Email to:Leaking: My Family’s Grubby Little Secret!
A leak from ‘within’ destroys dreams, takes away what you cared about most, leads to questions you never thought you’d have to ask, namely:
What the hell makes this grubby family tick!?
I know……..
Because when I was 12, I came very close to saving the backyard Cedar Grub infested Cedar Tree under which the Riverina’s most foul-tempered pet, Bindi-Boo Major, festered in a sea of bile in his Letona Cannery Workshop purpose built holding pen.
And I failed…….
['Grubby behaviour from a family grub.' cr: Tony the Misfit: flickr]
Because a grubby family member with a moral map smaller (and far less complex than the CBD of Grong Grong) LEAKED all over me….
P***** on my parade and like how!
The grubby sequence of events was set in train when the Department of Agriculture declared a full-scale Cedar Grub Emergency in Leeton.
Gwennie, never one to take threats to her family’s health and safety lightly, went stark-raving mad.
She was on the Cedar Grub frontline…..
Hundreds of thousands of big, black and hairy Cedar Grubs from the elegant host in Bindi-Boo Major’s holding pen were squirming over the lawn, straight through the carport, under the back screen door and INTO everything held dear in the fibro palace.
Nothing was immune…..
*Knicker Drawers = Cedar Grub Incubation Chambers..
*Pantry Cupboard = Cedar Grub Smorgasbord….
*Beds = Cedar Grub ‘Quiet Time’ Areas….
*Small Electrical Appliances = Cedar Grub Adventure Playgrounds….
So fraught was Gwennie she took to household duties wearing a shower cap, terrified that marauding Cedar Grubs would take refuge in the mysterious recesses of her permed curls.
THEN a molten clutch of charred and twisted Cedar Grubs popped up out of the new pop-up toaster.
AND Gwennie cracked - frantically demanding that a local axeman cut down the canker, cut out the cancer that was the centrepiece - with the hills hoist – of our (to be brutally honest) pretty basic backyard configuration.
To NO avail, I pleaded with Gwennie on behalf of the Cedar Tree.
My main argument?
That if Bindy-Boo Major was without even a hint of shade come the traditional inferno that was December-March his legendary foul temper would explode into murderous rage.
This was Cedar Grub Ground Zero – I had nothing to lose.
I’d throw the Cedar Grub Dice just one more time…..
When Hec entered the fibro palace in good spirits from the Leeton Hotel just past eight pm, I asked him to sit down.
Which he did (just).
I handed over a piece of paper which simply said, ‘The Cedar Tree Stays.’
I said: ‘Sign this.’
He said: ‘I can’t do that, KJ.’
I said: ‘Why not?’
He said: ’Because my life wouldn’t be worth livin’.’
I said: ‘ WHO got at you between the carport and the kitchen table?’
He said: ‘No one.’
I said: ‘I don’t know what makes this grubby family tick.’
Quickly adjourning to the sleepout shared with two potential grubby leakers, I removed five big, black and hairy Cedar Grubs from my sheets…
And slept the fitful slept of The Betrayed.
The axeman brought the Cedar Tree down in a precision display of strength and bad language.
The Cedar Grubs retreated.
I know that is was Gwennie who intercepted Hec in the carport on the night of the fifthy Cedar Grub Coup.
I DO NOT know the identity of the grub (or grubs) who leaked to Gwennie details of my Cedar Tree Petition.
I probably never will.
There are four suspects: Mezza-Anne, Elizabeth-Kaye, Julie-Ellen and Francy-Maree.
To this day, I tell ‘em everything – and NOTHIN’!
********************************************
So, lots to discuss…….vermin, Cedar Grubs, loyalty, leakers, trust, federal elections………an embarrassment of riches that a blogger can usually only dream of……
Any heart-warming memories of Riverina Cedar Grub plagues…….?
AND, as you all know, kerriejean.com is a beautiful exemplar of participatory democracy – so if you’ve got something to say, particularly to LEAK, feel free…….
By:
Just clicking on the ‘comment’ thingo and following the simple instructions. The place to write your gems is at the bottom of the last published comment. *A little bit of counsel for people new to this caper. Your email (just called ‘mail’ in this case) address does NOT come up on site. And just ignore the URL thingo.
Prawn Cutlet Award
August 2nd, 2010 at 12:12 pm
Chopping down a cedar tree in Palm Avenue was never an option at my place!
