Category Archives: Lifestyle

A whiter shade of pale…

Q: What do Lexicon, China, Barrister, Berkshire, Stowe, Hog Bristle, Goat’s cheese, Eskimo Hut, Table Linen, Enchanted, Cloud Stream, Peace Flower and Skydancer have in common?

A: They are all paints marketed under the banner of whites and neutrals. And there are hundreds of them!

A few weeks ago my nephew popped round to see Mum (who was visiting from England). I asked him if he’d help me out by painting some colour swatches on the wall while I tapped away at my latest article.

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The previous weekend I’d slogged (sweated) round Bunnings (for non-Aussies, Bunnings is a warehouse-style DIY store) mid-heatwave. No wonder it boasts the ‘lowest prices’ (its strapline on every ad), the air-con is either on energy-saving low or is just a series of fans pushing hot air around. I was in between paragraphs writing about melanoma (no risk inside Bunnings at least), and once I’d bought drawer and door handles, plastic drop sheets, oversize garbage bags (the local charity shops are growing to LOVE me) and looked at blinds and sinks, I was pretty much over the whole thing – the heat, my impending renovations and having to make so many decisions. So by the time I got to the paint section, I grabbed six tester pots and hoped for the best. Rather like the rare occasions I bet on the horses, I was influenced by names I liked as much as the actual colours. How could I go wrong with Peace Flower, for example? Surely it would create an oasis of calm in my living room and block out the screeching bird in my neighbour’s garden.

But, of course, none of the colours looked right; they were variously too silver, too white, too bland, too yellow or too brown – all very Goldilocks. Mum suggested a hint of pink would add a bit of warmth. And she was probably right but that would mean ANOTHER trip to Bunnings to get more tester pots and I simply couldn’t face it.

The wrong shades of white...

The wrong shades of white…

Then I had a light bulb moment! Helen and John were due to arrive in Melbourne the next day as part of their world trip from the UK to Vancouver, Tahiti, Australia and Cambodia. Helen is an artist and has a keen eye for colour, and she and John, a gorgeous man and retired farmer, have renovated what they call the ‘bung,’ Helen’s bungalow, in Somerset.

Almond white is what you need they said, it’s much nicer and warmer than Magnolia (an over-used favourite back in Blighty). They’d used Almond White in the bung and it looked great. Paint dilemma over, I thought, relieved. After studying my renovation plans in detail (rather heroic of them as they were, after all, on holiday), we set off for lunch and then did a tour of St. Kilda and Albert Park. On the way home, we stopped at my local hardware store (the opportunity was too good to miss) to get some of the Almond White to test out. But it wasn’t quite that simple. It turns out that Almond White is a UK colour so we rang Dulux Australia for the ‘recipe’ but they didn’t have it. However, they did tell us that Dulux in New Zealand do an Almond White in their range, but they didn’t know if it was the same as its British cousin. But, if it were the same thing, Hog Bristle Quarter was the nearest match. I duly bought a small pot of the Hog Bristle (white with a bit of ochre) and Helen painted it on various sections of my walls. While not quite Almond White, Helen and John thought it was pretty close and a big improvement on the other colours I had chosen.

That night they went off to stay with friends near Warrandyte. I stayed home and had plenty of time to stare at the walls, not in a sad-singleton-Shirley-Valentine-kind-of-way you understand, but in a colour-appraising way. Did I really like Hog Bristle Quarter or was I just making do? Helen and John returned on Sunday night. And guess what? They had admired the colour on the walls at their friends’ house only to discover it was none other than Hog Bristle Quarter. That was enough to convince me that HBQ was indeed the one and that I didn’t need to test out another Fifty Shades of White. Phew!

On toes and too much to do

The truth is that life has been truly, madly, deeply bonkers and busy this last ten days; too busy even to brag about my brilliant welcome-to-mum beetroot soup. Because, although I say it myself, it was rather good.

Mum arrived on one of those early morning flights about ten days ago and kept going all day. She didn’t have much choice. Bertie dog was ill and passing blood – my courtyard was a mess – and so we spent the first afternoon scrubbing down the paving stones and then had an hour-long appointment at the vet’s (he’s since recovered after lots of tests and mega doses of antibiotics). After the vet’s I had an hour to prepare dinner, change and get my head in gear for a meeting with a publisher in Carlton. I only just made it as I ran into heavy traffic and had to ditch the car and jump on a tram.

