Deary, Deary, Dairy-Air

If you have been thinking about moving to the beautiful countryside, I advise you to visit during manure-spreading season. Phewwww. The corn and soybeans have mostly been harvested, and now the air is vile. Not fresh barnyard manure, which doesn't smell all that bad, but well-rotted old cow manure that smells so terrible, I can hardly put it into words. It almost has a smell of rotting blood, or maybe the bottom of a bucket of rotting fish innards.

The view out my window is stunningly beautiful today: clear blue sky, breezy, the very last of the fall color all the brighter for the contrast with the gray leafless tree tops. But the smell!!!

I think I'll stay inside today.