Like many folk here I’m from somewhere else, but am happy to call Gladstone home; until I shuffle off to one of our city’s many retirement villages in Bargara, Hervey Bay, or Yeppoon.

Now when the von Bray tribe lobbed into Gladdy back in 1976, we discovered the towns’ locals were a shy and cautious breed, so all our friends were blow-ins just like us.

Back then, to qualify as a genuine local you needed at least four generations of family history here, or be able to prove that your sixth finger was starting to grow. I’m just kidding!

Three generations was usually enough.

So you can imagine my surprise when I heard recently that you only need to put in five years of hard time now to be classified as a local. Five Years?!

Well bless my thongs, toss me a mud crab claw and call me a local!

And if you’ve ever tuned into 4CD, spilled a Frosty Boys’ burger down your shirt, swum in Steiner’s water hole, drank Capri soft drink and PCD milk, met Cliffy Boles, hooned at the waterfront, been booted out of the town pool by old man Marr or suffered through Silly Solly’s ads on RTQ7, then congratulations, you’re a local too!

If you’re a recent resident, then pop by each week for a blast from the not so distant past, and in no time at all, you’ll be walking, talking, dressing and plucking your banjo like us locals; until you leave again.

(First published in The Gladstone Observer – January 22nd 2016)