Our second day started well and ended badly. We took Bertie for an afternoon walk in the park and went off the path and under the trees to avoid the sun. Don’t ask me how but, within minutes, a stick with attitude had singled out Mum’s leg and gashed it in two places. What would have been a bandaid affair for me or you, resulted in a major wound for Mum. Just as Bertie had stopped bleeding, Mum started, ruining her new shoes in the process. Yikes!

We got an appointment with the unpopular male doctor at my local practice the next day. He’s a belligerent, opinionated kind of medic totally lacking in any bedside manner. Mind you, Mum can be quite a tour de force herself especially when it comes to insisting that they use her special dressings the had brought from England. Was she planning to have wounded legs? Did she fear bashing her legs so much that it turned into a self-fulfilling prophecy? Sometimes I do wonder. Mum is the one who banged her leg on bed post in Singapore, had a similar stick incident on a beach in the Mornington Peninsula and, on a holiday in Cornwall in 2001, dropped a TV on her head. That really was quite a drama; she had tried to tilt the television downwards but it wasn’t fixed to the bracket so toppled over.

This is not to make light of her recent wound. Her leg was very sore and swollen but, more than that, Mum was furious it had happened and frustrated at not being able to swim, walk Bertie and help me clean and clear out cupboards in preparation for my renovations. I probably added to her frustration by running around like a mad chook flipping from thing to thing – writing grants and feature articles, buying a finger glove and special chicken-flavoured toothpaste for Bertie (he’s got a bit of plaque on his teeth apparently), doing the body corporate accounts (I can’t make them add up), clearing out cupboards (Mum is appalled at the stuff I have amassed – “you never used to be like this”), taking stuff to my local charity shop, testing paint colour on the walls, and toing and froing with the builder and other suppliers on everything from shelf heights to electrical points, Laminex samples, tiles and telephone points. Renovations are like migraines; you’ve got to go through it to know what it feels like. Believe me.

Then I’ve been emailing the folks back in England and dipping a toe in world of eBay to sell some of my clutter. So far I’ve sold a dress and am two dollars out of pocket. It sold for a dollar and I underestimated the postage. And talking of toes, my sister in London has dislocated her toe and it hurts like hell. She got out of bed in the night to attend to her husband who has had major knee surgery and has his knee in a brace. Are we accident prone in our family or just Drama Queens, or both?

Anyway, in between all of this whirling around, we’ve had some lovely moments of R & R: a lazy lunch in the garden with gorgeous rose wine, lunch at a local cafe in between a gentle bit of window shopping and, the highlight, a visit to Tim and Bruce in Hepburn Springs where we sat on the veranda watching greedy cockatoos nibbling on pears, read books, chatted about all and sundry, and had a beautiful dinner (Chicken Coronation, none the less, and Nigella’s plate trifle). With renovations looming in my own house, it was gorgeous to get away.

Bertie's hair clip...

Bertie’s hair clip…

I came back wondering how I could de-clutter not just my house but my to-do lists. And I’ve come up with a way to make combing Bertie’s ears less of a chore (see my last post about the bossy groomer). Getting out the knots and grass seeds is one thing, but food gets stuck in his hair and makes it all matted and he hates it when I try to comb it out. So, short of coming up with an edible chicken-flavoured comb, I bought a hair grip, one of those Lady Jane things, and I pin his ears back before he eats. As he gobbles up his food in about 30 seconds, he doesn’t even notice and it works a treat. The only thing is that I get the giggles as his little face looks so funny with his ears back. So I have to work hard at keeping a straight face when issuing the SIT and WAIT commands. These are two of the commands we’ve got down pat unlike leash walking…

On Sunday morning, he yanked on his lead and nearly pulled me down the front steps. My sandals caught on the step and my foot got bent back and I ended up with a huge bruise and rather sore toes. What was I saying about our family and the Drama Queen gene?

Looks like a Greek sculpture gone wrong...

Looks like a Greek sculpture gone wrong…

A few hazards back and one forward…

Further to my last post, I’ve had more encounters of the insect variety. In fact, the more I tried to insect-proof the house, the more the various beasts and bugs seemed to pop out of every nook and cranny. I found a spider in my washing – did it go through the machine or just drop off the line and into my wet washing in the basket? Either way it was dead or, as that Monty Python sketch about the dead parrot goes, just resting. I prefer dead to just resting. Then the other morning I woke up to ants crawling over the kitchen sink and in the bin even though I’ve distributed discs of ‘Ant Rid’ about the place. And just to add variety, it being the spice of life, a large earwig had draped itself across my sofa.

