Page Text: The Perth Files
The world's most isolated city as viewed through the eyes of someone who has chosen to live elsewhere for most of his adult life... thrills, spills, shark sightings and roster petrol stations galore! The views expressed here are all mine & nothing to do with my employer.
Showing posts with label perth. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
Some more gems from the Daily News 1979...
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1979 - perms, vinyl and disco rules yeah?
The Smashing Pumpkins got it, "Shakedown 1979, cool kids never have the time..."
The end of the seventies was the end of a golden time. I was one year shy of becoming a teen and occupied my time feeding 20 cent coins into the pinball machines at Minder Binders and Gay Gordon's down on Scarborough Beach and getting burnt like a Samboy chip in the surf off Trigg Point.
When I wasn't mastering the psychadelic deck of my Len Dibben, I was fighting the speed wobbles on my Trax skateboard down stupidly steep hills like Pearl Parade. Somehow I almost always found a soft landing place - I lost plenty of bark, but never broke a bone, even when I rode the BMX flat out into a brick wall at the bottom of my treacherous driveway (brake failure).
It was the year I fell asleep on the toilet facing the wrong way after staying up all night watching a monster movie marathon. And the year I got dobbed in for smoking a ciggie at one of the aforementioned pinball parlours.
I was there when Premier Charlie Court opened the space age Clock Tower at Scarborough Beach (no ciggies) and spent many a day and night gazing skyward wondering if Skylab would come crashing down on my head.
So, when I came across this old copy of the Daily News - yes, Perth had its own afternoon newspaper - I thought I'd share.
There was Pinnochios and Beethovens for the disco set and plenty of places you could get a perm and blow dry... men too!
Sexist advertising was rampant and cigarettes, at less than a dollar a pack, were openly promoted in full page ad slots.
Stay cool Perth...
Apologies for being such a poor correspondent, but of late I've been sharing my ideas, thoughts and feelings with the good people at Wangle.
Here's the first of those posts and you can check out the original story by clicking here .
These dark winter mornings and watching the miserable light fading from my workplace window at 5.00pm of late has put me back into a funk about the fate of daylight saving in Western Australia.
After 11 years enjoying daylight saving while living in Melbourne, I returned to Perth with my young family just in time to see DLS re-introduced and then cruelly snatched back from my grasp three short years later.
Yes Perth, you Indian givers, you have decreed that daylight saving is officially dead in the water in WA for the forseeable future. I now hear there are plans afoot to bring back roster petrol stations.
WA, one hour and 57 years behind the rest of Australia. Would the last person to leave Perth please turn out the lights? Were they ever on?
But it’s okay, this summer I’ll be bringing the kids around when they wake up at 4.45am every day and we’ll have a nice play on your front lawn. At about the same time that every species of bird gathers outside my bedroom window for a good chat about how dandy it is to see the sun up so early.
All I wanted was a bit of time in the afternoons to get out of the house with the kids when I came home from work… maybe a barbie, go to the beach, or kick the footy. But no, you lot wouldn’t have that.
According to you, normal people should be eating dinner by 5.30pm and tucked up in bed with Fat Cat before the hour reaches double digits.
I’m mad as hell. While you early morning dog walkers, tradies and sports enthusiasts are no doubt salivating about the prospect of blazing sunlight at 5.00am, think about those of us with small children who have no good use of the morning hours.
Thanks for nothing folks and keep an eye out for me this summer – I’ll be the one driving around honking his horn at the first sign of daylight, making sure you ‘NO’ voters really are awake to enjoy this most ‘precious’ time of the day.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty to love about living in Perth. It was my decision to return from Melbourne and choose this city as the place to raise my kids, but do we really have to endure this ‘if it aint broke, don’t fix it’ mentality forever?
Fair suck of the sauce bottle people!
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The birds are back in town
I was awake at 4.30am this morning. There was a dull glow - a hint of dawn - tapping at my bedroom blinds and then it hit me... this is only going to get MUCH worse as we march into Summer and there is NO daylight saving to come to my rescue.
But it wasn't the light that woke me today. No, it was the early morning cacophony of our native bird life that dragged me from slumber.
First it was the dreadful warbling of the two million magpies that hang out in the adjacent golf course. Excuse the French, but what the fuck are they shouting about? 'Hey, this is my tree - youse can all fuck off and find your own.' 'Hey Frank, there's a baby dugite crossing the 18th fairway that's got our name on it.' 'Man, any of you dudes spot me some worms till my pension check comes in on Wednesday?'
I mean seriously, why at the mere hint of dawn do these noisy bastards have to start up with all the warbling? No wonder koalas are so freakin' grumpy all the time and wombats bury themselves 15ft underground - it's the maggies.
Of course, not long after the maggies start up you get the mother of all noisy bastard birds, the Victorian kookaburra getting in on the act. Throw in a couple of crows having a stoush over the contents of a discarded KFC box and you have a regular fucking orchestra in play.
I don't mind the sound of birds during the day - it's restful. And I get the fact that for some reason they are genetically wired to shout at each other first thing in the morning, but that's why daylight saving was so very, very handy.
As we move into summer, the sun is going to rise progressively earlier and with an increasing level of intensity. Back in 2005 I remember waking at 4.45am one morning thinking I'd slept in. That summer the kids were all awake no later than 5.30am.
