Chapter 2: Corn-cult crazy
…
Most of the trip continued in that vein.
Geraldton itself was much the same as it ever is; stuck in that borderland between small-town rustic and burgeoning city, seemingly intent on destroying what little charm it has left by whoring up local business and generally “improving” the fuck out of local landmarks. Luckily for them my terrible wroth was narrowly averted by offerings of honey-seared scallops at the Camel Bar, which were so freaking awesome I even forgave them for advertising BECKS ON TAP in ten foot letters on the street-front, which apparently is a very exciting thing to have and means you can charge ten dollars a pint for it. Bastards.
Delicious, delicious bastards.
Local beaches haven’t escaped the ever-vigilant eye of progress but thankfully, so far, only the city-centre marina has truley suffered for the cause. This meant the unmolested dunes and shores of Pages beach were free to host the high point of my trip as I tore up and down the headlands in my car’s first test of its all-wheel drive abilities. To quote Euripides “Aww yeah, that shit be pimpin”. You have no way of knowing he never actually said that, so stop giving me that look.
I have to admit I was sceptical to begin with, the Outback looks like nothing more than a middle-class overture to the off-road realm designed to let soccer-mums mount the curb and not much more, so when we first drove onto the beach I was pretty damn sure I was going to get bogged. Turns out my car is invincible and I am the lord of nature. Who knew? I was so impressed by my vehicles prowess I even let Kate drive in all her licenseless glory along the beach and sand dunes.
Personally, I think I handled myself with remarkable aplomb both when we became airborne and when we mounted the native scrub. Sure, she later described my soothing murmurs of encouragement as “girlish squeals of terror”, but that’s just her way with words.
Aside from that we were mostly just sort of there instead of here. We saw relatives as rife with bitterness and in-fighting as always (all part of their own private charm) and Kate got to reclaim a substantial portion of her missing book collection. Good, because she’s got a lot of good books. Bad because (station-wagon or no) trying to cram a couple of crates of books, two people’s worth of luggage and two people’s worth of dog into the back of a car for a five hour trip isn’t all it’s cracked up to be (not helped by Kate spending most of the trip trying to reach back for her books, all the while cooing softly and stroking them creepily).
So here’s to hometowns! To places we escape, to places we return, to places we never reach. Here’s to you Geraldton, for being better than I remember and for being worse, for being nice, for being idyllic, for defiling my chlidhood, for having that guy in the bar who called my mp3 player “that faggy radio thing”. Hurrah to you Geraldton for just not caring what I do.
Christ that took me a long time to say. I talk alota pretentious wank, don’t I?
Yeah. I do.
