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THEY WALK AMONGST US

MAXINE LINTON-SUFFOLK PROVES WHY SHE’S OUR EDITOR IN SHEEP WITH THIS OUTSTANDING PIECE OF JOURNALISM

It is a common misconception that our township has been spared the outbreak of ‘Goonies’ so commonly found in ‘Alternative Cultures’ in towns on the other side of Ballarat.

But we at the Astonisher thought we might check things out. We have been sneaking around poking our noses where they shouldn’t go (we were only punched once) and found out that there is a secret group in town that worships the foot. It confirmed our suspicions that something was afoot in Linton.

We are not talking about ‘foot fetishists’ there are several of them as we found out peeking through the towns windows, but we are talking about the foot worshippers that meet here in town, secretly, under cover of darkness.

We have heard that they call themselves ‘The Church of the Unwashed Soles’. Adherents to this cult believe that ‘at the end times’ when the Saviour returns to Earth he will be coming here to once again wash the feet of his Apostles.

To this end his Apostles (anyone they can pursuade joining) have sworn never to wash their feet until the Second Coming. These men, women and children are led by their ‘Pedant’ (someone who displays his or her knowledge ostentatiously) or someone that non-believers would call a ‘Smartarse’.

We have managed to get hold of a copy of the ‘The Commandments of the Unwashed Soles’ and hereby, herewith, as it has come to pass we shall expose ourselves to you.

1. Thou shalt never wash thy feet until the return of the Saviour.

2. Thou shalt only wear Thongs so as to ensure thy feet remain in need of a wash.

3. Thou shalt spend 99.94 minutes on thy back waving your bare soles towards the heavens on Don Bradman’s Birthday.

4. Thou shalt worship no shoes before me.

5. Thou shalt do no kicking.

6. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbours thongs.

7. Thou shalt honour thy Father laying at thy Mothers feet.

8. Thou shalt aspire to be pedantic.

9. Thou shalt not associate with the Devil at the ‘Foot Locker’.

10. Thou shalt, at regular intervals, sing the Psalms and Hymns of the Church which shall include;

* Your feets too big

* Don’t wear blue suede shoes

* Put your right foot in, take your right foot out

* I have Knick-Knacks and Paddy Wacks between my toes.

* They’re your own feet you silly fool but you’re too drunk to see

* Damn Dem Golden Slippers

* These feet are made for waving

For the Socialists

* Under Stalins Heel

And for the Fascists

* Mein Kampf Ert Comes First

We contacted an ex-member of the ‘Church of Unwashed Soles’ and interviewed him to confirm our information. He insisted on covering his feet to remain anonymous..

It’s horrible he said - the smell really gets to you after a while and my wife refused to suck my toes - the Doctor and Podiatrist refused me service and my children have rebelled by running around wearing Trainers.

To protect his family our informant would prefer not to be named. He would also like to deny he intends to sell ‘blessed thongs’ as Kevin Rudd holds the copyright on ‘flip-flops’.

He was adamant about warning everyone in the town about these deviants. He stresses that we should not socialise with people who wear thongs. He fears they will brainwash you into believing their way of life is really one of loving and caring and comfortable feet.

έχετε νωθρό sphincter

LET’S DO THE TIME WARP AGAIN?

One of the regularly visiting patrons from a town outside the Linton Time Warp told us of a recent experience at his local bank. Lets say the customer went into the NABBED bank to pay a bill with his ANZAC Bank cheque made out to someone called CASH.

He presented the account and the cheque to the Teller. ‘

‘We can’t accept that’ they said.

‘Why not, your a bank aren’t you?’ said our customer.

‘Wrong bank’ said the Teller.

The customer then drove around to the ANZAC Bank, cashed the cheque and proceeding back to the NABBED he again presented the account.

‘You do accept cash don’t you’ he said rather facetiously and paid his account.

‘Any bank does’ said the Teller. ‘Why didn’t you pay it while you were around at your own bank?’

Are we sure it’s Linton in the Time Warp?

