maylands - the weights
tim had a big collection of dumbbells which he was always leaving out in the weeds to rust.
his cousin brady was into metallurgy at the time and for christmas brady gave him a set of big heavy discs that he'd had forged on the iron himself. no one knew how much they weighed. they didnt have numbers and were certainly too heavy for our kitchen scale. some of the smaller discs were heavier than the big discs and discs the same size often had radically different weights, even though they all appeared to be the same colour and texture. the homemade weights were very mysterious to me but not in an interesting way. i didnt really care and got sick of them being in the way all the time.
brady didnt give tim the metal rod for the discs so tim used an old wooden broom handle which was always in danger of snapping. if the two weights were radically different weights, the rod would turn diagonal when tim lifted and the weights would slide down and smash onto his hand or off the rod and onto the floor or onto his foot. still tim kept using them.
one time i accidentally ran tim's weights in my car which damaged by hubcap and tim had to find a new broom handle. i also accidentally ran over mike's coat-stand and a box of his coat-hangers. this was because i was evading the police.
i had just been fired from the firehouse restuarant and was driving home and had forgotten to turn on my headlights. as i slowed to turn left onto darby st from guildford, i saw a police car waiting oto do the opposite. i got that self-conscious feeling of guilt you get whenever you pass a cop, and aw shit, i turned my head light on. but i had forgotten that i only had one headlight working. fuck! i turned it back off, and then realised that it probably looked cheeky, like i was making my car wink at them, so i turned it back on, and as i turned onto darby, i saw my headlight illuminate the faces of the two frowning cops and as i passed them, their heads turned to follow me. then in my rearvision mirror i saw the car make a slow U turn. i went from 10k/s under to a subtle 5 k/s over, hoping to do it as smoothly as i could, and right as my home-street approached me, YOW, i hooked right and put my foot down firmly on the accelerator, and a moment later, heard the siren start and lights begin to flash, but UP, they disappeared into haze as i crested the hill, my foot fully down, my house 50 metres away and then YAH, into the driveway, blasting down the driveway and down the alley and over tims weights and through mikes furniture, stopping right before i smashed the hill's hoist. then, getting out the car i tore off my shirt and grabbed a flattened sunhat mike's coatstand and the snapped broom handle from the weights and up the alley i sprinted, striking a farmer-like pose of hoeing corn just as the screaming policecar burst past the house, the hogs in hot pursuit of my missing car.
i felt very clever and dastardly, like a mix between brer rabbit and ned kelly.
draft version??
down the alley, i was going over the crest of the hillhi sped up to a legal 5 k/s over the limit, and right as sherwood street approached me, YOW, i hooked right onto my street and sped up even more and suddenly ccame the YEOOOW of their siren and as i reached the crest of the hill with their red-blue flashes disappearing, i gunned it for 50 metres and then YAH, turned right and blasted down the sharehouse alley into the safety of the yard, destroying tim's barbell and a bunch of mikes furniture in the process.