Volks in the road

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Last updated on July 13th, 2017 at 12:27 pm

Of all Kevin Rudd’s biographical claims, most irresistable is his tale of sleeping in the family car:

• “Kevin Rudd has spoken about sleeping in the car one night because he and his mother didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

• “They were forced to hop between relatives’ houses, relying on the ‘bleak charity of the time’, he has been reported as saying, and had to bed down in the family car at least once.”

• “When his dad died in 1968, when Rudd was 11, the family was thrown off the land and he vividly remembers having to sleep in a car with his mother and siblings as she desperately sought accommodation.”

• “His mother Margaret was evicted from the farm and the family, while searching for a home, slept in a car before finding temporary accommodation.”

• “Apparently facing eviction from the farm and with nowhere else to go, his mother, Margaret, was forced to sleep overnight in a car with two of her four young children.”

It’s a nice story, but it lacks the detail needed to elevate it beyond “interesting factoid”, which is where George Washington’s cherry tree fable would reside if it merely involved a non-specific tree. Did the Rudd clan, back in 1968, sleep in a humble EH Holden? Perhaps an early Australian Falcon? Their sub-sub-compact size would appear to rule out the Lightburn Zeta and Hillman Imp, but who knows; Rudds might be unusually compact themselves.

Answer: none of the above. The ABC’s Tom Iggulden revealed the Rudd mystery car last year:

His mother, left alone to care for her family, was forced to leave the farm. For a while they lived in the back of their Kombi van.

In this case, added detail actually diminishes Rudd’s tale; the lad, his mother and a sibling turn out to have slept (for one night, according to most accounts) in a Volkswagen van – not a car – easily large enough to be slept in (hippies have known this for decades). As a childhood tragedy saga, The Legend of Kevni’s Kombi is a little on the roomy side.

(Via San Diego’s Larry Faria, whose search for Kev’s kevan initially led him to the site of astrologer Ed Tamplin, who – unlike many media pros – seems to have accurately predicted the past)

Posted by Tim B. on 12/09/2007 at 12:33 PM
    1. Haven’t all Aussies traveled in a fried-out Kombi since they all come from the land down under?

      Posted by Some0Seppo on 2007 12 09 at 12:54 PM • permalink

 

    1. I once lived in a Kombi van for a month touring the South Island of New Zealand.  Little did I know that this could be the springboard of a political career….

      Posted by kpom on 2007 12 09 at 12:57 PM • permalink

 

    1. Even if not by choice, I would think camping out one night in a van with your family would be a pleasant adventure for most kids and a pleasant memory for most adults.

      Posted by Redd on 2007 12 09 at 12:58 PM • permalink

 

    1. Isn’t the family of the landlord objecting to the portrayls of their father as a cruel landlord that unfairly evicted the Rudds?

      Posted by Redd on 2007 12 09 at 01:01 PM • permalink

 

    1. we had a simpler version of one of those.  i remember one camping trip to cape cod, we were forced to sleep in the van.  we also spent sometimes several days in a row travelling from one post to another during the summer.  no wonder i am often restless and feel deprived of a normal life. *giggle*

      Posted by missred on 2007 12 09 at 01:09 PM • permalink

 

    1. My parents used to take us camping, and they didn’t own a tent, so we often slept under the stars.  When it rained (which didn’t happen often in Texas in the summer), we slept under a tarp strung between trees.  Once we camped in the mountains of Colorado, and it got cold, so we snuggled in the back of a Buick station wagon.  We even did that a couple of times when we moved from one crappy oilfield town to another, until we could rent a house.  I didn’t realize till I was nearly grown that not everybody had that experience.

      Posted by RebeccaH on 2007 12 09 at 01:23 PM • permalink

 

    1. I myself have fallen asleep on a sofa.

      Posted by rhhardin on 2007 12 09 at 01:29 PM • permalink

 

    1. I was forced to sleep in a 1967 Alfa Romeo Duetto Spider once.

      Not that it means anything to anyone but me, but just thought I’d get it out there now, just in case.

      Posted by rinardman on 2007 12 09 at 01:35 PM • permalink

 

    1. Our ancestors, U.S. and Oz alike, spent quite a lot of time sleeping in the family conveyance. That’s why we’re great.

      Posted by Dave S. on 2007 12 09 at 01:37 PM • permalink

 

    1. Haven’t all Aussies traveled in a fried-out Kombi since they all come from the land down under?

      Well, I guess if you didn’t have a head full of zombie, then it’s a tragedy.

      Posted by Dave S. on 2007 12 09 at 01:40 PM • permalink

 

    1. Christ, are future politicians going to speak of their hardscrabble twenties when they often couch-surfed?

      I guess if you didn’t grow up in a white-picket-fence suburb, go to a good college on scholarship, and land a cushy gig after graduation, you were grist for a fuckin’ Steinbeck novel.

      Posted by Dave S. on 2007 12 09 at 01:43 PM • permalink

 

    1. OK, I’ll stop talking now.

      Posted by Dave S. on 2007 12 09 at 01:44 PM • permalink

 

    1. RebeccaH: when I became an adult (well, passed the age of twenty—whether that qualified me as an “adult” remains to be seen) I used to tell my friends tales of childhood camping trips with my parents, when I and my sister would sleep in the back of our ancient station wagon while my parents would sleep in my dad’s moldy old army tent, and I would get looks of horror. And it’s not that I made friends with the five-star hotel set either; it’s just that Miami has a lot of non-Southerners living there who don’t get that whole “outdoors” thing.

      Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 12 09 at 01:58 PM • permalink

 

    1. I had a VW Vanagon years back.  Every freeway entrance ramp and subsequent merge into traffic was a white-knuckled, hair-raising, primal-scream-inducing “adventure.”

      There really is no sensation quite like seeing a 45K pound Semi Tractor-Trailer rig growing ominously in the rear-view while you are completely powerless to accelerate.

      That van took decades off my life, I’m sure.  It’s a miracle I survived the damned thing at all.

      I understand the Prius has a similar life-shortening acceleration-deficit-disorder.

      Posted by Hucbald on 2007 12 09 at 02:26 PM • permalink

 

    1. I slept behind some bushes once.

      Put me in charge.

      Posted by richard mcenroe on 2007 12 09 at 02:27 PM • permalink

 

    1. #13, it’s just that Miami has a lot of non-Southerners living there who don’t get that whole “outdoors” thing.

      I hear you, Andrea.

      Posted by RebeccaH on 2007 12 09 at 02:36 PM • permalink

 

    1. I slept in a Volkswagen Beetle once. Fortunately I woke up before the car ran off the road.

      Posted by ErnieG on 2007 12 09 at 02:43 PM • permalink

 

    1. I’ve slept in the back of a Ford Anglia.

      Wet camping trip.

      Most uncomfortable.

      If I was a kid it would have been much easier, being smaller and all.

      #17 I’ve also slept in a Holden Gemini. Not my car, good thing I woke up as I ran off the road…

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 03:30 PM • permalink

 

    1. Hmm,

      Kevni’s tale leads us to a VW Van.

      The VW van leads us to Ferdinand Porsche.

      Ferdinand Porsche leads us to Nazi Germany.

      Nazi Germany leads us to Adolp Hitler.

      Gadzook’s that must mean……<shudder>

      Kevni Rudd is the love child of Adolph Hitler!

      Posted by joe bagadonuts on 2007 12 09 at 03:33 PM • permalink

 

    1. I fell asleep in the back of a Ford Escort panel van at Chullora Drive-in.

      Twice.

      Posted by Pogria on 2007 12 09 at 04:17 PM • permalink

 

    1. O/T but too funny to pass up:

      Marine Humor (commentary on the MSM—-enjoy)

      Posted on 12/09/2007 12:10:20 PM PST by Kimmers

      Dan Rather, Katie Couric, and a tough old U. S. Marine Gunny were all captured by terrorists in Iraq. The leader of the terrorists told them that he would grant them each one last request before they were beheaded. Dan Rather said, “Well, I’m a Texan; so I’d like one last bowlful of hot spicy chili. “The leader nodded to an underling who left and returned with the chili. Rather ate it all and said, “Now I can die content.”

      Katie Couric said, “I’m a reporter to the end. I want to take out my tape recorder and describe the scene here and what’s about to happen. Maybe someday someone will hear it and know that I was on the job till the end.” The leader directed an aide to hand over the tape recorder and Couric dictated some comments. She then said, “Now I can die happy.”

      The leader turned and said, “And now, Mr. U. S. Marine, what is your final wish?” “Kick me in the ass,” said the Marine. “What?” asked the leader? “Will you mock us in your last hour?” “No, I’m not kidding. I want you to kick me in the ass,” insisted the Marine. So the leader shoved him into the open, and kicked him in the ass. The Marine went sprawling, but rolled to his knees, pulled a 9 mm pistol from inside his cammies, and shot the leader dead. In the resulting confusion, he jumped to his knapsack, pulled out his carbine and sprayed the Iraqis with gunfire. In a flash, all the Iraqis were either dead or fleeing for their lives.

      As the Marine was untying Rather and Couric, they asked him, “Why didn’t you just shoot them in the beginning? Why did you ask them to kick you in the ass first?”

      “What,” replied the Marine, “and have you two assholes report that I was the aggressor?”

      As Capt. Sal LeBlanc U.S.M.C says, “I can only Imagine.”

      Got this from my USMC son today and thought it worth sharing….

      Freeper by the tag of Kimmers posted it at Free Republic.

      Posted by Grimmy on 2007 12 09 at 04:18 PM • permalink

 

    1. I once spent 5 months in a 10 tonne metal box, the inside of which never dropped below about 30C. They should make me President of the effin’ Galaxy for that!

      Posted by CB on 2007 12 09 at 04:29 PM • permalink

 

    1. In 1968 weren’t most parents hippies, happily bringing up their kids in Kombi vans on their long roady tours?
      The Rudds really WERE nerds, even then…
      He even misses this chance to appear hip..

      Posted by Barrie on 2007 12 09 at 04:57 PM • permalink

 

    1. One night in a combi?

      Fuck.  In the seventies my family (six of us) spent three months in a 15 foot caravan.  It was all we could afford for a while.
      Until now I had never thought of it as unusual privation.

      Posted by entropy on 2007 12 09 at 05:11 PM • permalink

 

    1. It’s a van and it was for one night. Think that Rudd’s tale of an impoverished upbringing in the back of a car will turn out to be a camping trip that was called off afer one night because little Kevin got scared. Might explain the mystified looks on his siblings’ faces when this tale first appeared.

