Hello again, readers. I hope you are having a good day, and I apologise for sending you two articles in the same day. I had forgotten to push “go” on the last one and only realised it when I prepared this one. If there is any consolation, I think this one is better, and I haven’t even written it yet.
Spring has sprung, thank god. The sun has been out for days, and the temperatures are creeping up into shorts territory. The ground is drying out, finally, and the days are getting longer.
With the sun out and mud retreating, K is back onto the land, and Tim, a friend of ours, turns up for a few days to help with some contracting jobs. Tim is a master of fencing and general farm contract work. A new fence and gate are built to separate the glamping site from the rest of the farm. Not only that but the electric fence that the last neighbour decommissioned for us has been reinstated. If I knew where that old goat had gone, I’d send him a bill.
We are excited about the new fence and the now-hot electric fence. We sit and admire it over a few drinks. At the end of each day, there are a few drinks. This is tradition. We discuss the political issues of the day and do other things, such as predict the weather for the next day.
I say to Karene, “I bet if I had said to you four years ago that you were going to get this excited about a fence, you’d have told me I was mad.” It’s true—the move from urban to rural changes a lot of things.
Now, an electric fence is measured in volts (high) and amps (low). To keep bulls in, you need a reading of about four (4,000v), but three will do. For sheep, you need about six, as their wool provides some protection. Tim has done such a good job that the fence is currently running at nearly eleven. I think this might be a new world record. We are immediately wary of the fence and step well away from it. To keep a bull elephant in or out, you need a fence running at about nine. This bastard is going to destroy anything that tries to go through it.
Once the entire run is switched on, the fence goes all the way around the property; the reading drops back to a less scary six or seven. Still, it is a mean belt if you accidentally touch it, and all of us have at least one story of someone who has struggled with an electric fence, only to become stuck and have the crown jewels zapped until someone else can poke them off with a stick. This is quite common.
This is discussed over some drinks after work in the driveway. Sparrow has been working next door and arrives with “tea”, bourbons in a can. I can’t drink it because I don’t want to die of diabetes. But the sun is out, every politician is abused, electric fence tales are told, and then it’s off to light the fire.
Tim fixes the bore enclosure that the cows destroyed, prunes trees with all the skill of a monkey with a chainsaw, and installs a tap into the glamping site. I’m also quite excited about the tap.
I’m worried that people are going to die from heat exposure down there in summer. The site gets about five degrees warmer than the rest of the property because trees somewhat enclose it. Having a hose means they can at least keep themselves cool. Nudity is allowed and to be encouraged (what is the point of glamping if you can’t get naked - Answer: none), but a cold shower is going to be a mandatory requirement.
It also means that if they or we set fire to something, then we have a slightly more efficient firefighting capability than extinguishers.
The plan is to move the old trough from there into the slightly smaller fenced-off paddock if we can find the irrigation line. We know where it comes out in the glamping site, but it is a complete mystery as to how it gets there. Short of digging up meters and meters of ground, we are going to need to try water divining. It’s called Water Witching, and there are plenty of YouTube videos showing you how to do it.
So that’s next on the agenda, wandering around Water Witching in paddock six. The new city neighbours will think we are insane. If we can get that right, then I might have a new career option available, “The Water Wizard.” I could get a custom van painted with a wizard on the outside and sell my services to the farmers at the Gladstone Pub. 0800-WIZZWIZZ.
I could wander the paddocks in my wizard shirt with custom-built divining sticks, and when they signalled the presence of the precious juice, I could say things like “Eeeeeee, buy gum, there be water ‘ere, bring yonder tractor.” And, “Oooooh nay, thar be nay warter in this ‘ere paddock, fetch me another.”
I could be paid in beer and chops. And cash. Ah, to dream.
Speaking of beer, back at the local, the mood is lifting as the weather improves. Even the sheep want to come in. Very tasty looking sheep, so probably a bad idea on their part. Soon, it will be spring chaos, and already, there are a lot of contractors moving around and grabbing them now is a good idea.
After two years of winter, there is a lot of work around the valley to get things sorted out. Heavy machinery hasn’t been able to get into paddocks or even entire communities for months and months. It’s almost warm enough now for the grass to start growing again.
With thirty-seven days until the election, there was much debate about just how stupid the entire process is. We’re definitely in “the lying through our teeth to try and get back in” stage. Meanwhile, the opposition is playing the “I’ll promise anything knowing I can’t deliver it, but please vote for me” stage. Shambles.
Of course, there is nothing in any of the promises for the rural community and sector. New Zealand is going to have a tough time in the next couple of years if the input prices stay low and the sales prices continue to drop. There are already a lot of people out here tightening the belt. With no other revenue coming into the country, that’s going to hurt. Buckle up, baby.
I watched a speech by one particularly stupid politician recently. They had “done a tour of the rural communities” and wanted to talk about what they had learned and what they were going to do. Only, they hadn’t done a tour of rural communities at all; they’d done a tour of cities outside of Wellington and Auckland. They proudly rattled off the locations and then listed all the issues that urban folk were having, nothing to do with rural at all.
The display of ineptitude is astounding this time around. Labour bashed contractors last week, the market closed as a result, and the Australians have started a campaign to get us to work them there or remotely. There are dozens of jobs being posted here for work there.
National bashed the big consulting companies, so every government department of size that is using them just signed contracts with them to the tune of billions of dollars worth of commitment over the next few years. Even if National gets in, they can’t undo that.
Anyway, that talk is just making me grumpy and thirsty. After all, how many politicians does it take to change a lightbulb? Two. One to change it and one to change it back again.
Rural know how to hunker down and look after each other in tougher times. At least this year, the weather is improving. No doubt, in three months, we’ll be moaning about how dry it is.
K is preparing the glamping site for its launch later in October. We could probably have people in there now, but the weather is still a bit fickle, and the nights are cold. There’s no great rush.
For her, it’s on to the round pen building for the horses, and she’s been towing timber behind the tractor in readiness. Big, heavy, straight pieces of gums from the trees she’s cut down. Plus, all the other seasonal chores that are starting, including the need to wether some of the rams that were born recently. Ouch.
The paddocks will need rolling soon before they dry out too much; of course, everyone needs to do that at the same time, so there will be much bribery with beer and cash required. There are three kinds of currency in rural: beer, cash, and baleage.
Until next time, take care of yourselves and stay in touch. I love hearing from you.