Monday, September 8, 2008

Dear City Council

Please consider my pleas.
You have all sorts of bylaws; many of them established in order to protect the rights and comforts of the people living within your township.
You have noise bylaws elaborately designed that dictate when someone can mow the lawn, operate a drill, play loud music or shoot off propane cannons in the fields to scare off the birds. In fact, your bylaws outlining the propane cannons on blueberry farms are very well thought out. Not only do they specify allowed times during the day, but also the power of the shots, the direction the shots are faced, how often they must be rotated, and how much time is needed between each shot.
We have a dozen new blueberry farms in our neighbourhood this year, all of them using propane cannons and many of our neighbours are upset about the noise disturbance, particularly considering they can start the shots at 6:30 in the morning and seem to be popping them off every 15 seconds or so, directly aimed at us.

But, that's not why I writing to you.

What I'm writing about has bothered me far far far more than the propane cannons.
Far more disturbing and disruptive to my peace, stopping us from socializing with friends and even preventing us from having our windows open at times, let alone leave the house....is the fucking farmer two fields over who spreads his entire 10 acres with manure in the late summer every year. God Forbid I plan a wedding or something equally lovely and important. The smell is ATROCIOUS. And I like to consider that I handle my stinky farm smells quite well, for the most part. I'm not bothered by the pigs or the rabbits or the chickens or the sheep. I'm not even bothered by the smell of the dairy barn that I visited with a bunch of 3-year-olds last year. I change T.Rube's diapers mostly without gagging every single day!

This particular manure smell is simply above and beyond what should be acceptable. It is the most highly offensive smell that I have ever experienced. It makes your eyes water and eats away at your nose and burns your lungs with every inhalation. You can feel the toxicity in it. I have no doubt that THIS is the shit that is destroying the ozone layer - and FAST.

We can't go outside, for crying out loud.

Please, I beg you... This issue requires legislation. I know that farmers have been spreading manure for generations. But, surely, you can place some restrictions on it. Maybe the time of year or the amount of space they can spread at one time. Or maybe the type of shit can be better controlled. Or the quality of the shit. Or what goes into the shit to begin with. Evidently some shit smells better than others, and this is the worst of the worst. We can find out what kind of shit my neighbour spreads on his fields and then you can ban it. He can spread a nicer smelling shit, I'm sure. Isn't there shit that smells like roses?

With all of the time and effort put into designing the blueberry cannon bylaws, I trust that you'll find a thorough compromise here also. We simply can't go on like this.

Thanks for your time and honest consideration.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

You tell em' J.Rube
Did you send this off the the officials.........or are you just venting. I'm hoping you did.

Magnolia said...

Wow!!! It must be bad. Yuck.

My nanny used to LOVE that disgusting smell....however...by the sounds of it she has never smelled the nasty shit you have. LOL

I hope the air smells sweeter soon.

Burrus Boys said...

Jodi...grew up in rural Alabama. Had a s#@tkicking neighbor that did the same thing. Our added twist? No air conditioning. Only a house fan that pulled every noxious fume so we could enjoy it just as much inside as we could outside. I could smell, taste, touch and almost hear it for at least three days.

the rural rube said...

Ugh - Alabama in the summer sounds hot! We don't have air conditioning here either, so it does get seriously ugly. it is starting to dissipate now.... thank friggin' god.

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