      Posted by Contrail on 2007 12 09 at 05:16 PM • permalink

 

    1. You’ve all gone off the deep the end. Do you really think it makes any substantive difference to the story whether they had a sedan or a van?

      Even if not by choice, I would think camping out one night in a van with your family would be a pleasant adventure for most kids and a pleasant memory for most adults.

      “Facing eviction, with nowhere to go, one night my family had to sleep in a car. Ha ha, good times, good times!”

      Posted by Jefferson Skates on 2007 12 09 at 05:18 PM • permalink

 

    1. I suspect, JS #26, the problem is that Rudd has centered so much of his life story around it.  It must be “seared, seared” into his memory.  I wonder if he at least got a Magic Hat (TM) out of it?

      Posted by JorgXMcKie on 2007 12 09 at 05:23 PM • permalink

 

    1. Don’t you dare knock veedubs!
      I discovered girls on the back seat of my old Krautenwagen. Great memories.

      Posted by Bonmot on 2007 12 09 at 05:25 PM • permalink

 

    1. #27, JorgXMcKie:

      Sounds kind of fishy. Any van that could make it up the Mekong into Cambodia for Christmas might be worth a CIA commemorative hat. But I suspect the road worthiness would suffer from the water proofing requirements.

      Posted by Grimmy on 2007 12 09 at 05:38 PM • permalink

 

    1. I gotta be in Brisbane for the rest of the week, staying on south bank. Any RWDB’s want to meet up for a quiet ale?

      MarkL
      Canberra

      Posted by MarkL on 2007 12 09 at 05:39 PM • permalink

 

    1. A gogo mobile?

      Posted by 1.618 on 2007 12 09 at 05:44 PM • permalink

 

    1. Mr. Skates (#26) has proven himself to be somewhat lacking in humor and comprehension before.

      Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 12 09 at 05:54 PM • permalink

 

    1. #26
      It’s curious how others who were adults then, or much older than Lil’ Kevvie, have very different memories of what happened.When I was that age, and I am only a year younger than Kevvie, my parents, particularly my mother, sheltered me from any ‘nastiness’ of the real world.

      I never watched the news, nor did I know about the terrible things which went on in the world. Didn’t Kevvie’s mum protect him, too? Or is he remembering what he’s ‘overheard’? Little piggies have big ears, remember. A child’s take on events can be vastly different to reality – look at situations of parents separating. Many kids blame themselves, perhaps they’ve been naughty and that’s caused it? Who knows what Kevin thought, as a child, about what he may have overheard, or thought he heard.

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 05:55 PM • permalink

 

    1. I once fell asleep trying to drive a few hundred Kms after night shift. I pulled over and opened the door of my Rodeo ute and streched my legs out.
      I woke about 5 hours later feeling like satan himself was using my feet as a pinata. I hadnt counted on my lilly white feet beeing slow roasted on a 40 degree day. I actually got blisters on the soles of my feet, and the top looked like pork crackling.Thats my resume for a front bench position..

      Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 12 09 at 05:57 PM • permalink

 

    1. MarkL
      Your email isn’t working.

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 05:57 PM • permalink

 

    1. #34
      Owch, frollicking.
      You’ll shit it in with those qualifications.

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 05:58 PM • permalink

 

    1. 32. Mr Skates comprehension is on display at comment 22. in Andreas link.

      Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 12 09 at 06:10 PM • permalink

 

    1. And that story doesn’t explain how his single mum managed to send him to a private school, then pay for a uni education.  How did this guy end up a labor man?

      Funny how:

      1. evicted straight after the funeral – becomes 6 months

      2. father killed by hospital doctors – becomes father drunk drove into a tree and was dead anyway

      3. had to live out of a car for 2 weeks – becomes 1 night in a combi

      His brother says kevin’s “recollection” is much too coloured by his desire for acceptance by his peers.

      Also, he met the NZ pm at his home in brisbane yesterday.  While waiting in 30 degree heat / humidity, little kevin said “that’s just another day in brissie”.  I held my breath, waiting for the “oh, we’ll just have a cup of tea on the balcony” line, as I needed to vomit (bad egg), but was disappointed.

      Can Rudd please note, as prime minister, we expect a little decorum, a little statesmanship, a little toughness, and I for one am sick of hearing about “brissie” (even us brisbanites don’t call it that), his cups of tea, his “ordinary” days, and his limp wrist / speech / manner.

      You are PM of the country – start acting like it ffs!

      Posted by peter m on 2007 12 09 at 06:14 PM • permalink

 

    1. A kombi is a campervan, right. Well, around here we’ve always called campervans and caravans Kevin Kennels.

      Posted by Tony.T.Teacher on 2007 12 09 at 06:15 PM • permalink

 

    1. When I was between the age of two to four years, we were forced to live in a caravan about 6’x4’
      My father was working on defences round Britain and though I do not remember it well my poor late mother endured dreadful privation in her first years of marriage.The Caravan was lodged in a frozen snow covered field during one winter outside of Carlisle. The caravan had no insulation and with a small kero heater for warmth the van was running with water day and night- no toilets only a bucket outside and no where to wash clothes or self and dependent on locals to help out which apparently they did as people pulled together during wartime.

