Jill's Blog

Jill, old enough not to want to give away her age, is mother to four demanding daughters that keep her on her toes when it comes to anything retail and beauty related.

Jill much prefers shopping online to fighting the masses instore and her favourite websites include EveLom.co.uk, OkaDirect.com, TimeToSpa.co.uk, Inverawe.co.uk and FormanAndField.com (the latter two keep the men in the family smiling!).

Shooting Times...

Published on Sunday 7th October 2007

Well, here we are in October, husband back on his peg and me standing by – occasionally loading but usually just enjoying the beauty of the day waiting for the partridge and pheasants to fly towards us to meet their, unfortunately some might say, not inevitable end.

A sporting chance it really is; I can't understand why anyone can object to the possibility of a bird that has been reared in beautiful surroundings having been fed well and allowed to roam free being hit by a gun, when they happily eat chicken that'll certainly die having had no life at all.

Actually there's nothing more satisfying to me than watching a man who is ‘something in the City’ and who boasts of his prowess in all things, completely missing a bird that I could have hit with, to quote Lady Bracknell, ‘a handbag’!

Another good thing about this time of year is that it allows me to browse the wonderful sites that sell the appropriate gear for standing for hours in a field. Oliver Brown has a very nice tweed jacket for the ladies that I have my eye on and he also does a good line in waxed jackets.

The Barbour site is another good one for getting the basics: wax jackets, cartridge bags, socks etc and Orvis offers a really hard wearing leather quilted gilet (pictured, left), which would’ve been perfect for me last week as I either sweltered in my coat or froze in shirt sleeves.

For a little personal indulgence a visit to The Really Wild Clothing Company, an offshoot of the Royal Berkshire Shooting School, is a must.

They also do, as do the others I’ve mentioned above, things for men as well. That said, by the time you’ve visited, there mightn’t be much left in the housekeeping...

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