Saturday, November 9, 2013

Something that Happened Yesterday

Yesterday while driving down the Great Ocean Road we stopped at a fish and chip shop in Apollo Bay. The choice was between two shops; one with a blue exterior – the kind of blue you would usually associate with a seafood place, and I would usually associate with bad smells – and one with a bright red (if I remember correctly) exterior. The red one looked bigger, and more popular (to me at least – there were no people in either). Phil said we should go in the blue one, so we did that.

The guy at the counter sounded Russian to me, although Phil was adamant his accent was Greek. We made jokes at his face as we ordered, he told us that “no, the sauce is not free”. He said it in his accent though, so it wasn't that clear. Between us we only had fourteen dollars, so we decided to get eight dollars worth of chips and a piece of fish worth six – that's fourteen all up... MATHS!

The guy told us we could wait outside, maybe, if we were lucky, he'd bring our food out.

Earlier at the petrol station... OH MY GOD! We spent about half an hour with our petrol gauge on ZERO, flying through the hills and winding roads next to the Great Ocean, praying to non-specific gods that we would make it the remaining 35... 19... 15... 10... 5 kilometres to Apollo Bay without running out of gas. HEARTS BEATING THROUGH CHESTS!! We made it though – goodliest of good fortunes – and rolled into the petrol station... we got some petrol and made some jokes and laughed a lot and one of us said something funny to the attendant who laughed with us too – she was having a great time. Then just as we were about to get in and head to the fish and chip shop (still undecided at this point on blue or red), I quipped that Phil had said he was going to get some cigarettes. I was half joking, half being serious because maybe I wanted one too OKAY!!!? So we got some cigs too.

Because of all of the previous things together, we found ourself sitting outside the blue fish and chip shop, smoking cigs (one each) and not saying anything because we were both insanely tired. I only half finished mine before realizing I didn't really want it, and walked the ten metres to put it in the bin after consciously fighting the urge to flick it away like a James Dean lookalike – I even said words to that effect as I walked back, glad at having made the right choice.

Two minutes later when Phil finished his cig, he DID flick it. Right onto the pavement. Motherfucker. I picked his up too, squashed as it was after being butted on the table, and ferried it over to the bin to be disposed of responsibly. Because I'm a good bloke. Okay?

And then we got our chips, brought out by the Greek/Russian man (probably Greek) and took them, with the piece of fish that was hidden underneath, to the car. We ate most of it save three or four little chips at the end, drove for another few hours, and at 1am, arrived in Melbourne.

That was something that happened yesterday.

Peace, Taco.

No comments:

Post a Comment