However I’ve made progress on the spaniel scratch front. I visited a groomer to sort out the dreadlocks behind Bertie’s ears as he wouldn’t stay still enough for me to cut them out myself. If you’re familiar with spaniels – cockers in particular – you’ll know that they have very long, thick and curly ears which can become repositories for food, water, sand, fluff, grass seeds and more. I’ve done my best to keep on top of the combing but he doesn’t make it easy for me.

Anyway, it was day four of Melbourne’s recent heatwave when we visited the canine crimper. The melting asphalt stuck to my shoe as I got Bertie out of the car and so it was a relief to enter the air-conditioned haven of the pooch parlour and to be greeted by the upturned faces of lots of small, smiley-faced fluffy dogs, looking positively Disney-like in their cuteness. So far so good.

The groomer lifted Bertie onto the table and said, more like, barked: “Why haven’t you taken him to a groomer before?” Take aback by her abruptness, I stuttered something about not realising I should have done so. “The breeder should have told you to do it in the first six months. A dog needs to get used to a groomer otherwise they end up having to have an anaesthetic at the vet’s before you can cut their nails and hair,” she continued, accusingly. “And why haven’t you had him de-sexed?” Determined to stick up for myself, I replied: “Because I haven’t chosen to do so yet.” In fact, and I didn’t share this with her – the animal rescue stickers were enough to explain her strict stance on de-sexing, some of the research says that (population control aside) leaving a male intact until he is up to two years old is beneficial for joint and bone growth.

dog grooming

“See these grass seeds?” she said, grabbing a clump of matted fur by his ear and snipping and then shaving the area down to the skin, “they not only cause infections, they can get into his blood stream and affect his heart.” “Well,” I protested, “I have tried to groom him but he bites me and wriggles about.” “That’s because you’re doing it like this,” she retorted, miming yanking the comb through his ears. “With all due respect, I haven’t been doing it like that,” I said getting hot under the collar. How dare this woman imply I am a bad mother!

Little does she know I am the one who has read all the books (well some…), who put a ticking clock and hot water bottle in his bed in the early days to ease his separation from the litter, who made him a special digging pit, showered him with toys, who takes him for two walks a day, puts filtered water in his bowl, experimented with special diets for his sensitive tummy and tried acupuncture to make him a bit less hyper-vigilant!

On the positive side, she did do a good job and she also clipped Bertie’s nails. But that’s not the point. Did she really need to be so blunt, bossy and critical? Imagine if I were like that with my clients. Why have you not over-hauled your website before now? Had it de-jargoned? And what about the fluffy grammar? Had you left it any longer, I would have refused to help and sent you to the web doctor.

How we communicate says a lot about who we are. A generous interpretation of this woman would be that she has a closer affinity with animals than with humans. I found it amusing that she was modelling typical alpha female leader-of-the-pack–I’m-in-charge behaviour. For a short while I had a boss like that. She had a mane of curly hair and arms adorned with bangles. She’d sit down at a meeting, spout jargon and hammer out a point by clopping her bangles on the table and sweeping her leonine hair off her face.

On this occasion, however, I learnt a valuable lesson about grooming (I now comb Bertie’s ears daily) and Mum will be thrilled his nails have been cut. Just in time! She landed this morning and is now unpacking. What’s more my neighbour built the self-assembly fan for me so we’re all sorted.

Hazard-proofing my house and drinking gin

I started to build a fan last night – you know, one of those cheapo made-in-China jobs you can buy at the supermarket. It’s not very hard to put together but, then again, I’m not very handy. I’ve only got as far as making the base or ‘cross stand’ and it’s going slowly as I’m using a $7.99 gimmicky little screw driver shaped like a pen with different heads contained in the pen lid. But with temperatures in Melbourne soaring – it’s currently 42 degrees and there’s no let up until Saturday – and my 82-year-old mother due to arrive from England next week, needs must.

