Too knackered

This is what I did last Wednesday morning: I sat on an upturned bucket inside a sheep-milking shed, holding a ram lamb's head and front legs while a vet called Adrian was slicing the lamb's testicles off.

- MICHELE HEWITSON

I wasn't looking. The ram lamb was my beloved pet, Reginald, the son of my beloved ewe, Elizabeth Jane. I suspected a conspiracy between Adrian and Miles the sheep farmer. I had nagged and nagged Miles into giving Reggie the op. Miles had threatened to sell him into servitude in China. There was no way he was going to China. I was determined to keep him.

The conspiracy I suspected was that Miles and Adrian had arranged in advance to provide a running commentary on how the op was proceeding. I had asked Miles to provide an additional bucket. I was feeling a bit sick. The additional bucket had somehow not materialised. Reggie had been given drugs. I hadn't. Drugs made him woozy. Woozy-making drugs for me would have been good.

Before this traumatic event, I had been given an education which involved participation in the sheep-breeding business of "palpating". It involves massaging a ram's bollocks. We were checking for lesions, some of which can be caused by rams going for other rams.