It was Enid Blyton who made the phrase "lashings of ginger beer" world famous.
In Enid's Famous Five, ginger beer was invariably consumed with ham sandwiches and the odd hard-boiled egg.
In more recent years, a series of books have been released under the category "Enid Blyton for Grown Ups". One of the books is titled Five Give Up the Booze.
Thankfully, the residents at Macquarie View retirement village in Bolton Point don't need to worry about that.
The lashings of ginger beer that they've been brewing is non-alcoholic. They've been making this delicious stuff at the so-called "Bolton Old Boys Brewery".
The operator of the village - Bolton Clarke - said the idea for the brewery "fermented" during an inaugural tournament for ideas that promote social connection.
The brewery went on to win the tournament in a field of 20 projects. The brewing process brought back memories for many residents, including Shirley Hancock.
"When I was young, my mum used to make ginger beer and ice cream together. I couldn't get home from school quick enough to get some," she said.
While the brewers are mostly men, the ladies have been making labels for the bottled ginger beer.
As she labelled bottles in the labelling room, Anne Morphett was asked what she most enjoyed about the process.
"Well ... opening a bottle and drinking it."
Bringing people together
Charlestown's Laurie Bowman had a call from a lady who grew up with Elermore Vale's Tony Davis and wanted to catch up with him.
Both Laurie and Tony are regular contributors to the Topics column. We passed on the message.
"I rang her and we had a great yarn. The last time we saw each other was around 70 years ago at West Wallsend. My wife Elaine and I are going to see her at her place in about a week's time," Tony said.
We told this to Laurie, who replied: "Bringing people together. What our Herald is all about".
Hungry little human beans
Kahibah's Daphne Hughes read our Topics piece on Tuesday about the aptly named Becky Swapston, who runs the Make the Swap Facebook page, which urges people to buy Australian-made products.
"The other day when my neighbour brought in my grocery order, I was horrified to find that the baked beans she had bought came from Italy," Daphne said, adding that the beans were made in the US or Canada.
She pointed out that the ingredients of SPC baked beans were "100 per cent grown right here in Australia".
And in our head right now, of course, is that jingle and the lyric "for hungry little human beans".
Viral Jokes
These crackers from Glen Fredericks, of Adamstown Heights.
Has COVID-19 caused you to wear a mask and glasses at the same time? You may be entitled to condensation.
COVID is making the world a prettier place. I mean, the ugly people are still there, but the mask does a great job of hiding it.
Why can't ants catch COVID-19? Because they have tiny anty-bodies.
The trouble with a COVID joke is that you have to wait two weeks to know if you got it.
The spread of COVID-19 is based on two factors: How dense the population is and how dense the population is.
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