We must stop this but I couldn't resist when you started talking about crows - apart from the standard 'stone the bloody crows!' - an expression of pleasure in Australia, there is also the more convoluted one which refers to a mythical place called Woop-Whoop - i.e. (and I quote) 'the arse-end of nowhere, and where the crows fly backwards!' Defies translation, but everyone knows of a place that qualifies. There is or was, an old Paddle Steamer on the River Murray called The Gem, which had one of the best restaurants in Australia on board. It was here I had my one and only meal of witchety grubs - big fat white things cooked in butter. They accompanied Yabbies (a sort of crayfish) which were delicious - and the grubs weren't too bad, but would never be part of my standard diet! Sorry Gary - couldn't resist! Norm

Ahhhhhh, Good old Woop-Woop - on the other side of the black stump, where the bunyips roam - the land of the feather feet. Crayfish are what our American frinends call lobster, I think. So, Norm, you have actually eaten bardis - witchety grubs. Well, I ate turtle once and I have had crocodile on several occasions. Both were delicious. I have also eaten kangaroo but didn't like it much. Fancy eating one of the animals on your country's coat of arms - LOL! Gary

Gary, Crayfish are about six inches long and live in creeks (small streams), as opposed to lobsters, a more noble beast that lives in the ocean. I love lobster but can't bring myself to try crayfish, or, as we called them in Texas, crawdads. They look too much like large cockroaches. I'm told by those who have, though, that they taste very much like lobster. I'll just take their word for it. Cheri

By the way, back to the original theme of this thread, there's an interesting conversation going on over here: http://community.adlandpro.com/forums/thread/374242.aspx Cheri

Hi Cheri, I took a look at the new forum - and obviously saw that I am a GUILTY party when it comes to going off-subject (as I have shown here). What I did learn was that from most people this is NOT appreciated, so thanks for that information. NB In mitigation - I did apologise to Gary for doing this. Two small points though; 1) Adland Pro does promote and project itself as a free advertising and business forum - so although I agree entirely that the spam type messages are irritating, they surely are actually ON-message as far as Adland Pro is concerned? 2) Wouldn't conversation be incredibly boring if it didn't flow from one thing to another? I can't imagine a dinner party being very succesful if it just stayed on one subject. Almost finally - a point was made about the value - or lack thereof - of the written words. To me the saddest thing of all is a book that has never been opened. Well maybe not the saddest thing - but I hope you get my drift. I regret to say though that I read through the forum, but found it a bit too one-dimensional for my butterfly mind. Going back to my own writing now -three general books at once at the moment, plus text books conversions, so pretty busy. Take care, Norm http://www.associatesintraining.com (Thought I would add my URL signature as this seems to be the 'done' thing - which is something else I learned off the other forum. 2 things learned in one day - not bad!)