Farm Kid Demanding iPad For Christmas To Be Given Something Much, Much Better

ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

A Betoota Downs boy is on track for a bumper Christmas this year, after loudly insisting he wanted an iPad like everyone else at school and inspiring his father to purchase something far more practical. An unlicensed .17 air rifle from a roo shooter who lives in the Windorah Holiday Park.

The boy's father, 43-year-old grazier, says he has no interest in buying a tablet that will burn through all the fucking Starlink and turn his son into one of those soft little Roblox kids who spend their afternoons dressing up blocky avatars instead of learning how to gut and skin a rabbit for the sheep dogs.

"No way," he said, while checking the air rifle's sights with the casual familiarity of a man who has gut shot more feral pigs than he's eaten hot dinners.

"I'm not having him sitting on his arse all summer playing that Roblox shit. That's how you get a kid who can’t reverse a trailer or put a bend in a mob of running Brahman"

The father says the .17 is the perfect starter kit for a boy who still struggles to put his boots on the right feet but is allegedly mature enough to begin shooting anything with a pulse, with the exception of protected native species.

"Kookaburras, parrots and cockies are off limits. He knows that," said the father.

"No magpies or crows. No galahs. No owls. No blackbirds. No butcherbirds. But rabbits? Feral cats? Those bastards under the shearing shed? Straight between the eyes. Clean shot to the head. If he can’t do that, he doesn’t get promoted. Can't be gut shooting cats with his mother around."

That "promotion" the father explained, refers to a carefully structured firearm development pathway he's designed for his son, which begins with the air rifle and eventually leads to a decent .22 once he proves he can handle the slug gun without waving it around like a garden hose.

With a .22, the boy would be permitted to take on larger game such as kangaroos and pigs, provided he demonstrates adequate marksmanship.

"Same rules," said the father. "Eye or earhole. None of this centre-mass Hollywood stuff."

When asked whether his son had expressed any enthusiasm for the alternative Christmas present, the father confirmed the boy was still crying in the ute about the iPad.

"He"ll get over it," he said.

"Once he drops his first pigeon, he won’t even remember what Roblox is."

More to come.