\u201cI took that Michelin you gave me in to the bike shop in Mudgee to have it fitted,\u201d Ben told me on the phone.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s about seventy kilometres, and it\u2019s pretty bumpy on the dirt road, so I tied the tyre to myself with rope. I dropped in to Coles to get some cigarettes on the way, and I walked up to the counter with my motorcycle tyre tied to my back with rope. The checkout chick said \u2018How are you today?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I said to her, \u2018To tell the truth, I\u2019m feeling a bit tired.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAny reaction?\u201d I asked him.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot a glimmer\u201d, he told me. \u201cI was a bit miffed.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMiffed?\u201d \u00a0I said. \u201cI would have been ropable.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, very good, Al\u201d, he said, \u201cand thanks again for the tyre. It steers really well now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mick rode up to join us for a few beers at Kingscliff the next day. I told him the story. He said he didn\u2019t get it, and he was just a carpenter, and it was my shout.\u201d \u2018Shout\u2019 is Australian for \u2018round\u2019, for all you foreigners.<\/p>\n
\u201cA carpenter?\u201d I said. \u201cLike me? And Jesus Christ?\u201d<\/p>\n
He said that while conventional wisdom had it that Jesus Christ was indeed a carpenter, I was not, and in fact he doubted that I was the steam off a carpenter\u2019s urine. He said it in shorter words.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s true\u201d, I said. I don\u2019t even need tools. I can cut wood just by looking at it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBullshit Al\u201d, said Mick.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, it\u2019s true\u201d, I said. \u201cI saw it with my own eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDid I tell you it\u2019s your shout?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cI took that Michelin you gave me in to the bike shop in Mudgee to have it fitted,\u201d Ben told me on the phone<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":13575,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[221],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13574"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13574"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13574\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13576,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13574\/revisions\/13576"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bikeme.tv\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}