The not-even-half-assembled self-assembly fan

The not-even-half-assembled self-assembly fan

Mum’s legs and feet – bless her – are already swelling up (and this in the frosty chill over there) at the mere thought of the interminable plane journey and the heat when she gets here. So I’m doing all I can to make her stay as comfortable and pleasurable as possible. So far, I’ve stocked up on 40% proof gin (and some tonic), red wine, Earl Grey tea and a jar of four fruits jam to go with her toast. I’ve bought a special mattress topper for her bed, cleared away three storage boxes of photos albums (all 38 of them documenting my life from 1963 to 2013) so she will be able to actually get into the bed, and am planning fun things to do and lovely meals to eat. I thought I’d do a cold beetroot soup for lunch on her first day– root vegetables are meant to be grounding (that’s why Bertie dog has a special raw meat preparation with grated turnip and pumpkin), so I reckon that should help her to find her feet even if they have doubled in size.

Some of life's essentials

Some of life’s essentials

We’ve got quite an itinerary planned. On our first weekend, we’re off to stay with Tim and Bruce in Hepburn Springs (luckily they have a well-stocked drinks cabinet too), then Mum is spending a night in Mt. Eliza with old family friends, she and I are renting a cottage in Gippsland for five days, my brother is taking her to Anglesea and then there are trips to the Botanic Gardens, favourite cafes, favourite friends, sitting in on my Monday night choir and more.

I’m thrilled she is coming out and will make the most of every minute we have together. I’m looking forward to sharing aspects of my life in Australia with her. As we reminisce about the good old days, we’ll be creating new adventures and re-stocking our bank of memories and stories. And while I work – how else do I keep the Bombay Sapphire topped up? – Mum has said she is happy to help with the ironing, cooking, grocery shopping and pre-renovation cupboard sorting. Perfect!

But there are still a few things to sort out. It’s not just the heat we have to worry about. Like many young, energetic and over-excitable dogs, Bertie has a habit of jumping up to greet visitors. And it’s unlikely I’ll be able to train him out of the habit in a week. Mum’s skin is very thin and rips and bruises easily so apart from having a supply of Steri-Strips to hand, I’m recommending that she wear long trousers and long sleeves until Bertie has got used to her being here.

Anyway, by last night I was feeling quite happy with all my plans and preparations… until Dad rang. “Make sure there are no whitebacks or white tails or whatever they are called. I would hate you or Mum to get bitten.” Dad has never forgotten that when he and Mum last stayed here there was a white tail in the bed. Not just on the bed but IN it. I was proudly pulling back the bed covers to show them the mattress on one of the new twin beds I had bought and there it was snuggled under the covers. “Actually, Dad,” I replied, “I have noticed rather a lot of spiders recently, from lots of little spiders on the sofa to a white tail on my bedroom floor. Enough said! I spent the rest of the evening charging round the perimeter of my house spraying webs around the downpipes, vents, gutters, window sills etc. And then I went out to the shed. And, sure enough, there was a spider with a fat body (yikes, a redback?!) busily making a web in the hinge of the door. I didn’t dare look too closely. I just sprayed and ran. Then I sprayed the ledge of the laundry window only for a cockroach to jump out and fall into Bertie’s water bowl. Arghhhhh!

It’s at times like this that a quote from Bill Bryson’s book Down Under comes to mind: “Australia has more things that will kill you than anywhere else. This is a country where even the fluffiest of caterpillars can lay you out with a toxic nip.”

Perhaps it’s time for me to pour a G ‘n’ T and let all thoughts of toxic nips or spaniel scratches just float away. Mind you, what about jellyfish in the sea? Should I worry about those too? More gin, anyone?

Chanelling the Queen?

Shortly after I posted ‘Tapping into the Magic of Christmas,’ I read about the Queen’s Christmas broadcast and her message about the need to strike the right balance between action and reflection. I went online to hear it for myself and was amused that she was also talking about experiencing spirituality in different ways and about the many distractions we all face. She ended up by saying: “I hope you will have time [over the coming year] to pause for moments of quiet reflection.” Good advice, I reckon. But, right now, it’s high time I reflected on the work I need to get back to. Alas, the holidays are over! Wishing all my readers a peaceful and happy 2014.

‘Fairing’ well at Christmas

For those of us from the Northern Hemisphere, Christmas Down Under can be a bit of a challenge. It’s Christmas but not as we know it. Hot blue skies, gum trees, flaming red bottlebrush flowers, beach, barbecues and seafood platters are a far cry from short, wintry December days, mince pies and mulled wine, turkey and the ‘trimmings’.