      This was no one night in a warm clime as was Kevin’s sad tale and how many had to live to escape bombing also and round the world today many live similar existences.
      I cringe to see this creature representing me – preening himself like a capon who thinks he’s a rooster He won’t even make a decent feather duster. However the Chinese might have some use for him as they seem to like deep fried chicken’s feet.

      Posted by Hillyminx on 2007 12 09 at 06:27 PM • permalink

 

    1. I slept a bit over 8 hours last night on a king-sized waterbed. There is water in the rain gauge this morning so apparently it rained during the night.
      I have no idea what the temperature was outside because my house is air-conditioned.
      I just hope that I will still be able to enjoy all this easy livin’ at the end of Mr Rudd’s first term in power.
      (I have resisted telling you all about the many nights of hardship I endured in the back seat of my 1940 Buick.)

      Posted by Skeeter on 2007 12 09 at 06:54 PM • permalink

 

    1. #14
      My friend used to sit and sit and sit until there was a HUGE gap for her to get into the traffic, or turn the corner.One day I asked why she waited so long and took such a large gap to get into the traffic.

      She told me “One learns patience when driving a Kombi.”

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 06:59 PM • permalink

 

    1. I spent 2 years living in a campervan when travelling around Europe.  It wasn’t even fitted out and just had a board with a thin mattress on it.  I wanna be Prime Minister!

      Posted by Cashew on 2007 12 09 at 07:14 PM • permalink

 

    1. I used to sleep in the park. Auditioning for disability in this country is hard.

      Posted by mythusmage on 2007 12 09 at 07:26 PM • permalink

 

    1. I once slept on sheets that didn’t have a 310 thread count. That was a tough night I can tell you.

      Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 07:28 PM • permalink

 

    1. #45 The horror, the horror…

      Posted by CB on 2007 12 09 at 07:36 PM • permalink

 

    1. #30- Tried to reply to your email but it keeps bouncing- I’m about and free most evenings this week. Send me a working email or ctc # and I’ll try to organise something, should be able to lure a few other reptiles out into the searchlights of Blightograd with the prospect of a pissup.

      Posted by Habib on 2007 12 09 at 07:41 PM • permalink

 

    1. Frollickingmore: grumble, I forgot the exact link. There, that should do it.

      Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 12 09 at 07:43 PM • permalink

 

    1. #30
      A time, a place and a counter-sign.

      Posted by lotocoti on 2007 12 09 at 08:15 PM • permalink

 

    1. O/T With all this climate hysteria, the nutters are sure out in force these days.  Have a read of this tosser!!!

      Baby tax needed to save planet, claims expert
      A WEST Australian medical expert wants families to pay a $5000-plus “baby levy” at birth and an annual carbon tax of up to $800 a child.

      Baby tax needed to save planet, claims expert

      Posted by casanova on 2007 12 09 at 08:18 PM • permalink

 

    1. Hmm. Habib, kae, I’ll send an email with my work email on it.

      MarkL
      canberra

      Posted by MarkL on 2007 12 09 at 08:20 PM • permalink

 

    1. My bad. Old email, now changed.

      MarkL
      canberra

      Posted by MarkL on 2007 12 09 at 08:23 PM • permalink

 

    1. Kev’s just warming us up for the next revelation.

      He was born on an organic dairy farm, where his parents ran an eco friendly B&B as a sideline. The milk from the dairy was sold each week at the Eumundi market to the Noosa holiday crowd.

      On the night of his birth, there was no room in the farmhouse, as the rellies were up on holidays. They were Country Party members and complete bastards.

      There was no room in the B&B either, as they had rented it out to a mob of doctor’s wives for the weekend.

      Kev was born in the cow shed, amid lowing cattle and a sheep. The donkey was, thankfully, quiet on the night.

      Three wise men, obviously from interstate, turned up in a ute intent on interfering with the doctor’s wives. They brought gifts comprising a carton of XXXX Gold, a bottle of Old Spice and some soap on a rope.

      Kev grew into a fine boy and all went well until the dairy industry was deregulated and the organic dairy job went arse up after some doctor’s wife from Melbourne claimed she got syphillis from drinking the unpasteurised organic milk and sued Dad Rudd.

      The Maroochy Shire Council imposed stringent regulations on B&B’s and home birthing suites, so the B&B went arse up as well.

      When his father died, the family was very poor, having swapped the carton of XXXX gold for an old Kombi van and sold the personal hygiene products at the Eumindi market. His mum sent him to the market to sell the last cow. Kev sold it for a handfull of “beans”. His mum got fair up him about this, but he said pull your head in mum, you swapped a good carton of piss on this rooted old Kombi, so don’t give me any of your gob.

      The “beans” grew into fine plants that gave up about a kilo each (trimmed and cured) which Kev then sold to “the man” at the pub across the road from the Eumundi markets.

      Thus, Kev and family overcame early difficulties, by way of diversification, management of agricultural risk and niche market targeting and began the long march toward the lodge.

      Next: Kev goes to war

      Posted by Pickles on 2007 12 09 at 08:25 PM • permalink

 

    1. wait ‘til someone tells Bob Brown this is the Kombi
      in question- oooh he’s gonna chuck a hissy fit when he finds out!

