Times have changed

[Cropduster]

I like to reminisce. It brings back so many memories.

Many of us will be old enough to remember the times before drink-driving laws came into being.

Frighteningly, the 'rule of thumb' was...if you managed to get home without having an accident, you must have been sober enough to drive.

Like most young men in Newcastle at the time, I worked and played hard. Being able to 'hold ya drink' was seen as a test of manhood.

It amazes me when I recall going to a particular friend's 21st birthday party. It was held in his parent's back yard, and I had gone with a friend that afternoon to watch a band playing in a local pub, so I was already 'charged' by the time I arrived at the party.

The party continued on into the wee small hours, and the beer flowed freely all night, and I had developed a sever case of the 'wobbly boot'.

But when it came time to leave, I could not find my car keys.

The parents, who were by now fast asleep in their bed, were woken up to drive their car around to the rear yard so they could shine the headlights on the lawn and help find my keys.

So here's the thing - I was obviously in no fit state to drive a car, but two adults were on there hands and knees at around 2am, helping me and other party goers stagger about looking for my lost car keys so I could get behind the wheel of a car and drive. Frightening, eh? But that was how it was.

Fortunately for me, and everyone else on the road that night, I finally remembered I came with a friend, and I did not drive my car to the party. This annoyed the parents more than having to get out of bed to help some intoxicated kid find his 'lost' car keys.

So I walked home.

I think back to what it was like and I shake my head in disbelief. Sure the cars weren't as fast, and there were fewer cars on the road, but...really!. We were allowed, and encouraged, to drive when 'full as a tick', and caringly advised 'not to have an accident'.

Times have changed.

[Maureen K Clifford]

Remember only too well Allan to my shame But also seem to recall that sentences when dished out by the courts were also carried out, unlike today when the justice system is a joke, and I feel so sorry for the wasted hours that police put into solving cases only to see the offenders back on the streets in a very short time. Most disheartening I would think. Plus back in those days we had more respect for the law - our local copper would just as soon give you a boot up the bum, a clip round the ear or drag you home to the parents - who he knew. We were pretty scared of him - one copper kept our small town well and truly under his thumb and us kids weren't game to play up too much.

[Neville Briggs]

A cop at my station had to go to a collision where two people died after being rammed by a car driven by a person full of a cocktail of drugs. It gets worse, when the officer looked at the bodies, they were close friends of his. Kinda shaped my opinion about issues of driving while affected by anything.

And times have changed for the worst I fear. The thought I that might encounter another driver who is affected by "pot" or "ice" is not a comfortable thought.
Ultra defensive driving is the name of the game these days.

And your parents were upset were they Allen, serves you right .

[alongtimegone]

I was driving home from a ball at the old Cloudland Ballroom in Brisbane in the early sixties. I had taken a coffee bottle of rum (remember those) to drink during band breaks but the organizers kept us well lubricated all night and so I had only had a small nip from the bottle. On the way home I went very wide when passing another car and was pulled over by a patrolling police car. Two officers approached my car and their first question was “Have you been drinking?” I picked up the rum bottle that was on the seat beside me and told them that I’d had a drink but only a small one as was obvious by the still almost full bottle of rum. They told me that even a little could affect my judgement and to be more careful when passing another vehicle, and sent me on my way. Breath testing for alcohol consumption had only recently been introduced in Queensland and I think the police had not really been in the swing of it at that time. Today of course I would be gone like a f… in the wind.