Local Woman Torn Between Empathy And Serenity As Old Codger Launches Into 40 Minute Bus Monologue

EFFIE BATEMAN | Lifestyle | Contact

An exhausted local woman has this morning found herself fighting the urge to be a bit rude, after getting cornered on the bus by an elderly bloke who was clearly in need of someone to chat to.

Hopping on the 336 bus from Betoota Ponds to the flight district, a trip that can take anywhere from half an hour to forty five minutes, a bleary eyed Nadine Fortunati, 29, had been hoping to get a little snooze in after a night of tossing and turning in the sticky weather.

However after making the mistake of sitting up the front of the bus, Nadine was soon cornered by a chatty pensioner who not only had a lot to say, but didn’t seem that interested in actually having a two sided conservation.

As an empathetic lass, Nadine tried to be mindful that some people don’t have anyone to talk to.

But as a tired lass, she also found herself very tempted to shove in some headphones.

“There’s a lot of bloody traffic today isn’t there? It wasn’t like this forty years ago. I can tell you that. You should have seen the Grove back then. Nice place to live now. In the 90s nobody wanted to live there.  Someone once nicked my steel cap boots off my front porch. Fucker even stole my welcome mat. Well, you could see he welcomed himself to my welcome mat haha. Anyway, I started leaving bottles of alcohol filled with piss hoping they’d nick that but they never did.”

Nodding along, Nadine agreed that yes, it certainly does sound different to the grove she knows today.

“I couldn’t imagine living in one of the cities though. My daughter ended up moving up to Melbourne, bloody backwards place that is. I think that lockdown sent them all cuckoo. Nah I couldn’t live in a place like that. I’d much rather somewhere quiet here. You like the quiet?”

Before Nadine can answer, the man switches topics.

“Speaking of cuckoo. Fucking cockatoos have been driving me up the wall. Noisy little fuckers aren’t they. Got a bunch of them that scream outside my bedroom every morning. My wife used to poison the magpies because they’d swoop the grandkids.”

“You know it’s the male birds that do right? Anyway…”

More to come.