Outside influences

Today's Festival of Flint was a bit of a disaster. We were meant to be celebrating the amazing powers of flint and its long association with the Beaker People - who of course dug Grime's Graves to get the best quality tools. We forget - the Beaker People weren't shambling amateurs - they were experts in their fields. Their fields being mostly where they used their flint as well, of course. Flint is an amazing, mystical stone - its crystalline appearance belying its sedimentary origin - and I love it. I wanted everyone to considerits wonderful markings, its remarkable origins, and the way that, like the sword of the spirit, it can be two-edged and yet beautiful.

But mysteriously - and in total contrast to every other Celebration we hold, of course - a bit of a fight broke out. And of course everyone was in possession of remarkably sharp objects - all those flint shards and hand axes we had been making at our Flint Manufactory. It could have got a bit nasty, but we turned a couple of fire extinguishers on them all and that dampened things down.

But what caused that sudden riot? Surely not the disputed football result this morning - where Hnaef, as captain of the Reds, was wearing his walking boots instead of football boots and the Blues had to retire hurt. Nor this lunchtime's "Get in touch with your inner Mink".  Nor the cider that people had been drinking during this afternoon's autumnal cider-making. I can't believe that would have created such tension between the Beaker People. No, I blame Outside Influences.

Outside Influences are always the cause of life's woes. No child ever did a bad thing in his or her own right - they've always been led astray by The Wrong Sort. No community in this country ever raises up the people that spark off trouble - it's always Outside Influences. No peaceful demo in this country ever turns into a riot unless there is an unexpected influx of Outside Influences. So my theory is that there's a small town somewhere where all the Outside Influences live. Whenever some people have just cause to get grumpy, the town of Outside Influence loads up a coachload of its inhabitants, and buses them down to Cause Trouble.

The town of Outside Influence itself is either totally wrecked by its own inhabitants, or else immaculate in beauty because they use up all their aggression. If the latter, I suspect it may be Marlborough. I'm not commenting on candidates for the former. Not after the last time, when they torched the doily shed. After all, it's only a 15-mile drive...

So now I've firmly cast the blame outside of the Community, thus absolving all the Beaker Folk and myself from any blame, I'm going to be calming everyone down and concentrating on building bridges, pouring oil on troubled waters and healing the rifts. Obviously we're then going to have a load of oily water with nowhere to flow due to the lack of a rift, but we'll burn that bridge (probably one of the ones we've just built) when we get to it. And I'll be listening very carefully. If I hear anyone betray a hint of an Outside Influence accent, I'm going to hit them with a flint hammer. That will teach them to resort to violence.