Australia's Joke

Australia was this 65-year-old hitman-looking guy from Australia who used to ride the train with us in a stylish black leather jacket, and he had this joke he did over and over again until all of us starting repeating it with him whenever he did it, and then eventually all I had to say was the first few words of his joke and everybody would start laughing.

We'd be on the train together and you know how the conductor will speak over the PA on the train and declare "Next stop, beautiful downtown Lemont!" or whatever to tell everybody what the next stop was, that was what triggered it, the repetition of that day after day until we had it all memorized, there were a couple towns on the route that were just godawful shit-holes and it was kinda funny to hear the conductor say how beautiful they were 'cause you know he couldn't possibly be honest or anything about it so that sorta called all of his other PA Opinions of Town Beauty into question even though some of the other towns were actually pretty cool looking y'know its like listening to him lie about how beautiful your town was just made things worse for the people who had to get off in the crappy towns 'cause that's where they lived.

Yah, the conductor saying that crap in his cheap little prison-guard uniform with a smile on his face and his eyes twinkling and his keys jangling day after day made him seem like some kind of creepy claymation cartoon character in a Twilight Zone Episode that you couldn't trust fer shit ahaha.

Anyways, once you guys got off at your shitty town (so that you couldn't be offended), Australia would always do this "First prize is one week in beautiful downtown Lemont! Second Prize is two weeks in beautiful downtown Lemont!" routine while imitating the way the conductor sounded on the PA (and just about everybody who ever had to ride a train to work for any amount of time can imitate their conductor perfectly, that shit gets burned into the back of your brainpan after being subjected to it day after day after day).

That's why I only had to say "Second Prize is two weeks..." in my version of the train conductor's voice and everybody would laugh.

And because that was sorta like an inside joke, y'know, 'cause you ain't got enough information unless you heard the whole thing before, I could do that bit as we pulled up to a shitty town and the people who lived there wouldn't have any idea of what I was talking about but everybody from the stops farther down the route would be laughing.

Yah that's awful and evil or whatever but that's what makes it funnier, y'know, when you are covering your mouth and making those weird hitching noises while yer trying not to laugh ahaha.

Australia was a good-hearted guy so his face would turn all red and his eyes would be watering from how hard he was laughing-while-trying-not-to-laugh even though I took his joke and made it way the hell more awful and stuff by changing the timing of the thing.

Like, what the fuck are you gonna do about it anyways, y'know?

Damn ugly town might as well be worth a laugh to somebody ahaha.

Hey, I didn't live in a good looking town either man.

And I never said anything like everybody else did on the train about how all the people from Lemont looked they were related to each other and it was weird how they were so awful to each other in the parking lot y'know I was one of the good guys man I hardly talked any shit at all compared to all the old ladies and everybody else!

Actually Lemont was one of the prettier towns I just used them 'cause saying the real names of the shitty towns involved seemed like adding insult to injury and shit.

Well, actually Lemont was that town where everybody looked like they were related to each other and they were all mean and pushing each other out of the way and acting like little kids in the parking lot but I was talking about everything I said aside from that.