      Posted by eeniemeenie on 2007 12 09 at 08:26 PM • permalink

 

    1. Habib, email sent with work email on it. Kae, I can’t send you an email as your account does not allow it.

      MarkL
      canberra

      Posted by MarkL on 2007 12 09 at 08:29 PM • permalink

 

    1. #8- I once konked out in the “rear seat” of a 1970 1750 GTV after a particularly refreshing evening- woke up looking like a pretzel and probably still have back spasms and rhumatoid arthritis as a result. We also managed to get seven people into it one night for a drunken trip from St Lucia to the ‘Valley to see some shithouse band- weaved past three carloads of Plod without the slightest interest being shown- perhaps Alfa Romeo were an early pioneer of stealth technology.

      Posted by Habib on 2007 12 09 at 08:32 PM • permalink

 

    1. It’s fixed, MarkL. Email away.

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 08:32 PM • permalink

 

    1. I was onced forced to spend the night in a deluxe garden view room because the deluxe ocean view rooms were all taken by the attendees of a climate change conference.

      Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 08:42 PM • permalink

 

    1. Being a Navy brat in the 50’s, my family suffered our share of deprivations.  Never knew it, though, because my parents never let any of the adult problems touch the children.  I think that shows much greater respect for kids than today.  I join the commenter above in wondering if Kevin’s mother, instead of making the situation an adventure for the kiddies, burdened them instead with her victimhood.  No matter how the story goes, it doesn’t make Kevin look good.

      Rebecca, your tale of camping trips remind me so much of our own trips when we were home on leave (Oklahoma and Texas–great lakes in both states!).  The kids always slept on a pallet on the ground, our parents slept, not in a moldy army tent, but on moldy army cots, all of us enjoying sleeping under the stars.  Those trips still form some of my favorite childhood memories.  Is there a better breakfast than biscuits baked in a cast iron dutch oven buried in the coals, bacon, eggs, and fried potatoes and onions cooked over the campfire?  Not for me.  I can still smell it all.  Yum.

      Posted by saltydog on 2007 12 09 at 08:44 PM • permalink

 

    1. You and your shrivelling agenda are out. So why do you still bother? Can’t be the cash, though I note there’s no ads for right wing detritus on this site anymore. You never have revealed who bankrolls this exercise in dill-brained agitprop. Wager it would make more compelling reading that this drivel on Rudd.

      C’mon, tell us before someone else spills the beans for you. Do they pass round the hat for you at Janet Albrechtsens’s dinner parties? Surely Rupert isn’t forking out for this brave adventure in moral panic.

      Posted by Miranda Divide on 2007 12 09 at 08:45 PM • permalink

 

    1. I must confess that I have some empathy with the family sleeping in a car thing.

      Our family, mum and dad and four kids (one a baby in a cane bassinet, with hand knitted safety blanket) slept in a Humber Hawk one night in 1970 in the table drain beside the road about 15 miles south of Tamworth.

      At least the old man had the decency to go to sleep at the wheel about 1am and roll it four times first.

      Posted by Pickles on 2007 12 09 at 08:45 PM • permalink

 

    1. Forgive me if I seem like I’m dragging this thread off topic but I just followed Andrea’s link to the “stolen generation” thread and I noticed two posters asking about the white kids that had been involved in the “stolen generation” controversy.

      There is no further elucidation and nothing about white children (well of course mixed race Aboriginal/White are just as much white as they are aboriginal but I’m not sure that’s what the posters meant) can anyone help me out with a brief explanantion?

      Posted by Harry Flashman on 2007 12 09 at 08:46 PM • permalink

 

    1. #60 – You never have revealed who bankrolls this exercise in dill-brained agitprop.

      He gets a buck everytime he fucks with your mind. He’s rich beyond the dreams of avarice.

      Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 08:47 PM • permalink

 

    1. #60 – actually, since Kevin 07, there has never been more to talk about, agenda wise.  But, I guess, shrivelling and Miranda go hand in hand.

      Wager your jealousy is working overtime.

      Posted by peter m on 2007 12 09 at 08:55 PM • permalink

 

    1. Harry Flashman
      It was quite common for children to be taken from “unfit” mothers or parents, no matter what their colour.
      It was also quite common for children to be taken by the Church from white mothers, especially single mothers. Or the single mothers were forced or coerced into giving up their babies.

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 08:55 PM • permalink

 

    1. Tiger,

      I’m right!!!

      As soon as our precious troll Miranda notices that you’re posting more than once, she zooms in hoping you’ll take notice.

      She definitely has the hots for you mate!
      woo hoo!!!

      Posted by Pogria on 2007 12 09 at 08:56 PM • permalink

 

    1. Harry

      Federal Court Sumary

      Posted by Pickles on 2007 12 09 at 09:00 PM • permalink

 

    1. #66 – I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that the mention of Miranda causes a stirring in my trousers. Of course it could be the beans I had for breakfast.

      Posted by Infidel Tiger on 2007 12 09 at 09:02 PM • permalink

 

    1. You never have revealed who bankrolls this exercise in dill-brained agitprop

      I thought it was common knowledge that Blair relies on funding from a mix of sources including MOSSAD, the CIA, the Elders of Zion, Sargon of Akkad (thanks to wronwright) and the Sith Lords of the Galactic Empire

      Posted by eeniemeenie on 2007 12 09 at 09:06 PM • permalink

 

    1. In a Kombi? A Kombi? Heck, I’ve slept on the ground rolled up in an old overcoat, with a bit of firewood under my head. Should I start drawing up the list for my first Cabinet?