But this year I had an unexpected Christmas fix. Last Friday night my choir sang at a Christmas Fair and Festival at Ripponlea House, an elaborate (think chandeliers, ornate fireplaces and plasterwork, stained glass, embossed wallpapers, Regency furniture and more) Victorian mansion in Melbourne’s South East. After our performance a few of us took the opportunity to look round the house. By this time it was about 8.30 p.m., the light was fading and there was a slight nip in the air; perfect conditions to appreciate the house in all its Christmas glory.

Evergreen branches and candles adorned window sills, stockings hung in the nursery fire place and half-wrapped boxes of gifts lay on the bed in the master bedroom. In the dining room a formally set table was decorated with gold crackers, silver candelabras with red and green candles and paper napkins shaped like crowns. As if that were not enough to stir up nostalgic, rose-tinted memories of the festive season back in Blighty, carols floated up from the terrace below where a more traditionally minded choir ours were singing all the old favourites. It felt like Christmas and I went home feeling warm, fuzzy, and, well, festive. Deck the halls indeed!

This time last year, I was on my way to Copenhagen where I spent three nights on my way back to England. Christmas has its origins in the mid-winter pagan festivals of Northern Europe – yule comes from the Norsk word Jul – and so mid-December in Copenhagen was the place to be. Leaving Melbourne on a sunny 30-degree day, I arrived to snow and temperatures well below zero. From start to finish it was like being in a Winter Wonderland with stalls selling roasted almonds and mulled wine (known as glog) dotted around, brass bands playing carols in the city’s cobbled streets and squares and lights and decorations adorning every available window and facade.

Christmas at the Royal Copenhagen shopfront

Shop Window at Royal Copenhagen


Although it’s hugely touristy and commercial, I went to the Christmas Market in the Tivoli Gardens. Here, there was no escape from Santa – even in the Ladies’ toilets a piped voice wished us Ho, Ho, Ho, Happy Christmas. It was all a bit twee with a token reindeer in a pen surrounded by gingerbread-style houses selling steaming mugs of mulled wine, fur-lined boots and woollen hats from Lappland, confectionery, candles and Christmas decorations galore, but you couldn’t fail to get into the festive spirit.
Rudolf looks a little lonely

Rudolf looks a little lonely


The Christmas Fair in Christiana, a squatter community that started in the 1970s on the site of an old military barrack was a complete contrast to the extravaganza in the Tivoli Gardens. Now a self-proclaimed autonomous neighbourhood operating to a nine-rule Common Law, Christiana is scruffy, hip, New Age and eco-friendly with some edgier fringe dwellers into the mix. OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
In the grey hall, designers, artists and craftspeople from inside and outside the community were selling artisan products ranging from glassware, wicker, wood, ceramics and fabrics to chocolates and gourmet foods. Food Take-away snacks eaten at long refectory-style tables were suitably eclectic and included mulled cider, pancakes, baked potatoes, chilli con carne and Thai noodles.
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My last stop in Copenhagen was a Christmas concert at the Helligaandskirken (Church of the Holy Spirit) in the city. The choir sang a varied program (from German and Danish carols to the Messiah) a-capella-style and it was glorious. Sublime even. I was moved to tears by the beauty and simplicity of it all. I was genuinely touched by the Christmas spirit and it had nothing to do with Santa and presents!

Totally into Tea

As a tea drinker living in one of the world’s coffee capitals – according to one website I checked, metropolitan Melbourne gets through three million cups of coffee a day – I’ve decided it’s time for tea to steal some of the bean’s thunder – you could say it’s the war of the shrubs, camellia sinensis versus coffea. Because although there are plenty of other tea fans out there, coffee is still the beverage du jour and it’s all got increasingly fancy what with hand-picked beans, computer-controlled roasting, humidity-controlledfridges, syphons, grinders, dripper, filters and frothing jugs. You name it.

Freshly picked tea leaves from the camellia sinensis shrub

Freshly picked tea leaves from the camellia sinensis shrub

The good news for us teAtotallers (teAtotal being the opposite of coffee careerist) is that tea drinking has also reached a level of sophistication that makes dusty tea bags dunked in a cup of hot water seem a travesty. Tea is a whole world unto itself as I have been discovering.

