Oh no, now wallaby gonna do about the car?

Its a dead heat. Yep after this weekend the scores are all tied and I'm not talking about the footy. Kangaroos -1 versus me, also on -1.
You know when something bad happens to you and you get a bit pissed off, and then something else bad happens and you get more pissed off, and then something else bad happens and you get more pissed off, and then something else bad happens and you get more pissed off, and then something else bad happens and you suddenly realise that everything is so fucked that it just becomes hilarious.
It all started with my genius idea of driving to Canberra for an art show that I was involved in. (I'll be referring to every idea that I've spawned over this week end as a genius idea so get used to it)
I thought I might have been able to talk some people into coming with me. Turns out Canberra doesn't hold too much appeal to pretty much every person in Melbourne. Not even to Nate who was also involved in the art show.
I decided not to ride my motorbike after the last disastrous Canberra mission, which involved riding from 4am to 1pm with hardly a rest stop in freezing cold conditions only to arrive just in time to make 20 runs in a cricket match, which we then ended up losing. Later that evening a drunk dude named Cons smashed my motorbike into the front door of a pub. So rather than risk that happening again I asked Mum if i could borrow her car. Instead of her car, I got to take my step Dad's car which has some "idiosyncrasies" as Mum put it. They include the driver's side door not shutting properly, the petrol pump not working properly, the lights having some weird operating code that I didn't have the time to decipher and the radio being a total piece of shit.
I didn't find out about these idiot-sync-fart-clouds until I was about to leave.
So after dinner with Mum, Grandma and some other uncles and aunties on Thursday night, I started my drive.
(I noticed these money boxes that my Mum had made for Grandma on the way out of the house)
















I drove as far as Holbrook which is a small town about an hour north of the border with a big submarine in the main street which I think is supposed to attract tourists or deter German and Japanese armies.
I was running low on gas so I decided this would be a good place to camp for the night. I pulled off the road and slept in the back of the car. I woke with plenty of time to get to Canberra, hang the art show and still hopefully have time for a skate before the opening. The sun was shining and things were looking up.... for about 1 minute.
Then that I discovered that the car had decided today was a good day to not work. I kept trying everything I could think of (not very much) to get it running until the battery died. Then after a few hours of phone calls to various parents and friends and a hearty truckers breakfast,
I decided to hitch hike the rest of the way. So I packed up all the art I could carry, which was mainly Nate's stuff, and started trudging along the side of the freeway with my thumb out. No luck at all. To my sheer amazement, not even the hot blonde girls in the wicked camper van stopped to help me. I gave up after more than an hour and walked back to the car.
I talked mum into joining the RACV and after a while a dude came to see if he could fix the problem. He had no luck either, so he called a tow truck.



















The tow truck driver took it around the corner to a mechanic, whilst trying to convince me to spend some time at the local naval museum. Now might be a good time to mention that Holbrook is hundreds of miles away from the sea. Why they have a naval museum and a huge submarine there is anyone's guess.
Some how the mechanics managed to get it going by spraying some crap into the motor and hitting the petrol tank with a rubber mallet. So I was back on the road with almost enough time to get to the show. As it turned out I ended up only being about 15 minutes late, which meant I had to hang our artwork with the room full of punters looking on, drinking free booze. It turned out to be pretty good all things considered and the other artwork there was really awesome. One of Nate's pics was sold only a few minutes after I hung it up.
There was even a picture of Scotty G there, taken by Nello.





















Obviously due the explicit nature of all things relating to Scotty it had to be displayed in a secretive booth






















I didn't take any decent photos of the show. Here's a crappy one with one of my pics on the left, Nello's photo of Dave Adair in the middle and a picture of Dustin Dollin as the mad hatter done by Jack Tarlington on the right.
















I ended up meeting some rad people and having a really fun night. Afterwards I got taken to some weird night club by Luke and Caroline which was probably the nail in the coffin as far as me not having a hangover the next day goes.
This bastard hangover really exceeded his mandate the next day. If there was a Coleman medal for hangovers he would have definitely won, not so much for his intensity but his sheer unbridalled determination to ruin my day. About an hour or two out of Canberra heading back to Melbourne I was beginning to feel quite unwell so pulled into a beautiful little rest stop area with weeping willows and a small stream running through it. There were people enjoying picnics and letting their dogs run around in the sun, the birds were singing.... then I drove in, opened the car door and puked all over my shoe.
At this point I decided driving would not be in my best interests so I climbed into the back of the car to have a snooze. I woke up a few hours later feeling marginally better, climbed into the drivers seat and discovered that I'd somehow been sleeping with the headlights on high beam. Needless to say the battery was flatter than a flat tire with a block of flats on top of it in the Bonneville Salt Flats. Stoked.
After more phone calls and an argument with the RACV who claimed they had no knowledge of our membership or the fact that they'd fixed the car only 24 hours earlier, eventually a dude came and got the car going again. By this stage I was beginning to wonder which witch had put a curse on me. The possibilities seemed endless so I stopped thinking about it. Fuck all y'all witches.
Okay, back on the road, I was fairly certain nothing else could possibly happen to me. WRONG. At about 8pm, going around 110kph, I ran straight into a fucking kangaroo. Actually it was probably a wallaby. Either way its dead now so I dont think it will care what I call it. It scared the shit out of me and fucked the car up. I'm lucky the little native treasure was bending down which meant I hit it with the front guard of the car and ran over it. If it was standing up it probably would have come through the windscreen and .... well I doubt I'd be sitting here typing this nonsense.