A friend of mine who works in the legal profession made a short post this afternoon in which she related the following tidbit of info:

So, my building and most of Phillip Street, including the entire Court building was evacuated just before lunch over a bomb threat.

Accordingly to SMH, it was a fishing tackle box accidentally left behind by a forgetful fisherman.

The post made me immediately recall a great part of my childhood, so I sent the following response:

Mind you, if it was the sort of fishing equipment that my friends and I used to use when we were 13 years old, then evacuating the building was exactly the right thing to do.

When I was a kid, I counted myself lucky that my parents owned a house that backed on to the Georges River. If I was bored and it took my fancy, it would take me no more than five minutes to go from lazing around the house to cruising about on the river in an eight foot aluminum boat with a 4.5 horsepower engine.

I kept company with a group of about eight kids, all of whom owned similar boats and at least once a month , winter or summer, we'd cruise along all 30 kilometres of the Georges River, from Liverpool Weir to Botany Bay, looking for new places to pitch tents and set up campsites.

Boat license? Screw that - it was the early eighties and no one batted an eyelid over a bunch of kids cruising about a river.

The areas that we discovered were always isolated islands or generally inaccessible parts of national parks.

Now when we set up a campsite - we well and truly Set Up A Fucking Campsite.

My tightly-knit, aquatic convoy of pubescent deviants weren't satisfied with merely building a campfire and pitching tents. Oh no, too easy.

Once we'd identified a suitable spot, we'd go into hardcore, military mode and begin our plan of attack. We'd set out at six in the morning, our boats loaded not only with with tents, deckchairs, hammocks and provisions, but shovels, picks, rakes and fucking lawnmowers.

We'd spend the entire morning landscaping the campsite until it met with out satisfaction.

Those guys on "Backyard Blitz"? Bunch of pussies. We were hardcore, little SOBs.

Once we'd set up shop, then it was time to relax, laze about in hammocks, do a little underage drinking around a campfire and enjoy a spot of fishing.

There was nothing more satisfying then cooking a fish you'd caught and prepared yourself while sitting around a campfire at night with a bunch of like-minded juvenile delinquents. Good times.

We used to fish the traditional way, with rods and hooks and lots of sitting on a riverbank and waiting. Until one day, my buddy Peter watched a film that showed a bunch of Vietnam-era soldiers using hand grenades to catch fish.

Their method was simple and effective - toss a grenade in the water, wait for the inevitable Ka-Boom and within thirty seconds a bunch of freshly tenderised, stunned fish would float to the surface, just waiting to be scooped up with a net.

We listened to Peter's story. We were 13 years old. Our eyes widened as though we'd just stumbled upon the meaning of life.

13 year-old boys just love to Blow Shit Up. We're stupid like that.

In these days of anti-terrorism laws I'm reluctant to post our recipe for home-made grenades on the intertubez, but let's just say it involved jam jars, chlorine and a couple of readily available chemicals.

And they worked. Holy shit, they worked. Looking back, it's a wonder we all escaped unscathed, alive and intact.

Our method was simple - toss the 'nades in the water and FIND COVER IMMEDIATELY.

Chemicals? Four Dollars.
Jam Jars? Free.
Getting to scream "FIRE IN THE HOLE" like it actually meant something?

Beyond priceless.

Still to this day, whenever I hear the term "stunned mullet", it brings back an irreplacable set of childhood memories.

SD