In a rural village, things can get a bit whiffy at times. We are after all surrounded by farm land with sheep, cows and horses. Once a year, we get a rather strong manure pong from the fruit farm, but now that we know what it is, it doesn't bother us, much.
Years ago, Shackleford was more well-known for it's mushroom farm pong. Well growing mushrooms can be a bit odiferous. They were delicious though.
The more frequent stinks come from overflowing septic tanks. Not ours, I might add. We have a sewage treatment set-up under our lawn. For the interested among you, it's a circulating, aerated system which breaks down organic waste and produces 'clean' water. This is different from a septic tank, which just fills up and needs to be pumped out by the poo truck, a very smelly business. One of the old chaps almost always forgets to get his tank pumped before the rain comes, which results in smelly water in the road. And we have noticed that one of the neighbours doesn't seem to have had their tank emptied in the last year; what horrors will lurk there when they venture in?
But the most irksome stink of the summer is the bonfire. Billows of smoke, loud pops and crackles as green leaves and branches burn. I thought that bonfires were usually lit in the autumn, around bonfire night, after the first of the leaf fall has been swept up. I am dismayed at the increasing trend towards getting rid of summer clippings by burning. Apart from the fact that it makes my clean washing smell, it spoils a summer day, and it pollutes the atmosphere. And it's inconsiderate, too. We seem to have one particular offender who thinks it is appropriate to light his bonfire on a Sunday afternoon; last weekend just as we were serving pre-dinner drinks on the patio. The palls of smoke engulfed us, I had to apologise for it. It was embarrassing. It's a shame, too, that he chooses to make his bonfire within 10 metres of our summerhouse. I don't want to be bad neighbours but....
The Boxers dislike the bonfires too. They sneeze and are frightened by the loud bangs as the green clippings explode like sausages in the pan. What will the chickens make of it all? At least the weather has been kind to us this month.
That's my grump for today.
If you have time, please pop over to #BlogFlash2012, where you will find the link to many other contributors to a fun creative writing challenge for August.