Sunday Stealing Remembers the Good Old Days

 On the good side of things:

• The temperature has dropped 20 degrees centigrade - it was 42 degrees centigrade (108 F) yesterday. It's back down a more palatable 20 degrees centigrade (70 F) today. 
• I've hoovered the floors. 
• My sense of smell is finally returning after a week being filled with a nasty cold. 
• I went to Bunnings today (American equivalent is Home Depot, British equivalent B&Q / Homebase). I bought the one thing I needed and then got a charity sausage on the way out. They always have a barbeque at Bunnings for charities and associations. $3.50 or a sausage in white bread. In a controversial move, they put the grilled onions under the sausage. 

VERY CONTROVERSIAL - it's like saying when you have scones, jam and cream that you put the cream on first. 

Let's watch that one blow up!

Questions come from Sunday Stealing. As always. 

1. Tell us about a time when your family got a newfangled invention (your first air conditioner, color TV, VCR, microwave, computer, etc.).

As a child of the seventies / teenager of the eighties technology moved quickly. We got a microwave in what would have been the late seventies. I remember my father being over the moon because he could use the microwave to warm up the milk for his cornflakes in 30 seconds and they wouldn't go soggy - nor did he have to dirty a saucepan. 

2. Is there a particular song that sparks a childhood memory?

We used to go on holiday up the Murray River on a houseboat as I was a kid. This was a good break and something very different. To get to the boat it was a couple of hours drive. This was in the days when cars only had a radio - maybe a tape deck if you were lucky. Australia, being so large, also meant that you'd go out of range of the city stations very quickly and you'd have to search the radio for the nearest local station. 

I've got memories of driving out to Renmark, and after what seemed like forever moving the dial, we finally found a station that played something more than classical. I remember Donovan's Mellow Yellow coming over the airwaves. 

3. What is something an older family member taught you to do?

My grandmother taught me to knit and crochet when I was about five-years-old. They are skills I still use today. 

4. Back in the day, what name brands would we have found in your family's kitchen?

Ah, this is going to be an Australian - indeed, South Australian version of this. 

So, some things you'd find in our kitchen which you may or may not still be able to get in Adelaide:

• Holbrook's Worcestershire Sauce (still the best)
• Bickford's Lime Juice Cordial
• Arnott's YoYo biscuits (still only available in South Australia)
• Balfour's or Villi's pasties
• Dairy Vale cheese and yoghurt
• Woodroofe's lemonade - again, soooo much better than Sprite - nowhere near as sweet

Also, the Arnott's YoYo biscuits had a song, which I say most South Australian's over the age of 45 can still sing. 

5. As a child, did you collect anything (rocks, shells, stickers, etc.)?

Books.

Today's song: