Today, at approximately 10am Australian Eastern Standard time, the mail arrived at the Crikey office in Melbourne’s CBD. Normally The pile of letters and packages included a plastic express post parcel addressed simply to “Crikey“.
Contained within the package was a snuggie – and not just any snuggie – OUR snuggie. The original Crikey snuggie. Stinking of wood smoke and beer, dirtied along the hem, MCN logo on the side, missing in action since the wee hours of Sunday.
There was no note with the snuggie, the address was printed on a label and the signature, declaring to Australia Post nothing explosive was contained within the parcel, reads simply “Amanda”.
I know of no Amanda. As far as we know there was no Amanda at the party of the century. However, since I explicitly said there will be no questions asked upon the return of the snuggie I cannot ask, all I can do is speculate.
Popular consensus on Facebook has labeled a Mr John Safran of Aunty the snuggie kidnapper, although Crikey believe that is largely because our initial suspect, Mr Richard Willingham of the Bendigo Advertiser, immediately provided a (somewhat flimsy) alibi, while Mr Safran has consistently failed to leap to his own defence.
Unfortunately the Crikey snuggie did not return in time for Bernard Keane to wear electric blue backless polar fleece to Parliament’s night of nights, the Canberra Press Gallery’s mid-winter ball. Nor for Leigh Josey to wear it to the Japan vs Australia soccer match at the MCG, where he was famously removed from the media section by security with a Turkish photographer. Perfect opportunities to road test the snuggie, lost.
The wait for the return of the snuggie has been fraught with anxiety and many nail biting moments. In an attempt to recover any snuggie before the aforementioned road testing events, I requested assistance from the twitterati. They were utterly useless. Anyone who tells you the cyber revolution has begun is crazy, these guys can’t even magic up a blanket in two days.
A certain commercial television network offered their snuggie, but unfortunately decided to use the blanket with sleeves in a promotional event that evening. Some suggested I order another online, however knowing full well the difficulties posed by their delivery service, I procrastinated. Scott Dooley from Triple J suggested calling local sports centres, “if they answer after two rings it’s them because they’re experiencing warmth AND convenience!”
I was just short of launching an elaborate attack on the local shopping centre, but lucky for Kmart and their display snuggie, the original has returned.
And now all that’s left is my punishment: a walk of shame in the snuggie down Swanston Street. Something to look forward to.
