The Last Post

[OFS's friend]

I just thought of another one regarding Mrs McGinty:

On this occasion he entered her outside dunny to set her up again. She used to use neatly cut-up newspapers for toilet paper (a common thing in those days) and OFS went in, removed the stack of nicely-trimmed pieces, went home with them and stuck them all together with a cheap gluey paste made from flour and water, then returned the lot to the hook in the dunny. We often wondered what happened when she went to wipe herself with an eight-inch square sheet of half-inch thick cardboard!

OFS's friend

 

[mud n blood]

What a giggle!

My grandfather too, had some episodes like that. I remember him telling me when he was at school, he took a hession bag with some snakes he'd caught in it, and stuffed tham in the teacher's desk drawer before class. He found out years later that at least one of them was a brown.

Also the time he and his best mate stole all the teachers' horses (horse-drawn carts in those days) and chased them down the main street like a stampede thru Boonah town. It made the papers too.

When they were older (ie 19+) they used to arrange one-on-one fist-fights with lads from adjoining towns on the weekends, with wagers up to a week's pay. They were all working farms back then, so they would have been pretty "hard" blokes. Photos of him in the early 1930's showed him to be a tall, handsome, well-built, very fit man .... an awesome figure .... just like me of course ---- not!

He used to drink with the local cop a fair bit, too. When it came time for him to finally get a drivers licence (after the war), the cop asked him if he could drive. He said "well, I drive a tractor on the farm". Unbelievably, he got his licence and never had one test in his lifetime!

Just a few short ones ....

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Anyway, that's what I reckon ........

mud n blood

 

[Tiger_Of_Old]

thank u ofs friend for telling some of the stories told by ofs.altho i didnt know him i can relate to his stories as my grandfather served in the war.to think what sacrafice all the diggers as well as the woman at home etc gave to be and hvae today is a debt that we can only repay by keep remembering what they went thru and not to happen again.
3 cheers ofs!

 

[DEES RULE!]

OFS i hope that you will watch us and spread some of your wisdom on us from above... and hey i hope that you get a good view of the ground from where ever you are!
R.I.P

 

[OFS's friend]

These were the days when outside dunnies had the night cart man come to remove the cans once every week. Mrs McGinty told my mum that she had accidentally dropped a very expensive ring into the can and she could not see it, what should she do? My mum advised her to ask Mr Bailey (the night cart driver) to assist her. When he arrived on the Monday morning, Mrs McGinty was all dressed up ready to go out, floral dress, white gloves, posh hat, high heels. Mr Bailey went in, removed the almost-full can, replaced it with an enpty one and headed for his cart. Mrs McGinty called him and asked if he could help her to find her lost treasure. Mr Bailey tipped the contents onto her manicured lawn, said "There it is," picked it up and placed it in her hand, together with pee and pooh and paper and all. Mrs McGinty almost fainted and was still standing in shock even as Mr Bailey went to the next house to continue his trade.

OFS's friend

 

[OFS's friend]

Apologies for not writing for a while but I have been away with my elderly cits group for a fortnight. Tough life being a pensioner! I will continue with some more stories from my memory bank if there is enough response to keep them going until the footy season starts for all you keen footy fans.

Mrs McGinty was the only person in our street who owned a bicycle in the early 1930s. She rode it 100 yards down to the shops about four days a week, just to show off, we all knew. She used to keep it on her front verandah all the time as it was quite safe to do so in those days. One day OFS found an old wreck of a bike dumped near the Merri Creek, but a lot smaller model than hers. He took off the front wheel and put it onto hers. She did not realise it had been done until she began to ride it and it looked as if she was riding down a hill. Almost everyone in the street was watching that event and she was acutely embarrassed, almost threatened police action but eventually calmed down and said that if the wheel was replaced by a certain time she would not take any action. OFS did so during the darkened hours, he could not afford to be taken to task by his parents and the police.

On another occasion Mrs McGinty was going shopping on her bicycle one day and had just left her front gate when she met a few of the neighbors. The gossipy talk lasted about half an hour, then she took off towards the shop, then got stopped again by a different group. Finally she got into the shop, was in there about 10-15 minutes and when she came out her bicycle was gone. OFS had pinched it, rode it back to her house and put it back on her front verandah. When she began jumping up and down about her stolen bicycle, everyone in the street swore blind to her that she had walked to the shop that morning. When she got home she found her bike exactly where she (he) had left it. I am sure she must have thought she was going mad at the time.

OFS's friend

 

[mud n blood]

Classic stuff!

This should go into a book ......

