Scatology - My Contribution to that Field, Page 3

  Chapter Three - Pooper Scooper

  Back in the late sixties I was a teenager. A friend of mine lived on a farm not far from me. I used to visit there frequently. We shot targets with our air rifles and generally hung out in his Dad's large shed. One day we spotted an advertisement in the local paper for army surplus which listed crated WWII vintage military courier motorcycles. Apparently these were still in their original packing boxes and had never been assembled and used. With hundreds of acres of farm at our disposal we had visions of tearing about the place and doing all sorts of nifty tricks on such a machine.

  These surplus bikes were cheap but even so would require us to pool our meagre resources for a purchase. Bobby and I were still a bit short for such a transaction. That's where Pete came in. He was Bobby's cousin and lived on a ramshackle farm a bit further out. Pete probably would not have much in the way of cash to contribute, but he did have some mechanical skills and tools. He and his father and brothers were all self-trained mechanics. Not a lot of farming went on at their place; in fact other than a few scrawny dogs there were no farm animals at all and the fields featured an abundant crop of weeds. The house and shed was surrounded by a small sea of derelict cars and farming equipment.

  The boys were always acquiring broken down wrecks and rebuilding them. Pete had been helping his Dad and older brothers in that activity since he was a toddler. In fact, the only real interest that family harboured was in rebuilding old vehicles. What little money they lived off came from those activities. The farm, inherited as a working unit from Pete's grandfather, had slid straight to rack and ruin as soon as the old boy had checked out a couple of decades prior.

  Pete looked like your archetypical hillbilly. He was a scrawny kid with a rough, freckled skin, thin wispy hair and old man's eyes. He was fifteen going on seventy. His choice of clothes did nothing to dispel that impression. Like the rest of his family he invariably dressed in overalls. His were hand-me-down, threadbare overalls which were way too big for him. Unusual for that era, he also wore rubber flip-flops and a baseball cap. His uncle had served in the post war occupation force of Japan, returning home with a supply of flip-flops, or thongs as we called them, and baseball caps acquired from the US forces he was stationed with. Pete's family rapidly adopted that loose, open form of footwear and the caps. Pete's thongs were hand-me-downs from his brother, many sizes too big for his horny bare feet.

  Similarly a grubby, second-hand baseball cap was cinched right in and sat low on his ears. Those ears! Pete was blessed with the most enormous, protruding ears; regular jug handles. His nickname at school was "Wing nut" but only the unwise referred to him by that if he was within earshot. Like his brothers, and despite his thin, gawky frame, Pete could fight like a thrashing machine and seemed impervious to any injuries inflicted upon him in return. He had grown up hard and it showed.

  He was an uncommunicative sort of kid, taciturn in nature. When Bobby and I rode over to his place to discuss our proposition, his eyes lit up. It turned out he had very little in the way of personal possessions and a meagre handful of loose change was his sole source of capital. As the go-fer in the family business he did not pull any sort of income and only got a few bucks from his brothers on the odd occasion they made a good profit on a rebuild. The prospect of having a share in his very own motorcycle, and the chance to actually build it, was of great allure to him however. After some lengthy negotiation we agreed that by providing his knowledge and any special tools that may be required he would get a one fifth share of the bike. Bobby and I would have two shares each.

  Bobby and I went in to the army surplus shop and talked with the owner, who we knew pretty well. Army surplus was the only place we shopped. He had half a dozen large crates out back, all stencilled with US military markings. We negotiated a holding deposit on the proviso that we would pay the rest within two months. It was a frantic couple of months as we struggled to rake up the princely outstanding sum of ten dollars! Ten bucks was a lot of money in those days, especially for kids still in high school.

  We just made it. Mind you, there had not exactly been a rush on those ex-military bikes and I'm sure we could have extended our deadline, but that was lost on us at that time in our excitement. The next big challenge was getting the prize back to Bobby's place. It took a lot of pleading, and two bucks, to convince one of Pete's brother's to back-load their family's small flatbed truck on one of his runs into town.