Dad would come from from the *WC&IC each afternoon and cast a wary and troubled eye over the four cedar trees along the back fence, increasingly covered with grubs, tut-tut quietly, tho we knew deep down he was extremely annoyed by the trail of destruction being wrought by the buggers, and wander inside for a soothing cup of Bushell’s tea.
After all, he’d planted the trees himself when they’d bought the house in the 1950s, and, as a minor version of David Suzuki, he had NO intention of ever wielding an axe in anger against them!
And, anyway, they were wonderful trees to sit under in the middle of summer when it was over 100 degrees outside – as long as there were a few remnant leaves to provide some shade, that is . . .
Nevertheless, like Gwennie, mum would cuss and swear at the little buggers invading her laundry, surprising her in the toilet at those highly personal times and reminding her of the Wehrmacht invading the Soviet Union in June 1941 . . . tho she hadn’t been there (ie. in the Soviet Union) of course. Still those carpets of crawling critters created considerable consternation.
Her preference was for tree removal, too!
‘No,’ dad would say, ‘we’ll just wait for Council to spray them.’
This was all the advice mum ever needed. She’d be onto the phone to Frank Ross to complain about the need for Shire to protect the trees and us kids from harm.
A few days or weeks later, a small truck bearing a huge white barrel we all guessed was pesticide would slowly make its way along the back lane, quietly spraying cedar trees in its wake.
Many years later, the spraying would stop and we’d get letters from Shire asking us to remove the trees as a sign of environmental common-sense. After all, they’d been ripping out cedars along Acacia Avenue and elsewhere in town.
Dad wouldn’t hear anything about it.
He’d planted the trees and they were there to stay.
And they still are! Almost sixty years later.
When one died a while back – which surprised me ‘cos I thought cedars lived for hundreds of years – and I planted a couple of replacements to fill in the gap I felt I was striking a blow for ‘Leeton’s David Suzuki’, again.
Mind you, the residual cough I have today, undoubtedly caused by the toxicity of the pesticides used all those years ago, is enough to remind me that there’s an ever so slim line between logic and the environment.
Perhaps Hec and his axe were right all along?
Dear Palm Avenue,
First all all, a declaration in the interests of journalistic rigour……I am NO relation to the famous Frank Ross, long-term Leeton Shire Clerk….
That done, what a magnificent portrayal of another family living the nightmare that were the internecine Cedar Grub-driven wars.
From what you report, I can now confirm what I always suspected – the battlelines were drawn on gender lines.
While men were able to flee Cedar Grubs at places of employ, it was the housebound women of Leeton who were forced to confront big, black and hairy Cedar Grubs – in kitchens, in bedrooms, in bassinets, in teapots, in tupperware lettuce keepers – and, according to you, EVEN in the highly prized privacy of domestic toilet facilities.
In retrospect, perhaps it was better that our ornamental Cedar got the chop….
I cannot even countenance the effect of a couple of litres of DDT on Bindy-Boo Major – if he’d been in residence when a Cedar Grub SWAT team moved in.
KJ.
*Water Conservation & Irrigation Commission.
August 2nd, 2010 at 3:17 pm
Ode To Them Abbott Lobes
Ear lobes, I like dem ear lobes,
They’s honest ear lobes,
They’s good ear lobes….
Ear lobes, I like dem ear lobes….
Dere not dem wing nuts,
Dem aeronautical wing nuts,
Dey darn fine.
Ear lobes, I like dem ear lobes,
(Very much)
August 3rd, 2010 at 7:15 am
Wonderful, wonderful cedar trees.
Remember them well….
A line of them, shading the weather shed at Stoney Point Public school. Cedar grubs in line astern like a hairy freight train making their way up the trunks or on the ground, EVERYWHERE.
Had Alfred Hitchcock been born in Leeton, he would have made a film called ‘The Grubs’.
Tippi Hedren, however, may have been reticent about playing the lead.
Dear Stoney Point,
Quite the contrary.
I think the glorious Miss Hedren would have loved a change of pace – enjoying the challenges of ‘The Grubs’ shoot very much.
The horror of ‘The Grubs’ would be breathtaking in its realism – Miss Hedren retires to her modest motel room for supper (rice medley) and a quick shower.
