The Op-Shop Puzzle

June 1st, 2024

Charity stores are full of puzzles, and I’ve always looked at them and wondered at their condition, and how many pieces were missing. Many times I’ve thought about buying one to find out, and the other day I finally did:

As you can see, this lovely puzzle cost me a mere $2. I did some research, and the manufacturer (Philmar) made puzzles from the 1940s into the early 1970s and their Azure series was in the 1960s.

Mum and I both guessed the puzzle would be missing a half-dozen or so of its 300 pieces. This is not just a pessimistic guess: mum worked for many years in a charity store and had reason to suspect the condition of donated puzzles. A brief inspection showed the condition to be very good for something probably over 50 years old, with fraying and the occasional bend no less common than in a brand new puzzle.

300 pieces is a quick and easy puzzle and I intended to complete it in one sitting. The image wasn’t particularly challenging so – missing pieces aside – I didn’t think this would be difficult.

So far so good. Always start with the border, if only so you how much space on the table you’ll need for the puzzle!

The more I worked on it the more impressed I was. The pieces went together extremely well and they were printed on cardboard so stiff it almost had the feel of a plastic puzzle. Cardboard puzzles today can often be cheap and nasty, so I imagine this was a high quality brand when it was first released.

I was past the halfway point now and so far hadn’t identified a single missing piece! There is however a small error in the above photo that would confound me slightly as I continued.

The above was at about an hour after starting, and believe it or not the blue sky took me at least as long to complete. The error is that two border pieces left of the middle turret are placed incorrectly. They were so well matched to their neighbors that it took me a long time to recognize the mistake!

And we’re done! A lovely image on a well made puzzle and not a single missing piece! The smudge to the left of the right turret isn’t dirt, it’s part of the image. All told, this took me a little under two hours.

I was curious about the subject of the photo. It is Castle Scaligero on Lake Garda in Italy. If you look closely at the above recent photo, you see (on the left edge) boats moored next to the castle in the same place as in the decades-old photo used for the puzzle.

So the result of my investigation was that – based on a single case – op-shop puzzles can be trusted! I will likely continue this experiment one day in the future 🙂

And if you’re wondering, mum will now donate the puzzle back to another charity shop, hopefully to be purchased by someone else and made again!

It’s Been Raining All Day Long

June 1st, 2024

A wet day today. We woke to rain, it rained all day and now as night falls it’s still raining. I needed to pack today since I’m off to Sydney tomorrow, but first I decided to fit in a walk to see the beach in the rain.

It was somewhat early when I set out – around 8:30 am – and there were few other walkers, and no one else with umbrellas like myself. The rain was weak but steady, and the temperature cool. I headed to Mereweather, dodging puddles and observing that even on such a comparatively bleak day the sky in Australia is painfully bright. The storm water drains ran quick with rainwater.

I reached Dixon Park Beach with the intent of walking to Merewether Baths but at the sea’s edge the wind was powerful and I feared it would take my umbrella. The rain down on the sand was almost parallel to the ground and I gave up trying to keep my shoes and socks try. I popped into the public loo at the Dixon Park surf club and an elderly man stood naked inside, obviously changing after a swim. It was a confronting site, and only afterwards did I think that if he had indeed been swimming he was the only one. I was getting hungry.

I had intended to take the Anzac Walk for some lofty views of rain-soaked Newcastle but the wind and a rare moment of self-preservation due to my exhaustion changed my mind. I headed back to Darby street and walked toward the city. A gaggle of lightly dressed girls ran past. Were they joggers? In this weather? I took a brief break under an awning to tighten my belt since the bottom third of my pants were now soaked and they were falling down. I was getting tired.

Darby Street is anathema to me: cafe after cafe after cafe. What city needs so many in close proximity? I crossed the street to admire the gigantic Bob Hawke mural and take another brief break under cover since the rain had now picked up. A bit further on I stopped at Cooks Hill Books and bought nothing, in part because the owner clearly disapproved of my umbrella. I own too many books anyway.

Some sort of market was happening at Civic Park. Food and craft sellers huddled in their tents as the rain lashed down. There were no customers that I could see. I stood under a tree watching a kookaburra play in a muddy puddle as I tried to remember which building adjacent to the park was used in a Superman film. I was hungry and tired.

I walked to Hunter Street and headed west, following in my footsteps from… last week? It was very wet now, everything from my knees down was sodden. I flipped a mental coin and it came up Colonel Sanders so I traipsed in and repeated an identical order from last week. The cashier was either incompetent or an idiot and needed help from two others before i received my food. I sat and ate my burger and lukewarm chips without vim, as a homeless man garbled nonsense at me and then with strange clarity called me ‘professor’. I ignored him and left.

I went to Marketown and bought chocolate and a single breadroll. My intention was to save the chocolate for the plane but I knew that would never happen. I resisted the urge to grab a frozen coke (it would just make me pee in this weather) and continued on to Beaumont Street and then back to mums. I returned about two and a half hours after I had left, with a full belly and clothes I very much hope will dry before I need to pack them.

An uneventful walk perhaps, but another very nostalgic one for me. Every day like this is a day in the life of me that never left Australia. Now and then, that’s not such a bad thing.

Gap Creek

May 31st, 2024

Yesterday Sue and I went to the Watagan Mountains to do the Gap Creek walk. This is a fairly short walk down into a gully to see a waterfall. While it’s only about a mile return, it’s a fairly strenuous walk due to the descent and return climb.

