The Art of Gnome hunting.
For those of you who enjoyed the Tamgotchi and the Furbies they were overrated. They constantly needed attention while eating $5.00’s worth of Duracell batteries. You have to feed them fake food, entertain them and clean their ditigalised poop. And worst of all you have to pay for them.
When it comes to true blue Aussie version of the Tamawhati and Furbdurb nothing beats having your own stolen pet gnome child to love, cherish and proudly show off to friends and family. Now that is a trophy to be proud of.
Like most typical Australian frowned upon sport entertainments, there’s an art to it. You can be a mediocre stumbling douche or you can be the suburban ninja-the guy who knows all the right tricks, has the grace of Italian stead and the balls of an American pit-bull.
The casing of a suburban street for these treasures. Driving slowly, creeping in your old dodgy Ford Focus like a pedophile scouring a kiddie crashe. The adrenalin rush of kicking a maltizer terrior across a yard and going in for the steal, the grabbing of the golden snitch before Slytherine clubs you to death with a beater and knocks you off your broomstick. This is a real Australian sport.
It was in December 2011 I experienced my first gnome snatching. It was a warm summer night and I was cruising the suburbs. The night made me feel invisible. There was no one around. There was first a failed attempt of trying to snag a black cat off the road. Just to see if I was quick and sneaky enough to physically catch it and so I could get an outrageous facebook post to rape peoples news feed with.
Feeling the scorning wounds of defeat I went to drive off home, tail between my legs… yet the irony was I didn’t have a tail as the cat with its tail still attached did get away. But in my slow depressing roll down a random street, no different from any other street- I saw it. Next to a red brick letter box was this little lifeless beared man. A street light made it glow to look like a holy grail, it was godly, it was chosen for higher purposes, I had to have this Jesus hypnotizing artifact. My eyes glazed over. Id have heard of people taking gnomes before… it sounded simple, it was an easy target, not too close to the main house and there were no fences in the way or blood thirsty guard dogs.
I pulled my car up to the curb, leaving the keys in the ignition for a quick get away and then a violently dashed from the car and went in for the kill.
My first trophy was a red hattered rosy cheeked little happy man who I christened Neville Gnome.
To me Nev is my child and I’m his mother. And like a good parent I dropped him. He didn’t bleed to death like a real child would, which was kinda nice but he did break into multiple pieces, enough for me to doubt if he could survive such intense injuries.
But I stuck him back together. If something’s broken- you fix it.
He’s since escorted me to work at the pub and considered to be part of the team, he’s made it through 6 different customs in international airports, been on boats, planes and has meet people from all other the world and has a Facebook page showing pictures from all his glorious adventures. He’s a trophy which I’m proud to show off to the world.
There have been other gnomes I’ve added to the collection, not as significant as Neville and me being the great ‘parent’ I am, I’m not afraid to admit I have a favourite child. In my gnome hunting career I’ve learned a few things and picked up from mistakes.
Always walk past the house first- this tests for sensor lights, alerts you for dogs and gets you all in the mood for it like when a Hawk circles its prey, your top of the food chain in this scenario.
When you drive around during the day keen eyes peeled for gnome houses to visit later at night.
If there are dogs bring bacon to distract it- this depends on how badly you want the gnome, may also suggest sleeping pills or ratsac to be hidden in the Bacon if you want a cleaner job.
If your caught by a gnome owner- play the ‘im drunk, your not my mum!’ –card and run away and pray they believe in gun control.
Have an accomplice- if things go pear shaped and you need a quick get away this is where safety in pairs comes in handy, if going to the bathroom in primary school taught me anything it was the need for an extra person plus-with a valid drivers licence and car are gold in times of need.
Have a costume. This makes it more intense. Wouldn’t recommend a flanny and balaclava in the instance that you are caught out and found by the police and saying you were only going to steal gnomes isn’t always believable. My choice of attire is a bear hat, its comfy and keeps me warm and I can use puns like my gnomes skills are unbearably good and its hilarious.
If you DO take pictures of the nights hunt and put them on facebook and you do know the person who you stole from…. Disable them from you feed.
I do recommend holding the gnome ransom and sending questionable photos to the victims family in an effort to get free candy. If they don’t reciprocate then you know you did the right thing for taking it in the first place. Or you get a free feed or free gnome, check mate you win.
Swaping gnomes with others IS hilarious. It causes confusion for the owners and makes you just all rounderly awesome and you get a ‘get out of hell free card’.
Being drunk does make it more hilarious- but puts you at a disadvantage as your sensors aren’t clear and you may drop and smash your new innocent gnome friend and no one want that.
And lastly have an EPIC playlist to get you jazzed up for your adventures and feel free to change the words to songs to be more fitting for the nights activities like ‘I would steal 500 gnomes’, ‘total eclipse of the gnome’, ‘Gnomes just wanna have fun’ and ‘If you wanna be my gnome you gotta get into my car, stealing you is so easy but that’s the way it is’. Are prime examples.
Like anything, it takes practice and time to become successful at something. Eventually you will gain an army of gnome children and have heaps of outrageous stories to tell and pass down to your gran kids.. which you don’t actually need to have as you will have hundreds of gnome children to love and it wont cost you a penny!
But once you ace the art of gnome stealing your pretty much a pirate of surbia. Like any pirate the bigger the ship, the bigger the crew the bigger the booty you will get.
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