There have been some aptly named fast food over the years.
Like the Burger King Suicide Burger, which consists of four beef patties, four slices of cheese, bacon and special sauce, squished between two buns. The Heart Attack burger joint in Las Vegas topped that, with the Quadruple Bypass Burger, all 9982 calories of artery-choking goodness. But little old Melbourne might just take the cake with Hunky Dory, a fish and chip chain that proves that when things goes bad, they go really bad.
Cry me a river
You see, not all is hunky dory over at Hunky Dory.
First, The Age broke the news that its claimed fish of the day was not dory at all, as we would call it in Australia, but cheaper farmed Vietnamese basa fillets – marketed in Australia as Pacific dory – from the Mekong River Basin in Indochina.
That would be the Mekong River that has an estimated 220,000 tonnes of toxic waste dumped in it every year by large factories, and is considered one of the most polluted rivers in the world. The very basa fish that the US Food and Drug Administration claims is contaminated with heavy metals and banned antibiotics, including mercury.
In 2007, the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service surveyed 100 fish from this very river and detected 14 antimicrobial chemicals, including "sulphonamides, tetracyclines, penicillin, quinolones, flouroquinolones and antimicrobial chemical groups".
Which means the fish from this river are fed with antibiotics.
Amid all of this, and given that Hunky Dory served tonnes of this fish every year through its seven Melbourne stores, you'd reckon owner Greg Robotis was having a fairly bad week. But it actually did get worse.
Tricky Ricky to the rescue
Amid the storm, and while Hunky Dory managers were working hard to do the right thing and change the signs for customers, a brave hero waded into the fight on their behalf. One Ricky Nixon.
That's right, the Ricky Nixon who was stripped of his licence as an AFL player agent for an inappropriate relationship with a 17-year-old girl, and admitting he supplied her with alcohol.
The Ricky Nixon who was photographed in a hotel room in nothing but his Reg Grundies with aforementioned young girl.
The Ricky Nixon who was charged with intentionally causing serious injury, false imprisonment, assault with a weapon, escaping lawful custody and resisting arrest, after a fight with his former fiance.
Amid Hunky Dory's crisis, Nixon tweeted "Write down Fri May 27th 2016 the day Fairfax sunk lower than a Fish's ass with a story on Hunky Dory #GreatestLoadOfShit" to his legion of 292 Twitter followers. We admit it did take us 10 minutes to decide if it was parody account.
Just the bloke you want doing your PR. Maybe Animal Liberation can get the dentist who shot Cecil the Lion to say a few nice words about the cause.
And Nixon's trademark call? It's "toot toot". Not a message you want to give customers who may have eaten dodgy fish.
THE HECKLER
Amid Senator Nova Peris's announcement she would not contest the next federal election, after serving a three-year term as Northern Territory senator, it was widely mooted that she was the frontrunner for the AFL's most senior Indigenous advisory role. Word is that is far from the truth. While it is believed Peris attended AFL House on Friday, she is one of many candidates for the role. Sources say she is unlikely to get it. Expect a very different name to be announced in the next week.
