Thank you, Roger.
> On 1 Jan 2014, at 3:44 am, Roger Day <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> lovely poem
>
>
> On Wed, Dec 18, 2013 at 7:59 PM, Bill Wootton <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
>
>> No, not eight, at the tents, Max. Other stuff with yabbies and
>> clotheslines and grandma, eightish, no probably ten, now I think about it.
>> But Vanessa and co plied their wares out front of their tents for a brief
>> moment as a spruiker encouraged onlookers to ante up and head in the tent
>> to see more and of course less. I must have just teened it I suppose when I
>> saw a youth called by spruiker, jump up on platform outside tent and, at
>> the spruiker's behest, place his open palm on on the exposed flesh of
>> Vanessa's stomach. Vanessa smiled wordlessly. Gasps. This on the corner, as
>> I recall it, of Pall Mall and whatever that road is that runs up to
>> Hargreaves Street, right opposite the Shamrock Hotel, in broad daylight.
>> What went on in the tents I never knew but that out front experience ...
>>
>> Thanks also Sheila and Doug, I will look again at those verbs which crept
>> in at redrafting stages after I spoke to my parents and may not warrant
>> remaining. The verbs, not the parents, who have been married Diamond sixty
>> today!
>>
>> Patrick, I suppose I did want to half-hint at something a bit Bradburyish
>> at the end but didn't want to tamper with the tone so stopped it there,
>> albeit not quite as precisely as your moth closer.
>>
>> Bill
>>
>>> On 19 Dec 2013, at 6:33 am, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>
>>> Ah, now he says he was eight.
>>>
>>> And back then in Bendigo eight year olds could pay their - what?
>> shilling? - and be ushered in to see two strip tease acts?
>>>
>>>>>> Vanessa the Undresser and The Girl with the Twin 44s.
>>>
>>> I'd rather you were down on your knees lifting the flap of the canvas.
>>> I guess cinema images are supervening here:
>>> I see young Bill being dragged back by some stern authority…
>>>
>>> Max
>>>
>>> purely in the interests of social history - was Bendigo and its fairs
>> replicated elsewhere?
>>> what a lot I missed...
>>>
>>>> On 18/12/2013, at 11:23 PM, Bill Wootton wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Thanks, Max, Pat.
>>>>
>>>> It is a slow camera eye but a bit ghostly too, I suppose. I have
>> revamped the cheeky episode lines to:
>>>>
>>>> Fumes from Uncle Rex's Abbots Lager
>>>> 'soldier' opened by feigned accident in kitchen.
>>>>
>>>> hoping to clarify how an eight year old pretended to be opening ginger
>> beer on a hot day and opened a bottle of beer instead. Admitted the
>> 'mistake' to Grandma without tasting. The illicit smell! We have a gal tank
>> for water up here on the bush block and my father, a carpenter, and his
>> plumber brother always shortened galvanised iron to gal. gal pipes etc so I
>> thought gal roof would be OK.
>>>>
>>>> Suggestions about re-ordering have been adopted so I move now from
>> pantry to outside laundry to clothesline to shed which seems better. Doug,
>> tomorrow may disagree, he preferring last week to see more fragmentation in
>> last week's poem at least.
>>>>
>>>> A big feature of the Bendigo Show is the Chinese Dragon, with many
>> (human) legs but what I meant was bugger, as in 'blow' or 'who would care
>> for' such a dragon when two strip tents were in the sideshow and much more
>> attractive to young boys than any dragon, no matter how long.
>>>>
>>>> Cheers,
>>>> Bill
>
|