Dei Est Mort

OK, so yesterday they packed old JP2 in a box and sent him off to heaven. Next up is the Conclave of Cardinals, where they pick the next guy. Conclave is actually a corrupted amalgamation of the two words 'cone' and 'cleave'. See, what happens is all the candidates names are written on the back of old TAB tickets and put into one of those pointy hats that Cardinals dig. The cardinals then cleave to cones. That is to say, they all get together in the sacred pope-picking palace and attach themselves to their billies and pull cones like madmen until the pope-picking palace is so full of smoke that it starts to seep through the colourbond over the rumpus room.
Outside, the huddled masses see this as a sign from above and do the harry inside to see who got the nod. When the assembled cardies hear the doorbell, they stash the billies and pull a name out of the hat. Whoever is on the ticket is officially a demigod until he dies. Or bans bingo.
So, in order to commemorate the passing of JP2 and celebrate the picking of JP3 (or Sextus or something), I thought that I would relate to you a long-winded, rather pointless story with no plot, purpose or ending; but which does involve the only Catholic service I ever attended.

In late 1984 I was living in sin in the Latrobe Valley with a girl of catholic upbringing. I was working as chemical plant operator in a small factory in Morwell.There were only four of us there; the manager, who looked like the wrinkled retainer who works in the accounts department in one of those British dramas of the forties or fifties. Then there was the maintenance bloke, a middle-aged pommy ex-bovver boy. As well as them, there was the truck driver, who looked like Warwick Capper, but was a bit sharper than Wozzer. Shortly before christmas, the boss turned on the grog and tucker first up in the morning. Before noon, only the truck driver and I were left standing. He rang his girlfriend to come get us and we adjourned to his place. I don't remember why, but I do remember that his girlfriend bred cats. They were fairly small with short, jet black fur, acid-green eyes and pointy little ears. The really noticeable thing about there appearance, however, was their fangs, which came down the side of the mouth like a sabre-tooth cat. They looked like the sort of cat Satan would have. Playful little buggers, though. A few more beers, then his girlfriend dropped me at my place, where I collected mygirlfriend and proceeded to the pub across the road from the railway station. We were going to stay with her mother for christmas and driving at that time of year was not an option, so we were taking the train. We had already missed the one we intended catching, so more beer while waiting for the next one seemed a reasonable idea.
I was somewhat slightly inebriated by the time we boarded, so barely touched the bottle of scotch I took with me. We got off at Flinders Street and Y&J's is just across the road... There was a stereotypical depression-era old digger at the other end of the bar - Second-hand suit jacket, knitted vest, rollies on the bar, the whole works and jerks. Full I of maudlin patriotism and respect for this grand old Aussie battler, I got the barman to get him a drink. When the oldster received his drink, he raised it to me and said in a surprisingly powerful voice "Och aye the noo. Dinnae gimme nae borrer, less I put ma' napper into yer heid. It's a broa' brick moonlick nick. Dinnae ye ken tha' ah woor thorsty? Jimmy."
Disillusioned we staggered outside to catch a tram to Elsternwick. We, I staggered, GF was only just starting to get wobbly. On the tram, I managed to get every single passenger - as well as the conductor - to sing at least one line of a christmas carol. This meant that I had won a bet with GF which was paid in carnal activities. I miss that woman, she had the morals of an alleycat. The personality of one too, sometimes, but nobodies perfect. Except me.
Anyway, we get to GF's Mum's place where we stayed for about a week. Several odd things happened over this time.
We were installed in a room with only a single bed in it - one of those beds with the bookcase style bedhead. Now these beds ore only held together by gravity - the bed frame has a short vertical rod welded on each side of the bed head end, these rods sit in sockets screwed to the bedhead. One afternoon GF and I were bored, so we retired to our room to do what married people do - argue about the position of the toilet seat. Actually, I meant we were having sex, but I'm shy. Things were getting a bit willing when the rods on the bed frame bounced out of the sockets on the bedhead. Much loudness, followed by a tap at the door; Mum, "Are you all right in there?"
Now I was at the stage where I wouldn't have stopped if I was made the replacement halfback instead of Jesus Christ for the Jerusalem Saints, so it was left to the GF to answer, "Ye-ess."
"Are you sure?" Doubtful.
"Oh God, yes!"
"OK...?" Sound of slippered feet shuffling off.
Also, at the Elsternwick pub (don't remember what it's called. On the corner of Glenhuntly Rd. and the Nepean Highway, anyway.) I met someone who proved that sometimes urban myths aren't really myths but facts; there was a woman there called the Breathalyser. She obviously didn't know the significance of the name or she was too port-addled to care, because she answered to it.
Finally, on Christmas Eve, we went to midnight mass. Funnily enough the church is just around the corner from the railway station, which is in Horne Street. I say funnily enough because right across the road from the railway station is The Daily Planet which the time was Australia's largest brothel. It probably still is. In fact, during the eighties or nineties the Planet* received the ultimate in business respectability - naming rights sponsor of a V8 Supercar team.
Any hoo, off we go to church. First thing I notice is some hippy wandering up and down waving an incense burner about the place. Next thing I notice is the priest, because he was wearing an outfit that would have made every drag queen who's ever been to The Albury green with envy. So we all pull up a pew and the priest starts spruiking. Fuck defy know what he was on about, it was in Latin or Swahili or something. He is interrupted mid-drone by about half a dozen skinheads who burst in the main door and start yahooing up and down at the back of the room. Some people turn and look - a couple checking their watches as if to check that the skins were on time - then turn their attention back to the drag - queen priest. The skins seem to lose momentum and after some perfunctory cursing, they shuffle off. The priest stops droning and some dude wanders down the aisle with a collection plate. Only it wasn't a plate, it was a deep, but narrow velvet bag on the end of a rod, so that collection guy was the only one who could access the money. And they reckon the Scots are canny...
In every pew there were a couple of people asleep. When collection guy came around, the number of sleepers increased dramatically, including GF and her mother. Collection Guy held the bag under my nose for a while, but I just looked at it, looked at him, then looked at the front again. I mean, the costumes were nice, but the singing was awful, the dancing non-existent and I didn't follow the storyline at all; no way was I going to pay for that show.
At one stage they were handing out bikkies and plonk down the front. Now I was dry as a Budget speech and hungry enough to chew the crotch out of a low-flying fruit-bat and I wanted to hook in, but GF wouldn't let me. You had to be in their gang or something.
That's it, I told you this story was pointless.
* I was going to use the abbreviation DP but... No.