Category Archives: Gerard Oosterman

Ol Man River at Roselands

04 Saturday Sep 2010

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It was many years ago, when children still had birthday parties in parks with friends and parents. A couple of kilos of sausages and some cordial were all that was needed. The barbecue was soon set up, the bread rolls buttered and gifts unwrapped. Not anymore now. It has to be at Fox-Tell studios, at MacDonald’s or at the Ten pin bowling alleys. They are all now screaming hordes demanding endless wallet openings of stressed parents unable to resist the exploitation by commerce. They capitulate, roll over and give up a battle that was never there to be won anyway.

I remember, again, many years ago, the start of a future of which wallet opening would become the norm. There was a six page spread in The SMH and bands playing on the streets with banging drums and blaring trumpets. It was the opening of Roselands shopping centre in Sydney.

 Opened in 1965, Roselands was Australia’s largest shopping centre in the Southern hemisphere for years, even though it is quite small by today’s standards.

 It had a magic waterfall of three stories high. Some liquid; was it water or oil? Whatever it was would be cascading down along nylon lines creating a faux effect of luxury and steaming jungle. It also had a restaurant with a small stage, called The Viking. We had dinner there with another couple some time after the opening, perhaps around the late mid sixties. Our choice was ‘chicken in the basket’; I suppose it came with baked potatoes. The desert was peaches with ice cream ‘a la framboise’, or some expensive name like that. The conversation was starting to falter; perhaps the Barossa Pearl had not yet worked its way down yet. Fortunately, the peroxide chanteuse started her show with a stirring rendition of ‘Old Man’s River’ albeit at a much higher pitch than usual. After all, Paul Robeson’s deep base would be a bit hard to follow for any man, let alone a woman. After the peaches arrived she changed the music to a less demanding, “I never felt like singing the Blues”. The rest of the evening I have forgotten accept than the wife of the couple solemnly declared,” she is not a good singer but she has a lovely personality.”

From then on it all became a world of fast bucks and faux reality, tingling cash registers and a world swept away by the money merchants and their seductive easy terms on everything. Wallet openings not only became the norm, it became the main driving force for families to continue. Now Roselands is dwarfed by much larger shopping centres which work like giant vacuum cleaners sucking in entire societies with millions of pale looking shoppers, hopelessly addicted to endless wallet opening giving a very faux respite from the ennui of everyday living. They then get spat out to the concrete reality of the car park.

There has to be more to life.

Excuse me Sir, your Bonnet is showing

29 Sunday Aug 2010

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As kids we all believed in dragons in the forests and monsters of the sea. What do grown men still believe in when looking at cars? We all know that clever car salesmen would not dream of starting a car yard without also decorating the yard with flags all strung around strings leading to the ‘special car’ usually elevated on a kind of scaffolding or throne. It all goes without saying that all cars for sale must have their bonnets open as well. Why?

What are the expectations of those interested in cars of finding underneath those bonnets?

This morning I promised to walk to the Moss-Vale shopping centre to buy our special Sunday treat, not a car, but a much more modest item, croissants that a Vietnamese bakery excels in making here locally. On the walk to the bakery one passes two car sales yards. The first on the left side is huge. It sells both second hand and new. Hondas, Hyundai’s, and Subaru’s. All bonnets ajar as if yawning, greet those that happen to drive or walk by. Below the bonnets and at the front there appear increasingly aggressive looking grills. With some squinting and going back to the years of ‘monsters in the sea’, they are looking like predatory fish, a mixture perhaps of shark and piranha.

The second car yard sells Skoda’s and Peugeots, new as well as second hand. Perhaps in keeping with a more modest and aesthetic Euro approach, there are no flags but just open bonnets. This morning I noticed a young couple standing in front of the first and very large car yard. The girl was standing somewhat away and was kind of moving both her arms up and down and sideways as if exercising or perhaps showing a bit of impatience or boredom. The boyfriend had his head hidden underneath the bonnet. Now, this head under the bonnet has always intrigued me. What are they hoping to see there? It is only ever men that look under the bonnet. Is it a sex differentiation thing? Are they doing a kind of metal muff diving here ( scusi signorina), or is it a genetic predisposition, afflicting both hetero and homo men? Surely all cars have an engine under the bonnet and what can you ascertain by just looking?