THANK (insert your own deity here) FOR ELITE PRIVATE SCHOOLS

Haileybury, Scotch and Presbyterian Ladies are names of Colleges that conjure up thoughts of money, power, and elitism. Old Boys Networks, Corporate Lawyers, Stockbrokers and Bankers, AO's and MBA's, Professors and Politicians.


Private Colleges have been the birthplace of many Captains of Industry, National Party Politicians, Colonel Blimps and Crooks. The upper echelons of society can usually trace their origins back to an elite private school where they may or may not have been drilled in either the Cadet Corps or their Boarders bed.

But where would our Caledonian Society be without our elite schools for they are the only place where young people experience and even take up playing in Pipe Bands. The swirl of the skirt, a bit of deft fingering, strange screams, getting your arms around something you can squeeze, a lot of banging and something hairy hanging between your legs along with much blowing and wailing. All of these things cannot help but make your mind conjour up the images of a Scottish Piper.

Sometimes they are ostracised from society for participating in these noisy gatherings and have to seek out hidden places to do it, beyond the range of inquisitive ears for society insists on them doing whatever they do well beyond earshot of children. Despite the fact that we have a Piper living somewhere in Linton they remain anonymous to the Astonisher but we hear that a lot of blowing goes on down around the Recreation Reserve.

Imagine if you will a world without Bagpipes. Hallelujah I hear someone cry. However good that might be to some it would also spell the end for Highland Dancing, Parades, Funerals and Caber Tossing.

Students from the elite schools go on to play their Pipes and Drums in the Ballarat University Pipe Bands or those in Bendigo and Warrnambool, Watsonia and Hawthorn, Frankston and Moorabbin. Even the band in Daylesford, where the wearing of skirts is almost compulsory for all genders, would be no longer if the Pipes disappeared from the Quadrangle.

But Pipe Bands do persist. We are stuck with them forever. They are part of our Australian culture now as evidenced by the names. Saul, Semple, Mak, Sylviris, Brandt, Wong and Canaan, Bates, Maxwell, Ng and Page. Many good Sasanach names ripple through the ranks. But Australian culture is evident in the fact that almost half the members of Pipe Bands are now women and there is more than a sprinkling of our Asian family there as well. We are well attuned to the faces of Indians, Pakistanis and the Gurghas wielding Claymore and Dirk but it is still somewhat unusual, even to me, to see Vietnamese lips on the blow-stick or banging on a snare drum.

It doesn't even seem to matter what size you are either. You can be a Super-Magda or Dwarf. I've seen players of the Field Drum with only about 10cm clearance from the ground as they heft the skins half their size down the street.

Over the years the Bass Drum seems to have moved up the chest to lay on top of the stomach rather than in front of it due, I expect, that some players have developed a paunch and their arms are not long enough anymore. As a result skins and even the drum themselves have become see-through.

Yes, we still enjoy the painful wail of a bagpipe. Where would we be without them? Then again, maybe that all that squeeling down at the Reserve might be very tight sphincters on very tight Kangaroos and not a Piper after all.

Would you believe I am really a great fan of the Pipes. So

COME OUT , COME OUT


WHOEVER YOU ARE

DAWG GAWN - III

Last month we got as far as the ‘Whippets’ first swim. I promise that this is the third and last episode. It is getting close to becoming pedantic and repetitive and that’s something I am rather good at.


Anyway it has gone now. To a new ‘Master’ who I feel will treat it far better than its former. But while it was still with me we had a few further adventures. As a dog that had been confined to a small house with a miniature back garden, ‘Dog’ had not really experienced the wide world as you or I might have done.

A month after entering my dubious care he began to develop some hair on his chinny chin-chin. He was also daring to go outside more too.

One splendid day he was following me around the property while I was doing something or other called exercise and natural instinct kicked in. I knew that every time the sheep bolted he got a bit agitated. This time however out of the long grass hopped .......... A wabbit.

Before it had a chance to ask if anything was up with Doc the waskally wabbit wan qwickly off and so did the Whippet. The pursuit was so fast that both disappeared over the horizon within seconds. Then I waited, for over that very same horizon were to be found nine sheep and two alpacas.

