Takeover Bid

Hilarious. I popped in to Farmer Jack's (our tiny supermarket) and asked Lorraine & the gals at the checkout if the Dust (our town newspaper) was out yet. "Nah - that Mal's just slackin' off, bloody thing's three weeks late again." We were having a good old whinge about it, and I said without thinking, "They should just hire someone who likes doing that kind of thing to do it instead of leaving it to the poor old town clerk for goodness' sake." There was a brief pause, and suddenly everyone at the checkout was looking at me. The penny dropped. "It's...me, isn't it?" I said. Grins and nods all round.
I picked up my shopping bag and stood tall. "I'm going over there right now! I'll take over the Dust!"
Everyone was cracking up and encouraging me.

I strode out to the car, but before I could take on the world I had to take old Kelvin over to Merv's place with his carton of Emu beer, because a lashing gale and horizontal rain was engulfing the poor old fellow as he tried to shamble home on his aging alcohol-crippled legs. "Good on yer love, I'll get yer somethin' on Fridee when me pension comes in." "No! Oh my god Kelvin! You don't have to get me anything, it's fine, is this Merv's place?"  "Nah keep goin' past Campbell's joint, up where Grunter's old ute is near Maxine's bloke's place."  "Oh, yeah, next to Curley's, no worries."  "Ta love."

With Kelvin safely pickled on Merv's front porch, I returned to my mission and boldly presented myself at the shire office front desk. At this point I would like to explain that I had left for the supermarket in a pair of muddy old boots, garden-dirt streaked ancient men's pyjama pants, an equally filthy t-shirt with battery acid holes all over it, my unbrushed hair stuffed wildly into a paint-spattered hair clip, filthy diesel-blackened fingernails and greasy reading spectacles perched on my forehead.

Mal came out looking spotlessly clean in his ironed council shirt, smiling. It is a credit to him that he did not recoil in retching disgust, but shook my hand without hesitation. "Hi Mal! Last time I saw you, you were pretending to be paralysed from the waist down and I was wearing a firefighter uniform."  "Oh, yes, at the airport emergency exercise! How are you?" "I'm good, Mal, and I thought I'd just pop by in my filthy gardening clothes to see if you'd like me to take over the Dust."

Mal grinned. "I was going to call you this week about it actually! We'd love you to do it!"

So there you go - not only have I negotiated a property sale with a dead body in the back yard, but got myself a fancy council job in my pyjamas. Meeka is just great. I start training next week, although I have already secretly re-designed the entire newspaper on my own laptop. I hope they know what they've let themselves in for. My current headline for May is "Town Grinds To A Halt As Men Drink Beer". I think it'll run.