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Earning a trade as a late bloomer

“Only Column 8 and Granny can help with this one,” writes Adrian Bell of Davistown. “I bought a five-pack of ‘Tradies’ underpants. Each pair has one of the days of the week emblazoned on the waistline in high-vis, Monday to Friday. Do our tradies need clothes marked for each day? Is it for their valets? If they put on the wrong undies, will they attend the wrong job location? And what happens on weekends? Dirty undies for two days, or do they go commando? Can your stalwarts explain?”

George Manojlovic of Mangerton has detected a fatal flaw in programming: “Did anyone else notice that this week’s episode of Ray Martin’s The Last Goodbye on SBS is followed immediately by DI Ray?”

“Only in Newtown. I noticed that one of the King Street pubs had, among its Tuesday night specials, a tofu parmi,” observes Geoff Gilligan of Coogee. “Can’t imagine what the sides might be.”

Jim McAlpine (C8) still wants to know how to get to Sesame Street. The suggestions are many, with Susan Bradley of Eltham (Vic) getting specific in response to Jim asking for a map reference: “Sesame Street: in Melbourne, Melway 61 J10, or Melway 266 B7. In Brisbane, Brisway 458 H18. No Sesame in Sydney.” Using Google Maps, Col Mitty of Warrawee can see a vast collection of Sesame Streets around the world “but the most relevant one is off Broadway in New York. Who’da thunk it?”

Jim Dewar of Davistown thinks one should simply “look in the seedy part of town”.

“Seeing the name Warren Mitchell (C8) in Monday’s column took me back to the actor of that name and his alter ego, Alf Garnett,” says Don Bain of Port Macquarie. “Doubt the insufferable Alf would be allowed to get away these days with dressing down his spouse as ‘Ya silly old moo’!” Well, stands to reason, dunnit?

The memories of Alison Stewart of Waitara are somewhat more laudatory: “Upon seeing Warren Mitchell, I couldn’t stop myself thinking of Death of a Salesman. Great performance!”

John Ure of Mount Hutton sincerely hopes that Robert Hosking’s dad (C8) achieved success and satisfaction from his pursuit of philately. “I recall that as a young lad, I expressed interest in trading stamps as a source of pocket money. I told my dad that I wanted to emulate his youthful entrepreneurialism. His response? ‘Philately will get you nowhere’.”

Column8@smh.com.au

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Original URL: https://www.theage.com.au/national/nsw/earning-a-trade-as-a-late-bloomer-20240902-p5k73r.html