biff
Rock n' Roll Doggie Band-aid
From Willie's wonderful diary, about the night after the Brisbane show:
"We did a runner back to the Versace Mansion after the show, all relieved to have got the ball rolling again. There was a nice hospitality set up at the hotel, right on a deck overlooking the harbour. It was a beautiful night, full moon, the whole bit. By about 4am there were just a few of us left up; Bono, me and half a dozen of the female tour staff. It was decided that we should go for a night stroll, so we headed to the marina. Sadly, there was a large security gate between us and the boats, secured with an electronic lock. As a joke we started trying our hotel room keys in the lock and to our surprise and delight one of them opened the gate. Striding along the jetties between the enormous private yachts, Bono was asserting “you know, you’d be surprised how many people leave the keys in the boats”, so I knew trouble was brewing. It turned out that on the Gold Coast keys are not necessarily left so liberally strewn around boat yards, so it looked for a while like we were going nowhere, but by this time the idea of being out on the inky black water was so delicious that there was no going back. In the end the only vessel we could find to liberate was a small rubber dinghy, no bigger than a bathtub. Telling ourselves that it’s not the size that counts, we gleefully jumped in and squeaked by the gigantic yachts either side. There were just three of us in the little boat, Bono, Catriona and me, slipping through the water and out into the vast blackness of the harbour. It was almost perfectly still, the moon behind streaky clouds, and not a sound to be heard other than the swish of the oars through the rippling water and the distant cries of “Are ye feckin’ mad or WHAT…?” coming from our friends on the rapidly receding quayside. In the midst of this idyll I was overcome by a sense of great nostalgia. I haven’t been involved in any major boat-stealing since the headed days of Zoo TV. (And don’t worry, we put it back after the sun came up.)"
"We did a runner back to the Versace Mansion after the show, all relieved to have got the ball rolling again. There was a nice hospitality set up at the hotel, right on a deck overlooking the harbour. It was a beautiful night, full moon, the whole bit. By about 4am there were just a few of us left up; Bono, me and half a dozen of the female tour staff. It was decided that we should go for a night stroll, so we headed to the marina. Sadly, there was a large security gate between us and the boats, secured with an electronic lock. As a joke we started trying our hotel room keys in the lock and to our surprise and delight one of them opened the gate. Striding along the jetties between the enormous private yachts, Bono was asserting “you know, you’d be surprised how many people leave the keys in the boats”, so I knew trouble was brewing. It turned out that on the Gold Coast keys are not necessarily left so liberally strewn around boat yards, so it looked for a while like we were going nowhere, but by this time the idea of being out on the inky black water was so delicious that there was no going back. In the end the only vessel we could find to liberate was a small rubber dinghy, no bigger than a bathtub. Telling ourselves that it’s not the size that counts, we gleefully jumped in and squeaked by the gigantic yachts either side. There were just three of us in the little boat, Bono, Catriona and me, slipping through the water and out into the vast blackness of the harbour. It was almost perfectly still, the moon behind streaky clouds, and not a sound to be heard other than the swish of the oars through the rippling water and the distant cries of “Are ye feckin’ mad or WHAT…?” coming from our friends on the rapidly receding quayside. In the midst of this idyll I was overcome by a sense of great nostalgia. I haven’t been involved in any major boat-stealing since the headed days of Zoo TV. (And don’t worry, we put it back after the sun came up.)"