#hard yakka red collection

[millerblg]

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[egglygreg]

A while back I posted a list of Australian-isms I've been collecting for my story Strahliana, and, well, the list has grown quite a bit since then lol!

Here's what I've got so far with mostly no context:

Chucking a wobbly

Chucking a tanty

Bargey bum

Chin-wag

Going for a feed/have a feed

What a rip off

That's cooked

You'd better get a wriggle on

My dogs are barking (sore feet/toes)

Bloody beaut

You little beauty/ripper

Scarn on?

Cheeky mate

Flat out like a lizard drinking

Chook

Rock up

Tell him he's dreaming

Get decked

Howryagarn?

How ya travelling?

Too easy

Legend

Cheers mate

Darl' (darling)

Rubbish

Arvo

No drama

Snags

Swagman

Tah (thanks, give)

Sanga

Won't be a min

Far out!

She'll be right

Spruiking (promote, advertise, talk something up)

I'm deadset serious

Pull the other one

A few roos loose in the top paddock

Cool bananas

Heaps good

Crow eater

What are you on about?

Had a bit of a blue (a fight)

Derro, feral

Had a prang

Bucketing down

Old mate (derogatory)

Hard yakka

Onya

Go for ya life

Too easy

Whack it on

Cooee

Carrying on like a pork chop

Full as a goog

Cobber

Drongo

There ya go

What an absolute wombat

Silly galah

Bob's your uncle

3 dog night (it's bloody cold)

Absolutely rank (smelly)

Off like a bucket of prawns in the hot sun

Dunny

Stone the crows (surprise)

Spit the dummy

Have a kip

Brekkie

Oi!

No worries

Tucker

Have a gander

Agro

Cushie

Chuck a sickie

Cutting crook

Rug up

Stoked

D'ya reckon?

Shrapnel

Redback- $20 note

Whaler- $10 note

Fair crack of the whip

Have a whinge

My shout

Ripsnorter

Better than a kick up the bum

Pull the wool over their eyes

Spinning a yarn

Dodgy

Mosey- on

Billabong

On Ya Bronya

Brolga (long legs)

Bonza

Gone walkabout

Rightie oh

Ridgy-didge

Mucked up

Fair go

Crankie

Gnarly

Don't cross me mate

What a cracker

Dickie- on the blink

Not on your life

Top notch

Zonked

Dead as a door nail

Chockers, chock a block

Kicked the bucked

Daggy

Doozie

Nose out of joint

Browsing

Knock it off

Being fleeced

Done a runner

I'm rapt

I'm stuffed

Scrubs up well

Doona

Bluey (red hair)

Righty-oh

Dork

Dipstick

Fang it

Bushfire

Bum nuts

Shut ya gob

Spewing

Frumpy

Fossicking

Hooroo

Wouldn't know him from a bar of soap

Loose unit

Mrs Kafoops (bit pompous or self important)

Nark

Gronk

Cutting crook

Sesh (session)

Yonks

Bin chicken

Havin a sook

Chunder

Getting flogged

What a mad dog

You muppet

Munted

Me missus

Dobbing

(I'm not collecting true swearwords and really crude sayings, so none of these are particularly offensive. Also some of these may be words that are normal in the general English language but mean something else in Aussie English when used in a different context, and a few are way out of fashion and haven't been widely used since the 60s. Also some are regional!)

[stimtoybox]

Hiya! I've got a friend I'm trying to help out. He stims by pulling the hoods of his hoodies over his shoulder and chewing on them. I'm not sure how hard he chews but I do know he does it almost constantly (If we're not talking, he's calmly chewing away). I've seen so many of his hoods fall apart in just a matter of weeks. I've offered to buy him chewelery in the past but he says he prefers fabric textures. Any stim ideas?

I do have a few, anon, with the proviso that we’re merely exchanging the hoodie hoods for something else chewable. If he’s chewing that much, that fast, I think just about anything else fabric will be chewed up as often, if not sooner. So you might have to teach him how to make these chewables, or make a lot yourself on a regular basis, and you’ll have to put some thought into the materials from which you make them, particularly with regards cost and toughness.

I wear men’s winter-weight hoodies when I’m not dressed up (bigger, warmer, less dysphoria-triggering) and most of mine are made from a thick one-sided fleece. Some hoods have an additional knit lining, making a two-layer hood, but the cheaper hoodies or the non-fleece hoodies (also usually made from a thin knit) often have only one. Unless he’s chewing through light knit or summer-weight hoodies, it’s not a super fragile material. It’s also not cheap to buy off the bolt.

(Fabric is expensive. Sometimes you luck into cheap bits second hand at markets, and most fabric stores have a remnants or offcuts bin where you can find good discounts, but many fabrics bought off the bolt cost more than buying the same thing as clothing.)

For sourcing materials, I’d be looking at op/thrift/second hand shops for old hoodies and, if he doesn’t mind chewing on denim, jeans. (Otherwise: outlet stores, sales at department stores.) Also things like workwear-weight shirts and cargo pants, usually made from a tough cotton drill. (Clothes like Hard Yakka workwear, for example.) Men’s clothes are generally thicker and sturdier than women’s clothes, so I’d direct tough chewers wanting fabric chews towards them regardless of their gender, and I think this is, honestly, your best bet for finding affordable, sturdy material. Note that you’ll need to be a little careful: don’t buy clothes with paint marks, for example, or anything that smells of chemicals or must, or is more than very lightly surface dirty/dusty. Holes don’t matter, but cleanliness does! Wash thoroughly before handling - I’d be using the least-chemical detergents possible and wash the garments a couple of times.