For the last three summers the kids have been in bed by 8.30pm - no issues with late sun - and been up at the reasonable hour of 7am. But no longer.
So I'm thinking of making a statement. I'm looking to track down an old Mr Whippy van and when the magpies start their early morning warble, I'm gonna fire that sucker up and hit the streets where the 'NO' DLS voters live and MAKE SURE they're awake to appreciate their glorious early morning light.
And instead of Green Sleeves, I might instead opt for a bit of Enter Sandman or Good Morning Sunshine. Maybe the Pixies doing Gouge Away. I'd be keen to hear your suggestions?
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Last orders please...
Hi folks… I might be an annoying and persistent prick – some would say a dog with a bone – but I’m dressing up like a day-glo remnant from a Happy Mondays gig this Sunday and walking 7kms with the team from Midland Brick to raise money for type 1 juvenile diabetes.
The least you lot could do is click on this link and sponsor me – whether it’s $5, $10 …whatever you can afford.
So c’mon, dig deep!!!
http://walk.jdrf.org.au/WA/JohnCooke/
The Worst of Perth - Richie Benaud
A shout out to the peeps at The Worst of Perth and that very funny man The Lazy Aussie (TLA), who is responsible for driving at least half of the 5-6 people who visit this site every day... okay, maybe there are more, but it's not like there's any danger of The Perth Files melting down from a traffic overload.
Anyway,Teh Cookster has become quite the fan of TWOP and very happy to supply the odd pic or video where I feel they may have TWOP potential, ie, the current Richie Benaud image and the Subi Oval poo vid that is causing the boy so much angst.
So, once you've finished here --- and please stay as long as you like --- get over to The Worst of Perth and join the merry gang in a bit of banter on the very best of the worst things our fine city has to offer.
Oh and be sure and tell your friends to visit. And please be my friend on facebook... Needy? Clingy? Just plain creepy? You betcha!
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'Be bold Perth people'
A well crafted blog by Stephen Bevis, Arts Editor of The West Australian, on the dilema facing the Perth populace over the redevelopment of the Swan River foreshore.
He's right on the money when he suggests that erring on the side of caution on this one is destined to leave us with something second rate, a 'coulda been' development that promised so much more.
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Gas crisis, what crisis?
Since Carps captured the airwaves last night to advise us to stop burning so much gas, there have already been a few grumblings among those who feel it's their God given right to chew through our natural resources, no matter how finite they might be. To these people, the pipeline explosion may as well have taken place on Uranus for all they care...
Anyway, I'm convinced that those who flaunt the call to turn down the gas are the same people who steadfastly refuse to obey water restrictions and would defend their right to have a green lawn (and a warm house) with sawn-off shotguns, if they could only convince the powers that be that guns are good. Yes, while I'm outside hosing the leaves off my driveway, I demand the right to fire up the Rinnai space heater... and I'll leave all the lights on as well, so ner!
I'm sure that these people are a small minority, but if anyone out there really does feel aggrieved at the thought of having to layer up to beat the chill instead of hitting a switch, they should remember how the gas crisis could be so much worse. This Wikipedia extract gives you some context:
The fire at the plant was not extinguished until two days later. The Longford plant was shut down immediately, and the state of Victoria was left without its primary gas supplier. Within days, the Victorian Energy Network Corporation shut down the state's entire gas supply.
The sudden crisis was devastating to Victoria's economy, crippling industry and the commercial sector (in particular, the hospitality industry which relied on natural gas for cooking).
Natural gas is also widely used residentially in Victoria for hot water and gas heating, and Victorians endured 20 days of cold showers and chilly nights.
Gas supplies to Victoria were resumed on 14 October. Many Victorians were outraged and upset to discover only minor compensation on their next gas bill, with the average compensation figure being only around $10.
Yes, I was living in Melbourne at the time and while we Perthites do cop our early morning chills, imagine living with days on end where the temperature struggles to get beyond 12 degrees at any stage. Then try and imagine how having NO gas would affect you. And when I say no gas, I mean having your gas turned off at the meter and $5,000 fines if you get caught turning them back on.
Having no gas means no hot showers for a start, unless you have an electric hot water system. Oh joy, struggle out of bed at 5am and spend the next 30 minutes boiling the kettle non-stop to get enough hot water for a sponge bath. Those brave enough, or in desperate need of a proper hair wash, simply ran the gauntlet and endured an ice cold shower. Bracing, very bracing.
Of course, those with electric systems found their houses resembling the old Rottnest Island shower building, with people lined up, shower cap in hand.
And then there were those who gave up on bathing... I met quite a few of them on the public transport system. A fragrant bunch.
So, you can't shower, but maybe you can make up for it with a nice cooked breakfast? No, not if you're like many people who have a gas stove and oven. Suddenly every night is Lean Cuisine night. In the evenings you sit cold and slightly stinky in front of the flameless gas heater, chewing miserably on your TV dinner, watching the news for reports on those shameless parasitic scumbags who dare turn their gas back on.
A lot of children were spawned on those dark cold nights, so here's a thought! Rather than procrastinate about turning down the heating, do the wise thing and procreate instead - your country will thank you...
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