20 March, 2017. 14:23
ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
Moving to the harsh Queensland interior just last year, a local retiree has revealed that his ‘sand-change’ was going swimmingly up until yesterday when he arrived at a mate’s Sunday BBQ with a longneck of red wine.
Red wine and other communist beverages were banned from the wider Betoota district after the 1954 Petrov Affair triggered hysteria throughout the Diamantina Shire.
That quirky by-law obviously wasn’t at the forefront of Michael Broadmoor’s mind when he arrived at Mayor Keith Carton’s bi-fortnightly Sunday BBQ with a bottle of Cockfighter’s Ghost Shiraz tucked under his arm.
“What’s that you’ve got there?” asked the Mayor.
“Oh, it’s just a bit of the good stuff, you know. Not Grange, but a nice Sunday wine. Cockfighter’s I think.” he replied.
“Fuck me dead, Mickey. You would be doing a lot of cock-fighting if you put that shit in your body. Here, having a fucking Betoota Bitter you big poof and let me introduce you to my nephew,” replied the Mayor.
Later in the day, Councillor Carton confident in The Advocate, saying that he was quite shocked and appalled by what Broadmoor did yesterday.
Wondering how in Christ’s name he was able to smuggle red wine into the desert is one thing, but the biggest worry that the Mayor had over the whole affair is just how flippant and wreckless the sand-changer was in bringing red wine over to his house.
“You know, just when you think you know somebody, they go and pull something like this,” he said.
“Just goes to show that the threat of communism is coming back.”
