Within a sniff of the bottom line
If opening your rates bill makes you wince, spare a thought for those of us who live in the country.
Ours make our eyes water too they’re probably not that different than yours.
But while we have the odd streetlight and even rubbish collection, we don’t have footpaths, water services, reticulated gas or sewage drains.
We harvest God’s wees off the roof for our household water, and the grader comes out twice a year to get the corrugations out of the gravel road.
We do, however, have a septic tank. The tank is usually unthought of, gurgling away underground, fermenting whatever goes down the sink or toilet and slowly draining it out onto the lawn.
In summer, when the grass burns off, the outfall from the tank leaves a big skidmark of green in the backyard, which is about the only thing that needs to be mowed.
That’s pretty much the only time the tank is thought about.
Until it gets full, moans and belches, and then believe me, you know it exists.
It’ll start off as a faint whiff on the nose, and you could be a bit unsure if it’s the tank or something dying in the paddock next door.
Leave it a couple of days and you’ll be in no doubt whatsoever that whatever you dropped down the loo might be trying to come back to visit.
It’s about a once-in-seven-years occurrence. It’s time to put in a call to Septic, the fella that will pump the tank out.
Now my mate Septic, as he’s known to almost everyone, is one of those people you don’t see that often - but you’re very pleased when you do.
As he backs his truck down the drive he’ll be the first to tell you that in his line of business, he’s not into biting his fingernails, and you better pay your bill too - or you’re likely to get your ‘deposit’ or someone else’s, returned to you.
You fart, we’ll cart is his motto.
As the valve is undone on the tank, the seven years of stench you’re hit with is enough to make you want to vomit. It doesn’t bother Septic in the slightest. Last time he was at home he stood by the truck as it sucked out the sludge and scoffed a meat pie.
And in his line of business, he’s always got a yarn to share.
Like the house he went to to clean out the tank and had ‘‘a hell of a time, because it was full of johnnys’’. (That’s condoms, for anyone under the age of 50).
He told the lady of the house that they shouldn’t be flushing them down the toilet, and she replied that she and her husband didn’t use them.
‘‘The place was on the market two days later!’’ Septic laughs.
He’s been in his crappy business for 40-odd years, he reckons, and while it’s not a job for everyone, he has no plans to retire.
‘‘As long as shit keeps happening, I’ll keep pumping it,’’ he says.
‘‘My mate Septic... is one of those people you don't see that often - but you're very pleased when you do.’’