Writing an article on tea for a health insurance magazine recently, I discovered that tea drinking dates back to around 2700 B.C., making it older than coffee and younger than wine. Legend has it that the Chinese Emperor Shen Nung was boiling his drinking water when leaves from a nearby tea shrub blew into the cauldron and, hey presto, the cuppa was born. There are four main types of tea: Black ,Green, Oolong and White tea. The difference lies in the degree of fermentation and processing. White tea, for example, is made with minimal processing of young new leaves that can only be picked for a few weeks a year. So, while it’s one of the pricier teas, it’s also very high in health boosting anti-oxidants. And then there all the wonderful herbal brews and tisanes made from herbs, fruits, flowers and spices. I am currently drinking Revive tea from Husk, a gloriously fragrant blend of lemon scented tea tree and hawthorn berries.

Nothing beats the humble cuppa

Nothing beats the humble cuppa

In my perambulations around the subject, I came across Sarah Cowell of Teasense, whose love of speciality teas has taken her to China, Taiwan, Korea and Japan. She’s been a Tea Sommelier at Melbourne’s Vue du Monde and Storm in a Teacup and now runs tastings and trainings, encouraging people to approach tea as “a sensory experience and something you develop a ‘sense’ or feel for if you listen. Like commonsense, over time, you can develop your own ‘teasense’.” (See http://www.teasense.com.au).

Last week, I put my teasense to the test at one of Sarah’s events, a chocolate and tea pairing. We sampled 6 different teas: Roasted Green tea, Hojicha from Japan; Dry Season Uva Black tea, a high altitude from Sri Lanka; Oriental Beauty Oolong from Taiwan; Bi Lu Chun green tea (translated as green snail spring) from China; Jasmine Green and pear tea from China; and Genmaicha green tea from Japan.
She encouraged us to engage all our senses – this was mindfulness in a tea cup – and to notice the aroma, colour, feel, taste, texture and flavour of the tea. Just like with wine, one of the best ways to ‘feel into’ the tea is by slurping and aerating it in the mouth.

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One of the teas we tasted was Oriental Beauty Oolong from Taiwan. Sarah teamed it up with a 64% dark chocolate from Vietnam. Some of us got vanilla notes from the tea and, from the chocolate (no biting allowed, only a slow sensuous melt in the mouth), notes of dried cranberry and banana. And, interestingly, the tea felt creamier and smoother in the mouth with the chocolate.

We ended with one of my favourites Genmaicha rice green tea from Japan. Now something of a delicacy and treat, this tea originated in post-war Japan when times were hard and puffed brown rice was added to make the tea stretch further. I love the toastiness of the rice and find it softens the green tea. What’s more, you can eat the pieces of puffed rice after brewing! We paired it with a green tea Kit Kat (available in Asian stores), an excellent combination of earthy greenness offset by the sweetness of the Kit Kat, which has a white chocolate base with green tea added.

It was an excellent evening and I learnt some great tips to enrich my experience of tea:
• Decant tea into a second pot to stop it brewing and getting too strong. This may seem obvious but rarely happens. If I order a leisurely pot of English breakfast in a café, it ends up like brown stew by the time I pour my second or third cup.
• Brew oolongs and white teas in a small pot and re-steep, because the second or third infusions are often the best.
• Heat the water to 90 degrees for green tea. So, for those of us without fancy temperature-controlled kettles, simply leave for a few minutes after boiling and then let the tea infuse for one and a half minutes to avoid bitterness.
• Aim to pour your tea anti-clockwise. In China, this means ‘come in and welcome,’ while clockwise pouring means ‘scarper, bugger off, go home’!
• And, one of my favourites, in Chinese tea ceremonies they never fill the cup full so there’s room for friendship.

The evening left me inspired to host my own tea tasting and to always leave plenty of room for friendship!

Nourishing the inner self

I was away last week and, for the first time in probably ten years, didn’t check my emails or even sit at a computer for seven WHOLE days! And did it matter? Not one little bit. There were nearly 200 emails in my in-box when I got home, but only about 20 of them needed a reply. The others were all newsletters, special offers and circulars. So the first thing I did on my return was to unsubscribe from all the email clutter than I never get around to reading.

Before Out of Office Autoreply was invented...

