Ian Aldridge of Goulburn brings sad news. “I was driving the Hume Highway and there are no fruit advertising signs with spelling/apostrophe mistakes. Gone are the ‘mangos’ and ‘cherry’s’ that we were so fond of.” And gone is a chunk of Column 8’s business.
The subject of unexpected meetings is now closed but Nola Scott of Wagga Wagga would just like to slip in an aside. “My daughter and I went to England in 2018 to meet, for the first time, a friend I’d known since 1947. We became pen-friends while still at school; I don’t remember what organisation set up the children’s international pen-friendships towards the end of World War II. Now we email, or talk on the phone, both in our 90s.”
Last week C8 asked questions about “lost” cars and memories. Tim Ingall of Scottsdale, Arizona, has sent an answer that is too long to run here but it boils down to the brain having an efficient sorting system with different sections for long-term (hippocampus) memories and immediate recall (prefrontal cortex). Some areas of the brain are affected earlier by brain cell loss with ageing.
Some more spider stories for the less squeamish among us. Bill Irvine of Goulburn says, “My son’s bedroom had a resident huntsman when he was a teenager. It was not uncommon for him to wake up to the huntsman on the side of his bedside drawers, not 30cm from his face. His response? ‘Good morning, Ralph.’ To this day, any huntsman we see is Ralph.”
Then, many more Ralphs from Greg Adelt of Dubbo: “Sitting around a bonfire at night with family and friends in our paddock, we slowly became aware of hundreds, if not thousands, of huntsmen around us on the ground and climbing up chair legs and human legs, trying to get away from the fire. With yells and screams (yes, the women were just as bad), we retreated to the house.”
Jeremy Parsons of Milton says, “Vacuuming one day I noticed a large huntsman on the ceiling. I raised the tube to suck in the spider, then, concerned that it might somehow emerge, I sprayed insect killer into the vacuum tube. As I switched the machine on again, there was an explosion and flames, and burning rubber covered my right foot. Much amusement in our local emergency department.”
Drinks linger on as well. Jill Howell of Moruya sends in: “Back in the 1960s we had an American exchange student who informed us that root beer (sarsaparilla in Oz) and ice-cream was known as a black cow.”
Column8@smh.com.au
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