Only once have I seen a woman under a bonnet. Her car had broken down. I stopped and she was wiping the air-filter with a pink shopping bag rag. Trying to clean up a bit, I suppose. Her battery lead had disconnected and after I fastened it she managed to start the car and drove off.

After I bought the croissants this bloke had his head under another different car bonnet and the girl friend had given up her arm swaying, was sitting somewhat uncomfortable on a thick chain swinging between the car yard’s posts separating the yard from the grassy knoll. She was facing the road.

 I just walked by

Two Scoops of Rum and Raisin please

28 Saturday Aug 2010

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This morning we boldly decided to visit Campbelltown. Drivers in the fifties still had warnings of ‘driving-in’ hanging on the back of their new cars when I last visited that town. Perhaps it was also when I used to go swimming in a creek at Casula, not far from there, while a teenager with  totally uncontrollable and spontaneous twinges.

We put the Global Positioning System on ‘McArthur Square,’ Campbelltown, and clipped it on a special bracket inside the car window. It took us faultlessly and without exchanging any blows to our destination in just forty minutes.

Of course, after arrival we drove around trying to park with many others doing the same. We already had been told that McArthur Square is huge, and indeed, a Shopping Emporium unlike anywhere around the Southern Hemisphere.  A Mecca for lingerie, mobile phone covers, artificial hair extensions and food halls.  A behemoth of a roofed over city entirely dedicated to bright ‘down- lights’ and shops for shoppers shopping. We searched our minds what we had actually planned to do there. It was such a nice spring day with daffodils sprouting. What begot us?

Helvi had a sudden insight with wanting to find a book named ‘Mood Matters. Apparently it had been recently recommended by our literature cum laude expert and investigable Warrigal. We found an enormous bookshop named Borders, so big the books looked like postage stamps.  We had advice that the book wasn’t yet available in Australia. What to do next amongst the hordes of mobile swipers and triple story prams being pushed by bull-necked fathers/ husbands, wives/ partners with glittering jewel bedecked wrists, force feeding brats with chips, gravy and smoothies?

The relief of a food court.

” Two John Dory fillets with chips and salad please.” “It will take ten minutes,” The friendly shop assistant replied. The Fish shop front named itself ‘Shark’s delight.’ Who could resist that?  We were given the food on the plastic plates with two sachets of salt and pepper each. Now I am a careful distributor of salt over my food. I cautiously sprinkled half the salt over the chips and fish and stashed the sachet with half the salt remaining carefully under my plate for later use. I felt I was being watched.

Indeed, Helvi, without any qualms, filched my portion of salt from under my plate and calmly sprinkled it over her chips. I know she likes salt. I reminded her it was my salt but she accused me of being mean and making a fuss over salt. How petty. We finished our meal and walked around till we found DJ’s.  It rankled me still that I had had half a sachet of salt and she one and a half and yet my feelings of remorse and guilt went immediately into automatic.

Amazingly in most of those large shopping centres they provide huge leather chairs in the vast corridors for shoppers to lounge around in. Yet, away from food courts they often remain empty. I suppose, shoppers don’t have time to squander away from shopping? We had the Saturday Herald and sunk ourselves luxuriously down. I strolled off mulling over the salt incident and decided to make amends. I bought two scoops of Raisin Rum gelato from miles away, hiked back totally exhausted to our leather fauteuils and offered a few bites to Helvi. She took the whole lot and said,”why don’t you get your own?” Back I went, ordered another two scoops. This time, the’ Mixed Berries.’  “Gee, you like my gelato”, the Asian girl chortled.

 She gave me an extra half scoop. Perhaps there is justice!

