So, we have created a new game to accompany dog walks in the nearby bush reserve: I Wonder What the Background Story Was?

Last week, we found a new pile of deposits – literally, a pile of used disposable nappies – a pink rubber glove, a (hopefully) unused roll of toilet paper, a large plastic infant’s chair and assorted household detritus.

Curiously, this stuff was not the product of an opportunistic and lazy person who did not want to bother with things like environmental amenities or tips. It was deep, deep into the bush. Getting there through the canyon-like ruts left by four-wheel-drivers, and the narrow, overground path would have been a real feat. It’s a wonder they managed to get back out after pointlessly dumping their junk.

So, what might the background have been? No, you are not permitted to simply say: “Ice!” Or “room temperature IQ!” There has to be a story. It could go like this:

Justin (as good a name as any) was told to take out the garbage, but Kylie (let’s say) didn’t tell him that the garbage had to be first collected from around the house, under the bed, on the kitchen benches, in the kid’s room, off the back porch and from behind the dog kennel.

Justin, who was feeling a little mellow after his third cone of the day, yelled he was busy watching Russian car crashes on YouTube and suggested Kylie get up off her lazy butt and do it herself.

“I will,” she thinks and grabbing the one pink plastic dishwashing glove she could find, wandered around stuffing the off-smelling garbage in a plastic tub – which she then emptied through the open front passenger window of Justin’s 1982 Commodore, onto the brown velour seats and spilling all over the floor.

“Now get rid of it,” she orders as he discovers the muck in his prized ride and has an instant out-of-stomach experience.

He can hardly take it to the tip now, can he? The stench would be enough to have him gagging all the way. So, Kylie thrusts a new toilet roll at him for use in case he has to wipe down the inside of the windscreen.

Feeling emasculated, and having his prized car turned into a noxious wheelie bin, Justin decides to get rid of the mess and clean it up as best he can where no-one can see him, point at him and laugh at his misfortune.

That’s why he drove into the deepest bit of bush he could find, probably with his head out the window all the way and got rid of the evidence. Justin chortled to himself in self-congratulation – until he noticed the discarded infant’s chair and spent the next two hours trying to remember what else he’d done. End of story.

You can have endless hours of creative story-making. In the past year or so, among the story-telling elements we’ve found were: a steel-tipped hunting arrow, a “nest” of empty bourbon cans, three mattresses, a drive shaft, a destroyed 4WD suspension part, a couple of broken TVs, Macca’s wrappers, two abandoned cars, a cupboard, piles of unopened mail, most of an outdoor setting, hundreds of metres of plastic cable covering, one thong, a lawn mower and a catcher, bits of mud-caked clothing, some tyres and a small pet cemetery.

That’s enough for a TV mini-series.

WAYNE GREGSON