The Go-Cart!

Wanta laugh? Had phone call from some sort of home help from the hospital [ went to visit there yesterday] I think they think the government has a surplus of cash as I now take 11 tabs for breakfast[ another 2 at night] saves a lot on the food bill, Anyway back to the phone call, during the course of it there was a mention of training with weights, I must have had a giggle in my voice as the nurse came back with.... oh not from the floor, we are not trying to train you to Swartsnegger standard, I repeated the Swartsnegger bit and you know who, bless her cotton pickin' little heart, burst out in raucous laughter, and hasn't really stopped since, Think I'll dismantle the Mozzie trap that'll teach her, The Mozzie trap that's another thing, it's getting very close to getting the chop too, been experimenting with various places for about a month now and it has proved very successful at catching bugs, not very many mozzies, perhaps they are not the right breed, changed places again today, so it has another few days grace to demonstrate its capabilities , or I ring the supplier[ who also makes them] and demand my money back ,that's all for now, let you join your mother in raucous laughter

The Fam-i-ly Car

I remember we had a number of family cars mostly handed down to us from Grandad Graceville the first one, I recall, was a white De luxe Prefect – a small compact car ....with removable roof racks! Seat belts weren’t invented yet, so our large family of six piled into the small family car this usually ended in a number of arguments in the back seat where we four kids were packed in a sort of one forward one back affair the best positions being the window although occasionally Bill or I somehow ended up in the middle, then we would act excited so that the younger ones usually Melissa would think she was missing out & would agree to swap that was a good tactic..... sorry Lissa ...As we got older & bigger we worked out to fit us all in we shouldn’t open both back doors so we had to get in on one side with Mum or Dad slamming the door shut when we were all in, Mum or Dad really should have learnt to pay attention to this manoeuvre because when they became distracted (while still chatting & saying goodbye to whoever we’d been visiting )they would slam the door shut & invariably got someone’s fingers - & without fail they never slammed them once it was always a few times before they realised the reason the door wasn’t staying shut was because someone’s fingers were jammed in it, to add insult to injury we would always get in trouble for that as well because we didn’t say anything ...when in fact the pain was so bad you could only do the silent scream whilst trying to get enough air in your lungs to let out the really loud scream which would end in wracking sobs for the entire trip home, accompanied by chorus of “will you be quiet !”(Shut up was considered a swear word in our house)& "it wasn’t that bad!" "Stop whinging" or "it’s your own fault"....sympathetic lot we were.... it was usually Andrea who was in last so it was usually her fingers , I shouldn’t be surprised if she ends up with arthritis in her fingers when she’s old & decrepit.Although I myself had a particularly nasty experience somehow Dad managed to slam my foot in the car door & he just kept slamming it with all his 6ft force when I finally got a word out & he just said "What the B’ein Hell are you doing with your foot there? Is it broken? & why didn’t I say something instead of just sitting there? But he did take me to the doctor - on a Saturday even.

A few years later we inhereited another family car, also handed down by Grandad this was a two toned green Morris Major another small family car or did we just get bigger? There were five kids by then but Dani got to sit in the baby car seat(that was nothing like they are today it was a canvas affair that hooked over the front seat) lucky her - she wasn’t squished in the back with the rest of us, but I dare say we included her in the usual after school ,back seat melee by copping the odd bash in the back of her head with someone’s elbow or school bag & to make it worse Mum in her magnanimous way somehow offered take 2 neighbourhood boys , Andrew & Craig home from school as well - I mean what was that?? did there look like there was room in the back seat ?? , anyway they were boys & they smelt like boys & then Mum invariably got out & had a chat with Craig’s Mum when she dropped him off & we had to stay in the car she’d only be a minute.......I reckon Mum had a problem with time .so she chatted & we sat there hot ,sweaty, hungry ...elbowing each other calling each other really horrible things like” you stupid fat pig” or “you big fat pig “or “skinny pig” .......

