Celebrating Positives (offset of the Gripes Thread)

[Litespeed]

Blue swimmers are worth the effort and excellent with a home made Thai chilli jam sauce.

 

Lots around this time of year and some monster mudcrabs on Bull  lsland.

 

Never seen a spanner crab locally. 

[facthunter]

It was there OR the CO OP at Newcastle..Nev

[spacesailor]

Did Aussies have a " co-op " number ?.

Mums in the ' fifties ' was , 71090 . ( England )

Can't ' ever forget it ' .

spacesailor

Edited April 10 by spacesailor
Missed word

[onetrack]

That bloke with the fresh caught fish sure looks like he needs a good feed.

[facthunter]

Co-op referred to Is sea food  down on the wharf at the Harbour side Pretty BIG show. The smaller ones seem to have all gone when they widened the roads.  Nev

[old man emu]

I'm celebrating!!!!

My bike has been sitting unusable for nearly 18 months. I had carburettor float problems; battery problems and worst of all, a dud ignition coil. I've been buying in replacement parts, but have been reluctant to get stuck into fitting them for fear that some other problem might raise its ugly head to stop the bike running.

 

But last night I ordered myself to take up the spanners and screwdrivers as soon as I had breakfasted this morning. You all know that what looks to be a simple job throws up complications, like tight spaces where you want to put a nut and bolt, or dropping a screw into an almost inaccessible gap between components. However, I soldiered on, and this country living must have destressed me because I didn't swear once.

 

By late afternoon I had fitted everything; checked that I had spark; filled the oil tank and cycled the engine a lot to circulate the oil, and added some fuel. The first attempt only produced a single bang, but not long afterwards the ol' 45 roared into action. It also spewed out clouds of white smoke, which I expected since I had squirted oil into the cylinders while I was dry starting it.

 

All I have to do tomorrow is adjust the travel of the throttle butterfly and get stuck into washing and polishing. Then I might take a few tentative laps of the paddock next door before I give it a run on the side road beside my place. 

[facthunter]

Good result .Allow for the fact you've not ridden for a while and be ready to throw the clutch in if it's tightening up. About an egg cup of two stroke to the big tank is helpful on a new motor and unless you are sure of the ex Valve material allow a bit extra ex valve tappet clearance for long hills Nev

[old man emu]

2 minutes ago, facthunter said:

allow a bit extra ex valve tappet clearance for long hills

What are these "hills" of which you speak? The country around my place is as flat as a shit carter's hat.

[facthunter]

Old Bikes "FIND" hills . Nev

[nomadpete]

On 13/04/2024 at 6:29 PM, old man emu said:

 The country around my place is as flat as a shit carter's hat.

That gem should be immortalised on the Aussie slang thread!

[old man emu]

2 hours ago, nomadpete said:

That gem should be immortalised on the Aussie slang thread!

I don't lay claim to it. It's an oldie, but a goodie.

[willedoo]

The version I grew up knowing was 'flat as a larrikin's hat'. I don't know how that one started. Maybe larrikins had flat hats back in the day.

[willedoo]

Speaking of shit carters, I remember seeing them when I was a kid. My mother's parents retired to the Gold Coast and the dunny men used to come and get the drum full of dark ends from the thunderbox in the back yard. There was no sewerage connections back then, maybe a few septic tanks. The dunny men used to hoist the drum up on to their shoulder where they wore a type of leather apron to stop the cans rubbing into their shoulder. What a shit of a job. My grandmother used to leave some tall bottles of beer out for them at Christmas.

[red750]

A guy came across a dunny man poking around in a drum. He said, "What are you doing?"

 

The dunny man said, "I dropped my jacket in the drum."

 

The guy said, "You're not going to wear that jacket again are you?"

 

The dunny man replied, "Of course not! But my lunch is in the pocket."

[spacesailor]

A positive for me ! .

Out of nappies at last .

17 days after my prostate operation. 

spacesailor

[nomadpete]

8 hours ago, willedoo said:

My grandmother used to leave some tall bottles of beer out for them at Christmas

That was common practice. The flat leather pad was the alleged 'shitcarter's hat.

[old man emu]

In our inner city suburbs which were created in the 19th Century, you will often find a laneway running parallel between the rear property boundaries. The dunny was located against the back boundary fence and the laneway was used by the dunny men to access the rear of the dunny. 

 

"Dunny": A shortened form of English slang dunnakin (“outhouse”) + -y. Dunnakin, is of uncertain etymology, but probably from some form of English slang danna (“dung”) + ken,  slang for "house”.  Interestingly, "dunny" does not seem to appear in published works until the 1920s, although it must have been part of the common language long before then. Perhaps "dunny" offended Victorian era prudery. 

 

I grew up with the dunny well into the mid 1960s in the Sutherland Shire on the southern edge of Botany Bay. Out house was a typical late 1940s fibro house with the dunny out the back. We had to make sure that the gate the to back yard was unlocked the evening before the dunny man called. You had to train your dog to accept the dunny man as an approved person to enter the backyard. If you were having a big gathering, you had to contact the Council to ask for an extra pan to be delivered before the event.

 

The dunny man drove a 24-door saloon 

 

And it was obligatory to leave a few bottles of beer out on the pick up day before Christmas. Remember that there used to be regular beer droughts around Christmas? I bet the dunny men made a fortune selling off their excess beer.

 

Because of the design of our house, when we finally got connected to the sewer, we had to keep the dunny because there was no space inside the house for a "toilet".

[red750]

When I went to highschool, the dunny cart was referred to either the Ding Cart (don't recall if it had a bell), or sometimes as the icecream man.

 

What has four wheels and flies?   The dunny cart.

[facthunter]

Six wheels and 40 Pisstins and flies..  The one in Wauchope said MILK TASTES BETTER.   Nev

[nomadpete]

I never did understand why nobody ever ran a bit of wire out to the dunny, for a light.

 

The rows of little sentry boxes seems a forgotten icon.

[willedoo]

My grandfather used to buy cartons of apples and use the individual paper apple wrappers as bum fodder. The paper was a green colour and the texture of modern day baking paper. Very scratchy. But to celebrate the positives, it was better than a stick.

[octave]

So today I am on my way to Adelaide. This is a trip we make every 3 months. Flying is the usual method but this time we thought we would try the train.  

 

Anyway when it comes to celebrating the positive this picture really reminds me of a good day.  

 

In 2018 my son who lives in NZ had planned a campervan trip around NZ south Island with his business partners. About a week before they were due to depart he messaged us and said "why don't you book an RV and tag along?".  Long story short, we did and had a brilliant time. I have many great pictures of this adventure but this one always seems special. 

 

We arrived at Dunedin, parked  the vans and walked into town.  We chose to walk along the beach although it was late afternoon and pretty cold and windy.  

[facthunter]

Life is like $#!T  sandwich. The More BREAD you have the less $#!t you have to eat.  Nev

[nomadpete]

Thanks Octave. We had drifted way off course.

[facthunter]

Hey I thought mine would be a POSITIVE bit of advice.. Nev