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Authors: Richard Glover

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BOOK: In Bed with Jocasta
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Just like The Space Cadet’s furniture is a little bit like furniture.

And the plastic crap is a little like a real toy.

And the hamburger is a little like real food.

And the lights are a little like something attractive.

Which brings us back to Dante. Like him, we’re now ready to go home. Travelling back, through all seven circles of the modern world.

The Mouse Trap

T
he Space Cadet wants a pet. He suggests a large dog, and is met with fierce opposition. He moderates to a cat, and does no better.

‘A guinea pig?’ he asks quietly a week later, cutting the cloth of his dreams into ever-smaller pieces. Unbelievably, his mean-hearted father still says no. The Space Cadet turns sadly, his shoulders fallen, and limps back into his bedroom.

At this rate, he’ll be asking for a pet flea within a month, and still be getting knock-backs. And so I say it, mumbling towards his departing back: ‘Maybe a mouse.’

The Space Cadet embraces the idea with an enthusiasm bordering on hysteria. ‘A mouse would be
fantastic,’
he says. ‘I’ve always wanted a mouse. Always.’

I tell him that I’m not going to give in straight away. He must prove he
really
wants a mouse. On the spot I come up with an excellent parenting idea: he can have the mouse if he remembers to ask again, once a week for, say, three weeks.

But The Space Cadet doesn’t have a great grip on the calendar. He’s so nervous about missing the deadline, he decides to take precautions, and asks me about the mouse every five minutes, every day, for ten straight days.

Finally I crack. We drive to the shop, and The space Cadet is shaking in his seat with the excitement of it all. His first pet.

‘Which floor of Ashfield Mall do you reckon the pet shop’ll be on?’ Jocasta asks, and The Space Cadet answers her: ‘It’ll be on the ground floor.’

We ask him how he knows. says The space Cadet, jiggling as he talks: ‘Well, they’d put it on the ground floor because the children really want the pets. And if it’s on the ground floor they can go in and get the pets
really
quickly.’

We arrive at the mall and walk into the pet shop, which is on the ground floor. We find this allows us to get separated from our money
really
quickly.

The space Cadet selects a mouse, and then a mouse cage. The mouse costs $2. The cage, which is on special, costs $49.95. It is made of brightly coloured plastic, and features a sort of Centrepoint Tower rising up from its top, up which the mouse can climb.

When we get home, The space Cadet announces that the mouse is called Fluffy, and we all sit around the kitchen table watching him as he runs on his wheel.

‘Fluffy is very fast,’ says The space Cadet, and we all agree. We’ve chanced upon an exceptional mouse. Perhaps the fastest, most athletic mouse ever. We all decide we’re very proud of him.

Steve, from over the road, wanders in and watches Fluffy on his treadmill, going ever round and round and round, and becomes increasingly depressed. ‘It’s like a metaphor,’ he says grimly before wandering out into the back garden and staring into the distance.

His partner, Helen, says she doesn’t like the mouse, but the mouse house, with its neon-bright plastic tower, and ‘Lazy Vue’ viewing platform, would make the basis of an excellent building application to council, and would we mind if she took a few measurements?

The Space Cadet, though, just wants to get Fluffy out, and have him crawl up his arm, holding his tail as demonstrated by the lady in the shop. We do this successfully. Three times. But not the fourth.

Fluffy escapes. We’ve had him precisely five hours, and are now owners of a perfectly useless $49.95 plastic mouse cage, with Lazy Vue platform and neon-bright tower.

Batboy says that since a $2 mouse lives two years; maybe next time we could get a $4 mouse, which would live four years.

The Space Cadet is looking glum. ‘We don’t even know when his birthday is,’ he says, as if this makes the loss all the more hurtful.

Jocasta is even more upset. ‘I’d already bonded to Fluffy,’ she says miserably.

I spot some movement. Fluffy is under the couch. The last time we had a mouse under the couch my intentions were rather more deadly. This time, it’s different. With four planks of wood we construct a sort of stockyard around the couch, and consider how to lift out the furniture.

I summon various helpers, and soon we have five adults, arguing over the capture options.

‘Don’t hurt him,’ says The Space Cadet.

‘Yeah,’ says Steve, who’s stalked back inside from the garden, ‘we should subdue him first with capsicum spray.’

In the end we lift out the couch, work in the barriers, and successfully return Fluffy to his owner. He seems happy enough to be crawling over The Space Cadet, who, this time, maintains a somewhat better grip on his tail.