The above is a view on the way down. It’s a rainforest and Sue had warned me of leeches. Luckily we saw none! The day was overcast but the temperature pleasant, and it was an easy walk down.

The above shows the view down in the fully, with me scrambling along the rocks at the base of the waterfall. It’s rugged and uneven down there, and the rocks are very mossy. Were it damp, I think it would be a bit treacherous!

That’s the waterfall! It’s lovely, and we were there at the right moment since the water caught the morning light as it fell. We didn’t see any sign of animals or even birds during the all, although we heard scrabbling and birdsong (bell birds, whip birds and lyrebirds).

The climb back up was tiring. It’s about 160 meters, with a mix of winding path and maybe 100+ steps. If it had been a hot sunny day this would have been excruciating, so we benefited from the cooler weather. By the time we got back to the top I was starving!

Good thing a fish and chip shop wasn’t far away 😉

Pineapple Fritting

May 31st, 2024

Pineapple fritters are battered and fried pineapple rings. I’ve had a few this trip, and here’s a comparison.

The first came from Red Rooster, a chicken chain that competes with KFC. I hadn’t eaten a pineapple fritter in decades and had a mental image of what they would be like: juicy sweet pineapple in a light batter. So when this one was breaded that was a surprise. It was $3.

The taste was an even bigger surprise: it didn’t taste like pineapple! The pineapple ring itself was weirdly tasteless, and the batter had a strange donut/sweet taste to it. It wasn’t entirely terrible, but it also wasn’t particularly good, and I’d say had I eaten it blindfolded I wouldn’t have even known it was pineapple. I’d never eat one like this again 🙂

The second came from a kebab shop on Maitland Road (Charcoal Chicken) and when we ordered and she asked if we wanted sugar I remembered these are supposed to be a dessert item. As you can see it doesn’t look much like a pineapple ring as much as a large potato scallop, and the sugar was fine like baking sugar. This one was also $3.

This one was absolutely heavenly. A juicy, sweet and delicious pair of thinly sliced pineapple rings covered by a light batter. Every bite was wonderful and the sugar only heightened the sweetness. I would have happily eaten more than one 🙂

The third and last one I ate this trip was from a fish and chip shop in Cooranbong. It resembles the previous but the sugar this time was cinnamon sugar. It was the cheapest at $2.50.

This one wasn’t quite as good as the previous, but still many times better than the first. The batter was nice and light and the cinnamon sugar sweet, but the pineapple itself – the very soul of the fritter – was lacking in taste. It was a thin slice compared to two in the previous and perhaps this was the problem? I’d eat this one again, but wish I was eating the precious example.

So the question arises. At about $3 a pop, with the taste on average being only ok, should a pineapple fritter be your first choice for a hot fruit dessert snack?

Do I even need to answer? 🙂

More Memories

May 31st, 2024

Yesterday Sue and I went to more antique/op shops. A lot of you told me you enjoyed the post about op-shop triggered memories the other day, so here’s some more…

I went through a phase in primary school where I collected football cards. The above were from 1982 so may have even been from a set I collected. At the time I didn’t even watch football (and even now I don’t know what the RFL was/is) but – no doubt started by my mania for Star Wars cards – I was big on footy cards. I recall trying to trade with other kids so they must have been a popular schoolyard thing. The above set of nine cards is not arranged in number or team order, but they’re framed so must have been important to someone. I’m sure they’re not worth anything, so the shop owner is dreaming putting $75 on them.

These are money boxes featuring the mascot character of St George Bank. Bank money boxes were popular when we were kids, and the idea was you’d fill them and take them to the bank to have the contents deposited into an account. I don’t remember ever actually having a St George account (my first and only Australian bank account was at Newcastle Permanent) but I do remember using very similar money boxes as a kid, and cutting into them with scissors long before they were filled. The ones in this photo are quite new, since the logo at the bottom was only created in 2011.

We had a lot of Playmobil when we were kids, and while we didn’t own the above set ($350 at the antique shop) I believe we had some like it. We always used to call it ‘Pocket People’ which is surefire way to tell we had the Australia versions, since the local licensee (Toltoys) rebranded them here using that name. I still think Playmobil is a cool toy, and wish they’d one day get a Star Wars license!

Speaking of Star Wars, I saw the above cup last year when I was here, only now the store has a second copy in equally poor condition. It brings back many memories since we owned a few of these back in 1983 when the film came out. I believe these were obtained at cinemas if you bought a coke when you saw the film. If this had been in better condition I would have certainly purchased it, even at the $10 asking price.

I’ve mentioned Smurfs before on the blog, and the above box of them ($160 for the lot) is a window right back to 1980. They were sold in Australia at BP service stations, and I believe you could only buy them if you also bought petrol. They were a popular toy and BP stations were inundated with people when new waves were released, and I’m sure our ever-patient dad went out of his way to only buy BP petrol during those days. We had quite a few Smurfs and treasured them as everyone did during the fad, but I have absolutely no memory of what happened to them in the years afterwards.

Lest you think antique stores are magical places full of childhood memories for me, it’s worth mentioning that the vast majority of the contents are almost literally trash, and I ignored mountains of kitchenware, clothes, DVDs and children’s toys as I photographed the occasional curio. My foremost target is always a box like shown above, which are unfortunately very rare these days. Happily I found a few good examples yesterday, and maybe you may even receive one in the mail one day 🙂

Before I end, there’s one more op-shop related post coming. I actually purchased something from one of these shops that will receive a post of its own. Look for it before I leave Oz…