Circular Seasons

The sun is high and hot, cows laze in the shade and the fields are ripe with wheat. In America it’s the season of baseball and beach barbeques. In Britain it’s time for Crop Circles.

Why the population of a diminutive island believes that beings of superior intelligence would travel light years across the galaxy just to trample on their wheat is as big a mystery as why the wheat is trampled in the first place (not who tramples it, but why they bother). The stubborn fact remains, however, that they do.

Brits love to believe in the impossible; it's a trait that has served them well over the centuries. They defeated the Spanish Armada, built the greatest empire the world has ever seen, stood alone against the Nazi war machine and invented the Penny-Farthing bicycle, all because they believed in the impossible. Sometimes, though, it’s better to be able to admit you’ve been misled, cut your losses and accept the truth, and they’re not so good at this.

A stunning example of clinging to the improbable is the Yorkshire Fairies, a set of fake photos purporting to show two young girls gambolling with pixies in their back garden. People scrambled over one another in their rush to believe in fairies. And they still believe, despite the fact that the photos are obviously doctored and the girls themselves explained how the pulled off the hoax.

Most normal people would say, “Ha, you fooled me! Good one.” But the Brits, bless them, possess a heroic capacity for self-delusion even in the face of overwhelming and contrary evidence. This may explain why they keep voting Labour, but it does not explain why crop circles almost exclusively appear in Britain.

As of mid-July 2006, Belgium, France and Italy each had a single crop circle and America could boast only a paltry two, while the British tally was 25 and rising. Does this prove that 80% of aliens prefer to take their wheat trampling holidays in the British Isles, or is there a more rational explanation, such as the licensing laws?

Think about it: British pubs close at the perfect time for the proliferation of crop circles. Eleven PM gives a group of blokes just enough time to come up with an idea that sounds good while you’re drunk as well as enough time to pull it off. I’m sure all over America guys are sitting in bars talking about making crop circles: "Won’t that be a hoot? But first, let’s have another round."  Soon, it’s closing time and the sun is coming up. No crop circles tonight, Virgil; better luck next time.

But in Britain, everyone is turned out of the pubs precisely when they are drunk enough to think they can pull off a stunt like this and at a time when they have nothing better to do. It’s too early to go home, so why not pick up a four-pack of McEwan’s at the offie and go stomp around old Fergus Dunnhill’s wheat field?

  
Crop Circles; an endangered British tradition?

Problem is, they have recently changed the licensing laws in the UK. Pubs are now allowed to stay open as late as they want, which could put a swift end to British Crop Circle dominance. Happily, most pub landlords aren’t opting for 24-hour opening and are, instead, sticking with the 11 PM closing.

It’s a longstanding British tradition, don’t you know, like crop circles.