Playing with the big boys’ toys

There’s a tractor outside my kitchen window.

That means Doc is ‘working’. That’s his euphemism for playing with the big boys toys.

We’re building a shed at our house at the farm. Doc has bought so many toys out here that we need somewhere to keep them out of the house. Hence, a shed – or ‘man space’ as he calls it.

And best of all – it will house a toilet. One that you sit on, that’s inside, and you don’t have to trek miles for.  After all this time trekking over to the bushes to dig a hole every time I need to go, I will have an inside (well in the shed) toilet!

“Hmm,” I can hear you thinking “perhaps that farm life is not quite so idyllic after all”

Digging a hole doesn’t really bother me, nor does squatting rather than sitting – it is healthier, but I really don’t like having to trek over to the trees every time I need to go, with a shovel and roll of toilet paper. It’s like announcing to the world “See, my bowel is working ok. I’m going to shit this time. I must be getting all my fibre.”

And worst of all, it’s a bit like taking a shower when camping. It attracts interest. Last time we were here, out the back of the farm with no signs of life as far as the eye can see, I took myself off to the bushes to “dig a hole” as Doc says. I’d just settled myself down for a bit of quiet contemplation, when the farm manager decided it was the perfect time to check on our end of the farm. Not only did he drive past me squatting there with my arse hanging out, but a few minutes later he turned around and came back!

Doc has been talking about putting in a proper toilet for a while, but secretly I think he didn’t really want to do it. Having a proper working toilet seemed like that one step too far in making the place ‘civilised’. If it’s too comfortable then too many people might want to come out here.

And believe me, as soon as you say to people “there’s no toilet, you have to go and dig a hole in the bush”, they change their minds about coming.

But I think the snake incident scared him a little. If there’s a deadly snake inside the house there may be one lurking in the trees where we go to dig a hole. So since we got up yesterday he’s been working his arse off clearing up everything that could conceivably hide a snake close to the house.

The grass didn’t need mowing because being summer it’s now short and brown, but he cut back trees, moved all the branches and other lose twigs and fallen logs from the yard out to the paddock as the start of a winter bonfire, moved the trailers away from the house and just generally did a big clear up. The yard now looks huge!

Actually the yard is huge, it’s just that we’ve never seen it like this before.

And now he’s borrowed the tractor to dig the holes for the posts for the garage, and a trench and pit for the toilet.  He’s in bloke heaven.

The only hitch has been when the tractor got a flat tyre, and even that wasn’t much of a problem. Doc has a tool (or tools) for every occasion, so he just got out the puncture repair kit (or whatever the tractor version is), and the compressor and fixed the tyre and pumped it up again.

Hey presto – bloke magic!

And me? As they say – I love hard work, I could watch somebody doing it all day. And I’ll even photograph it and write about it.

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PS: If you’re reading this and trying to work out the exact location of the farm because you think you’ve stumbled onto a cache of tools, don’t bother. Doc brings out his good tools and takes them home again every time. It’s why we always have to drag a trailer out here, even for a weekend. Nothing of any value is left out here, but every country bloke needs his country shed!!