Back on his treadmill, Fluffy runs faster than ever, as Jocasta watches with a gasp of admiration. ‘What a mouse. An exceptional mouse.’

My Mother Killed My Stove

S
uddenly, all the battles of childhood are over. After forty years of losing every argument with my mother, I’ve got the goods on her. she has come to sydney and cleaned our cooktop to death. she has killed it armed with nothing more than a pump-pack of spray and Wipe and an over-zealous attitude to germs.

Of course, all mothers think their children live in filthy hovels. But not many have actually cleaned one of their son’s appliances to death — squirting in so much spray and Wipe that the house is plunged into darkness each time we turn on the hotplate.

Of course, we were expecting her visit. ‘My mother’s coming to stay,’ I said to Jocasta a week ago, and watched her eyes flicker with fear as she reached for the nearest Wettex.

My mother usually arrives from the country wearing white cotton gloves — designed to ward off the germs of the city in general, and our house in particular. Does she have the cleanliness problem, or do we? Is she compulsively clean, bordering on clinical insanity? or are we animals who live in our own filth? It’s an open question; but certainly standards are different.

In our last house Jocasta finally snapped, accused my mother of suffering from obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and advised her to invest in some sort of psychiatric medication. My mother replied that she was happy as she was and suggested that, since advice was being handed around, Jocasta might like to invest in a new Wettex.

Who won that particular battle of wills? I find it difficult to assess the evidence at the moment, especially with all the noise of Jocasta simultaneously vacuuming the hall rug with one hand while she dusts off the bookshelves with the other.

In between, Jocasta is yelling instructions at the rest of us. She says I’ve got to finish the bathroom and then move on to the stove — getting it so clean, Mum won’t be tempted to reach into the cupboard for the Spray and Wipe as soon as she arrives.

‘I’m not attacking your family,’ says Jocasta. ‘All I’m saying is that when your father comes we have to hide all the grog, and when your mother comes we have to hide all the cleaning products.’

We clean for two days solid, at which point my mother arrives. Despite our efforts, I can see her having to steady herself as she gets her first glance at the kitchen.

‘It’s lovely, darling,’ she says, pulling on her white gloves that little bit more tightly. She wanders around the house, using that tone of false brightness which is reserved for mothers viewing their son’s life choices.

My mother’s problem with germs has certainly been around for a while. At age eight, my career in the Boy scouts was cut short after I telephoned my mother from the bush adventure camp and mentioned there was nowhere to wash my hands after going to the toilet.

‘Don’t move, I’ll be right there,’ she said, before sprinting to the car and driving the four hours up the highway, spinning into the camp car park with dust flying.

‘Why are you going back to Sydney?’ yelled the other boys, shouting after the departing car.

‘To wash my hands,’ I yelled back.

All these years later, it’s not me, but Batboy and The space Cadet who are receiving the wisdom of her instruction. Batboy, for one, has turned into a bit of a recruit. ‘You know, dad,’ he admonishes, toothbrush in hand, his mouth frothing like a rabid dog, ‘you really need to scrub for at least five minutes to get them
properly
clean.’

The space Cadet, though, is a different matter.

Jocasta and I leave early for work, and so The Gloved-One takes the job of giving him breakfast. It doesn’t go well.

The Space Cadet refuses to eat his toast, so my mother decides to use some of her advanced parenting techniques. The ones which have left me such a well-balanced and stable person.

She walks into the room, stands in front of The Space Cadet and pretends to cry. ‘If you don’t eat your toast,’ she tells him, sniffling, ‘I’ll get in trouble with your daddy. And then I’ll cry and cry.’

Returning to the room some minutes later, she sees the plate is empty. ‘Good boy! You’ve eaten it all up!’

‘Well, no,’ says The Space Cadet, a glint in his seven-year-old eyes. ‘I
want
you to get in trouble with Daddy. So I’ve hidden it.’

The Gloved-One begs and pleads. But The Space Cadet is resolute.

For the last days of her visit, she knows it is out there: somewhere dark and out of sight, the Lost Toast, festering away, shooting its spores of germs into the air. For someone with a germ phobia, it is
torture.

We mount search parties, The Space Cadet sitting silent, thrilled with his power, Batboy crawling around, staring under chairs, my mother looking distracted, her fingers nervously plucking the edge of her gloves.

All in all, it’s little wonder she took it all out on the cooktop — cleaning it into electrical oblivion. Whatever the repair fees, I feel it’s worth it.

A day after her departure, The Space Cadet languidly reaches behind the back wheel of the couch, and pulls out the piece of toast. He gives me a restrained smile, and drops it in the bin.

