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Phil of Springwood on "He's a dog..." @Bigfellah, with your permission, I would like to add that I thank you sincerely for acknowledging my success at being a ... more
Bella on Preferential voting FIRST PAST THE POST ~ is not as democratic as you may like to think.In a preferential system every registered voters final ... more
steve on A few facts on illegal boat people Hey Wendy - I'm an immigrant - I've lived here for 40 years and have learned to ignore people with attitudes like yours but ... more
James Weir on A few facts on illegal boat people Wendy, I'm surprised anyone lives in Adelaide. Even the Welsh born redheads are getting out of the place. more
Phil of Springwood on "He's a dog..." @Bigfellah. Again in typical Socialist Fashion, you are denying me my right to form an opinion. Mr. and Mrs. Newton ... more
Meg on "He's a dog..." I believe that any ordinary person who assaults women would have been charged and jailed not sent to rehab. Has Matthew ... more
Wendy on A few facts on illegal boat people Look around..In Adelaide now, you cannot spot an Aussie. Everywhere you look its Chinese/Asians, Indians and Pakistani's. ... more
bigfella on "He's a dog..." Hi z,The point is: How the heck would Phil of Springwood know what sort of parents Bert and Patti were to their son? For all ... more
z on Bob Brown Lazarus Where is the costings that they demand of everyone else, thier 5 minutes of fame will be up shortley more
Shanelle on System failure The whole system is stuffed. I have been apart of it for 10years now and still im confused. Im in a bad place at the moment ... more
James Weir on Barnaby Joyce How many Clem 7's would you like in your Super Fund, Barnaby? It lost $1.5B in it's current reporting period. Only Govts can ... more
Steve Martin on "He's a dog..." Rebecca Wilson as per normal is just plain out of touch.The hitting of women is wrong but personalising this with "he's a ... more
Ronny Of Brighton QLD on Preferential voting MichaelIve just come back from a holiday.That bloke Dean Jaensch Siad that if someone(call Him RONNY) had 40% he said 60% of ... more
z on Preferential voting the way it is working at the moment is the first loser joins with 2nd loser and so on untill they beat the winner, so a ... more
brisman on Bob Brown The guy is not green he absolutley red through to the core. His environmental visions are shallow and don't serve ... more
z on "He's a dog..." bigfella, Phil of Springwood is not talking from so called flippantly expertise, Ivory tower stuff but more from commonsense ... more
robert goodchild on Support our Diggers the sticker Idea is great.I would happily part with $20 for one and would like to see the profit go to families who have ... more
Phil of Springwood on "He's a dog..." Hey Bigfella, back again so soon after your mobs magnificent defeat by the Tories, I thought you and the rest of your Left ... more
z on "He's a dog..." Hey Phil, why don't you say what you really mean more
bigfella on "He's a dog..." Congratulations to Phil of Springwood,We've become accustomed to his astute political and social commentaries based on ... more

Whatever happened to letter writing?

Posted by: Michael Smith | 16 October, 2008 - 12:50 PM

My dad, his brothers and their mates were such decent, gentle men.

I've just found a yellowed letter to my dad among his old papers. It's still in its envelope, from one of his best mates - dated 30 August 1976. Dad and his mates used to exchange letters like I make mobile phone calls. Dad and I had just had a holiday with his mate Gerard in a fibro box house at Coolum. Gerard and Marg had 5 odd kids.

Tranters Avenue
Camp Hill QLD
4152

30 August 1976

Dear Geoff,

Just started back from holidays, we had three glorious weeks at Coolum - the weather was real good, it's been the driest August on record.

I had the first week on the wagon and gave away the smokes. Been eating like a horse and taken up jogging. I was running from Coolum to Stumers (2 mile) every day, but buggered up my knee trying to break my best time. It's coming good again now.

The fishing was a bit patchy, no great numbers but plenty of quality. I got a sweet lip (reef fish) off the rocks at 99 steps (where we went that early morning) he was about two pound. I went down to Stumers one night after tea and got three nice bream, one was 3 ½ lb, 17 ½ inch from nose to tail. Not bad A.

We went for a swim every day, Marg piked a couple of times because it was a bit windy.

One Sunday we took a trip up to Cooroy and back through Noosa. We planned to have lunch at the Noosa Pub at the session 11-1pm but when we got there they were just finished. We decided to go over the road to a small restaurant; I went in, had a look at the menu and decided it would do. The menu had no prices. Anyway we all went in and had a beer and drinks for the kids then the waiter came with the menu with prices. It was terribly embarrassing when we realised the place was real upperty and lunch would have cost about $40. I had to go over and tell the manager we weren't very hungry after all, paid for the drinks and pissed off down the road for a pie and peas.

What are you doing at Christmas time? We are driving down to Sydney about 20th December and back about January 4th. Rob is keen to have a week with Michael, we could send him on the train a week early or he could stay a week after we come back.

Yesterday we went out to Roachdale, it's the market garden area on the south side. You can pick your own strawberry for 45c lb. We got 13 lb and I reckon I ate about 2lb while picking. They also have other stuff cheap - big cabbage 20c, lettuce 10c etc.

Well Geoff can't think of anything else so will close. Hope to hear from you soon,

Regards,
Jed.

PS Rob had a prang off his billy-card yesterday and buggered up his front teeth again.

Blog comments

When is someone going to audit how and where our hard earned money is spent. Shouldn't it be spent on the people who actually earn it and not on providing pollies with fat retirement cheques and unrealistic pensions for providing a "clayton service" during their term of office.

Marlynn Smith Saturday 15 November, 2008 - 7:48 AM