Earlier this summer we noticed a foul smell outside the house.

On windless days, the area between the back door and the garage seemed to fill with a swampy reek, like methane. I kind of got used to it, but one night, when I felt headachy and the stink was really noticeable, I rang Transco Gas, just in case. What they said alarmed me. We were to extinguish all naked flames not light any appliances, until they had checked everything; they would be straight round.

Sure enough, there was a leak. Gas had dissolved into the surrounding soil, causing a toxic miasma at ground level. The men dug up the path, drilled through a wall and fitted a new section of pipe. What a mess, but they were confident it was fixed and departed as swiftly as they had come, leaving five cones, a bag of cement and a section of cordon on the grass.

Imagine my surprise then, five weeks later, when I left the house by the back door and caught a whiff of - gas? Or something like it. Right, I thought, that gives me an excuse to ring Transco, ask them to carry out another set of checks and cart their crap away at the same time.

The gas man paced the area with his gas meter - no readings - what a headscratcher. He could smell something, too, but the meter said it was not gas.  Nope, not gas. Nothing for it but to fetch the other meter, the one which was sensitive to ‘traces of hydrocarbons’. I left him to his investigations.

Minutes later the back doorbell rang. The man had an exasperated air about him. His expression was one of amusement mingled with resigned irritation.

‘You got a lot of hydrocarbons out there,’ he said.

‘Oh?’ I said. ‘Not gas?’

‘A lot of hydrocarbons. You’ve got some badly stored fluids out there. Open containers. You want to get Him to put lids on those. And I’ve moved that gas bottle. Shouldn’t store that in direct sunlight, He shouldn’t.’

I sensed he was building up to the punchline.

‘A lot of hydrocarbons. Round by that pile of motorbike parts under that tarp. And the meter went ballistic by the shed where those other parts are, and in the garage, where he keeps His bikes. But what I think it is -’ [and here he paused for effect] ‘- is that pile of containers in the small shed with the sink in. It looks like He’s been doing some sort of… experiment. With oil, or something.’

He led me to the shed and pointed,

‘There, see? There’s no gas, but if you ask me, that’s where I think the smell is coming from.’

I got to the bottom of it eventually.

Here, you can see for yourself.

Last Modified : October 5th, 2008 Filed under : excuses, excuses Navigate : Previous post / Next post