Here's a version of "Of Late I've Been Driven Near Crazy"
I learned it from an elderly man in a pub in Collingwood - suburb of Melbourne, Victoria Australia. Sometime between 1984 and 1986. He called it an old Melbourne song. Been trying to track it down ever since. Tune is almost the same.

PUSH ON THE CORNER

Last night I was driven near crazy, by one I both love and adore.
Now she's packed up her boxes and left me, and I ain't gonna see her no more.
I've written her hundreds of letters, to beg her my faults to forget,
but now she's found one she loves better, and this is the answer I get:

Oh, wait till the push on the corner refuses to drink a long beer!
Wait till the thieves and pickpockets from the streets of Fitzroy disappear.
When the dear little Collingwood lassies from powder and paint they are free,
When the Chinese are coppers on Bourke Street, my darling I'll come back to thee.


push: gang
Fitzroy, Collingwood : tough inner suburbs of Melbourne, containing red-light district.
Bourke St : a main thoroughfare of central Melbourne business district.

Interesting connections, I think. Our friend O'Leary has written a good 2nd verse to this, and I'll try to persuade him to post it.
Joy

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Push on the Corner thread