Kevin Rudd called Julia Gillard into his office one day and exclaimed, "Julia, I have a great idea! We are going to go all out to win the country voters. And I know exactly how we can do it."
"Good idea Opposition Leader, how will we go about it?" replied Julia.
"Well," said Rudd, "We'll each get ourselves one of those Driza Bone coats, some RM Williams boots, a stick and an Akubra hat, oh, and a Blue Cattle dog. Then we'll really look the part. We'll go to a typical old outback country pub and we'll show all the locals we really enjoy the bush. That will win them over."
"Right," responded Julia, "let's get started."
Days later, both kitted out and with the requisite Blue heeler in tow, they set off from Canberra in a westerly direction. Eventually they arrived at a typical outback pub, just the place they were looking for. They both self-consciously walked in with the dog trotting behind and fronted up to the bar.
"G'day mate," said Rudd, to the bartender, in his best Aussie style, "two middies of your best beer please."
"Good afternoon, Opposition Leader," said the bartender, "two middies of our best coming up".
Gillard and Rudd stood leaning on the bar drinking their beer and chatting, nodding now and then to those who came into the bar for a drink. The dog lay quietly at their feet.
All of a sudden, the door from the adjacent bar opened and in came a grizzled old stockman, complete with stockwhip. He walked up to the Cattle dog, lifted its tail with the whip and looked underneath, shrugged his shoulders and walked back into the other bar.
A few moments later, in came another old stockman from the same bar as the first. He walked up to the dog and lifted its tail, looked underneath, scratched his head and went back to the other bar. Over the course of the next hour or so another four or five stockmen came in and, after lifting the dog's tail, went away looking puzzled. Nobody said anything.
Eventually, Rudd and Gillard could stand it no longer and called the bartender over.
"Tell me, mate," said Rudd, "why did all those old stockmen come in and look under the dog's tail like that? Is it an old outback custom or something?"
"Strewth no!" exclaimed the barman. "It's just that someone went 'n told 'em there was a Cattle dog in this bar with two arseholes!"
Wed Jul 04, 2007 2:38 am