That's right ladies and genitalia, The Vagabonds is ...here:

Friday September 23:  John Schumann’s Vagabond Crew will be rocking the Beach House Café, Franklin Parade, Victor Harbor. Phone for bookings: 8552 4417.

Saturday September 24:  Shooey and The Vagabond Crew will be playing the Promethean, Grote Street, the City. Same deal –  bookings essential, numbers are limited. Book thru Venutix.

Saturday, September 24 SWEET BABY JAMES & ROB EYERS at the Wheatsheaf Hotel Thebarton. (9pm)

SHADES OF BLUE playing the Norwood pub Saturday, September 24 at 9:00pm; Location: Finn Mc Cools at Norwood

The Gov: Saturday, 24 September Peter Jenkins Band - FREE IN THE FRONT BAR...Peter Jenkins Band is a 4-piece blues rock and fusion band, performing a mix of straight ahead blues rock songs and progressive fusion instrumentals. A cut above the average, PJB is an exciting and polished musical act that is achieving international recognition and recently featured in Skope Magazines 'artist to watch' profile.

Sunday September 25 Sweet Baby James and Rob Eyers at the Gilbert Street Hotel. 2 Pm kick off.

The Whitmore Hotel

Friday September 23:  Double Bill Show: Greedy Franks and Baker’s Digest

Saturday September 24 the Cherry Pickers

Sunday September 25 tex Mex Stampede

Folk Federation gigs:

Friday September 23: Charity concert to aid flood victims. The concert will feature a number of established local artists, including blues/roots musician Joe Murphy, acoustic duo Two’s a Crowd and folk singer/songwriter Mary Webb.  For more information visit www.bringingrestoration.com.au

Looking ahead….

Friday 30 September:   The Wheatsheaf Hotel Thebarton: THE BEGGARS.

Blurb:    The Beggars find that space between the ancient tones of folk music and the sounds of modern Australian country.  “While listening to the compact songs you immediately think of greats like Gram Parsons, Van Morrison, Johnny Cash, or the Fairport Convention.” - musikreviews.de

Kick off:  9.00 PM; free entry.    See: beggars.com.au/

Sunday October 2: The Cat’s Pyjamas featuring Steve Brown at The Robin Hood Hotel, Portrush Rd, Norwoon. 4 – 7 pm.

Sunday, October 2 SWEET BABY JAMES & ROB EYERS, Whitmore Hotel, Morphett Street, the City – near Central Market. (2pm)

And more….

Being as aimless as a bedroom fluffball I tend to find myself in many unusual situations and occupations. I am reminded of the time some years ago I was a dental hygienist in Coober Pedy. The Practice butcher was Dr. Throbbingrod whose jodhpur-style duds were a novelty in a town of dungarees. I was Nurse Mightynorks. I was packing enough funbaggery for a party of four – or more.

Anyway… It was gritty and gruesome work out there in the Hole-in-the-ground town. The paucity of genteel diversions such as knitting circles and yoga classes meant that many of the underground trolls adopted a carefree attitude towards things like personal hygiene; unused soap dried as hard as Madonna’s face and a toothbrush can remain unbaptised for a decade.  Too often I've seen things moving in the mouths of some of them Flintstonians that weren’t their tongues.

Removing some of the layers of green muck and parasites was a Herculean task that sometimes involved a high pressure water gun and protective clothing. It was fortunate that I kept the total-body wet gear I had when I was the butt-plug puller at a colonic irrigation clinic.

Scrabbling in the dirt for precious geegaws also fosters a singular mindset that helps the miner overcome difficulties – or insufficiencies. One excavator staggered in with gums bleeding so badly he was practically empty of life's vital fluid when he fell in the dentist’s chair. He was nearly transparent; you could almost see straight through him.

“What the hell have you been eating?” snarled Dr. Throbbingrod, eyeballing the bloody mess of gum tissue.

“Not eatin’ anyththing, I wore out me sththovel and I’ve been digging withth me teethth.

“Well, here's a prescription that will help,” snapped Throbbingrod, handing the old Forty-niner a bit of paper.

“Ith thith a prethcripthion for a set of dentureths?”

“Yep.”

“Could you write me a prescthripthion for a new sththovel inssthead?”

Had a guy in one day whose mouth had been condemned as a bio hazard by the EPA so I got out the Karcher Plus pressure cleaner and cranked it up fairly high-ish. Perhaps a bit too high; took the fukker's head clean off at the neck.

“Did you say ‘clean’, Nurse Mightynorks...?”

“Sure did, Throbbingrod. Clean as a Wiggles concert.”

“Ok. Maybe you could back off the pressure a beez-dik but for heaven’s sake, Nurse, please ensure the next-of-kin get the invoice for the cleaning before you put the death notice in the paper.”

The job that caused the big rift between me and Dr Throbbingrod was when the ambulance brought in some cave digger that had had his teeth knocked down his throat in a fight. His mate had kicked his teeth in so hard they ended up in his colon.

“Nurse Mightynorks,” said Dr Throbbingrod, “Dive in there and clean up those toothy-pegs, will yer?”

“Pig’s arse, I will. I'm not goin' into that fukker's liquirice mine to find what's left of his choppers, I'm a dental hygienist, not a troglodyte!”  … and I sloshed him one in the chops.

The slosh in the chops probably wasn’t necessary but it seemed to follow on nicely after my indignant outburst.

“Slosh me in the fukken chops will yer…” shouted Dr Throbbingrod. “Well, cop this!”... and he ripped the dentist chair out of the floor and beaned me with it.

“You fukken cad,” I screamed. “You’ve chipped my nail polish!” I pulled up the water font, turned it on and shoved it up his quoit. “I’m outer here!” I hollered and turned to flounce out of the room.

And I'll fukken help yer!”  Dr Throbbingrod shouted and shot me out of the surgery with a hydraulic ram. “Get out and never darken my doors again!”

“HA! That was not my fault,” I returned. “You wanted the doors painted deep sea green... I thought the deepest part of the sea was the Mariana Trench and it’s pretty fukken dark deep  down there. You’ll be hearing from my solicitor about this!”

“I haven't got any fukken money so yer can sue till yer face turns blue!”

“I don’t want yer fukken money,” I sez. “I’m gonna sue the fukken pants off yer!”

Dr Throbbingrod paled as his blood deserted him. He knew what I was up to. It's about those jodhpurs of his. They weren't really jodhpurs. You see, even though dentistry is a license to print money, the tooth work Throbbingrod did was small change compared to the real graft. In the gob of every miner that plonked his date in the dentist chair was a small fortune. Toothaches caused by gold nuggets; cavities riddled with emeralds and opals; diamonds the size of gum abcesses and so on. Dr Throbbingrod found a Solomon’s Mine of treasures in those wombats’ space-hoppers; treasure he would deftly palm and transfer to the pocket of his duds which, over the years, began to bulge like… jodhpurs!  His pockets were bulging to bursting with a tonne and a half of black opals, diamonds, rubies, emeralds, gold, silver, uranium, philosophers’ stones and kryptonite.

I sued his duds off him and cleaned up. I left Coober Pedy with enough loot to set myself up in a 'noice little brick veneer flat in Carlton' and became a high priced call-girl to some of Melbourne's more colourful underpants... I mean – underworld - gangsters.