Author: ian

Via a news bulletin, at 8.30 a.m., I heard of the death of crooner, Bing Crosby, at the age of seventy-three. He had collapsed on a golf course in Spain whilst playing the game with three Spanish professionals. In the same bulletin I heard that Mount Everest’s conqueror, Sir Edmund Hillary, is seriously ill, some five thousand metres up in the Himalayas, yet can’t be brought down due to bad weather. Sir Edmund is fifty-seven years of age.

For the first time in ages, I weighed myself. I am only eleven stone two. We drove, in drizzle, to Miranda Fair. In Myer, Tiki stood in a queue for twenty minutes to pay $6.30 (a discount of ten per cent had reduced it from $7.00) for a dark blue cardigan. It is a birthday present for her younger sister, Wendy.

In the high humidity, I drove to town, via Redfern, eventually parking in the Kent Street parking station, at the rear of the Hoyts Cinema complex. I paid $3.25 for each of us to see “Rocky” (voted the Best Film of 1976), written by its principal actor, Sylvester Stallone. Prior to this, a film, on Mount Warning and Surfers Paradise, had been followed by a poor cartoon featuring two blue anteaters. During the interval we each devoured a packet of crisps.

At a quarter to five, we crossed Kent Street in the rain and I drove to Manly. As we were entering a marked lane on the Harbour Bridge, a light blue Holden sedan attempted to push up on the inside of our vehicle and had to brake suddenly, in the wet conditions. The young couple, with children, knew that they were in the wrong. As we crossed The Spit Bridge, it was mentioned on the ‘2UW News’, at 5.00, that “Ming Dynasty” (9/1), trained by Bart Cummings, had won the one hundredth running of the Caulfield Cup, from “Unaware” and “Salamander”.

I parked in the asphalt car park on Wentworth Street, facing the old buildings at its eastern end. Once inside ‘K’s Snapper Inn’ we were shown to the same table, in the rear section of the restaurant, that we had occupied a few weeks ago. A seafood cocktail, curried scallops, pavlova  with ice-cream for Tiki; scallops kebab, a king prawn salad, pavlova with ice-cream for me — two glasses of lemon squash each, two cups of cappucino: all for $20.80.

Tiki requested that I drive to Tania Park, at Dobroyd Point, to look out through the rain at the lights. Ours was the only car there and when another containing four youths stopped suspiciously before slowly moving by, we agreed that we should drive on, in case it should appear again. This time, I drove to Edgecliffe Esplanade, at Seaforth, and we looked out over The Spit. At 8.00, we left for home and found it to be bone dry on the southern side of the city. We arrived home by 8.50 and watched most of the movie, ‘Doctor In Trouble’ (1970), with Leslie Phillips and Harry Secombe.

It has been a pleasant sunny day, yet again, with a maximum of nineteen degrees Celsius. This afternoon one of Tiki’s workmates was losing his patience because he had asked thrice, over the public-address system, for a Mr. Ferrett to come to the office. I didn’t help matters when I volunteered: “Perhaps he’s out chasing a rabbit!”

“Flashez” screened at 5.30 p.m.; 6.00 (and also on Channel Two), “Wild, Wild World Of Animals” looks at the chimpanzee; 7.00, “Willesee”; and, at 8.30, a new “Benny Hill Show”.

More than 13,000 people have fought to see Elvis’s body, for just ten seconds, as it lay in a huge copper-lined coffin. The body was dressed in a white suit, light blue shirt and silver tie. President Carter said today that Elvis was unique and irreplaceable.

Elvis’s mother died on the 14th of August, in 1958. He adored her and died within two days of her obit – on the 16th August (American time).

The No.1 song at the moment, in Sydney, is “Ain’t Gonna Bump No More (With No Big Fat Woman)” by Joe Tex.

I awoke at 6.30 a.m. from a deep sleep. A heavy overcast is accompanied by a strong wind but it is not raining. At noon I turned on Channel Nine and “The Mike Walsh Show”. Guests include the Scottish singer, Andy Stewart, who is forty-three years of age and dressed in a kilt, and actress, Elaine “Number 96” Lee. At two o’clock, in today’s edition of the series, “Medical Center”, Dr. Joe Gannon (Chad Everett) falls in love with a nurse (Barbara Anderson), only to learn that her long lost husband has been located in a Vietcong prison camp. The couple had been married for just three days when he left for Vietnam and have a son who is now ten years of age.