Lawns and Dungog Lady Bowlers

19 Thursday Aug 2010

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One of the more lasting impressions of my distant past are memories of our neighbour, Bill Miami. Bill Miami was of Italian descent but adopted out to an orphanage as a baby. At least, that was the story told by others. He never spoke about it and why would he? Our family who had only recently arrived in his neck of the woods, Revesby, were his new neighbours for many years to come. Bill was married and also had six children when we arrived. So with twelve kids all-round, there was plenty of activity. Never a dull moment, as they say.

My memories of Bill were his fondness for keeping his lawn. During an industrial accident he had lost four of his fingers which left him just his thumb on his right hand. Despite this handicap Bill would spend hours each week-end on his knees prising out unwanted grasses. He wanted a stable mono-grassed lawn. Every now and then he would stand up, overlook his little pile of unwanted weeds and proceed with rolling compressed tobacco between his open palms. The cigarette paper was held between his lips. After the ‘ready rub’ was loosened to satisfaction he would roll it into the cigarette paper and light up. These were probably his moments of greatest joy and satisfaction.

We had a lunch yesterday at the Dungog Ladies Bowling Club. We walked in and as expected, it was suitably empty with just a few ladies bowling outside. One lawn was perfectly cut and groomed. The other lawn was artificial lawn, perfect for bowling. Not a man in sight. I felt I was treading on a very hallowed but flowery carpeted ground. The bowling club was from the 1965 era. At least that is what the honour rolls seemed to indicate. You know those brown maple veneered boards with scrolls and golden lettering? There were lots of names of lady champion bowlers dating back from 1965. There were champions from single, doubles, triples and foursomes.

We walked into the restaurant part of it, all still decked and decorated out from the opening date of 1965, I suspect. They had those tables and chairs with splayed legs, soft vinyl covers on the chairs. Plastic embroidered table cloths and huge menus. We had sizzling pork, vegetables with oyster sauce and a chicken-chilli dish. We were the only customers.

While we were eating our meal, some lady bowlers walked in silently, all in correct white attire and with small cases that must have held their bowling balls.

It reminded me so much of the days of Bill Miami and his lust for lawns and ciggies.

Garbage Bins and Social Intercourse at St Henri

16 Monday Aug 2010

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Social meetings and Garbage cans.

A few months ago we moved to a small community of 38 town-houses all set on a meandering private ring road. The settings of the town-houses are somewhat staggered but close enough to warrant our love of ‘privacy’ with the help of either blinds or curtains. However, there are a few recalcitrants brave enough to defy the rule and blatantly allow open curtains, enabling a peek into a world of domesticity that would otherwise be kept well hidden.  Indeed, since our arrival and our Euro-inherited open curtain/blind policy there are now some cracks appearing in the maintenance of that privacy. Yesterday, I noticed an open curtain and a man sipping a glass of wine while preparing food. He was wearing a beanie.

One domestic event enabling social intercourse amongst the inhabitants of this little village named “St Henri” is during the day prior to Garbage collection. The private ring circuit does not allow for larger trucks to pass through easily, so all those familiar garbage wheelie bins have to be taken to the front of the Street. The larger bins are coloured yellow for recycling trash such as plastic and glass bottles, also all paper and carton. The smaller red bins for real garbage including those stale odiferous plastic trays that most foods are increasingly sold in, especially meat.  The garbage bins are solid and are on wheels. They also have a specific identity number on the inside of the lid synchronising bins with owners or renters and registered with the Shire. Woe those who will lose their bin. A hefty $ 160, – replacement fee will be enforced. Early in the evening, all the red coloured bins are standing at attention on the road, like those red uniformed Beef Eaters guarding a Palace. On Thursday morning, they will be empty, waiting to be strolled back again by their owners for the next week.

