10 Wednesday Dec 2014
If there’s one organisation in Australia that consistently makes me lose my Christmas cheer then it has to be Australia Post.
Yesterday we popped in to a local Post Office to buy some Christmas stamps, for Christmas cards believe it or not, not that big an ask surely?
01 Friday Aug 2014
Posted in Journalism, Media, Opinion
Living in a bushland area you have to be aware that, sooner or later, you are going to face a bushfire threat.
This week we had our first close encounter at our current home.
We decided to go for a quick drive to establish just how close it was and to see if we needed to take any sort of action.
The bushfire as seen from the top of Clear Mountain.
20 Monday Jan 2014
Posted in Journalism, Media, Opinion
I was out on one of my morning walks when I caught sight of a sticker in the back of a parked car:
“Is that the Truth? Or is your News Limited?”
At first I chuckled to myself as a clever dig at the Murdoch press which in Australia until recently was referred to as News Limited (now News Corp Australia).
But then I got really quite annoyed about it.
Not in defence of Murdoch, but more that it really shows a lack of understanding about what journalism is all about.
10 Tuesday Sep 2013
Posted in Journalism, Media, Opinion
I recently overheard a Journalism student bemoaning the fact that yet again he’d heard someone say that journalism isn’t dead, it’s just evolving.
It probably is an overused phrase by those in the profession or working in journalism education – but understandably so. Who wants to be working in an industry that has no future?
Initially I thought, what, you’d rather we say it’s dead? That there’s no point in your three years at university because there won’t be any jobs at the end? Well that would be encouraging wouldn’t it?
But it got me thinking.
08 Monday Jul 2013
I love holidays.
Let’s face it who doesn’t? A time to travel, explore, relax and indulge a bit… okay, make that quite a bit.
But I never thought I’d be saying this: a trip to the United States is good for your health.
Well at least it was for me and my husband.
Our initial hotel had a ‘continental breakfast’ provided as part of an additional, compulsory, daily ‘resort fee’.
It was a little bit unusual – each room was provided with a small cold bag that you filled from the buffet and then you could eat it by the pool, on the beach or your hotel balcony. We chose the latter because of the stunning views we had.
Waikiki Beach, Hawaii
26 Friday Apr 2013
Posted in Journalism, Language, Opinion
Reading a newspaper the other day I came across an oft used phrase but with the wrong word in it.
In disgust, I hurled the paper to one side then emailed my husband and said “you’ll never guess what…” and told him what I’d read.
He didn’t get it.
I took a deep breath. What if it was me and I’d been wrong all along?
It does happen… occasionally.
So, of course, online I went to get to the bottom of this only to discover another language minefield.
09 Tuesday Apr 2013
Posted in Journalism, Media, Opinion, Politics
It’s taken me exactly 15 months since my initial blog on Margaret Thatcher to watch the film The Iron Lady, and ironically she died the following day.
Don’t worry, I’m not drawing too much from this coincidence, but my reaction to the film was much as I feared.
The whole experience felt like we were watching it through tinted glasses. I guess we were – the glasses of an elderly woman.
02 Friday Nov 2012
I have to be honest, there aren’t many things I would generally say that Britain does better than Australia – but providing a decent taxi (or cab) service is definitely one of them.
Having just returned from a second trip to the UK this year I know what I’m talking about.
Every time we called a cab it arrived promptly.
20 Friday Jul 2012
There’s been so much written about these books I’ll keep mine brief.
Sadly I got caught up in the hype on a recent trip to the UK – there hadn’t been much talk about it in Australia at that point but I was picking up a lot of talk via Facebook friends in the UK and once we arrived it seemed to be the talk of the town. Every town.
Usually I resist this sort of hype. I’m sure I was the last to read Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (which I loved by the way)!
But I went into one bookshop and there it was. I read the back cover and put the book down again and walked off into the shop.
I then noticed a couple of young women come in grab a copy and run – yes run – to the counter. Then another woman came in and bought a copy.
I walked over and impulsively grabbed two books. One for me, one for my sister-in-law. Well it was cheap in the UK!
12 Thursday Jul 2012
Posted in Opinion
I love travelling but one of the biggest issues I have with long-haul flights is the food.
Not because it’s unpleasant or unidentifiable – to the contrary, I think airline food has improved massively over the years – it’s the choice.
As a non-meat eater I usually opt for the vegetarian option. But it’s not that simple.