The Cold War: Pub edition

When winter sets in, the only thing colder than the weather is the escalating battle of tall tales around the pub fire, writes John Longhurst.

ALONG WITH the other old blokes around the open fire in the pub, Bazza shuffled ever so slightly to make room for young Simon, who said:

“By gee, you old blokes must be feeling the cold.”

There was the odd bone creak in the silent and passive competition for heat from the open fire.

Mick, feigning nonchalance to the cold in shorts and thongs, steadied his shaking schooner with both hands and turned to Simon:

“Not really, young Simon. You need to toughen up a bit. It’s nowhere near as cold as it used to get.”

There were nods of agreement and old Bill cleared his throat:

“When I was your age, Simon, we used to gather like this around the fridge with the door open to keep warm. Now, that was cold.”

One man’s ballad is another man’s exit cue

As Mick reads his poetry, Bazza drifts somewhere between a schooner and the seasons, writes John Longhurst.

There were a couple of chuckles and Mick’s bald head was apparently trembling in agreement.

Old Bill sucked in a deep breath:

“That doesn’t even rate with the cold down Gundagai way. You see, there was this dog down there that used to piss on his owner’s tuckerbox...”

Simon’s jaw dropped:

“Hang on, Bill, that’s a tale about a dog being loyal and guarding his master’s food. There’s a statue and a song...”

Old Bill cut him off with a shake of his head:

Nah, stay away from that Google thing, Simon. The real story is this bloody dog decided to piss on his owner’s tuckerbox one night in mid winter and a cold snap froze it in the act. It was so cold that the dog remained frozen like that all winter. Well, every dog owner in the district brought their mutt to witness it as a lesson.

Now, the arts community being ‘the arts community’ thought it was a mystery ice sculpture by some kind of 19th-century ‘Banksy’ type artist, so it became a tourist attraction. Of course, come summer they had to build a statue, change the story and make up a song to keep the tourists coming, and save the good name of Gundagai. But the point is, that’s how cold it used to get.

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Timeless Tom’s long sigh broke the pause:

Ahh, you are all a bit soft. Crikey, Simon, when I was your age, we would call this weather spring. In ‘59, I was fencing for this bloke up the Clyde Mountain in the middle of winter. It got so cold that his wife used to grow ice flowers.

Anyhow, this bloke forgot all about me working one day and I had to spend the whole night in the back paddock. It was so cold that the moon even balked at coming out. By nine o’clock, there were stalactites of ice on the barbed wire fence I was trying to sleep under and that was before the real cold set in around midnight. By then, you needed an ice pick to blow your nose.

Mick’s knees knocked together and Simon let out a long:

“Bloody hell. How did you survive the night?”

Timeless Tom took a long sip and relished the short silence:

“Well, luckily, I had a spare cigarette paper I could use as a blanket.”

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John Longhurst is a former industrial advocate and political adviser. He currently works as an English and History teacher on the South Coast of NSW.