Our town-house is a bit at the back. This is great because it involves a much longer walk to the street with the garbage bins, allowing a greater chance to meet someone doing the same chore.  Of course, during bitter cold, wet and windy weather, not many have been keen to stop and chat so far. Most are working. Stopping with a garbage can in tow does not provide the most ideal opportunity. Even so, it is better than nothing. Most of the people here seem to be either single women or single men, many with kids. Also some, like us, are not the 9am-5pm crowd, having sold a previous house or farm, and using a six month tenancy to settle down to a more permanent abode in the future. In fact, I think most of the people here are in transit and renting. Heaven knows what marital battles have been played out or are still ongoing.

 A few weeks ago I managed to ‘jumper lead start’ a car with a flat battery. It was for a single woman with 2 kids on her way to school and work. She has now swapped to the other side of our little road to a much larger place, double story with3 bathrooms and double garage. She promised to invite us over soon. I noticed that her car that needed the jump start is  for sale. She now drives a new 4 wheel drive car, metallic grey in colour. Perhaps a marital settlement has come through. Who knows?

 We were also invited to a mid-year residents Christmas party and sausage sizzle. A nice gesture, wasn’t it? The private ring road does enable kids to play around and even though cars are driven to and from individual garages or car spaces, it feels very safe and remarkably noise free. A little boy knocked on our door and asked if that ‘boy with the bike’ could come and play outside. He remembered one of our grandsons who had played with him the previous week during school holidays.

‘St Henri’ in Moss-Vale is a nice place and as a small community, seems to be working.

Shaving Internet Users Clean

13 Friday Aug 2010

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The worst thing that has overcome us lately is to trust the written word. When we moved, we wanted the e-mail, internet and phone pronto. The magic word nowadays from the smarmy merchants of the techno-connect world is ‘bundling’ which of course is not far removed from bungling.

We were amazed to hear we could not get a landline and internet from’ Yes Optus’ at the address we had moved to. They, the Yes Optus team, suggested wireless ‘Yes’ fusion plan with a phone through the computer and all calls except mobile free for a modest $ 79. – Per month. It includes all national and international calls and up to 2GB of data usage’. Now, I would not know a mega-bite from a gig-bite or what the $0.15 cents per MB meant when you go over the 2GB. It did not sound too excessive. We liked the idea of a free phone including all calls and particularly liked the ending of their letter enclosed with the delivery of a box with all the gizmos, with, ‘We’re delighted to have you with us’. ‘Yes Optus’.

The next thing was a bill clearly showing their delight. It wasn’t $ 79.-. It was $ 723.45. With 5307 MB over the 2GB at 0.15 cents per MB. I pleaded that for $20 more we could have got the ‘Yes’ fusion plan for 7GB of Data.

But that’s not all. Get a bit closer will youse? We changed to the 7GB promptly and got a discount of 40% on the bill, still left us to fork out $ 479. – Boy was we ropable.

But that’s not all.

I had initiated an online account with a usage meter letting us know how we were going with those fucking mega-bites. It was a nervous few day of watching the graph but we were keeping well within 7 GB and started to relax a bit. We had used 70% of data and only 5 days left. Even had the audacity of taking a few days off to stay at Summer-Hill without computers, when after return I noticed the usage had reached 100% and with still 2 days to go, I was again almost doubled up with ‘Yes Optus’ rage.  The usage was going ahead full steam and we were not even using the computer.

But that’s not all.

It turns out that some bastard; any bastard really can use this system if the “wire free” or Wlan has not been disabled. Like any ratbag in this 36 town house estate could calmly open his laptop and get access through double brick walls and acres of tiled bathrooms and peruse all the shaved havens he (or she )could muster at the Oosterman’s ‘Yes Optus” Fusion plan expense. Not a word about this little scam in any “Yes’ fusion booklets. No ‘Yes Optus’ warnings of any kind to disable the Wlan or ensure protection through pass words.

 We now drive to the library and get free internet till tomorrow when the new month starts. The moral of the story is that no matter what one chooses in life. It all seems destined to suck money out of unexpected corners. Most people like ‘wire free’ but, I can tell you, unless you embed it with pass words or, preferably disable the ‘wire free’ and ‘cable connect’ direct to the modem you could easily end up broke, sleeping in a railway tunnel. Not a word that neighbours can access one’s internet.  Amazing technology.

