Boomerang Boy

G’Day for Flyin’, Mate!

So says the Boomerang Boy, Bandy Bob Bolo of Tibooburra, New South Wales, Australia.

Yes, when you’ve spent all your growing years in the Great Outback, more than 100 miles from any sizable waterhole, and a good 600 miles from Melbourne as the Spangled Drongo flies (but 7-1/2 days of aimless droving twixt termite towers and ragged rills, and down invisible sun-cracked trails by humvee), you’d try to find a way to fly, too, Boy-o!

‘Course, ol’ Bob here had a leg up. His folks were the famous Barney & Bathilda Bolo of McMasters’ Fantasy Carny & Travelin’ Circus fame. Why, they could just pitch themselves down the length of the Big-Top to trip up a capering clown or two — three nights a week and matinees on the Sunday!

But their bouncin’ boy, Bandy Bob, aimed a bit higher in life. (And he always liked to return to places he’d seen before.) So the boomerang move suited him to a T!

On a bright and baking Outback afternoon, you’ll often hear, over the droning trancelike tune of an Aboriginal didgeridoo in the distance, the whispering whuff!-whuff!-whuff! of Bandy Bob skimmin’ away over yer head.