And sow it came to pass

I was taking my blighted knee* for a recuperative lollop this evening, when I happened upon a municipal tablet, which tablet proclaimed that I stood on the site of Preston's first factory. A button works, perhaps? A toothpaste tubery? A dark Satanic treadmill mill? Alas, no. My feet were planted on the sullied earth of an erstwhile bacon manufactery, est. 1862. For a moment there I thought I could hear the little grunts and squeals of piggy-wig ghosts, speaking in mid-Victorian Melbourne dialect, and then I realised it was the 86 tram struggling along Plenty Road.

I thought I knew Preston. I'd read the bit in Loaded where Christos Tsiolkas explains that Preston is where you go if you want to have sex with Turkish men in toilets. There's a perfect amenities block not a minute's walk from my front door.

But noone mentioned that I'd be haunted by the avenging spirits of the porcine and the wronged.


* No longer so blighted. I am pained to admit that the surly doctor was in the right when she shrugged off my queries about amputation and told me to sod off and rest it for a week.