This car was always forever losing bits, i dont know how many times the muffler fell off in front of Oxley high school ...at the bus stop.....how embarrassing!!! & Bill had to get out & pick it up & put it somewhere ...in the boot?? Surely it wasn’t in the back seat?? Was it? I wasn’t looking - I was off in some la la land that didn’t have bombie cars that exhaust pipes fell off of in front of high schools...... well anyway that was Karma for Bill cause he always got to sit in the front seat & being the eldest & only boy – hahaha - oh sorry Bill :)

One time we all piled in to go to school & drop Dad off at the train station on the way – I recall the driveway was on a hill coming out onto a very busy road in the middle of a blind corner that cement trucks frequented ,well anyway off we went, when (as I remember) Dad said rather calmly we have no brakes he may or may not not have said it all that calmly it was just that Mum swore – really ! She said SHHHITTTTTT JOHN!! & at waht felt like a roller coaster speed we screamed out the driveway,which fortunately didn’t have cement truck on its way past ......though I do recall looking & one was close behind us maybe 3 doors down the road ......surprising I think we kids were fairly quite in the back seat maybe we were praying or maybe just amazed that Mum had sworn ........well anyway we got to the bottom of the first hill near the Canossa hospital & Dad somehow managed to slow down enough before the next hill & stopped by pulling the hand brake on – Mum scrambled out with Dani? Andrea? & as the rest of us tried to scramble out as well, but Dad was slready changing gears we werent going anywhere we heard a " Stay where you are its a school day!" Obviously we were more scared of our parents’ wrath then being driven around in a car without brakes.... Mum was yelling at Dad, I might add it was not about our welfare, just about his inept mechanical skills & something about trying to kill her .....oh thats ok then he was only trying to kill Mum not us & if he stopped it must mean he had found the brakes again right ?..... no ... I'd never really noticed how many steep hills were between our house & Oxley station...but there is a few ...... Anycause Dad took off again with the inevitable cement truck appearing close behind us & watched Mum out the back window fading into the distance with whoever the baby at the time stomping off home, did she even look back at those little faces peering out the back window ......I don’t think so..... we turned back to face the front to find ourselves speeding downhill & which eventually ended when we careened around a corner on some flat ground somewhere near the side gate of Oxley High school on top of a hill, Dad stopped by reefing on the handbrake with such force we sat there in silence, the car rocking back & forth for a bit, Dad jumped out (we also took this as our cue to get out) Dad said "I’ll be late for my train youse mob ‘ll have to find you own way to school ... & get yourselves home" & he took off ... we stood there for a bit trying to get our bearings it wasn’t a street we were overly familiar with...but soon figured we’d head off in the direction Dad took & go from there , it’s a bit of a hike from the train station to school & we had to pass the haunted house with the bandaged wrapped mummy in the side window & the old guy that threw poison mud at kids as they walked past (we had this on good authority) but maybe we were probably just glad to be alive, it stopped us bickering for a bit anyway ,well until that afternoon when we had to walk home, that always started us off I think it was the thought of all those hills we came down in the morning we had to walk up in the afternoon & we were hot & tired & hungry & probably missing the good shows on tv you know Skippy, Advenure Island ,Batman, The Flintstones, The Jetsons .........

The were good times in that car as well like going down the big hill in Sherwood? anyway Dad would get a good run up & go down really, really fast & the last little bumpy bit at the bottom that made your stomach somersault & Mum would say "John I’m going to be sick" & that would be the fun part waiting to see if Mum would actually be sick........ but she never was & I think she actually liked it just as much as we did.......

We’d even go on family holidays in that car, got us all the way up to Tin Can Bay to catch the ferry across to Fraser Island for the Family holiday ....but that’s another story

Clotheslines are NOT toys!

Not that I think any of us knew that.
I have just read Vicki's post and have managed to stop laughing.

I too have a clothesline story -two in fact.

One where Andrea tied me to the Hills hoist at Rita Court to 'teach me to ride a bike on two wheels'
Yeah, well, what happened when I couldn't hang on to the bike because of the uneven ground and the bike dropped away? I can still see you standing at the far side, Andrea.

And there was the time that I was swinging on the clothesline, (I too, had the warning of death should I do it. They must have needed more evidence of guilt other than the severe bend in one of the arms to carry out the promises made).
So there I was one afternoon after school, swinging away, after the big run off and launch, around the far side, over the part where you can't reach because of the drop away,I was swinging my legs back and forth, trying to make a bit of momentum, when squeak,squeak, squeak, I slowly swing around to find - gulp - Dad, home from work early, watching me come around. You ever noticed how tall he was? Man, I was so scared, I couldn't even let go of the bar to run away. I can't remember if I got a belting. Maybe the look of fear was enough - or Dad wasn't quite sure he was even seeing what he was seeing.

A day in the life of a postal investigator

Well here we go again, third time lucky I’m told, see if I can avoid hitting, or not hitting the right or wrong key as the case may be.