Before Out of Office Autoreply was invented…

How often do we give ourselves the space and peace to switch off both mind and body? Not often. There’s always something or someone making demands on our time and attention. I was incredibly fortunate to have time out with my friends Sue and Bruce in the Mid North Coast area of NSW. They live up a bumpy track just outside Grassy Heads surrounded by the cacophony of nature – cicadas (in particular the bladder cicada, so called because of its large and hollow abdomen which acts as an echo chamber for its call), tree and other frogs, birds, wind rustling in the tree tops and occasional clashes and flashes of thunder and lightning.
Here is a short clip of how a bladder cicada sounds:

I savoured the time and spaciousness of having nothing on the to-do list – no goals, no must-sees or must-dos. And not having to rush around to fit everything in. Early to bed at night and up early each morning, I enjoyed beautiful food with veggies from the garden – kale, silver beet, rocket, lettuce, squash and zucchini – and felt nourished from the inside out. As well as reading, I did Laughter Yoga in the ocean with Sue, a bit of Chinese tapping therapy, a few walks, a bit of yoga and had a massage and Reiki treatment. I met new friends over cups of tea or something stronger, and spent a lovely afternoon in Port Macquarie where I considered becoming a supporter of the wonderful Koala Hospital.

Regular readers might remember I alluded in a previous post to Botox being used to mitigate jaw clenching (bruxism). Well, before I went away I followed up on a lead and exchanged emails with an “Aesthetic Business Coach and Cosmetic Injector.” He offered me a free treatment in exchange for writing an article, but somehow it felt like a slippery and potentially costly slope. I knew that it wouldn’t stop at my jaw; he would recommend other areas of my face in need of rejuvenation or his specially formulated skin care range.

Then flying back from Coffs Harbour I noticed an advert in the in-flight magazine for a plastic surgeon, who was quoted as saying: “I am a big believer in really listening to my patients to determine what will make them happy.” Really?! Can nips, tucks, lifts, prolongers and enhancers make us happy? What about the woman or man who has a sculpted face, dyed hair, plumped up lips, gym-toned body and whitened teeth but is professionally or personally unfulfilled? The ad listed an intriguing menu including all sorts of lifts – from breast to brows and the mind-boggling Brazilian Butt Lift.

One of the books I read while I was away was Daniel Klein’s Travels with Epicurus. In his 70s and faced with spending vast amounts of time and money on dental implants, Klein instead decides to spend a year on the Greek Island of Hydra. Armed with the works of some of his favourite philosophers, he muses on how to live an authentic and fulfilled old age. Distinguishing himself from some of his contemporaries, the ‘forever young crowd’, who are doing everything medically, physically and cosmetically possible to halt the inevitable pull of time and gravity, Klein writes amusingly of the pleasures of old age and quotes Epicurus: “It is not the young man who should be considered fortunate, but the old man who has lived well. The young man in his prime wanders much by chance, vacillating in his beliefs, while the old man is docked in the harbour, having safeguarded his true happiness.”

For me, part of living well is nourishing our inner – rather than our outer – selves, whether it’s through nature, exercise, friendships, good diet, holidays, reading, meditating, doing yoga or planting out veggies. You could say that inner peace and contentedness reach the parts that Botox never will.

A few of my favourite quotes

Victor Borge once said: “Laughter is the shortest distance between two people.” Don’t you just love that quote? Where would we be without humour? I don’t know how I would get through life without being able to laugh at myself and see the funny side of a story or situation. When I left a job in publishing back in the 90s, my colleagues were sad to see me go as they were losing the office clown, the one who brought a bit of levity to the never-ending meetings and impossible-to-achieve deadlines.

According to the Oxford Dictionary of Humorous Quotations, Oscar Wilde is the most quotable figure in the history of the English language. With 92 entries, Wilde beats other favourites such as George Bernard Shaw, Noël Coward, Mark Twain, Dorothy Parker and Woody Allen. The latest edition of the dictionary was published in late October to coincide with Oscar’s 159th birthday. According to editor Gyles Brandreth the litmus test for inclusion in the dictionary is that quotes makes us laugh, are memorable and stand the test of time. Sifting through the 5000-odd quotes must have been great fun for the one-time Member of Parliament whose favourite one-liner is from Boris Johnston, the Mayor of London: “My policy on cake is still pro having it and pro eating it.” Only BJ – I had the pleasure of listening to him open the Melbourne Writers’ Festival earlier this year – would come up with such a cheeky, schoolboy-type utterance! See: https://thisquirkylife.com/2013/08/30/boriss-blockbuster/

What are your favourite humorous quotes? Some of my personal favourites are:

“That woman speaks eighteen languages, and she can’t say ‘No’ in any of them.” Dorothy Parker
This applies to anyone who has ever had a problem with maintaining personal boundaries and being over nice and accommodating. I speak from experience…

“Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination.” Oscar Wilde
A brilliant quote for the idealistic freelancer…

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“There ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.” Mark Twain
Who hasn’t got a disastrous falling-out-with-friends travel story? I have several!