Looking back at my childhood, I don’t think I was ever much of a match for my mother. But I’ve had a hand in raising someone who is.

Yes, We’re Australian

E
very tourist guide to Australia has an extensive guide to Australian slang — defining words like cobber, cossie and fair dinkum. Yet the truly unique things — our cultural rules and tribal beliefs — are left undocumented.

If our visitors really want to fit in, here’s what they’ll need to know:

  1. The bigger the hat, the smaller the farm.

  2. The shorter the nickname they give you, the more they like you.

  3. It’s not a genuine Australian saying unless it involves a paddock, a lizard or a rat.

  4. A flash sports car driven by a middle-aged man does not incite envy — as it does in America — but hilarity.

  5. It’s not a picnic without a bull-ant climbing up your bum.

  6. It is proper to refer to your best friend as ‘a total bastard’, but your worst enemy as ‘a
    bit
    of a bastard’.

  7. Whether it’s the opening of Parliament, or the launch of a new art gallery, there is no event which cannot be improved by the addition of a sausage sizzle.

  8. All banks are bastards.

  9. A hamburger must contain beetroot.

  10. It’s considered better to be down on your luck than up yourself.

  11. The phrase ‘we’ve got a great lifestyle’ means everyone in the family drinks too much.

  12. If the guy next to you is swearing like a wharfie, he’s probably a media billionaire. Or, just conceivably, a wharfie.

  13. There is no food that cannot be improved by the application of tomato sauce.

  14. People with red hair should be nicknamed ‘Blue’, just as short people should be labelled ‘Lofty’.

  15. On the beach, all Australians hide their keys and wallet by placing them inside their sandshoes. No thief has ever worked this out. We may have very stupid thieves. or
    really
    stinky sandshoes.

  16. Industrial design knows of no article more useful than the milk crate.

  17. All our best heroes are losers.

  18. The Alpha male in any group is he who takes the barbecue tongs from the hands of the host, and blithely begins turning the snags.

  19. It’s not summer until the steering wheel is too hot to hold.

  20. Beer should be served so cold it makes your ears hurt.

  21. A thong is not a piece of scanty swimwear, as in America, but a fine example of footwear. A group of sheilas wearing black rubber thongs may not be as exciting as you had hoped.

  22. A gum leaf, crushed, in the hand, is the best smell ever.

  23. There shall be no dobbers.

  24. Historians believe the widespread use of the word ‘mate’ can be traced to the harsh conditions on the Australian frontier in the 1890s, and the development of a code of mutual aid, or ‘mateship’. Alternatively, we may all be just really hopeless with names.

  25. The wise man chooses a partner who is attractive not only to himself, but also to neighbourhood mosquitoes.

  26. If it can’t be fixed using panty-hose and fencing wire, it’s not worth fixing.

  27. All parties, in however grand and well-prepared a house, shall be held, cramped and noisy, in the kitchen.

  28. The most popular and widely praised family in any street is the one that just happens to have the swimming pool.

  29. A swallowed fly, while disgusting, must be greeted with the plucky comment: ‘Mmm, protein.’

  30. We invented everything in the world worth inventing, but then sold the patent to the Yanks.

  31. Smearing toast with a spread that’s black and salty, and which has the appearance of axle-grease, is widely viewed as a good way to start the day.

  32. Every older Australian has a bullshit theory involving ants, a kookaburra laughing and the likelihood of rain, and every theory is the direct opposite of the last one you heard.

  33. If invited to a party, you should take cheap red wine, but then spend all night drinking the host’s beer. Don’t worry: he’ll have catered for it.

  34. The phrase ‘a simple picnic’ is not known. or at least not acted upon. You should take
    everything.
    If you don’t need to make three trips back to car, you are not trying.

  35. If there’s any sort of free event or party within a hundred kilometres, you’d be a mug not to go.

  36. A kid, upon burying his father in the sand, shall always give him breasts larger than those of his mother.

  37. Every surname, brand-name and motor-car spare part must be shortened to the point of incomprehension, as in the sentence: ‘If I hadn’t stuffed the diff, I’d have taken Blacky to Maccas.’

  38. There comes a time in every Australian’s life when he or she realises that the Aeroguard is far, far worse than the flies.

  39. Our national character means that we cry during the first verse of our national anthem, but can’t remember the words of the rest.

  40. And, finally, don’t let the tourist books fool you. No one says ‘cobber’.

BOOK: In Bed with Jocasta
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