  Once at Bobby's farm it did not take long to unload the bulky, heavy crate from the truck onto the loading ramp. Bobby and his cousins were well practiced at handling large and heavy items on their farms. We eagerly dragged the crate into the shed with the tractor. Excitedly we armed ourselves with pinch-bars and attacked the crate. We quickly discovered that it had been built to last! Thick pine planks and lots of large screws securely protected our treasure. A concerted effort from the three of us, and not a little swearing, was needed to strip away the protecting timber.

  Luckily, the bike was not broken down to all its component parts as we had feared it might be. It had been disassembled into a dozen or so of the major segments. Everything was heavily greased and wrapped in some sort of heavy brown paper, all tightly lashed with coarse string. As we exposed the parts it became obvious that the motorcycle was enormous. It was like a two-wheeled tractor! A huge fuel tank sat above an equally large two cylinder motor of daunting proportions. A surprising small, unpadded seat was held in place by a couple of large springs. It was like straddling a 44 gallon drum, getting your legs over and around that tank.

  The assembly turned out to be easy. A comprehensive instruction manual and the necessary tools were provided in the crate and only a few large bolts were required to join the segments. In a hushed aside Bobby and I regretted diluting the ownership by including Pete in the deal. As it turned out we did not need his dubious mechanical skills anyway. However, it was too late to change that and we felt obliged to put that behind us. The biggest challenge was the physical manoeuvring the heavy components in order to align and bolt them together.

  Fitting the drive chain turned out to be the most difficult part the whole procedure. It took multiple attempts and, in the end, it was Pete's experience that finally triumphed. Flushing out the motor internals took a while too, but eventually, on the second afternoon we were ready to attempt a start. With the gearbox filled with oil, various bearings freshly greased and a tank full of petrol we stood back and surveyed our project.

  It was really the first time we had looked at the project as a whole. The impression of size was reinforced. The motorcycle was huge. From the massive tyres to the great fuel tank and motor, everything was oversized in comparison to the new civilian motorbikes of that time. Pete, with his motorcycle riding experience was the obvious test pilot. Bobby and I had never even sat on a motorcycle to that point in time.

  Pete hauled himself up onto the beast and threw his leg over the bulk of it. He sat his bony arse on the skinny little seat and checked his controls. If my memory serves me right, it only had three gears to choose from. Pete jiggled the gear shift, making sure it was in neutral. Then he flipped down the kick starter pedal and stood up in the saddle.

  It soon became apparent that despite his wiry strength, Pete's scrawny frame lacked the weight needed to kick over the large high-compression motor of the beast. After he wore himself out, Bobby and I took turns, without success. Half an hour later, the three of us were standing dejectedly next to our project when Bobby's Dad drove up. He was working in the back paddock and had returned to the shed for a few tools. After a quick chat he came over and took a seat on the bike.

  Bobby's father was a big man and had ridden motorbikes in his youth. He tweaked the controls then stood up and brought his weight sharply down on the kick-starter pedal. Joy of joys, the motor coughed and spluttered a few times. We were exalted. A couple more kicks and the engine roared loudly into life. Bobby's Dad
revved the engine a few times and the shed reverberated with the throaty, brute roar of the machine.

  He got off and hauled the bike off its large stand. We helped him to push its awkward, top-heavy weight outside. Holding the idling bike upright, he looked at us and asked, "So, who's first up?" Bobby and I pointed at Pete. Skinny Pete mounted the machine. Bobby's Dad yelled over the noise of the motor, "You'll need to get a bit of speed up. It's really top heavy and wants to fall over. The stand is fairly stiff to kick down too. You aren't strong enough to lift it, so keep it moving until you really want to stop. Make sure it doesn't pin your leg when it falls over."

  Pete nodded and revved the motor a few times. Then he gripped the clutch lever and pulled the gear shift back to first. Opening the throttle to get the revs up he started to let out the clutch. The clutch bit unexpectedly and the bike jerked forward. The rear wheel threw up a shower of dust and gravel. The bike was powerful and low geared with lots of torque. The sudden lunge had surprised Pete and for a few moments the bike kangaroo hopped as he struggled with clutch and throttle. The bike meandered and lent. Pete looked in danger of either toppling or running into a nearby harvester.