There is a shop in Hurstville’s Westfield which sells mobile phones with ‘free dermal injections’ including ‘music streaming’. It’s all getting too much.

What happened to the world of ‘Smokey Dawson?’ We are all “Yes Fused.” and will be lucky to get out of it alive.

Cabbages and Lasagne

09 Monday Aug 2010

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Has anyone ever tried the combination of pasta with cabbage?  (8th Aug,2010)

 This morning, waking up with dread, having read the previous day’s poll on leering Big Ears chances of getting in government, we spent the day with coffees while dressed in morning coats, refusing to get dressed. It’s all so grim. We contemplated a good walk but decided on a trip to Bowral and have lunch. It’s not always one had turned seventy the day before and not having had the kids congratulating at the crack of dawn.

I treated myself on this birthday by buying a new pair of reading glasses yesterday. You know those instant ones you buy at the chemist for $5.99? They turned out to be worse than the ones I had been wearing. The old ones had the lenses fogged up by scratches from coins and key rings. My key-ring now has an added gadget, a remote for the garage door behind which we have stored the majority of stuff for when we finally move next door to Bowral. Anyway, yesterday’s glasses were minus– 2, today’s are -3. A lot better.

The lunch was at Berkelouw’s bookshop café. A rare opportunity to peruse books and eat, cleverly combining a couple of needs. Milo was tied up outside with people queuing for their turn in patting him. The lunch was lasagne, lovely, but not as nice as Helvi’s. The trick with good lasagne is to keep it moist, not let it dry. Yet, at the same time a crust on the outside is a must. Lasagne is never easy.

At the same time, we all know that the humble potato and milk will keep us in good health indefinitely. This, according to an item on last week’s TV about the dangers of mono-agriculture and the growing of a single crop excluding variety. The potato was brought back from South America by Columbus. The western world has never looked back since. Apparently there are hundreds of different varieties of spuds. The Irish made the fatal mistake of growing just a single variety and when a bug or virus discovered the Irish grown potato it caused  the wilting of the plant and subsequent starvation of thousands of Irish during the ‘potato famine’. Tough agricultural lesson!

I would add ‘cabbage’ to the list of a life sustaining food. The Chinese have prospered not just from being the most industrious and hardworking nation, but also for their fondness of cabbage. We have recently re-discovered the cabbage and add it in a shredded form to almost everything we cook.  For any future economic collapse or double dipping recession; be prepared. The cheapest vegetables are generally potatoes and cabbages ( remember gabbage?) and with some cow’s milk we are guaranteed to stay alive and survive for decades.

 Think about it!

Of Wine and Powder rooms

05 Thursday Aug 2010

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It is some years ago now that wine drinking was almost unknown. Plenty of beer but little wine. It was even less usual for women to be seen drinking at all. Certainly in pubs, women were only allowed in well hidden ‘Ladies lounges’ or ‘Lady Parlours’ as they were sometimes called. They would coyly sip a sherry or a pony of shandy. It was also unheard of that women would frequent public toilets, or at least that’s what the general impression was when sauntering around parks, city streets, or railway stations.

I remember, as a curious youth I would try and observe women drinking alcohol from outside the street looking into those mysterious Ladies Lounges. Indeed, in Sydney’s Oxford Street, there was one wine bar. I have forgotten its name. Believe it or not, both men and women could be seen to drink there together. It was the infamous group called ‘The Sydney Push ‘.It was decades before its time and breaking all the boundaries.

There was drinking, dalliance and cavorting of all sexes and in the same room.  Lorenzini’s Wine Bar and Repin’s Coffee Shop were places of very early mixed and same sex meetings of a variety of painters, writers, criminals, poets and prostitutes; however, of greatest notoriety, was the Royal George Hotel in Sussex Street. Clive James, Germaine Greer, Frank Moorehouse and many luminaries or not so illuminating of the time, used to do the rounds of all the ‘in’ places.

