Working in the front yard brings me into contact with the seemingly dozens of aboriginal people shuffling past on their way to the dole office and the pub (in that order), as well as the odd non-aboriginal local such as mad Eric, an elderly Swedish alcoholic full of exuberance & happiness. "Oh my god today is beautiful, look at you, gorgeous, come and be my lover darling!" "I'd love to Eric but my bloke would get jealous!" This gets more and more outrageous until we're both giggling & he heads off to work.
I try to be friendly to everyone who passes, and about half the time I get a smile or at least a hello. Most of them know me by now and are starting to act like they recognise me. But if any of the aboriginal people stop for a chat, it always ends with them asking me for money, beer or a cigarette. So I've come up with a few handy stock replies:
AB: You got smoke sista?
AJ: Sorry, I gave the last of them to the kids who were round this morning!
AB: You got any beer, waitin on me dole pay eh.
AJ: So am I! You got a smoke?
AB: You got any money sista? Dole cheque not in eh.
AJ: Gosh, sorry, I'm flat broke after donating ten grand in tax to
government funded aboriginal programs!
Responses range from blank confusion, bewildered chuckles and possibly inner homicidal rage. I am trying to work up the nerve to come up with a Rainbow Serpent angle, but they might send the feral five year old petrol sniffers round in the night. Last night Gary came home to find my and Phil's rubbish bins sitting right in the middle of the road. Every morning we pick up the Emu beer cans and Winfield cigarette packets that have been thrown over the fence. Sometimes it's something larger, like a shopping trolley lying on its side in the driveway. The kids play chicken with the road trains in the main street; last year a little boy was killed. The police and child welfare are tearing their hair out.
The mining season is kicking off again and I can't believe the size of the road train freight coming through - machines so mindbogglingly huge that they have to be carried in sections, by several road trains in a huge long conga line. I have shares in Doray Minerals who have several projects going on up the road, so it's exciting to take a drive & watch them drilling. I think I own about half a spare tyre for one of the smaller drilling rigs. If the stock crashes, I can always nip up the highway and help myself to my share of the mining equipment, pop it on eBay.
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