They were funny looking buildings, that were once a way of life, If you couldn't sprint the distance, then you really were in strife. They were nailed, they were wired, but were mostly falling down, There was one in every yard, in every house, in every town. They were given many names, some were even funny, But to most of us, we knew them as the outhouse or the dunny. I've seen some of them all gussied up, with painted doors and all, But it really made no difference, they were just a port of call. Now my old man would take a bet, he'd lay an even pound, That you wouldn't make the dunny with them turkeys hangin' round. They had so many uses, these buildings out the back," You could even hide from mother, so you wouldn't get the strap. That's why we had good cricketers, never mind the bumps, We used the pathway for the wicket and the dunny door for stumps. Now my old man would sit for hours, the smell would rot your socks, He read the daily back to front in that good old thunderbox. And if by chance that nature called sometime through the night, You always sent the dog in first, for there was no flamin' light. And the dunny seemed to be the place where crawlies liked to hide, But never ever showed themselves until you sat inside.
There was no such thing as Sorbent, no tissues there at all, Just squares of well read newspaper, a hangin' on the wall. If you had some friendly neighbours, as neighbours sometimes are, You could sit and chat to them, if you left the door ajar..
When suddenly you got the urge, and down the track you fled, Then of course the magpies were there to peck you on your head. Then the time there was a wet, the rain it never stopped, If you had an urgent call, you ran between the drops. The dunny man came once a week, to these buildings out the back, And he would leave an extra can, if you left for him a zac. For those of you who've no idea what I mean by a zac, Then you're too young to have ever had a dunny out the back!
-- Edited by sarg on Wednesday 19th of June 2013 07:35:06 AM
Grams said
03:20 PM Jun 19, 2013
Excellent...lol
I remember going to the outside dunny, when we used to visit my dads cousin in Shoalhaven in NSW, she had the inside loo under renovations, so we had to use the outside one. I remember holding on for as long as possible back then.
But I don't know what a zac is...I must be too young :p
jandas fun said
06:56 PM Jun 19, 2013
Grams wrote:
Excellent...lol
But I don't know what a zac is...I must be too young :
Two 'trey bits'
Johnw
Peterpan said
07:37 PM Jun 19, 2013
jandas fun wrote:
Grams wrote:
Excellent...lol
But I don't know what a zac is...I must be too young :
Two 'trey bits'
Johnw
Six pennies,or twelve ha'pennies. (Strike me I'm getting old..)
GaryKelly said
07:41 PM Jun 19, 2013
Yep, two trey bits - threepences (thr'penny bits) = sixpence = zac = half a bob (5 cents these days). And a bob was a shilling or a deaner.
Great poem, Sarg, and reminds me of our outdoor dunny when I was a kid. Ours was "modern" though... connected to the sewer and had a flush tank overhead operated by a chain. It also had a wooden seat, plus the usual squares of newspaper hanging on a hook.
bill12 said
09:29 PM Jun 19, 2013
I seem to remember a song about a redback on the toilet seat. My spider was a wolf spider and was eating a sunbird, and was as big as a saucer, and hairy to boot. It put me off outside dunnys for life.Great poem. Bill
QueenKombi said
10:30 PM Jun 19, 2013
Excellent poem!
My dear old mum insisted that the "indoor loo" when it arrived, was only put there for dad's convenience. It was jammed into the already smallish bathroom around 1970, but even after the arrival of the in-door dunny, we still had to trudge out to the one connected to the woodshed come hail or shine and yes, I remember the chain on the old "ORB" cistern. I was always scared that bell shaped thing would fall on my head. Thankfully dad eventually had it replaced with a more modern plastic type which has required ongoing replacement parts during the intervening years. The old ORB was fail-safe........... except for the danger of that bell shaped thing!
We were once in hysterics when dad (who was getting on in years) poked the exhaust pipe of the FJ through the asbestos cement sheet just behind mum's ankles as she sat astride the pan. She came bolting out and accusing him of trying to gas her. Mum rarely swore, but she did refer to him as a "silly old bugger" that day!
Mum passed on not all that long ago and my sister took over the old place. The outdoor dunny still remains and nobody every uses the one inside, so the tradition of the old outside dunny remains alive and well at sis's place
jules47 said
11:25 PM Jun 19, 2013
My inlaws had an outside dunny - shaded by an almond tree - nothing better they reckoned than sitting on the dunny, eating almonds straight from the tree!!!
neilnruth said
11:52 PM Jun 20, 2013
We had an outside dunny when we were first married. Phenyle was used to keep the smell under control. I don't know which was the worse smell. Everyone knew you had been because the smell clung to you as you left the dunny. Then another house we had an outside flushing toilet but the cistern was up near the ceiling so in winter we had to wait until the sun thawed the water out before we could flush it. And they call them the 'good old days'!
gypsy rover said
07:36 PM Jun 21, 2013
Here is ours at our house in Tassie. It still works but we use the inside one when we are there. Handy for storing gardening tools though.
Wow, that is some swishy dunny for an outdoor one Gypsy Rover.....
We had one on a rural property we lived on, cut up bits of newspaper on a nail and a flap on the back to retrieve the dunny.
I was only an ankle biter at the time, so my two older sisters had the job of emptying the dunny into a hole in a paddock.
Dunny full of Wolf spiders and redbacks, being a youngster I used to sit there talking to the wolf spiders, they never talked back though!
Thanks for the memories Sarg....
Here are few notes on the old Pounds, Shilling and Pence currency,
Add to the Wiki ones a "tray" for three pence (3 cents), Penny (one cent), Half Penny and Farthing (one quarter of a penny).
Also there was a Crown coin (5 shillings/50 cents) and a Half Crown (2 shillings 50 pence (25 cents).