      Posted by EdwardM on 2007 12 09 at 09:08 PM • permalink

 

    1. #28 Tiger,

      ooh! you are awful, and hysterically, screamingly funny.

      Plus, I hope you can recommend a good screen cleaner. I was having lunch when I read your response.

      Oh god, I can’t stop giggling. I think I’ll have a lie down.

      Posted by Pogria on 2007 12 09 at 09:17 PM • permalink

 

    1. #70 In his 20s Nicky once slept beside is motorcycle on the side of the road.

      Perhaps he’d qualify as transport minister in your cabinet EdwardM?

      Posted by The Thin Man Returns on 2007 12 09 at 09:17 PM • permalink

 

    1. Damn!! I meant #68!!!

      Posted by Pogria on 2007 12 09 at 09:17 PM • permalink

 

    1. #70- Did likewise at a motorcycle rally in mid-winter in a valley paddock halfway up the range between Bellingen and Dorrigo, after swilling several bottles of Stones green steam infused into cans of Tooheys Old; woke up with my upper torse coated in ice while my lower extremities were virtually in the bonfire that’d been going all night (depleting lots of old growth), and the soles of my boots had melted and my socks had scorchmarks. I had to light a fire under the crankcase of my Norton Commando as the oil had turned the cosistency of junket and the kickstarter was frozen solid.

      We then rode up the range to the Dorrigo pub to top up- what terrible deprivation, like the 6th army fleeing Stalingrad.

      Posted by Habib on 2007 12 09 at 09:20 PM • permalink

 

    1. #72 Thin Man: well, he’s obviously familiar with both roads and wheeled conveyances, so he must be qualified for the job… if not overqualified!

      Posted by EdwardM on 2007 12 09 at 09:24 PM • permalink

 

    1. #26 Jeff, the point is that Kev makes sleeping in a car sound like a terrible hardship. But it’s not, if it’s a Kombi van.

      Many people here have slept in Kombis and other assorted cars, and out in the open, and none of them have been eaten by bears or dingos. Why should it be viewed as a terrible hardship when it wasn’t?

      Posted by Ash_ on 2007 12 09 at 09:27 PM • permalink

 

    1. #74 Habib – Stones? That’s brought back some bad memories. That stuff used to go down too easily, and take me down with it. Daren’t touch it these days.

      Posted by EdwardM on 2007 12 09 at 09:29 PM • permalink

 

    1. I must have missed the point of this, but why the fascination with Kevin Rudd’s childhood? Yes, he was forced to sleep in the family van when they were evicted from their house. Yes, we even know what type of car/van it was.

      Now where is the story?

      Posted by John A on 2007 12 09 at 09:32 PM • permalink

 

    1. I’ll bet all these guys wished they’d had a car to sleep in that night.

      Posted by Pogria on 2007 12 09 at 09:35 PM • permalink

 

    1. #78
      Because Kevin made a big hoo-har about it.
      Then wanted to un-do the hoo-har when some of his stories were found to be, well, stories.We’re supposed to feel sorry for him.
      We’re supposed to see him as a battler.

      Honest Kevvie.

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 09:37 PM • permalink

 

 

    1. #78 The story is that he made it relevant to the election in order to be seen as a battler. He also made the farmer who owned the farm seem callous and uncaring, when it was in fact Rudd that skewed the timeline.

      The whole story was a beatup by Kev to make it seem like Kev suffered greatly in his childhood. So now that he’s been elected, we should be able to continue watching the story and get hours of amusement out of his bullshit.

      Posted by Ash_ on 2007 12 09 at 09:39 PM • permalink

 

    1. #80
      and was it this or some other story that he threatened the journalist over, saying that if the story was told he’d do something or other to the journalist?Sweet Kevvie.

      linky

      Posted by kae on 2007 12 09 at 09:44 PM • permalink

 

    1. I once had to sleep two nights in the back-seat of a 1956 Chevy station wagon.

      With a girl.

      That I’d met three days earlier at California Jam.

      And the owner of the car had bought a whole bunch of really good weed in LA.

      She dumped me a couple days after we got back to T-Town.

      I was 17 at the time.

      Oh, the horror, the horror.

      Posted by David Crawford on 2007 12 09 at 09:47 PM • permalink

 

    1. #60; I’ve heard rumors that Blair and Rupert fleeced all that blog money from Janet.

      Posted by dean martin on 2007 12 09 at 09:58 PM • permalink

 

    1. #53, I nearly choked on my lunch.
      BTW, there is a job for you, writing the PM’s speeches.

      Posted by Honkie Hammer on 2007 12 09 at 10:00 PM • permalink

 

    1. When I was a chiled we couldn’t afford a car.
      We needed to flag down passing cars when we wanted to sleep.

      Posted by Honkie Hammer on 2007 12 09 at 10:02 PM • permalink

 

    1. Tiom, you are being faaaaar toooo Australian for me to keep up here. Let me just say that the goddam climate will change, Mr. Fanuite

      Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 12 09 at 10:04 PM • permalink

 

    1. #87, Honkie Hammer:

      When I was a child, we were so poor we had to run along the side of the road yelling “vroom vroom” and pretend we had a car.

