Molly
Greetings. I loved your website. It made me feel at home, and also taught me a few things. As a Yank My family and I were welcomed with open arms when we moved to our new home in Australia. We loved Australia and its people straight away. Since we had to adopt out our dogs when we left the States, we looked for an aussie dog to fill the void, and it was filled to overflowing with our kelpie cross...
Read MoreMy Get Up And Go Has Got Up and Went…
How do I know when my youth is all spent? Well, my get up and go has got up and went. But in spite of it all, I’m able to grin, When I think of where my get up has been. Old age is golden so I’ve heard said, But sometimes I wonder when I get into bed With my ear in the drawer and teeth in a cup, My eyes on the table until I wake up. As sleep dims my eye, I say to myself, Is there...
Read MoreNine Miles From Gundagai
I’m used to driving bullock teams across the hills and plains, I’ve teamed out back for forty years in blazing drougt and rains, I’ve lived a heap of trouble down without a bloomin’ lie, But I can’t forget what happened to me, nine miles from Gundagai. ‘Twas getting dark, the team was bogged, the axle snapped in two, I lost me matches and me pipe so what was I...
Read MoreFond Memories
Author Unknown. I remember the first time I tried it, I was only a lad of fifteen; And though she was younger than I was, She was more composed and serene. I was eager, yet awkward and backward, Uncertain of how to proceed; But a feeling of joy soon possed me, The warmth of her hastened the deed. It wa out in the barn,I remember, The evening was scented with hay. Her body moved gently towards...
Read MoreThe Meanest Mother In The World
Copyright 1967 by Bobbie Pingaro I had the meanest mother in the whole world. While other kids ate candy for breakfast, I had to have cereal, eggs or toast. When others had cokes and candy for lunch, I had to eat a sandwich. As you can guess, my supper was different than the other kids’ also. But at least, I wasn’t alone in my sufferings. My sister and two brothers had the same mean...
Read MoreMuch More Than A Mate
By Glenny Palmer. 2001 per kind permission Glenny Palmer,Cedar Vale, Qld. Hidden in the misty Scottish Highlands, where the purple bells of heather gently sway, lies the ancient wellspring of our rich endownment, that lives in you,my faithful friend,today. On a journey marked by love and dedication, two centuries our fathers walked with you, from the frost fields of northern habitation, to the...
Read MoreXmas in the Lock-up
By Alf Johnson. It was just a country village in a patch of mulga scrub, Where the bulk of local business was conducted in the pub. Here you booked in as a tourist, or if broke, in “Rotten Row”, It made but little difference, there was nowhere else to go. Here the mate and I got stranded with our usual run of luck, With not a cent between us since we left “Old...
Read MoreDinkum
By Ross Magnay Well you ask me if I’m dinkum, Ask me if I’m true blue, Well I’m a dinkum Aussie mate, “Cause I’m telling you Can a fish swim underwater, Do the Catholics have a Pope, Or to be a bit specific, Is a pommy scared of soap? Yes you ask me if I’m dinkum, If I’m Aussie through and through, Well of course I’m bloody Aussie and damned proud...
Read MoreIn Grandma’s Day
Grandmother, on a winters day Milked the cows, and fed them hay; Fed the hogs, saddled the mule, And got the children off to school. Did a washing, mopped the floors, Washed the windows and did some chores; Cooked a dish of home-dried fruit, Pressed her husband’s Sunday suit. Swept the parlor, made the bed, Baked a dozen loaves of bread; Split some firewood, lugged it in, Enough to fill the...
Read MoreA Cockies Prayer
I long for a cow of modern make that milks five days for pleasures sake. That sleeps on Saturdays and snores on Sundays and starts afresh on Mondays. I wish for a herd that knows the way to wash each other day by day, That never bothers to excite us, With chills or fever or Mastisis. I sigh for a new and better breed, that takes less grooming and less feed, That has the reason, wit and wisdom to...
Read MoreA Cow’s Lament
Though I’ve just given birth to a heifer, And of pride and milk I am full. It’s sad to relate that my actual state, Was not brought about by the bull I have never been naughty-I swear it, In spite of the calf I have born, By Freddie Fond’s book I am virgo intacto, And I have not had the bull by the horn. How dreary the farmyard and meadow, The cow sheds seem gloomy and grey. the...
Read MoreThe Queensland Dog
Author Unknown. A stranger came from New South Wales, and he was tall and brown. He lined up beside us at the bar and sank his schooner down, And all the while, to pass the time, he told us doubtful tales, Of the country he laid claim to, that remarkable New South Wales. With soil so rich and fertile, so ran his line of talk, That pumpkin vines fair sprinted along, as fast as a man can walk. He...
