Happy 50th little brother!!

Well today is a special day for my younger brother Peter, affectionately known to many as "Dirty".

He turns 50!!

There are so many stories we could share about him, but a favourite tale that we always get a laugh out of is the following one, when we were all home on holidays from teacher's college one Summer.

At the Colbinabbin house where mum and dad lived, there was a big room called ‘The Boys room’ and another called “The Girl’s room”. Our oldest brother, Moose, lived in a little bungalow out the back.

Anyway, a stray cat had been coming in at night and annoying the hell out of Moose who worked really long hours at the local quarry, always leaving for work at about 5.00 in the morning, especially during Summer, which was when this happened as we were all at home.

Moose caught the pesky cat and put it in a sack and gave me, Dirty and another younger brother, Damian the task of taking it out the bush and shooting it. He also gave us a rifle, which was an automatic with a 15 shot clip.

“Yep Moose, no worries, we’ll do it today”

So, the 3 of us head out with the cat in the sack and the gun, thinking ‘this will take no time at all’. But, to save time, instead of going miles away out into the bush where Moose demanded, we just headed out behind the local tip, about one km away.

Well, now is the time to cue the Benny Hill music, as the next 5 minutes were chaotic!!

After much discussion about who would shoot, the task fell to me, while Dirty decided that we should let it out and shoot it humanely.

Well, as soon as the sack opened out flew that cat hissing and spitting and it BOLTED!!!!!

And then the shooter, who couldn’t shoot the ground even if he was aiming at it was letting loose with the rifle while the cat disappeared into the distance with little bits of dust spitting up behind it as the magazine was quickly emptied in its direction.

“Bugger!! What do we tell Moose????!!”

We decided that dishonesty would save us, so when Moose got home that night he asked if we had ‘dispatched’ the said cat, to which we vigorously nodded in agreement.

Imagine our shock and horror at 5.00 the next morning when Moose stormed into the boy’s room, with the ‘dead’ cat back in the sack. It had returned!!!

In a less than pleasing tone he marched over to Dirty’s bed, threw the cat in the sack on his bed, and this time with a shotgun, yelling

“Do it properly this time and don’t open the sack!!!”

Let’s just say it was done more efficiently this time, without the music!!

And we let Dirty go out and do it on his own!!

Just one of many funny stories that come from living in a large family who always like to have some fun.

Happy 50th Dirty !!