This story is set in a time long long ago, and just before Christmas, I was doing my usual job, you know protecting the posting public of Australia, if not the world[or that part of it that used the services of Australia post] from the evil actions of criminals unknown, in this case, those who played around with letter bombs, nasty people all round, Queensland had just witnessed one such act fairly recently, with a bomb being sent to our Premier Joe, so all persons were understandably edgy, the air lines were particularly jumpy ,because they were the carriers of mail from centre to centre within the mail network of the country, the Railways carried lots of mail too, but I suppose because they didn't have as far to fall as airplanes if things went wrong, they weren't as prone to worry as much, I digress get on with the main yarn.

There was I just twiddling my thumbs waiting for the knock off whistle to sound, instead the phone on my trusty desk shrilled, Was it my boss in Brisbane checking up on me? He sometimes did things like that, particularly on Fridays, but this wasn't Friday, or it hadn't been earlier ,in the day, I answered the call, easiest way to stop that shrill noise, to find Vic on the other end, Vic was the Supervisor of our Mail Exchange in Townsville, a quiet cautious man was Vic slow and easy, nothing hurried about Vic, a typical North Queenslander, born and bred in Townsville, been with the Post Office all his working life, His message? Went something like this, just had a call from-----no name [have to protect the innocent] one of the Airlines serving Townsville, telling me that they had a mail bag there that was making funny noises would I come and pick it up as they didn't want it, Vic knew mail bags weren't supposed to make funny noises, as well as I, so he said yes, But being a cautious man, and knowing that I was supposed to deal with unusual happenings in the mail system, naturally invited me to come along, besides I had the transport and he would have had to ring for a taxi, and then have to go into a long explanation as to why he wanted a taxi to take him to the airport, but getting money out of petty cash to pay for taxi's would have been time consuming and probably unsuccessful, so my invitation.

When we arrived at the airport, we were directed to a quiet secluded area of nicely mowed grass devoid of all other things, except a mail bag, now Vic had briefed me about the funny noises story and the planes' pilot not wanting want anything to do with it and the baggage handlers not wanting it either, so I knew we had a mailbag that made funny noises, but what to do with it. I had run my boss in Brisbane, before setting out, best to let the Boss know what was going on, in case the funny noise proved interesting, and as mobile phones had not yet been invented, I would have been out of touch to any one further than shouting distance away, I had seen the war time pictures of bomb disposal as a kid, and probably later because the vision of being splattered all over the landscape was very vivid in my mind, but being feeble minded ,or having a death wish, or more likely completely unthinking at the time, anyway Vic and I just looked at the innocent mail bag, I circled it, but it made no move to keep me in sight, so it was either playing doggo, or waiting for us to make the first move, Vic and I discussed the matter, and we decided that I should open it, at least I opened the bag so I must have voted that I should, otherwise why would I be cutting the string closing the bag?

After cutting the string[string you may well ask, but that is what the post office used to secure the mail bags with, a length of string about 12 inches long tied around the neck of the bag and a lead slipped over both loose ends up to the knot and then cramped shut with a tool lie a pair of pliers which imparted the post office identity which dispatched that bag, simple but it had worked successfully for---- oh yonks, now I thing they transport the mail in open baskets, but the post office now have their own trucks, on all the main routes anyway, don't know what applies at other places, any to get back to this noisy bag, grabbing it by the bottom corners, a lift an a shake emptied the mail onto the ground, no earth shattering bang occurred, so a slow exhale of breath by Vic [ I presume ] and defiantly by me, left us with a pile of packets of assorted sizes and shapes, to look at, nothing untoward to see, no waving flags saying bomb here, nothing, that is until muggings nudged the pile and one of the packets emitted a wisp of smoke and a rattling sound, well after I came back to earth some feet away, and Vic also maybe even further, checked myself over, found all parts intact and no untoward emissions from the nether parts, reached for a smoke and asked Vic if he was OK, got a chocked sort of grunt from him Vic didn't smoke, I don't think it was because of any cancer advertising, just hadn't acquired the habit, and as the smoking packet seemed content to just scare the living daylights out of us, I thought it would be safe to go a bit closer, so advancing 10 or 12 feet in is direction [a Springbok would have been proud of my exit leap from a cold stand ] saw that packet just laying there practically grinning, so I carefully nudged it to one side of the pile, and after conferring with Vic, we decided to reload all the remainder of the packets back into the bag and Vic could reseal the bag and take it back to his work place and send it on is way later

Now this Offender, what to do, it had remained quietly to one side while we restored the other mail to it rightful place, not that we were giving it any excuse to take offence, at least we now had an opportunity to examine it more closely we saw a return senders address, unlikely to be a criminal I thought, so what was the story, Hand the Offender over o the Commonwealth Police, who looked after trouble within the airport, I had read about a case of what turned out to be mangoes left in the airport and left unclaimed, and handed over to them as a suspicious parcel, things were really serious then, probably as much as today] That box was lined up and blasted with a shotgun charge of buckshot, very messy outcome. Should I subject this parcel to a similar fate?

