Pigs, Dogs, the Ozone Layer, and the Enigma of
Humans
Ernest wallowed around in his pen, lapping up the mud
onto all parts of his opulent porcine flesh. He was
happy. His pen was empty today and he could enjoy his
9th birthday in relative peace. He rolled over, smearing
more mud onto his back, gave a joyful flick of his ears,
and settled down to a mid-afternoon nap, looking
forward to the pleasant thought of more slops from the
trough in an hour or so.
The sun beat down, attempting with difficulty to
permeate the stench-ridden mud on Ernest’s back and
side. Some of it managed to fight its way through to the
pinkish flesh, UV rays biting deep into the exposed
epidermis. Ernest did not care! He could burn as much
as he wanted today; he was nine, after all. It did not
concern him that there was ozone depletion in progress.
Nobody tells pigs anything, anyway.
He heard the soft padded footfalls approaching the pen
from the barn and raised an ear to monitor the progress
of whatever was nearing his enclosure. He could tell
from the rapid motion that the interruption was four legged and probably Seymour, the border collie.
Bugger, he thought, the last thing I want to do today is
converse at length with some demented sheepdog on
the merits of chasing one’s tail.
Ernest feigned sleep, ensuring his tail switched just
enough to indicate to anyone watching that he was
deeply unconscious, slowing his breathing to provide
further evidence of his subconscious state. Hopefully,
Seymour would be persuaded by this not to ‘wake him
up.’
"Hey, Ernest, I know you’re awake," yapped Seymour.
"What ya doing?"
Ernest settled down even further into his fabricated deep
sleep pattern, hoping the dog would be fooled. This
bloody collie could be damned persistent, though.
"Ernest, I have some news for you. Wake up," he
yapped, even louder than the first time. Ernest then
knew it was useless and abandoned the falsehood.
"Yes, you moron, what do you want? Something about
some news, did I hear you say?"
Ernest pulled his bulk over to his belly, placing his legs
strategically under his body, and used his powerful
muscles to push the 400-pound weight onto his cleft
hooves. Just to give the dog a bit of an insight into his
annoyance at being disturbed from his reverie, he
emitted a loud belching grunt, and let rip with a well aimed fart in the direction of the dog for good measure.
Seymour backed away, the strong smell assaulting his
sensitive nostrils and setting off his stomach in small, nauseated coughs. He moved to the upwind side of the
pen, and squatted on his back legs, waiting for the pig to
approach him.
"Yes, Seymour, you bloody cur, you have my attention.
What is so damned important as to wake me on this fine
day?"
"Do you know why you are in your pen today by
yourself?" asked the dog, a sneer spreading across his
features. His mischievous behaviour was disturbing
Ernest. Seymour was normally a peaceful, honest
working dog, only taken to occasionally playing pranks
on his penned mates. Ernest was puzzled.
"Come on, spit it out," he demanded. "You obviously
know something that affects me."
"Well, I was up at the farmer's cottage earlier, sniffing
the backside of that suave Snookie, you know, the white
poodle that lives up there, and she kept on giving me
the come on. So, I tried to get on for the ride of my life,
and the farmer’s wife comes out of the house and gives
me a good stiff kick on my hindquarters, just as I was
about to - you know?"
Seymour turned his head towards
his tail, licking the ruffled fur on his rump, the target
area. He looked back and continued.
"Anyway, I hightailed it around the house and hid under
the veranda, licking my wound. Guess who else was
under there?”
Ernest cocked his head to the side, signalling for the
collie to continue, as he no doubt would.
"Jasmine and Sooty, those two cats that spend all their
time locked up inside the house," said Seymour with
surprise.
Those two cats outside? What did this mean? thought
Ernest.
"Outside?" quizzed the pig, somewhat perplexed by the
relevance of this information.
"Yeah, seems they got caught doing it on the lady’s bed
and were banished. Anyway, they were talking about
something when I interrupted them. They asked what I
was doing under the veranda, and I told them my tale,
whereupon they told me theirs. We shared a little laugh,
then Sooty piped up and asked me,
‘Do you know why
all the pigs, sheep, and cattle have been sent away?’
and I replied I didn’t know they had."
