August 16, 2026 — 9:00pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add more. AAA Barrie Restall of Teven thinks “if Les Shearman of Darlington, a Pastafarian (C8), is exploring new religions he might like to try Frisbitarianism, the belief that when you die you
Barrie Restall of Teven thinks “if Les Shearman of Darlington, a Pastafarian (C8), is exploring new religions he might like to try Frisbitarianism, the belief that when you die you go up onto the roof and get stuck there”.
Actually, this time around, Les took a more automated approach: “I got AI to fill in my census. For religion, it put AIthiest.”
“A young zealot tried to convince me of his religious beliefs,” says Wendy Crew of Lane Cove North. “I told him I had none, and in fact was against all religion. His prompt and unyielding response was ‘Well, that’s your religion!’”
It’s a heartache for Adrian Bell of Davistown: “Dare I suggest that the recent total eclipse might have been a celestial tribute to the sad loss of Bonnie Tyler?”
“We had a stopover in Singapore on the way to England in 1974,” recalls Rob Jackson of Cheltenham. “Our family, consisting of me, my wife, two girls and one boy, were detained by a customs official and my hair (C8), reaching beneath my collar as it was, was declared to be inadmissible. My wife set about cutting it with some small scissors she had in her handbag. Soon some students from our plane asked if she could perform the same operation for them, which she duly did. Others wore low T-shirts and were allowed through, despite having longer hair. Our five-year-old daughter, who had very long, fair hair, asked apprehensively if she had to have hers cut, too, but was assured that she didn’t.”
On the reverse, there’s Peter B. Buckley, New Ulm, Minnesota, USA: “In the late 1970s, my wife and I were touring the South Pacific. She had very short hair because of the heat. Anyway, in Tonga she was unceremoniously denied entrance to the ladies room at the airport. Inbound, she had been wearing long pants. Outbound, she decided to wear a dress. It didn’t matter – refused entry because of short hair.”
John Brown of Kianga remembers “a cartoon in Punch magazine which had a person dressed in an open-neck shirt and pantsuit trying to enter a fancy London restaurant. The maitre d’ is saying that ‘either he doesn’t have a tie or she isn’t wearing a dress’, so no entry!”
“A word to erstwhile Stones’ poster boy Peter Barker (C8): Don’t fret – It’s All Over Now.” Cheers, Jim Dewar of Davistown.
Column8@smh.com.au
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