ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact

Arriving back in our thriving inland community, nestled on the fringe of the Simpson Desert, one local man walked straight to the taxi line at Remienko International Airport and threw himself in the back of a BF Falcon.

David Cole said he’d been in transit for about 40 hours at this point and all he wanted to do was get back to his rapidly-depreciating Betoota Heights display home and crash.

As he woke up this morning feeling like he’d been operated on without anaesthetic, the 38-year-old said he got a taxi yesterday because he just couldn’t be arsed having a forced but polite conversation with a share-ride driver.

“I didn’t want to get in and just ignore the driver. My rating is only just above 4 as it is,” he said.

“So I got a cab. In a cab, you pay extra for the silence. I’ve honestly thought about contacting Uber and telling them I’m deaf so the driver won’t even bother trying to talk to me. But if I do that, I can’t listen to music or talk a phone call,”

“To be real with you, Errol, I don’t actually like talking to anyone. I just do it out of necessity. It’s not that I don’t like them, I just would rather not say anything. But that’s life, my friend. Sometimes it sucks, sometimes it’s great.”

Our reporter hung up on David because it was too early in the morning for that type of chat.

More to come.