The basis of the plot is somewhat like that used in the programme from the series, “Baa Baa Black Sheep”, which was screened last Saturday week.

In “Mannix” — which has Mike “Tightrope” Connors cast in the title role as a private detective — a girl, who has been in a coma for a year, regains consciousness and solves the hit-and-run crime by remembering who was at the wheel of the vehicle that struck her.

It is only sixteen degrees Celsius with a heavy overcast that is still threatening to dump more rain on Sydney’s southern suburbs.

This year’s winner of the Sydney Cup, “Reckless”, trained by “Phar Lap’s” strapper, Tommy Woodcock, started at even money when he won this afternoon’s running of the Adelaide Cup, from “Straight Up”.

On Channel Two, at half past five, “Flashez” features music presented by Australian singer, Ray Burgess. It is followed, at 6.00, by “The Big Match”, in which Ipswich defeated West Ham by two goals to nil. Cliff Richard is being interviewed by funny man, Paul Makin, on “Willesee”, at 7.00, on Channel Seven. Cliff — born Harry Roger Webb, in Lucknow, India — will be thirty-seven years of age in October, but looks a deal younger. His career began in 1958 when he recorded his first hit, “Move It”.

From half past seven, on Channel Seven, “The Dick Emery Show”; 8.00, Channel Two, “In The Wild” with Harry Butler: a visit to an oasis in the Great Sandy Desert makes us aware of some of the animals that have become extinct in the relatively short period of white Australian history. The seventeenth episode of “Rich Man, Poor Man: Book 2” screens, on Channel Seven, from half past eight.

At noon, following “Sounds Unlimited” on Channel Seven, there is a repetition from the series, “Sonny And Cher”. From one o’clock, on the same channel, a British documentary, “Survival”, features the ‘darting’ of roan antelopes, via the use of a helicopter, in South-West Africa and the transportation of the tranquillised animals to the safety of a national park. We arrived home at a quarter past four and saw the last fifteen minutes of the live telecast of Australian Rules from V.F.L. Park, in Melbourne. Collingwood thrashed Carlton by 152 points to 50. Malcolm T. Elliott hosts the programme from the studios of Channel Seven in Sydney. “Jeopardy”, followed from five and half an hour later, “It’s Academic”. Both are on Channel Seven and are a test of school children’s general knowledge. Andrew Harwood comperes the pair.

At six o’clock, on Channel Two, “Top Saturday League” offered its edited delayed replay of this afternoon’s match between the North Sydney ‘Bears’ and the Manly-Warringah ‘Sea Eagles’, which was played at North Sydney Oval. The latter led by 13-0 at half-time, with the highlight of this half undoubtedly being John Gibbs’ great individual try. The diminutive, fleet-footed half-back, who runs with his head back, literally ran through the whole of the North Sydney team to score under the posts. Gibbs scored again in the second half after he had kicked ahead and regathered the ball; and played a major part in the scoring of two other tries during the course of the match. Although Manly-Warringah won by 24-10, it played unimpressively as a team, perhaps feeling somewhat jaded after its 8-16 loss to the Eastern Suburbs ‘Roosters’ in a round of the midweek Amco Cup competition, last Wednesday night.

At half past seven, on Channel Nine, there is a movie-length programme of the dramatic series, “Baa Baa Black Sheep”, which is set during the Second World War. Squadron leader, ‘Pappy’ Boyington, played by the short Robert “Hawaiian Eye”/”The Wild, Wild West” Conrad, falls in love with a woman whose husband is missing in action, only to learn that he has been found alive.

The Centenary Test between Australia and England began this morning at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. England’s captain, Tony Greig, won the toss and sent Australia in to bat. John Lever had Ian Davis trapped l.b.w. when the slim right-handed batsman had scored only five runs. Davis’s opening partner, Rick McCosker, did not last for much longer, cutting a ball from the tall, lanky right-arm speedster, Bob Willis, up into his face, only to have the ball, from there, drop on to his stumps.

