Sunday, June 25, 2006

Anti Trees

Crime is a growing menace in our streets; trees, on the other hand, are a menace growing in our streets. Who amongst us has not accidentally walked into limbs that just happened to be growing in that place when we were looking in the other direction? Or, in their cars, run over speed humps in the road caused by the roots from the same trees?

Trees wilfully and maliciously obscure our city views. What innocent first home-owner has not been shocked to find that the sapling they nursed in their garden a few years ago has now suddenly, and terrifyingly, metamorphosed into a gigantic spreading beast, blocking both garden and house from sight?
Such is the rate of spread of the tree species that soon, that great wonder of nature, the modern metropolis, will be completely obscured by trees. It is high time that we did something to protect the city, and it's gentle native inhabitants - the numbat-like accountant, the ferret-like bogan - against the spread of the tree.
Further to this, trees are notoriously dirty: they require mud, grime, soot, and large amounts of soil to live, and harbour large amounts of animal species. By contrast, the noble edifices that make up our public libraries and houses of parliament and homes are made out of pristine, easy-to-clean products such as brick and porcelain; and they only commonly harbour one species, which, though at times uncivilised, are easy to control.

Consider the effects the encroachment of the tree may have on our endangered urban environment if left unchecked:

- In carpentry stores, instead of not being able to see the trees for the wood, we won't be able to see the wood for the trees.

- In art galleries, our view of noble classical pastoral paintings of trees and woodlands and fields will be obscured by actual trees. This will therefore have a deleterious effect on our ability to appreciate and learn from the cultural achievements of our ancestors.

- In parklands, instead of being able to run and play football and let our dogs loose, the way is obscured by growing masses of trees.

Nor is that all. Trees have been linked to a growing number of crimes, including felonious standing-in-the-way of joggers, wilful dropping-of-limbs on little old ladies, careless littering-of-leaves-and-not-picking-them-up-again, and even bag snatching.
Some people may object that trees are brainless and therefore can't help growing where they grow. I disagree: if a man is walking down the street on his way to the shops, it is his human right to be safe from the tree menace. If, say, he trips over a tree limb, then it is the tree's fault, not his: the tree has been growing there for years; it must have had ample warning to move its limbs to somewhere safer. It is simply out of the purest malice that it does not.

Something should be done to protect people against the tree menace on our streets, I say!


Tony.T said...

Wouldn't the noble libraries be buggered without the nasty trees?

Tony.T said...

Hmmm. Can't answer that one, can you!

TimT said...

I'm sulking. Logical arguments have no place on this blog!

Caz said...

A lot of librarians are injured every day by falling books, or by picking up large quantaties of books.

Libraries would be much safer without books. Think about the children, doesn't anyone care about the children?!

TimT said...

Those libraries are lethal. I think writers like to stage the deaths of characters in libraries (or, in the case of Dan Brown, art galleries). It has a certain flair. There's a great scene in one of the Lemony Snicket books where the kids have to escape a row of falling library shelves, all collapsing in on them like dominoes.

Of course, in the case of Borges' Library of Babel, you have to wonder where the characters came from in the first place. Is there a certain level of the library they go to be born?

Email: timhtrain - at - yahoo.com.au

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