And De Fun Don't Done Read Free

through the security check and seated on Q Flight 21 to Los Angeles.
    Despite all the joking with Warren, Les wasn’t all that keen on his holiday in America. Anybody else taking their first trip overseas, armed with plenty of money, would probably be jumping up and down in the one spot. But not Norton. He was quite happy to see the rest of the winter out squirrelled away in his nice warm house at Bondi. Americans he’d met, with their loudmouth, know- all attitude didn’t turn him on at the best of times, and thebloke he was going over to meet wasn’t a close friend by any means. The closest thing to a wrap you could put on him would be to class him as a tolerable, possibly likeable dill, who had been the object of their derision and who was repaying Les a bit of a favour. Oh well, thought Les, at least the other part of the trip he had planned could be interesting; if he went through with it.
    Norton was still a bit lucky though. The two seats alongside were unoccupied so he had plenty of room to spread himself out. After they were airborne and he’d finished some orange juice and a bit of a snack he’d been served Les had a rummage through his overnight bag. He was travelling fairly light. Just his travel documents, two Cherry Ripes, a couple of magazines, a Walkman and six tapes he had made up, and a book, Parliament Of Whores , by an American writer, P.J. O’Rourke. Les figured it might be a way of boning up on a bit of American culture. Norton wasn’t a great reader at the best of times, but he knew after the last book he read this would be a snack. The book he’d finished was called The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail . Billy Dunne, of all people, had insisted he read it. It was a documentary; a 600-page brain crusher written by two professors and a journalist. Les had to get Warren’s dictionary to understand half the words in it and it almost gave him headaches at times reading it. Once Les got into it, though, he could hardly put it down and towards the end he even left a couple of parties to go home and finish it. The authors had written the book almost by accident. The journalist had started off trying to find out how, at the turn of the century, this unknown French priest, getting around $20 a year wages, had managed to build a huge library almost as big as a castle, a mansion for him AND his servants, pave all the roads and rebuild half the houses in the small village where he lived in the South of France. And live a lifestyle comparable to Michael Jackson. It turned out he was blackmailing the Vatican because by deciphering the headings on old gravestones when he had nothing to do, then digging up the floor in an old church, he’d found outwhat actually happened to good old Jesus Christ when he was supposed to have died on the cross. Evidently J.C. baby kicked on a bit longer, knocking out about half a dozen kids around France and Spain before he decided to trip upstairs to see his dad. The priest didn’t kick on all that much though. Even though he’d never had a day’s sickness in his life, and was renowned for his health, he died mysteriously at thirty. The journalist and the two professors had found out the little priest’s secret and had written a fantastic book about it. Though not such a fantastic book if you were a Catholic or a priest, thought Norton when he finally finished it. Les settled back and began flicking through P. J. O’Rourke; and Les was right. After the other one, this was like reading a Little Golden Book. Though a hell of a lot funnier.
    Having never travelled overseas before Norton couldn’t say if the flight was good or bad; it was like a domestic trip only bigger with more flight attendants. Whatever it was, it wasn’t all that enjoyable. They gave you plenty of snacks and things to keep you happy and the Lamb Apricot dinner was nice, but it hardly touched Norton’s sides. Consequently his stomach was rumbling