Cosier was dismissed for ten and century-maker extraordinaire, David Hookes, playing in his first Test, came to the wicket with the score at 3-23. Hookes quickly added seventeen runs before he was caught by Greig, from the bowling of Chris Old when the total was forty-five. Walters was dismissed for four, in trying to hook a delivery from a metre outside of his off stump and Australia was 5-52, with Greg Chappell having been in for one and a half hours in order to score just eight runs.

Rod Marsh (28), Gary Gilmour (4), Kerry O’Keeffe (0), all fell in quick succession and, at tea, Australia was reeling at 8-126.

“Ngawyni” won the Australia Cup at Flemington and “Somerset Pride”, the Marlboro Classic at Rosehill.

Greg Chappell was bowled, by the left-arm spin of Underwood, for forty (9-136), when his patience finally ran out. One of my favourite racehorses, at present, “Blue’s Finito”, from Queensland, finished second in the last at Rosehill. Max Walker was bowled by Underwood for two, Lillee remained not out 10 and Australia was all out for just 138.

Woolmer and Brearley opened for England, at 5.00 p.m. Woolmer (9) was caught Chappell bowled Lillee when the English total was on nineteen and, at stumps, the score had moved to 1-29 with Brearley on twelve and the nightwatchman, Derek Underwood, on five.

At half past six, a programme of the “Holmes And Yoyo” series was screened and, an hour later, “100 Not Out” examines Test cricket played between England and Australia since that inaugural contest in 1877. Sydney’s maximum reached twenty-nine degrees Celsius.

At 3.00 p.m., I turned on the radio and learned, to my complete surprise, that England had been dismissed for just 95 — Greig had top scored with 18 — and that O’Keeffe, the replacement for the injured McCosker, and Davis were batting for Australia. Australia, at stumps, is 3-104 with Davis not out on forty-five and Walters likewise on thirty-two.

Queen Elizabeth II arrived at the Sydney Opera House, at 10.00 a.m., from the royal yacht, “Britannia”.

A new Subaru 1600cc four-wheel drive station waggon costs around five and a half thousand dollars to buy. This amount includes what are termed ‘on the road’ expenses.

Australia is 8-387, at stumps, with Rod Marsh 95 not out and the rangy McCosker — his broken jaw wired and his head wrapped so amply in bandages that it looked more like that of a walking Egyptian mummy than that of an international cricketer — 17 not out. Of those batsmen dismissed today Davis compiled 68, Walters 66, left-handed David Hookes 56 (that included five successive fours from the bowling of the lanky Greig) Gilmour 16 and Lillee 25.

“Desirable” won the Newmarket Handicap, at Flemington, on this Labour Day public holiday in Victoria.

I read in a morning newspaper about the greats of cricket from the past who will be visiting the Centenary Test, including Bob Cowper (27 Tests, 1964-’69), the Victorian left-hand batsman who, in the 1965-’66 Test series against England, amassed 307 (the highest Test score on Australian soil) at the M.C.G., which the reporter states: “… did more to drive people away from the sport”.

Agnetha and Anni-Frid, the female half of the Swedish pop group, Abba, appear in today’s “The Sun” newspaper, clad in bikinis. The photograph was taken in Perth.

This morning a blaze at the Harbord Diggers’ Club, a northern coastal suburb of Sydney, caused damage, estimated at one and a half million dollars, to its dining room and kitchen.

At 7.00 p.m., the current affairs series, “Willesee”, presented by Michael Willesee, featured a transvestite, and later, a girl of just fourteen who is eight months into her pregnancy.

At half past the hour, and also on Channel Seven: “Many Faces Of Dick Emery”. From eight o’clock, on Channel Two, a programme in Bill Peach’s series, “Holiday”, takes the viewer to Fiji, thence on a tour by bus in Western Australia before concluding with a cruise on the Murray River. I watched half an hour of the film, “Asylum”, on Channel 7, which stars Richard Todd, Sylvia Simms and Barbara Parkins; before calling it a night. Sydney’s maximum was thirty-three degrees Celsius.