, five for supernatural. I'm glad you didn't go with the, well, if mermaids are a real thing, then all of this stuff is just science.

But that's more my angle than yours. I would never doubt mymagicobservation.blogspot.wordpress. Imagining Staffordshire. Forward slash. What if a mermaid lived in a pond. Dot HTML. Hey, you don't need to imagine Staffordshire. You can visit.

No, if that website ever goes down, Staffordshire will cease to exist. That is the last place where anybody is imagining Staffordshire. And if nobody believes in Staffordshire, it vanishes like fairies. Oh, no. It's like, oh, we're all just people within the dream of the website imagining Staffordshire when we're in Staffordshire. Yeah, who is the dreamer? It's imaginingstaffordshire.blogspot.

No, wordpress.com. Wordpress.com. The most authoritative URL available. And speaking of URLs, not really, second category naming. Press.com. The most authoritative Earl available. And speaking of Earls, not really, second category naming. Well, Blakemere and Blackmere, very good names. We've got the cock in. The cock in, yes. We've got Mr. Cox.

We've got Peter Cox. Potentially times two. Well, I don't think we can put this in the episode, but if you were in school with someone who was called Peter C.S. Cox. Yes. You would pronounce it Peter C.S. Cox. Yes. I'm just saying, if you were in school, that's what would happen.

I'm not endorsing that. But we've got the British Sub-Aqua Club. I forgot about the British Sub-Aqua Club. And just the title, The Clutching Hands, The Grasping Hands. What did you go with? The Clutching Hands of Blakemere Pool, which I think came from the church blog, by the way. Oh, well, credit to the blog that I have criticised numerous times.

I think it's like a really strong three. Nice. Because there's three really good names, but it's just not quite enough to bump it up. A bunch of cocks. Okay, then. Okay, then. My next category, muddy bottoms.

The famous blues singer. Yes. There's the muddy bottom of the pool itself, of course. Very muddy, most bottoms. There's the muddy bottom of the stick that the guy was going to stick in the ground. That would have ended up with a muddy bottom. Okay,'s the muddy bottom of the stick that the guy was going to stick in the ground that would have ended up with a muddy bottom okay a potential muddy bottom i'm sure many of the victims would have ended up with muddy bottoms having been dragged yeah that local serial killer

probably slipped over okay all right i'm starting to sense you haven't planned this one as well as you might have i've just realized it was it've just realised it was a fun name to say. It's a really good name, yeah. But, yeah, Will of the Wisp. It might have a... That's very much the opposite of a Muddy Bottom. They have to have a Muddy Bottom, otherwise they can't be created because they come from...

Oh, because they come out of peat. Okay, yeah. Yes, okay. Well, then in that case, it's a four. I was going to say three. You've convinced me that every Will of the West has a muddy bottom. Yes. Four out of five.

Okay, then my final category is... Oh, it really draws you in. Oh, so that applies to your storytelling technique, including the bit where you nearly forgot to do the ending. Yeah, the ending that I teed up at the beginning. That just adds stakes, peril, the real possibility you might forget to finish the story. Yes, you might never have found out what happened to that man that time.

I was actually researching a completely different story, and this caught my eye. Yeah, and you've been completely captured by your relentless quest to find mermaids in the Peak District. Yes, yes. That's drawn me into its orbit. The white hands, obviously, in themselves, just beckon you in, beckon you in like a magnet.

It even affected a frogman. He was just passing by in full frogman gear i was like and saw the pod i thought i'll go in i'll see how deep that is yeah and two business guys two businessmen two top business blokes if you look for pictures of this online one of the one of the main pictures is someone just having a swim in it and having been there recently alistair i cannot imagine it ever being a nice enough day to think i think i'll go for a swim in this brown pool the amount of people that peter s cox cited who've been drawn into the into the web yeah yeah yeah yeah and alistair you the listener i feel you and the

listeners i've been drawn in yeah i've been drawn in me plus the listener, that's another one at least. Exactly. Okay. James, I hope you're ready to embroider this. Yep. Okay, because I'm out here on the lake of your narrative, and I'm shouting over its flies. Get it embroidered. Okay, well, we'll get those embroidered up.

We'll get those scores embroidered up. And sewn into the ledger. How can you just say that as if that's a normal thing to say? That must mean something. I don't understand. Is he in the process of being embroidered for future use? Perhaps he means embroidered in a figurative way, like fleshed out. Like the way when you tell the story, you embroider it with a few asides and funny voices. Maybe he means it like that.

But he's saying it's being embroidered as a permanent record of facts. Surely embroidery... He's talking nonsense. He's talking nonsense. He is sewing it into a quilt so that... He's making a quilt. Every night he'll see that and think,

yep, good, those are the facts. That's how deep that pond is. Well, James, I wish we could embroider this episode in a quilt so I could wrap myself up in it. Well, James, I wish we could embroider this episode in a quilt so I could wrap myself up in it. Oh, yes. Have a little snooze. Well, I'm glad you've enjoyed the tale of the clutching hands.

Well, actually, having said that, there was quite a lot of gender-based violence that I would just like to say we don't endorse. No, yeah, absolutely not. Terrible, terrible men. And it was men. Let's not end on that, though. Let's not end on that, though. Let's not end on that.

No, no. So, James, do you think you will ever find the Hayfield Mermaid? You know what, Alistair? On that Facebook. The second most reliable website on the internet. The Hayfield Ramblers Club are doing an expedition to it on Saturday. The week after we've been oh you missed it they're going up to the mermaid's pool bring your bathers but i'm pretty sure i'm pretty sure

i know where it is one day james yeah i've got it narrowed down to about three fields see i've got a map but the embroidery ran i've got a map of the ink plant if i'd had it embroidered embroidery ran. I'd rather not be the ink plant if I'd only embroidered. Yeah, yes. You can't, yeah. Thread can't run. There's a lesson there. Just blundering into the local pub. Gentlemen,

embroider me a map, post haste. I simply must find this mermaid. Well done, James, the CH of BP. Great story. Yeah, I can't believe I'm finding more mermaids. I can't believe it. When will you relent? Until all the mermaids have been catalogued and embroidered.

Alistair, there are quite a few asides that definitely didn't make the cut but will have made the bonus episode you could go to patreon.com forward slash lawmen pod and join the law folk join us and thank you very much to all the law folk who have already joined us and on the law folk disco at the law of disco at the Law Folk Disco. The Law Folk Discord. And thank you very much to Joe for editing this episode. Do we also have to apologise for where we think Missoula is? Have we apologised for that yet? We haven't. From a few episodes ago?

We haven't yet apologised for that, no. I don't know if there's time for the apology. It turns out it's not wherever we thought it was. Dallas? I don't know. I can't remember what we said. It's not there. It's somewhere else. It's where David Lynch is from. So I could have been doing the David Lynch accent for Missoula the whole time.

What a missed opportunity. I know. I'm sorry about that. But I didn't know how to spell Missoula in my defence.