The Devil's Piss Jam Company

The Devil's Piss Jam Company proudly presents....Day 2.

Sunday morning, my second day at chez Anne and Seth. After a breakfast of toast and homemade apple and blackberry jam (see, famous five - all we need now is lashings of ginger beer) we decide to go for a walk. Off we set armed with Anne's map.

Interlude - I have many memories of Anne and her obsession with maps. she would bring them into school and plan out some new route she was going to follow at the weekend. Once, soon after we first met, Anne tried to convince me that I lived in London. It was one of many heated arguments we had and no matter how many times I insisted that, as I in fact lived in Woodmansterne and she had never been there in her life I should know whether or not I lived in London. One day she brought in a map to prove she was right....o dear. She flourished the map before me pointed out where Woodmansterne was and then dealt her master stroke, "you live inside the M25!" This was the first but not the last time that I encountered people telling me that all within the M25 was London (as if it were some barrier keeping back the evil tide of the capital) so I do understand where she was coming from. It is similar to the belief that there is nothing beyond the Watford Gap; there is nothing outside of London - we are all sucked into it's gaping maw! Anyway I digress.

On our walk we notice the blackberrys abundant in the hedgerow and Anne says "In September the Devil pisses on the blackberrys" You can imagine my shock, this was not something I had ever heard before. Is this a delicacy in Wiltshire? Or is this a conspiracy of the satan -worshippers from the previous night? "Hello, me darlin'. Would you like some of my finest Devil's Piss Blackberry Jam?" Apparently, because the blackberry's go bitter in September, it is said that the Devil pisses (or spits) on them. I have read since that it is after the 29th September this happens ( the 29th being Michaelmas - I suppose after Archangel Michael kicked Lucifer out of Heaven, Lucifer was so pissed off (literally) that he pissed on the blackberrys). I think there could be a niche for Devil's Piss Jam. Not everyone wants to eat the jam made from organic fruit that fell from the tree, fruit which was allowed to range freely and was gathered by nuns wearing soft cotton gloves singing hymns of love and gratitude over them. No! Some people out there want to rebel! They want jam from fruit that was ripped from the tree by people who hate babies and kittens, standing in the pouring rain on a wet cold English morning whilst a sick parrot screeches in a barn nearby, fruit which had such a miserable life that it tastes like devil's piss and has to be pumped full of sugar and flavourings! Now these people can be served by the Devil's Piss Jam Company! After all, should there not be freedom of choice? Does everyone want to live healthy, morally and evironmentally conscious lives? I think not! Devil's Piss Jam will stand for the rights of the common man.

So that was just a taste of the thoughts and rantings that Anne and Seth had to put up with after she said "the Devil...etc etc."