      To sleep, we had to lay in a straight line in the center of the road so passing cars would fan us with the breeze of their passing.

      Posted by Grimmy on 2007 12 09 at 10:07 PM • permalink

 

    1. “Breathes there a biker with soul so dead,
      From gargling Stones, never went off his head?’Famous among ageing motorcyclists, Stone’s Green Ginger Wine was renowned throughout Oz in the 60’s and 70’s as a liquid substitute for such poofy things as wet weather gear or wooly jumpers, as it was guaranteed to raise the body’s core temperature at least 20 degrees per bottle consumed.

      For our American friends and those under 40 y.o.- Stones Green Ginger Wine

      Posted by Pedro the Ignorant on 2007 12 09 at 10:09 PM • permalink

 

    1. #90 Pedro,

      I always have Stone’s in the pantry.

      You don’t know how great pork chops can be until you’ve pan fried them with Stone’s Green Ginger and a dash of soy sauce.

      Same with prawns. mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

      Posted by Pogria on 2007 12 09 at 10:17 PM • permalink

 

    1. Stone’s Original Green Ginger Wine is well known for its distinctive flavour and traditional recipe.

      ‘Nuff said. On the one hand, I’m terrified, on the other hand I feel like I have to track it down and try it.

      Miranda: My, that’s some mighty gratuitous vitriol you’ve got there. I would have thought you’d have had that little festering bile retention problem drained by now.

      Posted by Dr Alice on 2007 12 09 at 10:42 PM • permalink

 

    1. You and your shrivelling agenda are out. So why do you still bother?

      He does it because it is soooo satisfying to make your sphincter pucker, Miranda my dear, and we love to help him.

      Posted by RebeccaH on 2007 12 09 at 11:25 PM • permalink

 

    1. Dear Dr. Alice,

      I have this “little problem”, would you suggest a pin, good laxative, or putting my head up my ass IF I could get it that far.

      Oh wait, scratch the last one, it is there, already.

      Signed,
      Miranda Divide

      Posted by El Cid on 2007 12 09 at 11:33 PM • permalink

 

    1. #94 I should have known not to click that. I should have known!

      Posted by Ash_ on 2007 12 09 at 11:37 PM • permalink

 

    1. A finalist in the Big Butt Olympics.

      Posted by ErnieG on 2007 12 09 at 11:56 PM • permalink

 

    1. 94.
      I suggest in this case the mountain COULD come to Mohammed.Damn thats a lot of donuts and daytime TV right there.

      Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 12 10 at 01:02 AM • permalink

 

    1. I once fell into a drunken stupor in the back seat of an RX-3, and awoke at 3am to find the slightly less-drunken driver slowing down to go through a red light – at 180 km/h.

      Thought it wiser to go back to sleep.  I didn’t want to know.

      Apart from that, I have spent in the back of:

      – several varieties of Ford Falcon
      – Transit Van
      – Datsun Bluebird stationwagon
      – Hillman stationwagon
      – Commodore
      – SAAB
      – a small BMW
      – numerous other British cars
      – Landrovers, Landcruisers, ACCO’s and Unimogs

      I’ve even slept in some of them.

      Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 01:22 AM • permalink

 

    1. 53 Pickles you bastard-I am having enough trouble with my bladder sphincter and you have to write that-

      Thank God for global warming the carpet will have a chance to dry out.

      Posted by Hillyminx on 2007 12 10 at 01:27 AM • permalink

 

    1. Hey, Habib. You ‘round tomorrow nite?

      MarkL
      Canberra

      Posted by MarkL on 2007 12 10 at 02:27 AM • permalink

 

    1. No way! A Kombi?
      How disingenuously this story has been told. That’s a crucial omission, right there. Kombi vans are practically made for camping in.

      Posted by Apple77 on 2007 12 10 at 02:47 AM • permalink

 

    1. It is always delightfully amusing when we let our little pet troll, Moronda, out to caper and cavort in the bright sunshine for our amusement. This time, the Moronda has excelled itself!

      You and your shrivelling agenda are out.

      Why yes, Moronda. This is called “democracy”. And soon enough, the luvvies will be out too, in a term or two or three. This is also called “democracy”.

      So why do you still bother?

      Well, Moronda, mostly for the amusement value. You see, mon petit cretin, if your neocommie fellow travellers had a sense of humour, you’d have had a fun time mocking we conservatives over the past eleven years. But because you are instead consumed by hatred and bile, you have had no fun at all. It’s all been as dreary as a speech by Kim Jong Il – your hero. Now you will have a negative fun quotient, as you have nobody to blame or hate in government. Your side is in charge, even if the Kruddster is actually proving to be a pretty good Conservative-lite PM so far. We are already having a blast pointing and laughing at the latest comedy: Kruddster and the Komical Kommie Komrades. Garret gagged – priceless! ALP espousing conservative foreign policy and economic values – EXCELLENT!!

      Can’t be the cash, though I note there’s no ads for right wing detritus on this site anymore. You never have revealed who bankrolls this exercise in dill-brained agitprop.

      That would be because, like the fabulously pea-brained Margronk of Kingston, your grip on reality is so loose that you actually believe blogs take $40,000 every six months to run. This is ‘neocommie blog economics’, and the subject of uproarious hilarity among us all. A small hint: they don’t actually cost that much. But do not tell the Margronk.