First came the nine sheep like a herd of unstoppable Buffalo with Max inevitably in the lead. Then after them came the two ‘Lords-a-leaping’ the Alpacas. What they must have thought they’d seen was a ‘Scud Missile’ undoubtedly fast but also incredibly inaccurate. What else to expect from a Socialist Country or an Australian Politician.

Oooops.....pull my head in.

Needless to say his inexperience meant that the wabbit won and he returned empty handed after about five minutes. With that the rest of the tribe took off rather quickly back over the horizon, with Dumb and Dumber making those Cockatoo-like noises again.

I rather began to take to the thing. He was lazier than me. Lay here, lay there, eat here and sleep there. He made me look like Robert de Castella by comparison. The thought of someone being lazier than me is a bit off-putting actually. I think that even looking at the sky is a chin up but this dog can even relax his bones to the point where he can lay flatter than unleavened bread.

In fact on one occasion I went to the bathroom and stepped onto what I thought was the toilet mat. To my surprised it yelped, whinged and whined until I apologised to it with a bloody bone.

It was almost the last day when I was standing in the carport. Dog raced around the corner of the house, tail wagging, eyes all aglow, acting very pleased with himself. He presented to me a mouthful of blue fluff. While I examined it he ran away again returning with another mouthful of blue fluff.

I had to find out where it was coming from. At the back of the house I came across him worrying the blue feather duster that I had left in the kitchen and he was eagerly tearing out it’s hair. Perhaps it thought it was a Smurf Rabbit and he was keen for me to see what a clever boy he was. One would ask why a dog would think I was dusting the television with the carcass of a dead rabbit in the first place.

Unlike the Astonisher which appears as though it will go on for a little while yet, this story which had a start and a middle must now have an end.

Reluctantly I had to part with dog who now lives at Tarnagulla but I have done it in a way that makes it possible for ‘dog’ to come for short visits to keep the rabbits on their toes.

But he did not go to his new home before a last final adventure with Maxine. The day before he left I was standing in the sheep yard at mealtime with the dog by my side filling the feed trough with their supplementary diet. By now Max had just about had it with this ‘thing’, enough was enough, the dog was definitely not permitted to be near her dinner. Maxine marched through the gate full of confidence and literally ran the dog out of the yard and away from her beloved food.

So that’s it then. The end of my dog yarn. Oh! Except for the Vet. The only time I saw an astonished face on him was when a thermometer was inserter apparently somewhere he thought was private.

Of course this column has always been more of a case of ‘self-indulgence’ than an organ of interest to everybody in town. Although I have heard that even the ‘Only Gay In The Village’ has had a giggle or two from it.

If I can write this diatribe so can anyone else, and, unlike some other rag I could mention we don’t pick and choose who we publish and rarely do we look at drawing lines anywhere except in the interest of taste.

So if you feel that you’d like to engage yourself in writing rubbish like this then we welcome you with open arms.

This story was sponsored by:


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URINE TOWN WAS NO PIDDLING LITTLE SHOW

Every now and then we have the pleasure of sitting through a show that is fascinating in many different aspects. I recently took a young person to their first ever ‘live’ musical show. Up till then their only experience was to a Circus In Geelong. Inundated with technological marvels that insinuate themselves into our lives we forget sometimes that there are real people out there doing real things for real entertainment. Must we have to live in virtual worlds when our own is far more fascinating than any video game.


The 2010 Graduating Music Theatre Performers from the University of Ballarat recently performed ‘Urine Town’ as professionally as anyone who has trodden the boards of the Regent. From ‘Overture’ to ‘Finale’ the audience was totally captivated. I won’t name the performers who stood above all the others because such a list would mean having to name them all. The goodies were so gaggingly good, the villains were really venal and even the camp guy was gay. The laughs came exactly as intended by the writers. I’m am constantly amazed that these young performers can remember every line of dialogue, every word of a dozen songs and every one of the 4362 dance steps for two hours. A couple of times there were brief pauses in the dialogue but I was unable to ascertain whether this was for laughter or effect, or for a few seconds the mental thought “Oh s**t what was my next line”. Maybe the show went a few seconds over because of this but that was another few seconds of pure, unadulterated enjoyment. Who would have imagined (other than The Astonisher) that having a Pee could be so entertaining?

