“THE TROUBLE IS YOU THINK YOU HAVE TIME” Buddha.

Google is an amazing tool for gathering information some of which can be life affirming and plenty that isn’t. Growing up there were people making good livings travelling through Australia selling sets of Encyclopedia Britannica at the local Agricultural Show. My Mum and Dad were never close to being able to afford those beautiful leather bound Volumes but thankfully the School Library always had a complete Set available for us to research any topic imaginable. Today you just need to “let Google be your friend”. This week I consulted Google and it seems I’ve been going through a period of “Fear Of Cancer Progression”.

Have a bad headache – the disease has metastasised to my brain. Can’t stand up because of back pain – Rupert has taken up residence in my spine. My pee, when it eventually dribbles into the bowl, is foamy – now “it’s” in my kidneys! Thankfully the “brain cancer” was fixed with a couple of Advil, the “spinal cancer” disappeared after a few Voltaren 25 tablets and a urine test showed my “Kidney Cancer” was nonexistent. In other words, I’m doing fine but I really I need to concentrate on not letting tomorrow’s problems rob me of today’s happiness.

As I look back on my life I find myself reflecting on the good times and the not so good. In the early 80’s we took Holidays in Bali for three successive years staying at Pertamina Cottages which was then, the only Five Star Hotel on the Island. The first two years our kids stayed with my Mum and Dad and the third trip they were big enough to come with us. I can’t be sure but I suspect there’s every chance John and Megan actually preferred being spoiled at Nan and Pop’s to travelling with Mum and Dad. The “kids” trip included a 3am visit to the Hotel Restaurant for John and myself when we snuck out of the room for ice cream while the girls slept. In those days very few Australians vacationed in Bali and the fair haired John and Megan were something of an oddity, especially for the many South East Asian tourists flocking there. John was particularly annoyed by the constant requests for photos on our very occasional excursions out of the walled Hotel and simply refused to cooperate with a smile for the Paparazzi. Both those trips were impacted by horse stories.

The first holiday we were flying out of Tullamarine on Saturday morning and the night before was not a good one. I have some interesting memories of a life on the Punt, plenty of them good ones, but that Friday night wasn’t one of them.

Earlier that year I had purchased a horse called Noble Man off the late Danny Frawley’s Family in Ballarat for $20,000. For context, $20,000 in 1980 has the equivalent purchasing power of $103,000 in today’s money. My cunning plan was to fly the horse to Perth to be prepared by Trevor Warwick, one of Australia’s leading trainers, for a first up plunge, win a few races there then fly the horse to New York to capitalise on the better prizemoney on offer in The States, before selling him on for a substantial profit. The only part of the plan that came to fruition was the flying of the horse to Perth! It was Robbie Burns who wrote “the best laid schemes of mice and men go often askew” and the Noble Man scheme certainly did that!

By chance, Noble Man’s Perth debut was scheduled for the night before we flew out to Bali so with a pocket full of “Pineapples” I headed off to Gloucester Park to execute part 2 of my cunning plan – land a first up plonk. I employed Russell Betts, a mate from over there, to act as bowler and had $8000 on him in the strong local Bookmaker Ring. Noble Man led and gave up like a pricked balloon and I headed back to Melbourne on the Red Eye with my tail between my legs, landing just in time for a quick breakfast before taking off for Bali. Needless to say, it wasn’t the ideal start to the holiday and it took quite a few Bintangs to get into the holiday mood.

That was Noble Man’s only start in Perth and after a Veterinary Examination revealed a heart problem, I gave the horse back to Anne Frawley (Danny’s sister) and he lived out his years on their Bungaree Property. All up, the cunning plan cost me about $35,000 and while I finished up with nothing, the Frawley’s finished up with $20,000 and their horse back proving Robbie Burns knew more about life than I did.

Our second holiday in Bali provided a genuine “good news, bad news” story. Earlier that year I had purchased a horse called Rapid Chimes from a young bloke near Bendigo for $16,000 and gave it to a good mate in Glen Tippet to train. The young bloke who sold me the horse contacted me a few years ago to let me know that he used the $16,000 as a deposit on a house in Thornbury that is now worth well over a million dollars so he we both won out of that deal. Glen did great with the horse and it was decided to send it to one of Australia’s legendary Harness Trainers in Brian Hancock to run in Sydney targeting the Juvenile Classics there. As an aside, Brian probably trained over 100 winners for us and remains a dear friend to this day. He trained on a tiny track at his property just out of Wollongong and was the best judge of when a horse could win that I’ve come across. I would guess our success rate on horses he tipped would have been close to 90%. When I approached him for the first time to train one for me he said “I only have 2 Rules: you pay your bills on time and you never ask me to get one beat. If you do ask me to pull one up, you’ll find your horse chained to the front gate for you to pick up”. That suited me just fine and I lived by those rules for the next 30 years.

Rapid Chimes did well for Brian and was entered for a race (maybe The Sapling Stakes??) that was going to be ran at Harold Park while we were away. Brian thought it had a good chance so I left $2000 with my lifelong friend Mick Barrett to back the horse. Mick was to fly to Sydney on the Friday and providing Brian was happy going into the race, he would get a couple of Sydney mates we used as Bowlers at Harold Park to back it. The good news is Rapid Chimes, courtesy of a wonderful drive from Brian, crapped in at 16/1 – the bad news is Brian wasn’t confident of the horse’s chances so Mick didn’t bet! At that time, there were maybe 3 people in the World who I would have believed if they told me we weren’t on at the sixteens but Mick was one of them. I would have trusted him with my life back then and I’d trust him with my life now. He’s been a wonderful mate. Needless to say the second Bali holiday was a little less stressful than the first but with a bit of luck it could have been $32,000 better.

That’s enough reminiscing for this week. Ainsley and Robert returned from their beach holiday (no they didn’t holiday in Bali) yesterday so they will give me something other than Rupert to focus on until School goes back in February. No one prepared me for just how much I would love my Grandchildren and the 3 of them are a good reason to keep on keeping on. Except for the Cancer, I’m a lucky man🙂

*Someone with a better memory than me or perhaps just someone not experiencing “brain fog”, informed me that we actually went to Bali three years in a row and my recollections have been corrected accordingly.