      Wager it would make more compelling reading that this drivel on Rudd.

      This comment demonstrates that you are a particularly retarded neocommie: utterly unable to understand the terms ‘fun’ or ‘humour’. That is, all by itself, very funny.

      C’mon, tell us before someone else spills the beans for you. Do they pass round the hat for you at Janet Albrechtsens’s dinner parties?

      Tee hee! You seriously believe that stuff about blogs costing tens of thousands a year to run. Priceless!

      Surely Rupert isn’t forking out for this brave adventure in moral panic.

      Bwahahahahahaha! It DOES seriously believe that! What a hoot! Stop it, stop it, my sides are aching already….

      MarkL
      Canberra
      VRWC member and forty-six evolutionary steps above Moronda demi-sapiens

      Posted by MarkL on 2007 12 10 at 02:59 AM • permalink

 

    1. #100- Sent you a smoke signal, thurs would be better for me.

      Posted by Habib on 2007 12 10 at 03:07 AM • permalink

 

    1. Luxury…There were 7 of us in a Fiat Bambino
      Tell that to kids today and they won’t believe you.

      Posted by Irobot on 2007 12 10 at 04:16 AM • permalink

 

    1. If Miranda thinks it is so bloody useless for us to keep going, why did she bother during the 11 long years of the Howard Ascendancy?

      I comfort myself with the thought that we will not be wandering in the wilderness anywhere near that long.

      Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 04:42 AM • permalink

 

    1. #105, Ah, but we don’t have the giant papier-mache puppet heads to help and console us. Never underestimate the power of the giant puppet heads.

      Posted by squawkbox on 2007 12 10 at 06:24 AM • permalink

 

    1. #60

      “I note there’s no ads for right wing detritus on this site anymore.”

      Actually, I don’t like those ads either, and I kinda miss the nekked PETA ads myself.

      Posted by entropy on 2007 12 10 at 06:56 AM • permalink

 

    1. #106 – squawk, that settles it.  If it’s papier-mache heads that we must build, then it is time to go the mattresses!

      Posted by mr creosote on 2007 12 10 at 07:43 AM • permalink

 

    1. Traveling in a fried-out Kombi
      On a hippie trail, head full of zombie
      I met a strange lady, she made me nervous
      She took me in and gave me breakfast
      Well Kev’s mum would do that for him, wouldn’t she? Probably made him a vegemite sandwich too.

      Posted by Zoe Brain on 2007 12 10 at 09:15 AM • permalink

 

    1. You say you want a revolution Volkswagen?

      Try this:
      http://www.ronpatrickstuff.com/

      Posted by mojo on 2007 12 10 at 11:24 AM • permalink

 

    1. #89,

      Ha! When I was a kid we couldn’t afford roads. We slept beside game trails. To cool off on hot nights we would pray that deer and wolves would wander by and take… [Too much information]

      Posted by mythusmage on 2007 12 10 at 11:30 AM • permalink

 

    1. #111 Hi Mythusmage, I’m here from the Australian Labor Party. We’re currently looking for new people to put into jobs at the ABC, and with your past history, we think you’re ideal for a position…

      Posted by Ash_ on 2007 12 10 at 11:49 AM • permalink

 

    1. #110 Mojo, that is sweet!!!

      Posted by Ash_ on 2007 12 10 at 11:56 AM • permalink

 

    1. Our family travelled around Europe in ‘69 on the return-end of a Missionary stint on the sub-Continent – in a VW Kombi that we picked-up in Amsterdam.  Us boys slept in it, while the parents and older sister had the tent.  Hell, didn’t everybody do that?
      We always begged dad to stuff a Porsche-six in the damn POS because it was so dreadfully, scarily slow – white-knuckle on ramp indeed.

      Posted by -keith in mtn. view on 2007 12 10 at 05:34 PM • permalink

 

    1. #110 – Now that is some vehicle.

      Hmmm, the car has two engines making the car a hybrid so maybe we can drive in the commuter lanes along with the Toyota Priuses.

      Posted by Zoe Brain on 2007 12 10 at 08:30 PM • permalink

 

    1. Yeah, I’ve slept in Ford Falcons, Chevy Corvairs, Toyota Corollas, Chevy Vans, Ford Vans, Army deuce and a halves, rowboats, sailing dinghies, on beaches, in the desert, in tents and under the stars, in hammocks…

      That must make me some kind of statesman.  Whaddaya think, Secretary General of the UN, maybe?  Finally, first class hotels on somebody else’s dime!

      Oh, and can anyone give me a compelling reason why I ought to be miserable just because Miranda can’t be gracious in victory?  That is my problem, how, exactly?

      Posted by Steve Skubinna on 2007 12 11 at 12:18 AM • permalink

 

    1. I had my own bed to sleep in every night of my childhood. But I did have to share a room with my brother – surely that would qualify me for a junior ministry? Department of Left-handed Curling Wands, perhaps?

      Posted by SwinishCapitalist on 2007 12 11 at 06:14 AM • permalink

 

  1. By the way MarkL & Habib do you boys slum to the extent of drinking with lawyers?

    Posted by Just Another Bloody Lawyer on 2007 12 11 at 08:17 AM • permalink