Read MoreA Farmers Last Will and Testament
Being of sound mind and body, I hereby bequeath all my earthly goods and chattels to the following persons:- To my wife ‘ My overdraft at the bank . Maybe she can understand it. I never could. To my son – Equity on my car. Now he will have to get work to meet the repayments To my bank manager ‘ I leave my soul. He has a mortgage on it anyway. To my neighbour ‘ My clown...
Read MoreBluey
By Barbara O’Connor Bluey was a bouncing big dog with sparkling , ivory teeth and jaws to match. A Blue Heeler as his name implies. He lived on an isolated property, the boss’s pride and joy. When visitors came Bluey would leap down the path, a gyrating bundle of jollity, his cavernous mouth parted in a gleaming smile, and CHOMP,right on the visitor’s heel. The visitors were...
Read MoreThe Old Blue Dog
Author unknown Sunday, bloody Sunday, reflects Bluey sourly. Usually it’s a day of joyous action, fishing and swimming with the kids down at the waterhole, treeing the odd goanna or giving a bunny or two a run for their money. Living it up! Today is not going to be like the other Sundays. He’s heard high pitched and persistent complaints that indicates the kids are being washed and made...
Read MoreStone the Crows
Ever notice how crows have that magical power of observation and seem to be able to diagnose illness from miles away, without ever getting close enough to see the patient up front? They keep a respectful distance and lurk like an undertaker in Paradise. They even look like one! All dressed in black and very serious looking. I can remember having humped my bluey through the heat of the day and...
Read MoreA true story
This is a true story.. Would I lie to you? One year when times were pretty tough and you took on any job to earn an extra “shillin”, the Dingoes were giving the cockies out Richmond way a hard time. To try to minimize the problem the local shire council offered a bounty of a shilling (approx 10 cents for those of you born too late to appreciate “good” money) for each...
Read MoreDingo
By Pat Lowe Per kind permission Top Dog Journal I once lived for three years on the edge of the Great Sandy desert with my companion Kurnti. Our first camp was at the side of a lake. The water lasted for a couple of months and then the lake became a dry, cracked claypan, which did not fill with water again for seven years. Dingoes came to visit us , sniffing for scraps around the fireplace at...
Read MoreMusso The Magnificent
By Outback Jack Here we go again folks. Now this isn’t a story about man’s best friend or woman’s best friend either for that matter. This is a true story about a bird, one of this country’s more abundant pink and grey Galah. Now this fellow was commonly known around “Clonagh” cattle station, where he spent most of his life as “Musso” How...
Read MoreKeeping Faith
By Roger Marchant Per kind permission Top Dog Journal It was quite dark now; the thick, hard darkness of an Australian bush summer night. And it was quiet out here in the back blocks. The flies were down, but the mosquitoes hadn’t made an appearance. Not that they worried us – we’d spent our lives around that tumble down shack. Living outside, mostly. Blue and I had been out...
Read MoreBuildings out the back
By Judy Jenkinson They were funny looking buildings, that were once a way of life, If you couldn’t sprint the distance, then you really were in strife. They were nailed, they were wired, but were mostly falling down, There was one in every yard, in every house, in every town. They were given many names, some were even funny, But to most of us, we knew them as the outhouse or the dunny. I’ve...
Read MoreRevenge is sweet.
By John Chandler. The mate and I were sitting in my ute at the biggest set of traffic lights in Townsville one Saturday morning. We were five vehicles back in one of six lanes; two left, three straight through and one left. At our level there were about 25 vehicles waiting for the lights to change. I saw the mate looking hard ahead of us when he said, “Aint that Frank first up in this...
Read MoreTrawler Tales
Strewth…’as he croaked it? There was a large trawler fleet working out of Townsville back in the ‘1970’s as I suppose there were all along the Queensland east coast. However it has always been my opinion that all the “characters”, be they skippers or deckies, congregated at the trawler wharf at the end of Flinders Street during those early years of the prawning...
Read MoreAustralian Working Dogs
It has been said that a sheepmans idea of heaven is to have his faithful Kelpies there working sheep with him. Anyone who has intimately known a Kelpie would agree. Australian Working Dogs. By Mrs M.Cleary. This is my tribute to our Aussie working dogs, Who give their best in dust and heat, in snow and mountain fog; They’ll tend their sheep or cattle til their pads are red with blood, Over...
Read MoreBingara Mayo’s Son
Author unknown. There was once a time in our splendid past when the Queensland Blue Heeler, or the Queensland Blue, as the animal is more commonly known, epitomised everything that stood for a proud nation. He was brutish, tough, vicious -tempered, would fight at the drop of a hat but stuck by his mates, hated fancy food and would screw anything that moved.Even better, those pommie bastards...
Read More