Turning on the water, she pulls the curtain across……..WHICH is crawling with thousands of big, black and hairy Cedar Grubs.
There’s NOWHERE to go. The hot water renders The Grubs angry. Soon, they are crawling all over the (perfect) naked form of Miss Hedren……
WHO tries to scream – but can NOT – because a clutch of Grubs is lodged in her windpipe…….
‘Shocking, disgusting, it’ll change your life…….gardening will never be the same again……THE GRUBS…..coming to The Roxy Theatre, Leeton, soon….(will you be brave enough to check under your seat?) ‘
KJ.
August 3rd, 2010 at 12:49 pm
Cedars are the ones with the yellow berries, are they?
I’m sure every Leeton kid, at one time or another, on a dare or out of sheer curiosity, has bitten into one of those berries. It would be a rare kid who would do it twice, though.
They make earwax taste like mango sorbet.
Dearie me, Roma Street…….now, I don’t pretend to be The Bush Tucker Man but I don’t think backyard Cedar Berries are for the eatin’.
Suffice to say, I’m even surprised you’re well enough to come in here and comment.
Cedar berries are potentially dangerous too on another OH&S front – squashed underfoot they morph into a potentially fatal slip hazard.
So between the grubs, the suss berries, the terrible slip hazard….isn’t it time to say ‘goodbye’ to Australia’s stock of troublesome cedars?
KJ.
August 3rd, 2010 at 2:45 pm
To quote King Lear: ‘No. no, no, no, no.’
It’s not time to get rid of those wonderful cedars . . .
In the multicultural MIA, they’re a touch of Lebanon on the Murrumbidgee!
Just not a very good taste in the mouth . . .
Dear Palm Avenue,
To quote Lady Macbeth: ‘Out damned Grub…’
Your opinion is noted. BUT, my considered view stands. After all, this is a Democracry….
KJ.
August 3rd, 2010 at 4:59 pm
Attention: Mr Ab-Do-Man/Six Pack:
What’s going on here?
There’s something Julia-esque about that grub pictured on this page if you look closely. All it needs is a string of pearls.
Are Cedar Grubs Australian?
If NOT so Tony, you should crack into Action Mode.
We’ll decide what comes to this country, and how long it can stay.
On the other hand, the Grub looks a little like the nicotine-stained moustache of a regimental sergeant major who votes for Barnaby…..
Dear The Dude,
Just when the Cedar Grubgate could get any hotter…..in you come with THIS…..
As a journalist, my every instinct is shouting: ‘There’s something in what The Dude says, there’s something in what The Dude says!’
KJ.
August 3rd, 2010 at 5:03 pm
Second thought – the pic looks like something a woman would pin on a blouse.
August 3rd, 2010 at 5:33 pm
The Rev Kev,
Richard II may have some comfort:
For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings;
How some have been deposed; some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;
Some poison’d by their wives: some sleeping kill’d;
All murder’d: for within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king……..
August 3rd, 2010 at 7:24 pm
Cedar grubs?
You bloody sissies!
It’s the ARMY Worm that’s worth worrying about.
http://www.thechronicle.com.au/story/2010/04/21/army-grubs-advance-on-green-lawns/
Dear Chadwick,
I’m sure I can speak on behalf of Leeton in sending my very best wishes to the people of Toowoomba.
TWO great Australian centres – populated by good, honest folk…….
TWO scourges – Cedar Grubs and Army Worms.
TWO options – move out or stay and fight the grubs and worms.
ONE truth – the people of Leeton and Toowoomba are NOT quitters – never have been and are not about to start now.
And that is all you need to know…….
KJ.
August 4th, 2010 at 1:43 am
Palm Avenue,
You mentioned Frank Ross. I have written a history which mentions his father Bill Ross but I have run into a dead end. Can you help ?
August 4th, 2010 at 3:26 pm
Came downstairs as An Act Of Courage…..
Saw the posts about cedar grubs and army worms.
There’s more…!
There are basket worms,
And lots of other crawlies and wrigglers….
Like little green worms.
I’m not going out there!
Back upstairs to the man-eatin’ doona…..
Dear The Knuckle,
So it’s….business as usual, eh? KJ.
August 4th, 2010 at 4:28 pm
Chadwick . . .
Can’t say I know any more than you do about Frank and Bill Ross. I know Frank retired from Leeton Shire some years ago and passed away some time later.
