Suburban Tales: Turtles and nudie runs

However Melbourne, it seems, breeds different levels of militancy in its testudines, because in the city’s far north-east, one turtle has thrown off the shackles of his oppressive suburban life and made a slow bid for freedom.

The Diamond Valley Leader reports libertarian reptile Kingston recently escaped - very, very slowly - from his pond, sparking a massive intra-street turtle hunt. His erstwhile captors - Shellie Drysdale and her children, Mitchell, 3, and 18-month-old Lochie - ended up posting photos and canvassing neighbours in an attempt to find their AWOL pet.

Kingston’s time on the lamb was not destined to last long, though he did waddle a commendable distance - he was spotted two weeks later across the street in another garden, and duly repatriated to the Drysdale household.

The story doesn’t end there though. Kingston soon went back to the free-or-die drawing board, and made good a second jail break.  The planning must have been better this time around, as the determined animal made it an impressive 500m before being picked up by a passer-by. 

His second great escape over, he was sent back to the family’s house where, presumably, he spent a week in the cooler repeatedly nudging a baseball at a wall. 

We turn now to old-guys-with-long-beards-dressed-in-sheets-and-muttering-about-Stonehenge news, and a happy couple who have turned their hand to handbinding. 

The Southern Star reports the couple, 19-year-old design student Alex and 16-year-old school lass Jenni, are about to undergo a pagan marriage ceremony of sorts, which involves tying a piece of string about their wrists, jumping over a fire and doing a goodly amount of chanting.

It’s not your typical walk down the aisle with a choice between the beef and the chicken and a front-row view of the family punch-up. And it’s not a ‘death or divorce do part’ affair either. Once the ceremony’s all done, the two are joined in emo-goth bliss for a year and a day. One assumes it’s the wiccan version of going steady.

Apparently the happy couple are planning a pilgrimage to Northampton in the old country, which is apparently the home of pagan culture. It’s a good claim to fame for the city - largely as Northampton isn’t really known for anything else.

While in the heart of the midlands, Alex and Jenni plan to step it up a notch with a 10-year-and-a-day handfasting ceremony, which should get them happily through both the seven-year itch and the cute guy from accounts payable stages.

Suburban Tales wishes the happy young couple well.

Lastly this week, we move to Sydney, where civic pride is back on display at Little Congwong beach. A beach where, according to the Southern Courier, a bunch of folk have nudded up and ferreted about the undergrowth looking for litter.

It was all ostensibly in aid of the recent Clean Up Australia Day, though the group’s main interest seems to be making the beach completely clothes optional.

The beach has held the slightly dubious title of an ‘unofficial nude beach’ since the late ’50s - a situation you’d understand would be fairly confusing for all concerned.

More recently though, tensions between clothes-free types and local pro-clothes residents have boiled over, to the point that the local jacks were called in to remove the nudists.

While the fight may be taking an emotional toll on both locals and hang-out types, there is an upside for any other community in Australia that is infested with refuse: provoke the nearby nudists, and wait for them to clean up your suburb as an act of protest.

Though as a public service, best you not ask them to clean up any areas that sport broken glass or bramble.  That would probably not end well.

Find more tales of glorious suburbia @suburbantales