Thread: The book, An introduction

we've all seen chain emails, usually I hate them they turn up then they turn up from someone esle whose email address is in the to: or CC: box from the first mail you received then months later when they get back after being forwarded from the lower provinces of outer mongolia where the internet is delivered by individual 1's and 0's carried by carrier pigeon the same message pollutes your inbox all over again before being forwarded back to you by someone who's got the attention span of a politicians promise post election time and is listed in the to: box of the very first version of the mail...

And now its my turn... Here's one that I received a couple of days ago.. don't faff it off give it a quick read, especially the list down near the bottom...

I'll spare you the agony of reading the bit at the top that usually reads " I dont usually forwards these things but....." and the bit at the end that prompts you to forwards this thing to everyone you know or the planet will come to an end and your partner will get fat(er).

here it is

A kid asked me the other day, 'What was your favourite fast food when you were growing up?'
'We didn't have fast food when I was growing up,' I informed him. 'All the food was slow.'


'C'mon, seriously. Where did you eat?'
'It was a place called 'at home,'' I explained.
'Mum cooked every day and when Dad got home from work, we sat down together at the dining room table, and if I didn't like what she put on my plate I was allowed to sit there until I did like it.'

By this time, the kid was laughing so hard I was afraid he was going to suffer serious internal damage, so I didn't tell him the part about how I had to have permission to leave the table. Nor did I tell him that we only started eating our dinner once Mum had taken off her apron and was seated at the table.

But here are some other things I would have told him about my childhood if I figured his system could have handled it


Some parents NEVER owned their own house, wore Levis , set foot on a golf course, travelled out of the country or had a credit card.

My parents never drove me to school, even if it was raining or freezing. I had a bicycle that weighed probably 50 pounds, and only had one speed-slow!

We didn't have a television in our house until I was 12. It was, of course, black and white, and the station went off the air at midnight, after playing the national anthem and a poem about God; it came back on the air at about 6 a.m. and there was usually a locally produced news and farm show on, featuring local people...

I never had a telephone in my room. No one in our street had a telephone. We had to use the public phone box up the street.

The only take away food was fish and chips, and pizzas were not delivered to our home... But milk was.

All newspapers were delivered by boys and most boys delivered newspapers, regardless of the weather. My husband delivered newspapers and carried them in a big strap across his chest, dragging a wooden trolley behind him with the remaining papers to be sold.


Movie stars kissed with their mouths shut - at least they did in the movies. There were no movie ratings because all movies were responsibly produced for everyone to enjoy viewing, without profanity or violence or anything offensive.

If you grew up in a generation before there was fast food, you may want to share some of these memories with your children or grandchildren. Just don't blame me if they bust a gut laughing. Growing up isn't what it used to be, is it?

MEMORIES from a friend :
My Dad was cleaning out my grandmother's house (she died in December) and he brought me an old Coca Cola bottle. In the bottle top was a stopper with a bunch of holes in it.. I knew immediately what it was, but my daughter had no idea. She thought they had tried to make it a salt shaker or something. I knew it as the bottle that sat on the end of the ironing board to 'sprinkle' clothes with because we didn't have steam irons. Man, I am old.

How many do you remember?
Head lights dimmer switches on the floor.
Ignition switches on the dashboard.
Pants leg clips for bicycles without chain guards.
Soldering irons you heat on a gas burner.
Using hand signals for cars without turn signals.

Older Than Dirt Quiz :
Count all the ones that you remember not the ones you were told about. Ratings at the bottom.
1. Candy cigarettes
2. Milk bars with tableside juke boxes
3. Home milk delivery in glass bottles
4. Free milk at school
5. Newsreels before the movie
6. TV test patterns that came on at night after the last show and were there until TV shows started again in the morning. (there were only 3 channels [if you were fortunate])
7. Hula hoops
8. Mickey Mouse Club
9. 45 RPM records
10. Hi-fi's
11. Metal ice trays with levers
12. Blue flashbulbs for your camera
13. Cork popguns
14. Studebakers
15. The postman delivered mail on foot twice a day and on Saturday morning


If you remembered 0-3 = You're still young
If you remembered 3-6 = You are getting older
If you remembered 7-10 = don't tell your age,
If you remembered 11-15 =You're older than dirt!




howd you go..... I got 15....


now to me that means either I have such a fantastic memory that I can remember past lives which is pretty much off the cards because I dont believe in that guff so that leaves the other option...

I had a great varied childhood. I know some of you will be thinking "So? I remember all those things." or "yeah but your older than me and my dad remembers all of those things."



I'm allllmost but not quite 33.

draw your own conclusions.

Once upon a time...

no wait I used that intro already....

Somewhere in a state not far from here...... no that wont work, what if someone in WA is reading this...

Ok so there I was standing on the apron having just disembarked the plane looking round giving it Yep, Red dust, saltbush and heat, Welcome to the North West of Western Australia.

So we moved into the accommodation, 2 to a room with aircon and a fridge. Set. lets go eye the workshop... Cool all the containers are there, Priorities people, which ones got our beer in it? Gotta get that cold Right now.

So with the beer safely in the fridge, the clean up of the brothel that was to be our primary worksite began. Once that was done it was a mere matter of nanoseconds before we had our first repair job, jumpstarting vehicles.... well to be more accurate the turning on of master switches and the selecting of neutral on autos.

So all was well in the workshop, we had the keys to the vehicle that required servicing and were waiting on the parts and oils to turn up for the service when we got our first call out. An IMV with no ces, can we go and change 2 flat tires on it and give it some diesel as they've left the engine running all night to keep the tyres inflated on the Central Tyre Inflation system. Problem was, it had CES they just didnt have the keys to open the lockers to get to the CES.. They had a second IMV out there that could have done something to help out but since it had NO ces but plenty of keys to open its lockers.

the oil and parts turned up so we did the service, while we had that in progress there were other high demand taskings that required our undivided attention Primarily, fishing, swimming and beer drinking. At this point I'll mention the quality of the food, 4 days After I came back We went to sizzler. Sizzler paled. I ate food that put sizzler to shame for pretty much most of the trip. Dont ask me about Anzac day, I dont remember...actually I do have a phone induced memory of becoming a Squadron Leader... but long story short after we'd identified the 2 most major problems I had a chance to call my old man, I asked him if he wanted to guess at what our 2 most common problems were and he nailed it Staked tyres and clogged radiators. in 4 days there were 15+ tyres with legally fatal damage. Before we even got halfway through the servicing of the IMV in the workshop we ratted all 5 tyres off of it just to keep the remaining fleet on the road.


There were a lot of other fun things on the trip but mostly it was pretty much a month long lesson of "If I figure something out and mention it Its whinging and complaining, If an officer says what I said after the event, thats constructive critisism." and "If I suggest it, its not a good idea, if after blowing out 3-4 hours failing to do it the way the hierarchy want it done someone else suggests what I suggested then its a good idea".

other highlights include

"you think that because you took our beer off us we grounded the fleet? You're an idiot, Ops asked us to inspect the fleets tyres"
"drunken pizzas from a messy kitchen with no food in it"
"you can sleep through that"
"my room mate snores"
"Incoming"
"do they realize we have our own job to do?"

But they are stories for another day.