From Wiki;
The Sixpence - 6d - was often referred to as a zack which was an Australian / New Zealand term which referred to a coin of small denomination such as a sixpence or 5 cent coin. The term was also used to refer to short prison term such as 6 months.
One Shilling One Bob
Two Shillings or Florin Two Bob.
Ten Shillings Ten Bob, Half a Quid, a Teddy or Half a Fiddly (derived from the one pound slang)
One Pound - £1 - Quid, Fiddly or Saucepan (rhyming slang for saucepan lid). The term quid from what I have found seems to be derived from the Latin word where quid means what as in quid pro quo to give something for something else. The word Quid was also used in connection to multiple pounds e.g.: 5 quid etc.
Five Pounds £5 - Fiver, Deep Sea Diver or Spin
-- Edited by Duh on Saturday 22nd of June 2013 03:10:39 PM
They were funny looking buildings, that were once a way of life,
If you couldn't sprint the distance, then you really were in strife.
They were nailed, they were wired, but were mostly falling down,
There was one in every yard, in every house, in every town.
They were given many names, some were even funny,
But to most of us, we knew them as the outhouse or the dunny.
I've seen some of them all gussied up, with painted doors and all,
But it really made no difference, they were just a port of call.
Now my old man would take a bet, he'd lay an even pound,
That you wouldn't make the dunny with them turkeys hangin' round.
They had so many uses, these buildings out the back,"
You could even hide from mother, so you wouldn't get the strap.
That's why we had good cricketers, never mind the bumps,
We used the pathway for the wicket and the dunny door for stumps.
Now my old man would sit for hours, the smell would rot your socks,
He read the daily back to front in that good old thunderbox.
And if by chance that nature called sometime through the night,
You always sent the dog in first, for there was no flamin' light.
And the dunny seemed to be the place where crawlies liked to hide,
But never ever showed themselves until you sat inside.
There was no such thing as Sorbent, no tissues there at all,
Just squares of well read newspaper, a hangin' on the wall.
If you had some friendly neighbours, as neighbours sometimes are,
You could sit and chat to them, if you left the door ajar..
When suddenly you got the urge, and down the track you fled,
Then of course the magpies were there to peck you on your head.
Then the time there was a wet, the rain it never stopped,
If you had an urgent call, you ran between the drops.
The dunny man came once a week, to these buildings out the back,
And he would leave an extra can, if you left for him a zac.
For those of you who've no idea what I mean by a zac,
Then you're too young to have ever had
a dunny out the back!
-- Edited by sarg on Wednesday 19th of June 2013 07:35:06 AM
I remember going to the outside dunny, when we used to visit my dads cousin in Shoalhaven in NSW, she had the inside loo under renovations, so we had to use the outside one. I remember holding on for as long as possible back then.
But I don't know what a zac is...I must be too young :p
Great poem, Sarg, and reminds me of our outdoor dunny when I was a kid. Ours was "modern" though... connected to the sewer and had a flush tank overhead operated by a chain. It also had a wooden seat, plus the usual squares of newspaper hanging on a hook.
My dear old mum insisted that the "indoor loo" when it arrived, was only put there for dad's convenience. It was jammed into the already smallish bathroom around 1970, but even after the arrival of the in-door dunny, we still had to trudge out to the one connected to the woodshed come hail or shine and yes, I remember the chain on the old "ORB" cistern. I was always scared that bell shaped thing would fall on my head. Thankfully dad eventually had it replaced with a more modern plastic type which has required ongoing replacement parts during the intervening years. The old ORB was fail-safe........... except for the danger of that bell shaped thing!
We were once in hysterics when dad (who was getting on in years) poked the exhaust pipe of the FJ through the asbestos cement sheet just behind mum's ankles as she sat astride the pan. She came bolting out and accusing him of trying to gas her. Mum rarely swore, but she did refer to him as a "silly old bugger" that day!
Mum passed on not all that long ago and my sister took over the old place. The outdoor dunny still remains and nobody every uses the one inside, so the tradition of the old outside dunny remains alive and well at sis's place
Chris
Wow, that is some swishy dunny for an outdoor one Gypsy Rover.....
We had one on a rural property we lived on, cut up bits of newspaper on a nail and a flap on the back to retrieve the dunny.
I was only an ankle biter at the time, so my two older sisters had the job of emptying the dunny into a hole in a paddock.
Dunny full of Wolf spiders and redbacks, being a youngster I used to sit there talking to the wolf spiders, they never talked back though!
Thanks for the memories Sarg....
Here are few notes on the old Pounds, Shilling and Pence currency,
Add to the Wiki ones a "tray" for three pence (3 cents), Penny (one cent), Half Penny and Farthing (one quarter of a penny).
Also there was a Crown coin (5 shillings/50 cents) and a Half Crown (2 shillings 50 pence (25 cents).
From Wiki;
The Sixpence - 6d - was often referred to as a zack which was an Australian / New Zealand term which referred to a coin of small denomination such as a sixpence or 5 cent coin. The term was also used to refer to short prison term such as 6 months.
One Shilling One Bob
Two Shillings or Florin Two Bob.
Ten Shillings Ten Bob, Half a Quid, a Teddy or Half a Fiddly (derived from the one pound slang)
One Pound - £1 - Quid, Fiddly or Saucepan (rhyming slang for saucepan lid). The term quid from what I have found seems to be derived from the Latin word where quid means what as in quid pro quo to give something for something else. The word Quid was also used in connection to multiple pounds e.g.: 5 quid etc.
Five Pounds £5 - Fiver, Deep Sea Diver or Spin
-- Edited by Duh on Saturday 22nd of June 2013 03:10:39 PM