Of course, that was during the period that one had to fork out a penny to go to a public toilet. Those toilet doors were heavy and made from solid wood  with fortified hinges that were spring loaded ensuring they would always clap shut. No free rides, no matter how big the urgency.  The penny would be put into a large shiny contraption bolted on the door. It had a kind of knob that you would have to turn in order for the penny to drop and to release the locking mechanism. I dare say ‘, the penny has dropped’ might originate from those toilet doors. Of course, that famous poem; HERE I SIT, BROKEN HEARTED, spent a penny and only farted, must have come from that period of paid bowel and/or bladder relief as well.

Those conveniences for us blokes were called ‘Men’s Toilet.’ It wasn’t so for women. Indeed, one of the most baffling and curious differences from our previous life in Europe and here, was the segregation of the sexes in public places such as hotels, at social events and toilets. There were apparently no women toilets in Australia, only ‘Powder rooms’, ‘Rest rooms, or even ‘Ladies reserves’  ,of course they were euphemisms for women toilets.  Why the name ‘toilet’ was alright for men but considered offensive or unpleasant for women remains shrouded in a historical cloud. Those ‘Ladies Reserves’ were mainly in parks such as The Domain of Sydney. There used to be some kind of wire netting fence around those establishments, indicating some kind of ‘reserve’. What sort of stigma was attached to women using toilets?

 I imagined a whole army of women furiously powdering themselves and eating sandwiches afterwards in the ‘rest room’.  The last thing, the society of that time would consider and contemplate, was the very idea of women doing what men did, use toilets. That is all gone now and even slowly being replaced with unisex toilets. Where will it all end?

Our manner of wine consumption has changed beyond recognition. Pubs and hotels are now vying for all sexes as never before. No stigma for a woman to enter and ask for a gin and tonic. Our wine production is also of world class. Some years ago Hardy’s opening up and exported their wine technology and expertise to France was the cherry on the cake. Millions are now clamouring for Jacob’s Creek worldwide. Mention Australia overseas, and most likely you will get a smile and ‘ah your wine’ as a handy entry in animated conversation. During the seventies it was ‘Cold Duck and Barossa Pearl ‘with Port and Sherry next, sold in glass flagons, soon after replaced by those handy bladders in carton boxes, a worldwide first. The most staggering change has been the acceptance of screw tops on wine bottles, while doing away with the traditional cork. It’s not corkage that gets charged in restaurants, it’s ‘screwage.’

Sophistication at its best.

Economic Shrinkage

30 Friday Jul 2010

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Most of the developed countries are racking their brains out on how to resolve damaging climate change without lowering economic growth.  The big boys in town want of course our economies to keep growing with an ever increasing supply of energy for ever increasing goodies by an ever increasing number of people. The engine of materialism has to be kept oiled even if it is killing us.

Economic frugality is the bane of western capitalism with economies that rely on growth rather than shrinkage, always pretending as if none of us live in a finite world.  We hear murmurings of renewable energy, responsible emission targets for the future, but precious little on lowering our energy use, lowering our consumption, lowering the world’s obsession with economic growth. Yet, this seems to be far more logical.

Generally, if you are crook you take it easy. Not, it seems, with an economy though. You ramp it up, give it a couple of fiscal shots and hope it will all pan out. In the meantime the world is getting hotter, but so what; much of it is all a bit temporary anyway.

How capable are western countries in living frugally, or, more importantly, how will the population take to reducing energy consumption, reducing water, reduce our large houses, car size, income, standards of living, reduce spending?  Some will argue that to save the world ecology we need to reign in economic growth and perhaps, if not voluntary, the ‘economic shrinkage’ will force itself on us, almost as part of a natural selection and survival of the fittest.

While there are many claiming that they have missed out on the fortunes of ever increasing material wellbeing, there are also many that have more than benefitted from wealth. In blatant terminal material societies such as ours and most other OECD’s, there are indeed many having missed out and live miserable lives while others are floating on a warm sea of obscene wealth.

