(Installment 2 of 3)

Everyone in the West knew that Felix and Gilles weren't really intellectuals at all. It was common knowledge that they were both chicken boners at Perfect Poultry in Laverton. The only time they ever got philosophical was when they blew all their pay on the pokies. I tried a good natured slap on Delueze’s back to show my pleasure in seeing my mate back from the dead.

Forgetting he was a ghost, my hand went straight through him and connected with Jean Baudrillard's chin, sending the post-modernist flying against the bar. I never liked Baudrillard that much because his team always won the Trivia competition, and when he won the meat hamper in the Christmas raffle fundraiser, he wouldn't even give me so much as a lowly sausage.

However, I felt bad for hitting him seeing I was a peace punk and all, thanks to CRASS. To make amends I shouted him a double absinthe, and ordered two shandies for Irigaray and Virilio.

I got talking to Virilio and asked him what he was up to and why he was drinking at The Rising Sun when he usually drank at The Belgravia where he tried desperately to pick up first year philosophy students. Virilio is about as attractive as the notion of seeing all the members of the Spartacist League in the raw. He is also incredibly boring and a plagiarist to boot.

Everyone in the Pub's reading circle knew his book "Speed and Politics" was really about how the local branch of the A.L.P financed it's election campaign, not some jumped up wank about photon carrying waves. That stuff was just made up to impress the readers of "Social Text", and to throw the Labour party heavies and Toe cutters off his trail.
The thing I remember best about Virilio, is that he was always trying to crack onto Luce Irigaray. Not that he was the only one. We'd all had a go at asking her out. I even offered to take her out to Angelino's all you can eat pizza and pasta restaurant with my half price shopper dockets but to no avail.

The general consensus in the public bar was that she must be a man-hating lesbian. What valid excuse could any woman have for turning down the creme de la creme of the Australian working class? After all, we were all Socialists of sorts – that is we never reneged when it was our shout – we all had a plethora of interesting and tasteful tattoo designs and discrete body piercings and most of us had all of our own hair and teeth.

However, most of the blokes went off Irigaray when she successfully organised the topless barmaids into a feminist consciousness-raising group. Not only did the girls start wearing shirts they stopped laughing at all our crude jokes and suggestive innuendo. I was still keen on Irigaray because she was a top pool player, and could drink anyone, bar Gilles Deleuze, under the table.

To be continued in next edition’s final installment…