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Anyway, that's what I reckon ........

mud n blood

 

[Leonardo]

I too am enjoying these stories, OFS's Friend, please keep them coming. They are bringing up memories of my childhood days but your tales are terrific. Please don't go away again for a fortnight or if you must do so, please warn us in advance.

Signed - Leonardo

 

[Fred]

Wonderful reading.
Thanks

 

[johnson]

This stuff has touched my heart. It's all so easy for us to get so caught up in our own little world's and forget about taking time out to reflect on what makes this country and the game of AFL so great.

People like OFS are as Bluey posted, the lifeblood of our culture, they help shape and form our opinions.

Thanks for sharing all these OFS friend. I hope and pray you are going OK and that you find comfort as you go.

------------------
Respect. Keep the peace.

 

[OFS's Friend]

Mrs McGinty 's right-hand-side neighbors were the Zed family. They were of Polish/Russian origin and could not speak English very well and everyone in the street had trouble pronouncing their name which was something like Czerjkwskiyolamna, so we just called them the Zeds and they did not mind at all. Mr Zed worked for the railways and did some part-time jobs to help the coffers along when possible but he was really a hopeless handyman. If he nailed two pieces of wood together with a 2-inch nail, both pieces would split and the nail would bend in three places.
Part of their shared side fence needed re-aligning so he offered to do it free of charge if Mrs McGinty would pay for the nails. He removed about 70 palings from the fence and these were all in good condition, so only the crossrails needed replacing. OFS knew of a pile of similar palings around the corner on a vacant block and that night he made several trips to "borrow" about 25 palings and scattered them amongst the Zed/McGinty pile. When Mr Zed got to the end of the job he found he had a lot of palings left over. OFS "just happened to be nearby" and offered some assistance. He would help Mr Zed remove the palings again, carefully measure the spaces all correctly and help Mr Zed replace them tomorrow. All agreed, everyone went home for the night, except OFS - he returned the 25 palings to the original vacant block when it was dark. Next day he began helping Mr Zed replace all the palings and guess what? He was about 25 short! I think Mr Zed contemplated jumping off Princes Bridge at one stage.

OFS's Friend

 

[OFS's Friend]

I just thought of another one:

Mrs McGinty had a dog called Peppy which was a bit like a french poodle but was unpopular in our street. It was yappy, snappy, and nobody liked it at all. One day it got out and found its way into OFS's back yard. He could not resist the temptation to paint some hoops with a weak waterpaint around its legs and tail with a reddish paint. It went home looking like a South Melbourne Football Club mascot. The paint washed off after about a week.

On another occasion OFS was cleaning up some rubbish in his home and being tossed out was a broken plastic doll. Peppy strolled in again and OFS painted a saddle on its back and tied the doll onto in like a jockey. When let out the other kids in the street laughed until dark and all the parents thought it was funny also but I think Mrs McGinty was not too pleased.

OFS's Friend

 

[OFS's Friend]

I have ANOTHER funny story about a man named Tim. He was one of Oldfashioned supporters neighbours and was a kind old fellow who loved a yarn and a drink or two. I think he has also passed away. Anyway, Tim was one day driving to the shops to buy some groceries (he lived alone). A car swerved up in front of him with the license plate of 'IPFREELY'. He chuckled to himself but also in disgust. When Tim was driving back home from the supermarket, the same car was ahead of him and going the same way that Tim needed to go. Tim was almost home and the same car was still in front of him. Just before his house, the mystery car pulled in to Oldfashioned supporter's driveway! Yep, it was OFS. Apparently, it was his old car that he had for about 15-20 years. OFS always wanted to change the numberplate but never got around to it. And yes, OFS bought the car with the number plate already like that.

Any comments?

 

[OFS's Friend]

I am bitterly disappointed that the writer of the previous joke about Tim was not in fact me, OFS's Friend. While I fully understand that in writing to websites no singular person has any sole copyright or other rights to any particular name. But I would have thought in my own sentimental way that I have been conveying some stories of OFS which I regard as sacred between OFS and myself and our own small (diminishing) circle of friends. I can assure followers of this topic that the Tim story did not come from me, the real OFS's Friend. Probably the writer of that story did not mean to intrude and sent in his story in good faith but I am just a little hurt that a story not associated with a very fine man was attributed to him. I hope the contributor of that story has the courage to apologise, not so much to me, but to the memory of a very fine gentleman.

