Friday 25 July 2008

Stench ...

You wouldn't be so brave if you'd ever smelled the Bog of Eternal Stench.

'Hoggle' in Labyrinth (1986)

 

 

There is no avoiding the fact that livestock farms are intrinsically smelly places. The farm that adjoins our property is no different; worse, it has been allowed to deteriorate into a barely useable piece of slurry.

The owner is an absentee-farmer who spends the majority of his time in Brasil. He appears to have left the responsibility of running the place to a farm manager who is incapable of organizing a piss-up in a brewery. And he, the farm manager, has surrounded himself with workers that make him look like a rocket scientist. I guess it is all a matter of perception; hire 'dumb' and 'dumber' and you are bound to appear intelligent!

This is the sight that met us on one of our previous visits:

 

Wall knocked down by an idiot farmhand. - (click on thumbnail for larger image)

 

I experienced a feeling of 'mild-rage' when I first set eyes on this. I've never had that emotion about property before. Let's be honest, I've never owned any property before, so I've never felt the need to get worked up about something like this. Apparently one of the idiot farmhands had nudged the wall with his tractor whilst trying to clear the effluent on the other side. This was the result!

I am, nevertheless, a firm believer in the old adage that, 'Every cloud has a silver lining', and I always work hard to try to spot it. And spot it I did. Look at that picture again and take a closer look at the grass on 'my-side-of-the-fence' (wall, if you prefer). Where there should have been an overgrown jungle, inhabited by various species of ferocious wild animal, there was only close-cropped grass. Scraggly, I admit, with a neatly marked 'path' which I assume was made by the farmworkers wandering down to the river through MY property, but cropped grass all the same!

Sheep!

The little blighters had wandered across, because nobody told them they couldn't, and proceeded to help me out with the overgrowth problem. Lovely little lambs!

But the stench was pretty unbearable, and when the wind blew in the wrong direction I could only imagine how unpleasant it would be to try to sit out on our patio and sip our Sangria's at sunset. Something would have to be done about this situation. Probably another trip to City Hall to get a restraining order on an absentee landlord.

And what hope of us getting that enforced?

Little did we know that a solution was about to present itself without any help or encouragement from us ...

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5 comments:

Lee said...

As he practices the art of leaving the reader waiting...

Good tale so far. Can't wait to hear the end. I keep wondering about the price of lamb chops. Lamb prices are through the roof in the states.

Hope! & Joy!
Lee

Fletch said...

"Can't wait to hear the end."

Hah! Me neither!

It is still a mystery ending as we haven't reached the end of the journey. I am only a post or two ahead of you. Fingers crossed it ends well.

On second thoughts, this will not be down to 'luck', but planning and persistence.

Lee said...

You Go, Terry! One step at a time, one foot in front of the other, looking where you put them first! That's what will see the hill conquered. :)

Cheers!

Shrinky said...

Oh Lord, here you are out in the middle of no-where and yet STILL you can find yourself at the mercy of your neighbours!

(I have to confess, at least Nuttty Nora doesn't keep livestock..)

Fletch said...

Yes, the old adage about "being able to choose one's friends, but not being able to ignore one's neighbours", obviously rings true.

Although I think we've struck it lucky - this time!

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