How’s this for openers?

More wine woes (C8), this time with Mickey Pragnell of Kiama: “My wife’s work group asked at an outer Sydney bowlo for a bottle of bubbly for a celebration lunch. The waitress returned with something she called ‘curvy brute’ and proceeded to attack the cork with a corkscrew.”

“Speaking of clubs and wine, a local surf club goes one better than just a small or large glass of wine, offering, ‘Low Tide, High Tide or Tsunami’.” We thank John McCartney of Mt Coolum (Qld).

“The Victorian Police Minister is called Anthony Carbines,” notes Stephanie Edwards of Leichhardt. “Hopefully the current force has more modern weapons.”

“I, too, remember Rob Venables (C8),” says Robert Hosking of Paddington. “I was at school with him: and of course, he sailed. His father, Hal, was a shipwright in Rose Bay, building the very pretty Stella folkboats (‘The Volkswagen of the sea’), while Rob, himself, was into old motor vehicles like myself. One memory is driving through the Cross in his beloved 1920s Crossley. It’s always a pleasure to see the names of those we have lost touch with in Column 8 and the Letters to the Editor, and note that they are still alive and kicking.”

Regarding the rubber band surplus (C8) that Garry P. Dalrymple is experiencing, Peter Miniutti of Ashbury has a well-rounded theory: “Surely it’s not too much of a stretch of the imagination for Garry to create the world’s biggest rubber band ball. He could just roll on down to the next Sculpture by the Sea with it.” Is it downhill from Earlwood to Bondi?

C8 first-timer, Brooke Walker of Blackmans Bay (Tas) collects them “until we have a critical mass (as judged by ourselves), then take them to our local farmers market in Hobart and give them to one of the vegetable stalls who reuse them to parcel out their produce. A circular economy, at least until they break.”

Geoffrey Briot of Stanmore writes: “In the mid-1960s the University of New England Jazz Band comprised mainly students with one or two local Armidale musicians. Our leader Neil Steeper would occasionally rename the band (C8). With an excellent local trumpeter, John Dagg and in a gesture to surrounding sheep farmers, we once became Johnny Dagg and the Dag-Rattlers.” Granny can’t help wondering if they were around long enough to form the perfect double-bill with Sussex Hotel regulars The Stray Dags.

Column8@smh.com.au

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