Goth Horror

I sometimes fantasise that just as in that classic about an enchanted toyshop where toys come out after hours to play and dance, that the product from Bunning’s shelves behave similarly once night fill and cleaners have left for the night. Chains becoming restless might shake and jingle encouraging hooks to climb down from there shelves to seek out eyelets who have better night vision. Spy holes might team with magnetic catches to neutralise the wowser motion alarms while springs naturally spring the dead locks giving free reign to the castors to roll their stuff. Barrel bolts and door stops, padlocks and wedges would set out hiding their stash from smoke detectors and like fly mesh accompanied by her ever present spline make their way to flooring in the hope that the electrical section might power another nights disco. There low life brooms and brushes who had already been imbibing of bleach and furniture polish, would literally peg their hopes on that old clothes line, to hit up in the garden stakes. Wheels and glides would dance with their favourite bolts and I don’t even want to think of what screws would be doing with washers before the night is out. Turps and thinners would no doubt be sponged up at these events, never more than by the sponges themselves. Then before dawn comes with its key in the door, all must hurry back to their allocated isles and barcode positions to slumber through the day as humble stock should.

This is the only explanation I can find for the placement of product I find each morning as I make my rounds, returning the aptly named returns like recidivist criminals to their cells. Wall vents too tired or exhausted lying with chisel sets. Wire coiled around sash cramps in post coital slumber. Screw caps discarded by fleeing screws in scented door snake side stacks. Ladders deprived of vitamin A by their internal, unnatural light upbringing, with sprains or broken legs from the nights exuberance. Is it any wonder that so many return from the cold servility of life on the outside to once more share this much missed camaraderie?

There are at Bunnings a considerable group of products that bear a close kinship to those stateless folk we hear of, condemned to spend their lives in transit or in transit lounges. These products born into this world for various reasons could be special orders (not stocked items) that the customer decides do not suit their purpose and return. They may have been promotional product whose only homes are side stacks, clip strips or those vast cardboard bins that clutter the main isles. When only a few of these are left or they have all been sold only to be returned there is no permanent home for them and they spend their lives in shopping carts wheeled out from the dock by excess cash register staff who knowing no better aimlessly wander the isles looking for their homes. Then with a surge of customers they are called to register duty, abandon the trolleys and wares which spend the rest of the day as obstacles till night fill under instruction from their rather severe co-ordinator Veronica, wheel them back to the dock. I know that you like I will feel a great compassion for these homeless wares and will appreciate what joy these late night shindigs bring to their lonesome unhappy lives.

Given this cast of characters and their controlled environment it’s no surprise that this idle mind begins constructing tales of their exploits. Mills and Boon like torrid passions between brutally handsome astro turf clad cordless grinders and frail, fair extendable clothes lines draped in almost transparent sparkling plastic table cloths. Hogwart like gate spring gurus so perfect that their design hasn’t changed in a hundred years give classes in meditation to young hollow wall anchors anxious to make heroes of themselves in the plasterboard pavilions of their world. My favourite though is a gothic horror tale inspired by a post stirrup in the shape of an arm length long auger tapering from Willy Mason bicep to a extremely nasty point on isle three. You get it, a horrible mythological construct from sleepers and shelf units with bags of concrete mix and grout to add muscle and stomach. I’m still struggling with the female lead who must of course be frail, fey and incredibly beautiful. She’ll come from somewhere over by the mirrors I’m sure but so far all I can find there are hot water services who may be cast as her mum.

Stay tuned to this station for the next instalment

Robert