A Plague Upon Your Garlic

A trail of disasters has struck the southern jewel in Australia's crown.  A week ago I stared out the window and noticed the leaves moving on an adjacent tree.  Later that day cloves of garlic started washing up on the beaches.  Fearing the worst I despatched a fast steam packet to the colonies (the telegraph is inoperative) and received dreadful tidings.  Angered by the persistent killing of Tasmanian devils by cars, cancer and carelessness the God of Tasmania has brought down a series of plagues upon that most hapless of states.

Firstly he smote the Basslink cable with a thunderbolt severing power from the mainland but the Tasmanians refused to repent.  Then he sent a mighty drought to wither their crops kill their hydro power.  The Tasmanian government responded by dumping diesel fuel into the water supply.  Belatedly realising what he was up against the God of Tasmania pulled out all the stops and sent a mighty gale to blow what was left of the state into the sea.

A large proportion of what was left of the state was garlic belonging to my colleague who unaccountably insists on living in a place with the social problems of the first world and the economic conditions of the third.  The wind howled, it shrieked and tore up the matting that keeps immature garlic safely in its bed.  Fortunately my colleague and her spouse were up to the challenge.  In the pitch black night with winds reaching "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore" levels and cloves of garlic flying around like odiferous shotgun pellets by sheer willpower alone they flattened down the lumps, snatched garlic out of the air and surreptitiously hid the bodies of those who had died after being hit by low flying garlic.

Dawn found them red eyed but defiant arms and legs spreadeagled over as much of the remaining garlic as possible.  At that point they decided that perhaps it would be wise in future to weigh down the matting that held the garlic in place.  You think?

The thought is father to the deed and not many days had gone by before my colleague and her husband were hip deed in sandbags.  Well they were hip deep in do it yourself sand bags.  That is they had a lot of hessian and a shovel.  A weekend of agonising work later and the garlic crop is buried under approximately twenty seven metres of sandbags.  All the garlic has to do now is figure out how to sprout through it.

But the God of Tasmania wasn't finished yet.  Enraged at the resilience of the people he sent disease to plague them (or possibly plague to disease them).  First one then another of my colleague's family went pale, dropped like flies and clutched at their bellies in agony.  Fortunately they did this consecutively rather than concurrently which meant there was always someone to sandbag garlic and minister to the sick.  Somehow they all got through it (garlic rubs helped) and now my colleague is back in her office and in communication with us on those occasions when the television doesn't interfere with telephone reception.  As for the God of Tasmania well I'm sure he'd like to send some more plagues but I understand he's busy picking up his welfare cheque.