for those who haven't heard this yarn.....It's about me and Ben James...
As we left after our first time at the lake and I was in Ben’s Volvo , Ducati on a trailer on the back and Dik in his Chev truck behind us Ben turned to me and said “ you know Stew, I only went because I said that I would , you know ,that I told you that I would, even up to the last day before we left because you know it was bloody hard work getting everything organised and it cost me a fair bit of money” . I wasn’t quite sure what to say because I had hassled him to get involved and I did have an ulterior motive for it , “ so , what do you mean Ben?” …he replied “ well , even if you die Stew , I’m coming back next year ….that was the best fun I’ve had in a long time!” We both burst out laughing , he was right it had been expensive and exhausting but we’d found something that we knew was going to be a big part of our lives. Ben continued chain smoking while he drove and I sat there taking in the scenery, nursing a hangover and turning over the events of the last week .On the rough and corrugated dirt road ahead of us I could see an emu standing stock still staring at us , “emu Ben” , “Yeah Stew” he said but I didn’t feel the car react “ emu Ben” , “yeah Stew” once again I felt no deceleration as I thought of my deaf grandmother who’d say the same thing to me when I was little just so I’d be quiet, I glanced over, Ben had a ciggie in his mouth and seemed a million miles away although he was looking straight ahead to where the rapidly approaching emu was still standing smack bang in the middle of the road , head turned toward us. “ #### emu Ben!” , “shit!” the car crossed up a little but slowed just enough for the emu to trot off the road . Ten or fifteen kilograms of body on legs over a metre tall is not the kind of thing you want to hit at 100 kilometres an hour . Ben hasn’t been allowed to forget the incident which is now well known throughout the club , and will for a long time to come be reminded with “emu Ben”.
...few understand what I'm trying to do , but they vastly outnumber those who understand why..
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