Dear Auntie Sue,
I live in Shawclough, where life used to be simple: you put your bin out, grumbled about potholes, and only saw your neighbours when their fence blew into your garden.
But now Number 14 has started composting. Not the polite kind with a neat little food caddy and a whiff of earnestness, no. This is full-blown organic warfare.
They’ve got barrels in the front garden bubbling like something out of Breaking Bad for Gardeners. It smells like old cabbage had a nervous breakdown in a puddle of vinegar. The foxes have started wearing gas masks. Even the postman skips our end of the road and just chucks letters from a safe distance.
Worse, the neighbour insists on talking about it. “It’s good for the planet,” she says, while stirring a vat that looks like it could summon a demon if read aloud backwards.
I tried hinting, I put an air freshener on their gate. I left a Yankee Candle on the doorstep. I even opened a window and theatrically gagged.
But they’re relentless. They’ve got a compost blog now. With recipes.
Auntie Sue, what do I do? I can’t live like this. I just want to hang my washing out without it smelling like fermented despair.
Yours in nasal agony,
Pamela
Dear Pamela,
Oh love, I feel your pain. Composting is the gateway drug to full-blown eco-extremism. Today it’s banana peels and “natural mulch”, tomorrow it’s a worm hotel and a manifesto about turnip justice.
Now, I support sustainability, but only when it doesn’t make my eyes water and my garden smell like a Viking funeral for salad.
Here’s your plan:
- Counterattack. Install a fake “environmental hazard” sign near the bin. Say it’s an experimental fungus trial. Nothing deters a composter like the fear they’ve accidentally created a bio-weapon.
- Escalate with kindness. Bake something. Take it round. Say, “This sponge cake was made using only freshly fertilised flour – from my own compost.” Watch them recoil at the taste of their own medicine (which will, ironically, smell like medicine).
- Go nuclear. Contact the council and report “suspicious agricultural activity”. That phrase alone should get you a hazard suit and an apology.
And if all else fails, remember: in Shawclough, the wind will change eventually. Hopefully.
Yours with a peg on me nose,
Auntie Sue