We can’t hide behind the fact that we, per capita, are the world’s largest polluters. The gall to point at countries such as India and China as being the worst is a mean trick conjured up by fat moguls, belching from riches and internal dollar bloat.

 The times ahead will be most interesting if not very hard for many people. The idea of forever increasing growth and ever increasing profits and wealth might be of the past.  Sustainability and environmental concerns will have to override economies that have become obsolete on ‘growth ideology’ while remaining blind to the world’s survival… A far more equitable sharing of the pie to others must come about. Time is running out and no way will the capitalistic methods of the survival of the richest and most cunning solve a world close to a climatic death throe. The cult of individual effort and winner take all, ought to get much more scrutiny.

In the meantime the world is getting hotter.

Of Skylights and Renovations

27 Tuesday Jul 2010

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Velux

There was a steady log of objections being lodged with Council, with the inevitable stream of Councillors and Aldermen strolling through our house to observe projected shadows or overhanging rafters and eaves, even possible stormwater run offs through our bedroom. No matter how much or how many objections were lodged, not once were we successful in getting a reprieve from jackhammers and nail-guns.  This was one of the reasons why we threw in the towel and retired to our over hundred acre glorious farm in 1996 with not a jackhammer within cooee ever since.

 During one of the many renovations, I’ve forgotten the exact couple, perhaps the ‘jelly all over’ neighbours, put a large sky-light in above their dining room ceiling. We objected in vain, pointing out that the sky-light was directly below the window of our son’s bedroom upstairs. If, for one reason or another, (fire perhaps?) the stairs could not be used for an escape route, he could at least get out through his window onto the single storey roof about one metre below it. The new sky-light might not carry his weight either! The sky-light would also enable us to look straight into their dining room. The objections were over-ruled when the neighbours changed the material to laminate and opaque but letting light-through polymer.

 Of course, the house was sold soon after. We sometimes saw the new neighbours at the dining table from our son Nick’s room, but apart from seeing arms scooping up food onto dishes or perhaps someone gesticulating while talking, the details were foggy and unfocussed. I had trouble even distinguishing between the sexes. It was as if looking through a cloudy milk-bottle bottom. Decades earlier and in Holland we would sometimes use these milk bottle bottoms as a primitive lens and focus the sun’s light on a shoelace until it started smouldering and then stink German teacher Kohler’s class-room out.

Anyway, the new couple had just about gotten over the jeering neighbours on the other side during the above pool wedding, with the suspended rat during the bridal waltz evening, and just when we were getting on a bit more neighbourly; She had even returned our prized hugely expensive French enamelled baking dish with lid, when the next drama occurred!

 Ronnie, who was born with the severe thalidomite effects used by his mum, had visited our son again and the age had arrived where the Commodore computer games and listening to music with the occasional bong, was now being enhanced by some beer consumption as well. Ronnie was amazingly deft with lifting his full glass with his strong teeth and with his shortened arm and splayed two fingered hand, heave it up and drink like the best of us. They were having a good time upstairs and even though the evening had arrived, it was still light.

It was about 7 o’clock pm when there was an almighty banging on the door. It was her, the neighbour of the ‘above the pool wedding and Spanish maids’, with a complaint. While having dinner at the table with friends, someone had been urinating on their roof, on THEIR skylight. She said she at first could not believe it, but when she and all the guests looked up, it was agreed by all that it was definitely not water; it was yellow!  “It was yellow,” she repeated. Almost as if she was forestalling another objection by us to Council.

I immediately went upstairs to investigate about yellow liquid but had already guessed what had transpired. Ronnie found it far more logical, if not extremely convenient as well, to use the open window to piss out to his heart’s content. The struggle for him to go downstairs would have taken too much time, and the urge was so instant. Ronnie was so sorry and said he would apologize. He struggled downstairs to our neighbour lady with the previous hanging dead rat experience. When she saw him hobbling down the stairs on his stick legs, she instantly also recognized what might have occurred. She left a bit deflated.