Ramblings from the road
Ever since horseracing began in Australia, the two most important staying races on the calendar are the Caulfield and Melbourne Cups and bookmakers have been holding all-in doubles betting on these two races for many years now.
Continue reading “My Big Win!”Every camping ground we stay in around Australia seems to have a camp something, you know, like a camp know-all or a camp smart-arse.
Continue reading “Camp Something”“I’ve had this,” Max said to me one morning”
“Look at that bloody mess my light table has been left in again. Bruce must have done some work on it after we went home last night and didn’t bother to tidy up after himself. Bloody arrogant untidy bastard.”
Continue reading “G’day Bruce”Arie (with a name like that he had to be dutch) was the factory clown. The sort of guy with a weird and wonderful sense of humor. He could say something extremely funny (everyone would crack up laughing) and he would still manage to keep a straight face which would make the situation even more hilarious.
Continue reading “Arie”
“You can be lucky, can’t you.” Its a well known phrase and used very often but one day it took on a whole new meaning for me. Let me start from the beginning.
Continue reading “You Can Be Lucky”“I reckon I’ve got you this time,” ‘Never Give Up’ Emptyhead was at it again. You had to hand it to him, he was absolutely relentless.
“Who sang: ‘Catch a Falling Star’?”
“Perry Como.”
“Geez, how do you know all these guys? I mean, they lived a squillion years ago.”
Continue reading “Relentless Emptyhead”My brother Greg was an excellent ballroom dancer (he won countless trophies for it) and he would ‘hit the town’ almost every Saturday and Sunday night to any venue where he could enjoy his favourite pastime.
Continue reading “Ballroom Dancer”In 1960, not long after I turned 18, I purchased my first car, a 1952 Ford ‘Prefect’. It was a little four cylinder matchbox, with one of those long gearsticks sticking out of the floor, a dashboard with a tray underneath which filled up with water when it rained, and the car was so small, it barely seated four people unless they were thin and weighed about 8 stone or less. It was however mechanically sound and provided I topped up the oil every week, it got me from A to B for about three years.
For a couple of years after we arrived in Australia we joined the local soccer club in Box Hill, and at the end of one season, we took a week off work and joined the club in it’s end of the year trip to Cumberland River, near Lorne.
Continue reading “End of Year Trip”During the course of our sometimes boring, monotonous working days I would walk past somebody’s bench and ask them: “Are you enjoining (sic) yourself?” or if someone made a mistake: “Why you do dat?” (sic)