  Letting go of the clutch he fought the throttle which was proving to be sticky. More by good luck than inherent skill, Pete managed to clear the obstacles around the shed and reach the open confines of the house paddock. In front of him was ten acres of open, flat pasture. With an open paddock and a bit more speed to stabilize the bike Pete declutched and revved the motor hard in attempt to clear the sticky throttle connection. That seemed to work and he popped the bike back into first gear and opened the throttle further. The big chunky rear tyre threw up a fountain of turf clumps and lumps of mud.

  The only other occupant of the house paddock was Bessie the house milk cow. She looked up from her contented grazing with some concern at this bulky, bellowing apparition which was now coming in her direction. She trotted off along the fence line. Pete was finding the wide handle bars and the sheer bulk of the bike hard to control. He cautiously steered to his left, inadvertently following Bessie, who with some alarm broke into a canter.

  Bessie raced past the three of us, giving us a disapproving look in passing, as Pete completed his first half lap of the paddock, hot on her heels. Bobby's Dad yelled out as he passed, "Get to second and go a bit faster. It'll be easier to steer."

  Pete dutifully changed the gear to second. The bike responded with a wheel-spinning shower of sods and wobbled alarmingly. Pete gave it some more throttle and the bike steadied, as it leapt forward. Bessie bellowed in fear and broke into a gallop. Anybody who has any experience at all with cattle will not need to be told that she did not attempt to turn and evade the horror rapidly gaining on her but just maintained her panic-stricken gallop along the fence line.

  Pete steered and leant the bike to the left and gave it some more juice. He veered away from the fence and passed poor old Bessie easily. Feeling a bit more confident, Pete increased his grip on the throttle and then changed to third. There was another shower of mud and grass and the rear wheel bit and spun in response. A bit more throttle increased his speed and the bike steadied again. He managed a big grin as he came past us once more. We heard the revs pick up as he accelerated further. The bike surged forward. Pete was now prescribing a large oval as he followed his wheel tracks around the paddock.

  He passed us once again and, as he did, gave it some more juice. The bike responded as the powerful motor growled loudly in response. He was now leaning to the left and the bike was tracking nicely at speed. He shot past us again in no time. We heard him rev the motor a couple of times and then the revs stayed high. The bike was fairly flying now. He shot passed us once more. Bobby's Dad yelled, "Slow her down Pete!"

  Pete yelled something in return. The only word we heard clearly was an alarmed "STUCK!"

  "Shit!" pronounced Bobby's Dad, "Oh well, he'll just have to run it dry. How much fuel did you put in for the test run?"

  Bobby looked a bit sick, but answered, "We filled it up."

  "Shit! How much was that?"

  "Fifteen gallons."

  "Shit! He'll be going around the paddock for a week!"

  Pete roared past us once more, casting an imploring look our way in passing.

  I mentioned before that Pete lived on a farm without animals. Unlike most farm boys, who grow up on farms with lots of animals, Pete lacked exposure to the more common aspects of living on a farm. A particularly unusual result of that was manifested in his profound abhorrence to animal dung. He had a proper phobia in that regard. Over the years a few kids had played pranks on his weakness, but Pete's handiness with his fists had deterred other pranksters from venturing there again.

  As his number of laps increased Pete had started to carve a muddy track around the paddock. The bike was starting to slither and slide on the now bare wet ground. Pete realized that he needed to get back onto the pasture for more stability as he vainly tried to unlock the throttle and gear shift. As he turned to come towards us one more time Pete managed to jump out of the rut he had created and get the bike on the pasture once more.

  Now that he had been doing laps for a few minutes, the urgency of the situation had rapidly faded and the comic aspect had come to the fore. Bobby giggled. It was infectious. So did I. As he came toward us he presented a bizarre spectacle. His oversized thongs hung down and acted like wind scoops. As he hurtled along on the big old motor bike his flip-flops channelled a regular gale up his trouser legs. The many sizes too large overalls had inflated like a balloon with the air flow and pressure.

  Poking out of the gaping neck hole of the tightly bloated overalls, Pete's scrawny neck and head looked absurdly tiny, like a tortoise caricature. His grim old man's expression completed the picture perfectly. The three of us began to laugh hysterically. As he roared past Pete gave us a look of puzzled, angry sadness. We were laughing like lunatics. But, the best was yet to come.

