Random reminder

Press, 4 March 1981, Page 22

Random reminder

GNOMADIC

Now it can be told. The Reminder; does not quake at covering the! waterfront. Ceaselessly pitting itself; on behalf of the small man (in this 1 case, the very small man) against the ' awesome forces of bureaucracy, I obfuscation, and the common herpes; virus, in whatever form they may be! found, the Reminder does not shrink i from speaking out. Today we name the. guilty man. Er, well, at least, today we i mention a couple of. unnamed, guiltymen whose storj' dwarfs anything our I investigators have unearthed, ; jeopardising Tasman relationships ‘ between garden ornaments of our] cousin countries in their selfish, but j amusing, search for dark and dubious I anti-dwarf japes. Driving north from Sydney towards I a tour of Queensland, according to? information that has fallen into the ■ hands of the Reminder’s Insight team, j two young men noticed in a northern j suburb a fine collection of garden' gnomes. Unselfishly, they decided to! give the perkiest-looking gnome a i.i holiday. They took the gnome and]

drove on. At a town near the New : South Wales-Queensland border they i stopped and, using an instant Polaroid camera, they took a picture of their guest sitting on the town’s well-known war memorial. They sent the photograph, with a note, “Having a wonderful time. Wish you were here.” to the gnome’s home ' address, which they had noted when abducting him. This was the pattern for the holiday. Years of sweating over a hot fishing pole next to a goldfish pond soon faded in the gnome’s memories as his benevolent captors took him on a whirlwind tour of the fleshpots of Queensland, diligently photographing him at well-known locations and sending the photographs back to his home with the note, “Having a wonderful time. Wish you were here.” The three returned south, and as they passed the gnome’s home, the two young men stealthily replaced their holiday companion near his pond with the other gnomes. His face they had painted a nice tanned brown, and they left him wearing a new pair of sunglasses.