Tomorrow you may meet them serving behind the counter at a whitegoods store, checking out your groceries or making an appointment as a doctors receptionist, one of them might even test you for your Drivers Licence, but for a couple of magical hours they successfully transported us to another world. As I said to the young person at the time “you don’t need special glasses for this is the ultimate in 3D ”.

Keep your eyes open for even more performances from our talented local actors and musicians. Buy a ticket now for ‘Singing In The Rain’

What a pity that we can’t utilise the talent we have in Ballarat better than we do. A site to put into your favourites http://www.hermaj.com/

DAWG GAWN - II

Like a terribly written book this rag will pull out all the stops to keep you reading it. As every bad movie has a sequel so do we.


Regular punters will remember that I was telling you a story about a dog that was impersonating a rag doll with only half its stuffing. This dog after a week was slowly having its diet increased as it gained much needed weight. It was soon putting away half a kilo a day in minced Chicken and Beef. I almost said that other meat which I know would have Maxine heading off into the bush as fast as her fat legs would carry her. So I will just call it meat.

Maxine has lost a bit of her shock over this temporary addition to the household. She may be still a bit stand-offish probably because she has realised that one night this thing might be consuming her detached left foreleg.

There was however, a discovery that whatever this hairy tapestry ate its tummy did not appear to change shape. Like Yul Brynner I called this ‘a puzzlement’. After another week the house began taking on that ‘doggy smell’, but what presented itself by the side of my bed each morning was gradually appearing like a more traditionally shaped Whippet.

There was still the problem of an excessive lack of hair on its front and over the four corner bones denoting the top of the limbs that give it propulsion. Enquiry found that there was no such thing as ‘Ashley and Martin’ for dogs. A Shane Warne look-a-like he was not going to be.

I had been contemplating some exercise, but the RSPCA advised me to go easy on him for a while. That was the best advice I’d heard as I have an intense hatred of burning kilojoules. So after another fortnight we went down to Happy Valley Crossing. That first day we just wandered around looking at the waterholes and my watching for a reaction to the thought that he might not want to get wet. His first wash in the shower recess had turned into a nightmare for both of us.

But he paddled knee deep in the water quite without restraint so that fear was quickly dispelled. Seeing no rabbits nor his attempt at anything like running he refused my fresh nibbles and instead snacked away on two chicken thigh bones that had probably lain under the park table for six months.

My immediate thought was why am I feeding him top grade raw meat and bones? I had never thought of weighing him, like building anything I do it just by using one eye, but I think he was getting a little heavier than maybe the five kilo’s that he started out being. In fact by writing this I will try to get him onto a set of scales just out of interest...........an amazing 102 kilos. (I couldn’t make out where the decimal stop was while holding him up on the scales.)

The next day was hot enough to brave the chilly depths of the water at the Crossing, so with a towel in one hand and a tempting bone in the other we headed down there.

Naturally I had to go in first to test how safe it was. To allay any fears in the dog that the Creature from the Black Lagoon really lived here. I was only halfway across when I heard it.

“He so loveth his lord and master that he did taketh a leap of faith unto the waters”

Starting out like a paddle-wheeler with only half it’s blades, white water spewing skyward, he eventually settled down into a sleek swimming machine, or a torpedo heading straight for the white whale it thought was ‘Master’. He clung to me like a limpet until we got to the far side where he needed some assistance to scale the mountain out of the water. Maybe to me it was a bit of a hill, to him it might well have been the White Cliffs of Dover.

His original owner had trained him well, as he turned out to be the most polite and gentle dog I’ve ever accompanied. He would take no food unless it was clearly offered to him and he was so gentle with taking food that one night he couldn’t even break the stork off a cherry when I offered it to him. I had to break it myself and hand feed him the cherry.

One must apologise for the seemingly splendiferous writing but I have been absorbing the seemingly contradictory books written by Mark Twain and God lately. Even without using that word -

‘supercalafragalisticexpialadoshus’

I’ve managed to fill another bloody page.

Translated that means you’ll have to wait another month for the rest of it.