  On his next turn toward us Pete was making an effort to avoid his wheel marks. In concentrating on that he failed to detect one of Bessie's better efforts. Bessie, I should add, had now wisely sought safety in the middle of the paddock, turning to keep face on to the orbiting Pete. She was plaintively mooing and pooing. The stress of the afternoon had brought on an attack of diarrhoea for poor old Bessie.

  However, the artefact she had deposited in Pete's path was from before that unfortunate development. It was a large, fresh, firm effort stacked up nicely. Pete's projecting left thong scooped most of it up in a split second transition, with a wet, resounding blop! The sudden impact, assisted by the wind flow instantly dispersed the mixture into a regular vapour cloud inside the ample free volume of his overalls.

  A large hazy green halo enveloped Pete's head. His cap was blown off. It went straight up into the air pursued by the expanding green cloud. There was even a green geyser out of each sleeve. It was amazing how long the green plume persisted.

  Pale, ethereal fountains of green streamed from his sleeves and vented chimney like up past his head. It took Pete a second or two to realise just what the green maelstrom inside his overalls actually was. Letting go of the handle bars he frantically tore open his overalls with both hands. It was not a pretty sight. His bony, lean torso glistened wetly with a dark, earthy green. You could not have done better job in a spray booth. We shrieked with laughter and staggered about. Bobby wet his pants even.

  Pete let out a despairing wail of horror and flopped off the speeding bike. The riderless bike continued on its way towards us, bouncing and bumping along like some sort of mechanical, headless chicken. In the paddock, Pete had regained his feet and was ripping off his overalls while still screaming in distress. Desperately he tried to wipe off the plastered green paste that covered him from head to foot.

  But our immediate concern was now the riderless bike, still speeding along and heading right at us. The laughter ceased abruptly
as the threat came rushing onward. The bike slowly developed a lean to the left and peeled gradually off to head towards the fence. Our sense of relief was short lived. Just as we thought the impact with the fence would bring the event to a close, the bike smashed into a solid strainer post.

  The impact did several things. It stood the bike upright once again and set it straight back towards us. What is more, the impact broke a fuel line and the bike quickly became a blazing meteorite. For good measure, a couple of strands of the barbed wire fence had somehow snagged on the machine. With its brute, powerful force the demonic, blazing apparition simply pulled two great swathes of writhing, twanging barbed wire from the fence posts. Faintly above the roar of the bike we could hear the musical sound of the barbed wire pinging free of the staples that held it to the wooden posts.

  "Shit! Run!" yelled Bobby's father.

  We scattered as the fiery burning monster roared back into the farm shed, trailing a wicked, flicking mass of barbed wire behind it. There was a resounding series of crashes as the bike cascaded off the benches and equipment in the shed. In no time the big farm shed was a roaring inferno. The shed doorway was effectively blocked by a gigantic metal tumbleweed of barbed wire. All we could do was watch as the shed was engulfed by the fireball.

  In the silence left by the now still motor we could hear screaming from the paddock above the crackle and whoosh of the flames. A stark naked Pete, smeared from head to foot with fresh dung was sprinting across the paddock pursued by one very irate milking cow. Every now and then she would gore his bony arse with her short but sharp little horns.

  Pete finally reached his goal. With a desperate leap, aided by one final jab from old Bessie, he leapt for safety onto the fuel stand. Scrambling up out of reach of the circling and still angry Bessie, he clutched at the metal latticework of the fuel tank stand.

  The Fire Brigade and Police arrived quite promptly. There wasn't much they could do about the shed which rapidly burnt itself out in a towering inferno that was seen from miles around. The big effort was peeling Pete off the fuel stand. He seemed to have suffered some sort of emotional meltdown. Having retreated into himself he hugged tightly to the metal stand and was unresponsive to all entreaties. It took the combined efforts of the Police and Fireman to prise him loose and get him into a waiting ambulance.

  Not unexpectedly, interest quickly centred on Pete. The Police, not to mention the neighbours and everybody else in the district, were keen to know why a stark naked boy, painted from head to foot in cow shit, was found in a mentally distressed condition clinging to a tank stand and suffering from a severely lacerated bottom. Rumours and theories abounded and caused a lot of grief to the participants in the episode. It is a firmly established colourful tale in that area to this day. At least Pete got another nickname out of it all. Folks now refer to him as the Pooper-scooper, but by golly he better not hear you use that name.