Once you’ve sourced and washed your bait garments, you can look at how you want to construct your chewables. If there’s any buttons, press studs, buckles, zippers, clothing tags or other plastic/metal attachments, cut them off. You can then cut the items up in strips (either across the torso of the shirt/hoodie or up the leg of jeans/trousers) and start braiding/plaiting.

I’ve got a few different collections tutorials for braided cloth chewables you might want to check out for detailed instructions. This ask has a few links I’ve gathered from various parents-of-autistic-kids websites and this link submission from @thepre-raphaelitesisterhood goes to few different DIY household chewable tutorials. All of them use cut-up garments or fabric (usually T-shirts) and some options have the addition of wooden pieces (either unvarnished wooden beads or a cut-up wooden spoon). You can make bracelets, bangles or even just long lengths of braid to chew on, if your friend isn’t comfortable wearing the chewable.

I will note that I don’t actually like the look of most fabric chewables. They’re acceptable for kids, but most adults, I suspect, won’t be able to get away with wearing these in school or office settings. I cut up one of my own T-shirts a while back and started experimenting, and I ended up with a variation on the necklace by making a braid, knotting both ends, folding the braid with the knotted ends together and then tying a knot part way up the length, forming a loop to go over the head with two dangling knots at the bottom:

[image description: two plaited fabric chewable necklaces made from lengths of purple and grey T-shirt knit braided into a long rope, knotted at both ends and then tied with a large knot a few centimetres above the ends, forming a loop large enough to fit over the head. The necklaces sit on a red and green circular watermelon slice pillow.]

Because this one is getting long, anon, I continue under the read more cut:

I consider this approach to be a little nicer than just a hanging loop of braid around my neck: the knot at the bottom looks more like a pendant and it looks somewhat like a scarf when worn. (Sorry, no photo.) If you cut wider strips (mine were approximately 5 cm wide, cut from a very thin/cheap K-Mart T-shirt) it should look even more scarf-like. This still might not work for some guys/masc folks, though, no matter the colours you use. You do get the overlocked seams at the tops of the braided loops, but I’ve been able to tuck those behind my neck and into the collar of my shirt.

If you want to avoid those seams altogether, cut your strips in half, cut out those seams and sew them back together, one short edge to the next, using an over stitch. Your join will be much less visible than the overlocked seams joining the sides of the T-shirt. I was experimenting with these above, so I didn’t bother, but it’s an easy thing to fix if wanted.

(Handling tip for light, stretchy knit fabrics, like T-shirt material: cut your strip and stretch it out in your hands before braiding/plaiting. The ends curl inwards, forming a tube. The braid will look as neat as if you sewed the edges into a tube, like mine above, and it only takes a few seconds to stretch each strip out before plaiting.)

For a strong chewer, I would recommend plaiting a long length of fabric, tying knots in regular intervals (perhaps as close as half an inch apart) and then knotting or stitching the loop closed, large enough to be pulled over the head. The knots provide tougher sections of the fabric for chewing on. An alternative approach, for toughness, would be to make three braided lengths and then braid those three pieces together, making a double braid. (You might need to sew several strips of cloth together, one short end to the next, to make your strips long enough for the double braid.) It will be thicker to bite on, but it should hold up better. You can even knot that, too, if your friend doesn’t mind larger wads of fabric in his mouth or likes chunkier bits to chew on or tease at.

I will observe that if you’re using denim or drill, you may have issues with fraying over time. (T-shirt knit won’t fray enough to matter, and neither will fleece.) If you have access to a sewing machine, you can solve this by cutting the long strips for your braid, pinning the two long ends together, sewing a seam down the long end and then turning the tube you’ve made inside out, putting the cut edges on the inside.

Wash the chewable after you’ve made it; this gets rid of any loose fleece fragments clinging onto the newly-cut edge.

I think, anon, that it would be easier for you to start out with cutting up an old fleece hoodie (your friend might still have a ruined one to donate) because the fleece is a more forgiving fabric for experimenting. I’d start off with a single braid, perhaps with knots, and then see how long it takes for him to chew through it. If he goes through it too fast, try the double braid and see if that’s any sturdier. Then, if that isn’t working, move on to denim and drill.

Unfortunately, anon, this is the sort of thing that takes experimentation - what fabric works best, how wide the strips you cut, whether to add knots or not, how long each design lasts. Know that it might take you a while to hit on the right combination of design, thickness and material to make the sturdiest chewable. That’s frustrating in terms of time and expense, but there isn’t a nice, simple shortcut answer!

I’m very aware that this post has become a wall of words, so I’m going to end it here. Please ask away if I’m unclear on any point or you want something elaborated on. I’ll probably do a proper tutorial for my fabric chewable design at some point, because I know this isn’t the best explanation.

I hope this gives you some ideas, but please, ask away if needed: I’ve packed a lot of information into one post, and if it overwhelms me a little, I’m sure it’s absolutely overwhelming for everyone else.

- Mod K.A.

[millerblg]

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