21st Century Hermit!!

OK so the picture isn't of a 21st Century Hermit its of our very own dynamic duo Maggie and Geisha lay very comfortably on the step to nowhere outside the stable.

But I haven't got a picture of Mad Keith the hermit who dwells upon the side of the hill, and has done so for 44 years in the same spot, drinking from a stream and eating strange things he finds. I haven't dared point the camera at him in case he panicked and thought I stealing his soul forcing him to take me captive and keep me alongside Mrs Mad Keith in a pit amongst the bracken on the hillside.

These pits do exist, I don't really know what happened to Mrs Mad Keith, perhaps she got bored and wandered off with a band of itinerant sheep shearers on their way to make their fortune in sunnier climes like Morocco.

I will find out, but for now we know that Mad Keith the aforesaid hermit who has lived alone with the bones of a dead cat in a box around his neck, OK I made that up too, but he did have a cat called Tim and he buried it under a piece of metal on the hillside, hopefully after it died. I know its called Tim because the letters TIM are painted in white gloss marking the final resting place of the treasured moggy. Mad Keith who avoids strangers, hides amongst the rocks and vegetation if he thinks you are looking for him, he who has no possessions apart from a really old bike which he fearlessly rides down the almost vertical slope of the mountain we share, he who shirks all mod cons, who's idea of luxury is finding his stream hasn't been used as a toilet by the sheep or that the socks he has draped across the barbed wire fence to dry are not as crunchy as the pair he is currently wearing.

Mad Keith has joined the age of technology!

Yes people, Mad Keith has got a mobile phone!

One that actually works.

Its not an empty case like the TV he sits and watches, no this is the genuine article that he can actually make calls on.

How do I know?

It was he that the emergency services were looking for the other night, the missing sixty year old. He is in fact considerably older than sixty, more like 74 but they were close enough and lets be fair they were in the same county and on the right hill.

I know all this because I bumped into The Oracle this morning as he opened the gate for me as I went to work. Apparently Mad Keith went to bed (imagine one made out of a forest floor covered in sheep's wool and your close) and felt a bit poorly. So poorly in fact that he thought he was having a heart attack so at 2 am phoned 999. When they eventually found him he was in a bit of a state and so they took him to hospital where he was diagnosed as having severe indigestion probably caused by eating a pack of sandwiches left by a helpful hiker. Fully recovered and fully cleansed by the NHS he was returned to his hovel last night by a helpful hospital driver.

This episode raises even more questions about the eccentric old man who is our nearest neighbour. I originally thought that the most pressing question I had relating to Mad Keith was what happened to Mrs Mad Keith. Now I know he is a technohermit with a mobile phone another question has taken priority.

What network does he use and how does he get a signal living here when I cant!