My better nature got the better of me, and as it was getting near Christmas, I elected to grant it a reprieve , for the time being any way, seeing the return address was a caravan park in Ayr, about 60miles away, and about an hour’s drive even for a lead footed driver like me I though why not give the Post Master at Ayr a Chance to join the party, and get him to check out the addressee and get their OK to open the parcel and see what caused the smoke and rattle, if things were still dodgy I always had the Army to fall back on, they were good at blowing up parcels for me but that is another story]

Well the PM when acquainted with the facts, as far as they concerned him, agreed to go and see the person concerned, it was a good excuse to get out of the office and take a run out to see the person, and to call be back, in the mean time I still had potential bomb, that nobody wanted, I didn't even want the thing, so thinking it hadn't actually blown up yet it would probably be OK in my car, O foolish boy but I hadn’t been on those explosive courses at that time and notwithstanding my recollections of bomb disposal movies where the hero usually lived to tell the tale, elected to put it on the backseat, not in the boot where it would have been contained and go off with a louder bang, so I arranged to go back with Vic, he didn't have a car any way and it was along walk with a sack of mail, I’ve generously consented to park my car in an out of the way in the mail exchange yard, until we heard back from the Post Master.

Well the PM phoned back with the news that the packet was a Christmas present for the senders grandson, and was a battery operated Toy Smoking Motorbike, which when we carefully opened the packet, that is what we found, and repacked the article less the batteries, and sent it on its merry way

God save the good ship lolly pop and all who sail in her

Managed to get this far and still have the story, not properly spell checked, but near enough

Well that was a waste of time, found this site and started a story only to do something and lost it, but at least found this page again so started again, all in a day of what ? Failures, no, temporary setbacks? We'll say so any way

Many thanks to my southern correspondents who guided me to this page. so now I can make all my mistakes and maybe fiddle around and correct them , or lose the lot and start again [which wouldn't be the first time and won't be the last, one of the disadvantages of one finger typing, another being the time taken ,rain's picking up, maybe the cyclone is going to visit us, better have a look at the latest weather[short brake to check, may return, well back again, yep the cyclone has shifted[at least measurably] now looks like it is safely past Mackay, if safe is a word that can be used to describe cyclones, now to pick up the thread of what I was thinking before cyclone Hamish interfered

The clothes line

Seems Granddad Graceville & Dad didn’t believe in paying for something you could make yourself so they made Mum a clothes line, well two actually, the first almost drove Mum to distraction. It was the old sort, you know a post at either end with rope between and a really big stick (found in the surrounding bush) to hold the wet clothes up off the ground. You might refer back to booby-trapped grass that Mum spent a fair amount of time picking up the dropped washing to find "the big stick" in the line had fallen over and the washing she had managed to hang out was in the dirt. This caused her to be quite upset & yell at Dad for his continued ineptness in clothes line building.

In fact we kids when tiring of tying the grass in knots would turn our hands at our version of pole vaulting, what you did was take a good run up to "the big stick" & sort of grab hold of it & swing off it & see how far you could get , beats me how Mum or Dad never noticed.

Well anycause Dad & Granddad built Mum a new clothes line along the lines of the hills hoist but made out of rusty pipe & it didn’t have a wind up thingy you just had to stand on the high side of the ground & hope you didn’t misjudge the swing & cop it in the side of the head. This sometimes happened when one of us would "help" Mum by swinging it round for her as she bent to pick up the next piece of clothing to hang up. She got a few clouts in the head because of that , she used to go off a bit at that.

