Brett and Taylor had enjoyed a most amicable friendship for almost a decade. However, there was an ever-present simmering resentment that was slowly breaking down the sinew of their relationship.
This resentment came from a disagreement over the correct regional slang to use for the humble chicken parmigiana. Brett told The Bell Tower Times,
“This farken idiot reckons it’s parma. I’ve tried to school him on it for years but he just won’t get it through his thick farken head mate. I’ve had a gutful of it, he’s always embarrassing me at the pub. I’m done with him”
Indeed, Taylor harbours a dark secret. One that Brett is aware of but was assured it wouldn’t affect his ability to function as an upstanding member of Westralia – he was born in Melbourne.
Taylor moved over to WA when he was 8 but it appears that almost a decade in parma-jurisdiction had done “irreversible damage to his developing brain”, in the words of Brett.
Brett mangled a can of Emu Export with the rage of a man with stage 5 blueballs. He continued,
“It all came to a head during a weekday sesh at the pub. I guess I was feeling a bit patriotic as we were talking about iron ore. Taylor then interrupts me to ask if I wanted him to order me a parma. To be honest, I snapped mate, felt it was disrespectful to me, WA and iron ore as a commodity”
A bartender on duty witnessed the awkward dust-up as a half-cut Brett got in Taylor’s face asking him to pronounce it parma one more time. Before launching into a lengthy diatribe that Taylor was in parmi-country now and if he didn’t like it, he could pissoff back to Smellburn.
Taylor had also had enough of his mate’s intensity over the regional slang. He told us,
“I don’t understand why it bothers him so much, I don’t mean to disrespect iron ore or whatever he accused me of, it just comes naturally to me. Dad’s a full-blown Melbourne fancyman and we have a weekly parma. It’s just in my DNA”
We understand that Taylor’s nonchalance about the issue is what fuelled Brett’s raging inferno. With John, another friend told us,
“It’s the indifference that kills him. Brett believes you either live for something or you die for nothing. He legitimately can’t understand why Taylor doesn’t give a shit about this inane bullshit”
John is on thin ice himself with being a vocal advocate for preferring the chips underneath the parmi, “soaks in all the flavour, mate”. He also floated the idea of his two friends meeting in the middle and just calling it a parmo.
Brett didn’t speak to him for 4 weeks following the suggestion.
Documenting the Human Zoo is thirsty work, so if you enjoyed what you read how about buying Belle a beer, ay?