I’m fairly certain he’s buried in Leeton cemetery (another home to those cedar grubs thanks to the glorious remnant cedars in certain places there) because I’m sure I’ve walked past his grave while at other people’s funerals.
Sorry I can’t help anymore with this, though I’ll ask a close relative at the weekend and see if she knows anything. Will pass on the details if she does!
August 5th, 2010 at 3:26 am
Thanks Palm Avenue. It’s Bill Ross I am after. He was a friend of Father Hartigan.
August 5th, 2010 at 1:10 pm
I know nothing about grubs and I really couldn’t care less about Leeton, KJ.
But you have been utterly reliable on the political front KJ and so I ask you ……..who is going to win the election?
I’m NOT surprised you’re lonely!
May I suggest that if you couldn’t care less about Leeton – about ‘Living, Loving, Learning’ – then this is NOT the community for you.
God help you, you’ve been coming in here for a very long time – WHAT FOR?
Are you some crazy voyeur? A rice fetishist? Do you enjoy reading about my NOT insignificant travails…..?
I feel sorry for you.
I am NOT able to ‘call’ the election at this moment – I do NOT feel like giving you my NOT inconsiderable electoral insights.
It is true that I am an ABC Blogger. But I am also flesh and blood. And I hurt as much as the next person……..
*I really don’t know what makes some people tick…..
KJ.
August 5th, 2010 at 5:03 pm
Here’s a challenge for Mayor Paul Maytom:
In the Bass River Valley, Gippsland, Victoria, there’s a Giant Earthworm Museum. They have a Big Giant Earthworm. (Megascolides Australis, the Giant Gippsland Earthworm)
So where are the proposals to build Leeton’s ‘Big Grub’? Is the MIA taking its treasured, yet feared invertebrates seriously? Embrace the Grub.
Dear Frankie,
Welcome!
Just betweeen you and me, I have over the decades embraced many a Grub…..and I’d do it again (given half the chance).
NOW, I’m very pleased that the eco-aware folk of Gippsland have paid tribute to their Big Giant Earthworm. (Megascolides Australis, the Giant Gippsland Earthworm).
I have earmarked the Giant Earthworm Museum for my next interstate road trip. I am looking forward to pressing and pulling interactive exhibits – and enjoying a compost sandwich in the facility’s tearoom.
* Leeton will NOT be celebrating it’s Grubs. Three big cans of DDT and 60 44-gallon drums full of dead Cedar Grubs does NOT a tourist attraction make.
KJ.
August 5th, 2010 at 7:39 pm
The Lonely Scholar,
I’d carry your library books to the Library any time, and make a deposit.
Big Deal! KJ.
August 6th, 2010 at 12:36 pm
Thank you Dude. I’ll let you know when my current three month lending period expires .
As for you KJ, no offence but I don’t have to LIKE kerriejean.com to have an ARC grant to examine it’s contribution to its ABC social media experiments – in fact fondness for your subject is a one way street to sloppy and compromised research.
I am often fascinated and repelled by this blog and others but I persist in the name of contribution to knowledge.
As for your abuse – you just can’t tell who is going to win!
Look here The Lonely Scholar……..don’t cry ‘Academic Freedom’ when simple matters of ‘Living, Loving Learning’ re your manners, your sense of decency, your ability to empathise – are raised.
NOW, I suggest you just go about your normal business – keep sucking off the public udder and write a couple of papers to be presented at Summer conferences in the Arctic Circle (to 30 vegan bearded Postmodernists with a great hate for Capitalism but a great love for its institutions).
And while you’re at it, stay away from The Dude.
All evidence thus far points to him wanting to ‘Live, Learn and Love’ in a reasonable fashion. Let’s keep it this way, eh? KJ.
August 6th, 2010 at 3:25 pm
I am lodging a dispute.
Whoopee do! If you learn one thing from this most unseemly sequence of events let it be this:
Never, ever put s**** on a country girl’s – or boy’s – home town. NEVER! KJ.
August 6th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
Bugger off.
I doubt whether your personal bile is of any interest at all to our cyber community. KJ.
August 6th, 2010 at 7:10 pm
The Lonely Scholar,
Aggro has its part – even in dancing:
http://www.smh.com.au/world/caught-out-by-the-kolbasti-dancing-into-court-20100806-11lhu.html