Well anyway like all Australian kids we were warned against swinging on the clothes line or else, you know, hidings, no TV, being grounded (the grounding was the best cause we lived in the bush miles from anyone, with no car, so we rarely went anywhere anyway). But like all Australian kids we took our chances & Bill and I swung on dads dodgy clothes line & guess what? We broke it good & proper. It actually flew off & landed in the paddock next door, lucky we didn’t kill ourselves (as Mum was also later heard to yell at Dad). Fortunately for us a storm came over shortly after , a pretty nasty one as Brisbane can be famous for, but any way we hid downstairs more scared of Mum than then being hit by lightning.

She came found us & got us upstairs. We thought we were in for it but she hadn’t noticed & we didn’t say anything either (we were smart like that) but the next day when she went to hang out the washing she noticed , gulp! But amazingly she thought the storm had caused it to fly off & the only one to get yelled at was Dad! I think she got a real Hills hoist after that. We did tell her eventually when were in our 20's.

Go kart, go!

Do you remember…the time that Charles made a go kart?

Oh, ha ha, I can hear you all start laughing now.

The story starts with me meeting up with the immediate Johns family down at the park. Attaching myself to other families was not a new thing for me, but it was the first time (I think) that doing this nearly was the death of me (there were most likely numerous other occasions but being a child makes you oblivious to these things and so they don’t count)

So, we met at the park on the river – it had a name, but I can’t remember it . Was it Apex park? The park was on the river, the river being down the bottom of a steep bank and then a flat bit then you hit the river itself – except when it flooded. (see prior story)

There was an old pram frame that had been kicking around between Rita Court and Wonga Court for what seemed like forever. I think it was Michael’s. By 9 years old he was too big to get in it and no one wanted to push him anyway. It had those big wheels, with metal spokes and a nice sturdy metal frame. I remember there being straps with which to leash the child to the seat. A lever in front of one wheel served as a brake when it was pulled back to rest on the rubber tyre.

Charles, being quite handy with metal things made a go kart out of it. I think this was achieved by folding the pram flat and attaching a plastic chair seat. (Thinking longer about this, I don't think it was a plastic seat. I think it was just a board.)

We gathered at the brink of the bank – the wind blew dirt in our eyes, making us squint into as we gazed impassively down the bank and at the river, glinting in the distance. What little grass was there was burnt and brown. Each of us was lost in our own thoughts… plotting the course, thinking of our loved ones, wondering what to have for lunch, where did I leave that tax form. You know, important stuff.

We looked at each other, silently sizing each other up, deciding who would be best to take on the mission of getting the juggernaut to the bottom of the bank.

It was decided. It would be me. In hindsight, I should have wondered why that was so easy and why didn’t anyone else put up their hand?

Ben was my co-pilot.

I sat in the chair on the pram chassis and grabbed a hold of the rope that was attached to either side of the kart’s front wheels. I pulled the brake a couple of times, testing it.

We were at the top of the bank so there was a good 200 meters (I think) of downward sloping hill that looked quite innocent. I should have known better – after all I had experience of this sort of thing, there was that incident involving me, Sarah Forsaith’s new bike, the boulder and the bent handle bars.

So, deep breath, ready, set, go. We launched and away we went. Things were bad right from the beginning.

There was the speed wobble, the impossible to control steering and the speed! The speed was incredible. Me and Ben were bouncing around and I think the screams started almost straight away, certainly by the time we were over the edge. We aren’t talking amusement park screams – delighted and thrilled – no. Screams acknowledging the hurt and injuries about to be inflicted on ones self were what we are talking about.

Ben bailed.

He rolled to the side and was up and off to the others in what felt like a flash – everything happens in an altered time state when tragedies occur. My scene, on the other hand was happening in slow motion – long and drawn out.

I was probably a quarter of the way down the hill when I stopped going straight and the kart started tracking towards some of the very old gum trees that littered the bank. I thought I was about to smack into one, when the kart over turned, at speed and dumped me. I traveled on for a bit before coming to lie on the dirty bank. I think there was gravel rash up both legs and arms. (It was Townsville. It was hot. I was wearing safety clothing, of course. It was a pair of shorts and a singlet).

I lay there, wondering at the pain. But that isn’t what hurt the most.

No, I learnt something that day. A couple of things actually:

Never ride in a vehicle made from a pram.

Never chose Ben as your co pilot – rat, sinking ship.

And a greater pain than any amount of gravel rash is climbing to your feet and seeing four people, barely able to stand up because they were laughing so much.

I am just glad that it was too hot in the park for anyone else to be there. I think I even had to drag the wreckage back up the hill. Talk about insult to injury.

That’s what I remember.

- danielle