ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
A 34-year-old local grazier is headed to the Sunshine Coast this week for the annual stripey shirt convention at the Mooloolaba Surf Club.
Said grazier, Wally Renneck of “Astoria” via Windorah, expects to see a generous handful of family when he and the family roll into town and one of them expecting to see him is his young cousin, Dane, who’s recently returned from his first year out in the lignum.
Dane recalls from an early age listening to the varied and wild stories that Wally would tell. A strong orator and enough wisdom to know the best stories are ones that change with every telling. Dane told The Advocate this afternoon in the surf club’s small but scenic smoking area that he’s excited for Wally to arrive and he’s already got a list of yarns he wants his older cousin to tell not just him, but his new mates he’s staying with up the Nautilus.
“Wally’s got this one where he’s heading to Brisbane for a 21st, they’re chugging long in his AU Falcon ute. No turbo but Smart Bar, and he’s bumped this roo outside a St George and he’s turn to his mate and gone, we should bring him with us. So they pull over and pull back the tonneau cover and dump this roo in the back and they’re off,” said Dane.
“They get down to Brissie and they park up in the valley and head off for a night. They come back to the ute in the early hours and drag this dead roo out on the footpath and drive way. Fucken funny, imagine seeing a dead roo on the footpath on Bruinswick Street. Fuck me.”
Dane laughed and took a big drag.
“But you see, at Christmas time, I got him to tell the same yarn. But this time, the fuck roo was alive! It’s jumped out from under the tonneau cover and taken off down Wickham Street! Fuck, that’s even funnier. I reckon,”
“He’s got another one about shooting the fucking camel out in the Simpson, he’s seen in running down a fence line and he’s pulled up and got the rifle out. He’s watching it gallop away from him, the head going up and down through the crosshairs. He watches it go down, he squeezes the trigger and as it bobs back up, whack! He’s blown the fucken thing’s brain out through it’s nose! But as it’s running down a fence, it’s tumbled onto fence and crushed it. So Wally’s out there trying to drag this dead fucken camel off the fence, realises he can’t so he’s force to build the fence through it!” Dane contined.
“Only the last time he told it, he reckons he had to cut through the camel with his pocket knife! Fuck me, I just lost it. If I live a life as wild as Wally’s, I’ll be happy!”
More to come.