The Tim story was full of holes. In a previous post it was mentioned that OFS did not own a vehicle until 1949 (a motor cycle). The era being written about was the Depression years and nobody in OFS's street owned a car, in fact none of the houses in their street apart from the Zeds and Mrs McGinty had a driveway. And it was not possible to have number plates customised until many decades later. And finally I do not believe it is possible to have more than six characters on a customised number plate anyway.

(The real) OFS's Friend

 

[The Dutchman!]

Late entrant on this but equally saddended to hear of OFS's passing. RIP digger.

Chris

 

[Oldfashioned Supporter]

Further to my previous comment about the Tim joke, I have decided to send in this lot using OFS's original password. I believe this will prove that I am in fact the original friend of OFS. Needless to say I am quite upset that some complete stranger would choose to break into this topic with such a rubbishy story as the Tim joke. If followers of this topic have had enough of my postings, please indicate so and I shall cease to send any more stories about OFS.

Mrs McGinty was fond of gardening and was very house-proud. She always left a pair of slippers on her front verandah near her front door so she could step out of her work shoes and always enter the house with clean slippers. She tended to just walk up to the slippers, step into them and keep walking. One day OFS sneaked over there and screwed the slippers to the verandah floor. Mrs McGinty stepped into them and tried to walk, but just stood stock-still in the one spot.

On yet another occasion OFS sabotaged Mrs McGinty's bicycle. He "borrowed" it, removed the back wheel, removed the tyre and tube, replaced the back wheel and put the bike back on the verandah. She began riding it down to the shop not realising that the bike had been sabotaged but suddenly did when she reached a cobblestoned part of the street and wondered what the horrible noise was.

The reason why Mr Zed and Mrs McGinty were the only driveway owners in the street is as follows: When the street's houses were established in the early 1900s, all the houses were built on very short frontages ( most were about 25-ft wide and most had a 4-ft path down the side. The two blocks in question were originally planned to sell as three but the owner of the blocks wanted to build a couple of fairly different (and more expensive) houses so he made two big blocks out of the three small ones. Hence both these blocks were the only two in the street with land capable of accommodating driveway space.

(The real) OFS's friend

 

[Leonardo]

I hope this topic does not turn into a slanging match between the Real McCoy and the Tim McCoy. I must say that when I read the Tim story it did not sound like the type of posting that the real OFS's Friend would send in. I fail to understand why anyone else would want to interfere with this topic with such garbage as the Tim story. Keep the stories coming please OFS's Friend, I am sure you will still get plenty of support from many interested followers.

Signed Leonardo

 

[Future Pie]

ofs sounds like a great person bad luck i didnt have the chance to meet him.

 

[Oldfashioned Supporter]

Mrs McGinty was a creature of habit. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday she dressed up and went into town at 10 in the morning, returning about 6.30. Rumor had it that she was a member of a toffy club of some sort and spent all her time sitting around drinking tea. On Tuesday and Saturday she did housework inside and spent time in her garden, which was almost always **** and span. On Sundays she went into town again and we all believed she went to an inner city church. Every fourth Sunday she would have visitors, a man and two women. They arrived at about 11, left right on 5. We all guessed that they were some family members. They all arrived in a big black Chevrolet and us kids all sat at a distance and admired it immensely (nobody in our street owned a car). One Sunday when it came to leaving time, they found they had a flat tyre. The man did not seem to know what to do and OFS (then aged about 16) offered to help and he got the wheel fixed even though he finished up covered in dirt and mud himself. I think that was the day that Mrs McGinty realised he had grown up a lot and that he was no longer just a teenage larrikin.

OFS's friend

 

[X_box_X]

I was searching through some previous posts on Bigfooty, and I noticed this very touching thread. I know Bigfooty isn’t alive as much in the pre-season, therefore, I decided to bring this post up, as I wasn’t around Bigfooty at the time of this thread. It will also give others the opportunity to read over this thread if they weren’t around at the time of OFS’s death. I certainly loved reading the stories and I didn’t regret one minute of it.

I hope OFS is doing well.

R.I.P, OFS!

 

[ScouseCat]

It was a nice change to read these stories and certainly puts things into perspective.

Rest in Peace my friend.

 

[skilts]

He still lives. What a pity he can't see the effect he still has? Then again, maybe he did know?

 

[karnaby]

x_box_x

thanks heaps for bringing this thread back up.

I enjoyed keeping up with the stories from the friend of OFS a couple of years ago & I've really enjoyed the chance to revisit them now. The off-season needs interludes like this.


Back to the top :^)

 

[jod23]

This thread is a reminder of how good BF used to be. I hope OFS's friend is still telling stories.

 

[Eago77]

Cheers x_box_x, good reading.