At the mention of his porcine mates, Ernest pricked his
ears to listen to what the dog was about to say.
Something important had happened, and he hadn’t been
aware of it.
"Go on," he said.
Just as the dog was about to continue, a loud human
vocal explosion erupted from the farmhouse, the farmer
obviously discontented with something. The sound of "Bugger it, damn, fuck, bugger, bum, fuck it!" ripped
through the still country air. The animals in the vicinity of
the tirade cringed in fear. The master was not a good
person to be around when he was like this. Then
another tirade:
"Bloody ignorant fools. When are they
going to get it? I ask six simple questions and all I get is
fucking fools, fucken madmen, and deranged bloody
idiots replying, thinking the world is created for their
mother beeping pleasure!"
Silence ensued as he settled
down again to his business.
Seymour, who had laid down at the outburst, crawled
over to the pen, closer to the pig, to finish his revelation.
He bunched his strong sleek leg muscles for a quick
getaway, in case the pig decided to assault his nose
again.
"The master has apparently changed his ideals. Polly
was sitting in the study, watching him on his computer,
reading some stuff, and he turned around and started
talking to the parrot as if Polly would understand. Which,
of course, she does. Anyway, he says to her, ‘I am now
a vegetarian. No more grazing animals creating holes in
the ozone layer with their methane emissions, no more
killing animals for humans to digest and get sick on, no
more chemicals to assist with the rapid growth of the
grass, and no more guilt. I am becoming an
environmentally friendly farmer.’
Polly says she was bemused by the context of what he
was saying but he seemed dead serious."
Seymour leapt to his feet, moved around the pen to the
water trough and lapped up some discoloured water.
Man, he got thirsty when he talked. Ernest followed him
over and had a drink himself, just for good measure.
The story was going to be lengthy and, he felt, important
to his longevity.
"Anyway," continued the dog. "Polly says the master
then rings up some cartage company and overnight they
take all the animals away. He then rang an organic
hydroponics distributor and signed up the farm for the
organic growing of vegetables. Bizarre! I am out of work,
you survive for some reason, and the world changes
because of some computer information. There’s no
figuring these humans," concluded the dog.
"Yeah, no figuring," replied a pensive Ernest. "Why have
they kept me, then, do you think?"
"Well, they kept four cattle and one pig, so my guess is
he is happy to have some animals around to help with
the natural fertiliser if you get my drift," responded
Seymour. I can be quite insightful at times, thought the
collie.
Ernest mused over this information. Of, course; I am to
be kept as a faeces production plant! How ignoble. I am
going to grow old producing piles of crap for the
18
vegetable gardens. Oh, woe is me! No more meat in my
scraps! I am an omnivore, and I need meat. Why do the
decisions of humans have to affect us bloody animals all
the time?
He wondered, then, why pigs could not fly, because if he
could, he would be out of there in a jiffy. Then he
thought, a flying pig! Huh. Would need a wingspan the
size of a small Cessna to carry my large frame around.
The pig dismissed Seymour, thanking him for the
discourse, and settled down once again. He made sure
his mud-caked body was revitalised with its natural
sunscreen and started thinking about the changes that
had been sprung upon him. Okay, no more mates to
grunt with, no more sows to try it on with, no little ones
to piss him off, and a pen all to himself. Not a problem.
The meat scraps - that was a problem. But if it meant
the gap in the ozone layer would close and negate the
need for him to cake himself in mud, so be it.
The weirdest of things, however, was the challenge this
presented to the humans. They could make a small
difference by killing all the grazing animals, but how on
earth were they going to kill their transportation animals,
those metallic objects they drove around in? And were
they capable of not growing onions and capsicums and
other vegetables that made them fart? He thought not!
These humans were a bloody enigma, he thought, as he
went to sleep in his pen by himself, under the bright midafternoon sun.
