Remembering - the Land Before Avocado

Irene Walker entertained us with this subject of ‘Remembering’. Her inspiration was the book she has been reading called The Land Before Avocado by Australian radio presenter and best-selling author, Richard Glover. In it he explores life in Australia during the time in which he grew up, the m i d - 60's  t h r o u g h  t o   t h e mid-70's. Irene asked those of us who remember that time if we could recall  when coffee was just coffee, when pubs only served beer and spirits and not a choice of wine and cocktails, when we always kept things such as clothes and dishes for 'best', when denims were not pre-washed, pre-faded and pretorn, when everything was colourful in the bathroom - avocado, dusky pink and sunshine yellow suites, when kitchens too were colourful even down to the smaller appliances, when we went out and about without carrying bottles of water with us , when supermarkets had much less choice and when you could buy one of something in the ironmonger instead of many in a sealed plastic packet. What a lot of memories. Sounds like the book is worth a read for those of us of a certain age. 

Then Irene had members scratching their heads over a quiz with a difference.  The quiz was based on the letters in The Rotary Club of Kilrymont St Andrews.  It was done individually and we were asked to name something or someone beginning with the appropriate letter.  If your answer was the only one given and it was correct then you got two points, one if less common answer and zero if most common.  Irene started off with the name of a President of the USA beginning with T.  Now there is the obvious one - the current occupant of the White House but how many remembered Taft or Taylor.  Following on from the recent sheet quiz on herbs and spices, Irene said it was amazing how many people put down oregano as something used in cooking!

The scoring involved Irene in a lot of work as people had a time limit after the quiz to scan and email their answers, read them over the phone, basically get them to Irene in some way or another.  The scoring at the top was very close with Grant Cargill and Isobel Clifford as joint winners and Wilda McKinnon a runner up.