Fashion trends a blast from the past

JUST my luck! What a loser!

I’ve just completed a 10-day straight shift.

The bonus of doing the occasional 10-day roster is that we get a four-day weekend at the end of it.

Now, I’m sure you have noticed the beautiful weather we had leading up to Thursday... when my four-day weekend started.

The Garden City has put on some magnificent weather, look at Anzac Day which was simply perfect. Bright, warm and sunny after a cool dawn service.

Then, naturally, come the start of my long weekend from Thursday and we’re freezing our eyebrows off. (Yes, eyebrows, the editor wouldn’t let me say “gronglers”.)

The other set-back with a 10-day shift for those of us who live alone is that the first of the four-day break is spent catching up on washing, ironing, house cleaning and Home And Away (just kidding).

The 10-day roster also just about exhausts the limit of my good dress attire so the washing becomes a priority lest I be forced to dig into the bottom of the wardrobe for some of those 1970s dress shirts we used to wear.

I’m not kidding, ask some of the legal fraternity who frequent the courts and they will all have a story about the orange/brown check shirt the court journo was once seen wearing in the halls of justice.

Who the hell set the fashion trends back in those days? A Bronx pimp?

Remember the clobber we used to wear to the White Horse cabaret, and later in the night, the Green Griffin and Caesars Palace discos?

Some of the clothing was brighter than the flashing disco floor light show.

My young colleagues at work wouldn’t believe that I had a purple three piece suit in the late 1970s.

I had to bring a photo into work to prove it.

Even though they fell about laughing at the sight of a purple suit, they still didn’t believe the clean shaven fit dude with the long brown hair was the old git before them today.

And, we groovers of the 70s had to be fit, remember those body shirts?

A bloke couldn’t turn up at the disco wearing a body shirt if he had a beer gut and man boobs, though some did - much to the mirth and disgust of the young lasses of the day.

Then, of course, to complete the chic outfit of your average 1970s Toowoomba Caesars Palace groover... platform shoes.

Boots with a three inch heels, that’s 7.6cm for the metrically minded.

It was like walking on stilts which was appropriate seeing as we were dressed like clowns.

How the hell did we even walk in those things, let alone dance?

My mates and I used to play a lot of footy back in those days and I reckon I went over on my ankles and tore ligaments about six times.

Once on the footy field and five times on the Green Griffin disco floor.

As I pen this piece about 15 minutes from knock-off time to end my 10-day shift, I can hear the rain bucketing down on the roof of The Chronicle.

There goes any chance of hanging out the washing.

If you should be anywhere near Toowoomba’s courts next week and see a bloke walking about in an orange/brown check 1970s shirt, please don’t laugh too loudly.