The river is only a meter or two wide and never that deep so it could hardly be described as one of the last great frontiers but for someone who passes the time by imagining breaking a leg and surviving on the few provisions purchased from the local supermarket it offers some sort of a challenge.
The reason for mentioning this otherwise dull pastime is that at places where the water has cause to tumble over rocks on its meandering path to the sea large mounds of foam form. Being a city boy and well used to a wide vaiety of pollutants this would ordinarily not cause me any concern but this island is basically free of industry (other than a cheese factory and an abattoir). I therefore assumed it was some sort of a natural phenomena but being unfamiliar with the ways of nature I couldn't come up with a plausible explanation.
About the closest I could get was come sort of a frog spawn but as I've not heard anything about plagues of 6 feet tall frogs I didn't think that would suffice so I put it to a local who informed me that it could be due to the use of phosphates in farming.
This came as a bit of a blow I don't mind telling you. It's all very well living in a cold and wet climate with very little to do for amusement other than drinking alcohol and watching TV but to find that the place is also bad for ones health seemed a bit much to take.
Imagine my relief therefore when I found an entirely natural, additive free explanation for this unsightly mess. Apparently, when small aquatic plants die they decompose and release fatty acids into the water. This is apparently something similar to soap so, hey presto, bubbles form.
While on the subject of additives to water, did you know that holy water has salt in it?
I wonder why the sudden fascination with water and realise that in my efforts not to mention the three things I said previously that I mention too much (D & C & the W) I'm left with only water.
No wonder I'm depressed, this whole bloody thing was supposed to be an amusing slice of life and it's turned into a pitiful expose of how dreary and pathetic my life has become.
I'd like to write more about the people I've met since I came to this island as they're much more interesting than me but everything about them which strikes me as noteworthy is usually something which highlights a negative aspect of their personality and I don't want to appear as someone who is bitter, negative and nasty. Perhaps more importantly they're mostly bigger than me and as there are only 1,800 people on the island it will be hard to avoid them.
Not that anyone is reading this of course. Why would you? It's about water.
So either I keep writing about water, D's, C and the W and bore myself stupid or I risk offending people who are bigger than me. Therein lies the problem.
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