Success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” Winston Churchill
A much more elegant take on the idea that there’s ‘no failure only feedback’, and a good mantra to live by.

“The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.” Lily Tomlin
Rats really do race! In 2003 when I was helping out on a volunteer conservation project on the Balearic island of Majorca, I went into the kitchen one morning and opened the food cupboard. Two black rats shot out and raced down the stairs. I don’t know who was more frightened, me or them!

“We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” George Bernard Shaw was in tune with his inner child, way before it became trendy and new-agey to do so.

I’ll close with a dog quote: “I don’t really understand that process called reincarnation but if there is such a thing I’d like to come back as my daughter’s dog.” Leonard Cohen.

A few of my favourite things… and people

There’s nothing like shifting up a decade to make you reflect on the past and think ahead to the future. Although getting older has its downsides, in other ways life gets easier: most of us wise up a bit, are less preoccupied with how we come across and whether people like us. We’re not so worried about how many exams we’ve passed and how high up the career ladder we’ve climbed. We know what we stand for, what we value most in life and whom we want to spend time with.

I made a fuss of my recent big birthday and celebrated being alive, well and still on planet earth. But most of all, I celebrated family and friends, from ‘old’ friends in the UK to ‘new’ friends here in Australia. They are all part of who I am and who I have become, and I am so grateful for all the ways in which they have enriched my life.

I received some wonderful birthday gifts, messages and cards with a few key themes emerging: tea, tea drinking and Britishness (Keep Calm and Have a Cuppa); jewellery, beautiful pottery, glass and ceramics; books, travelling and writing (a kindle, an oversize visual feast Lonely Planet book and a plaque of Charlotte Bronte, a great talisman (or should I say taliswoman?) to inspire my writing), and all things dog related (from a cocker spaniel mug to a book on dog behaviour).

A very special friend from the UK, Monica, who I have known since we were both 14 – and I am singling her out because she is dealing with extremely confronting challenges in her family life – found time to send me a parcel containing a few of my favourite things. Bit by bit I unwrapped a packet of Earl Grey Darjeeling containing ’15 biodegradable tea temples’ from a company with a dachshund logo called teapigs, some Earl Grey lip balm (organic and vegan), a long striped scarf in vibrant colours, some Tuscan blood orange body balm (free of nasties and animal testing), a designer linen towel, some wild (English) rose shower cream, a gorgeous enamel necklace, photos from our younger days (yikes, what was I doing with permed hair?) and a card full of special messages and in-jokes featuring a chocolate Lab listening to his iPod. I was so touched and yet so sad she was not with me that I couldn’t help but shed a tear.

A heartfelt present from a very special friend

A heartfelt present from a very special friend

And then I had a little soiree courtesy of my brother and his wife who generously opened up their house so I could mark my milestone with a few friends. And what an evening it was! It was not only a celebration of my half century but also the culmination of nearly ten years in Australia. The whole evening was characterised by the warmest and most affectionate of vibes with my mother, sister and niece tuned in via Skype from their kitchen in London. And I needn’t have worried what my brother would say about his little sister; he made a wonderful speech full of childhood memories such as smashing our mother’s best tea set, rolling down bracken-covered hills and driving up icy hills in Derbyshire. He went on to acknowledge my academic and professional successes at the same time lamenting my disasters with men and dating. Thank God for Bertie dog, he concluded.

I am most amused by my brother's speech

I am most amused by my brother’s speech

And then, as a complete surprise, my friend Rosi, whom I met in choir, bravely took centre stage (well, I could hardly hog it ALL evening) and sang to me her specially written version of These Are a Few of My Favourite Things. Cleverly, with all the verses rhyming, she wove in references to my being a striving self-helper and writer with a stiff neck habit, a fan of the Feldenkrais method and Ayurvedic practice, a not-for-profit grant-writer, a Bayside-dwelling, literature and dog-loving Brit with a fatal attraction for the wrong kind of men. It was the most affectionate warts ‘n’ all tribute one would wish for.

Never have I felt so loved and appreciated. For once I was not the singleton at the wedding, the wallflower at the dance, the outsider at the new school or the new kid in town. It was my party and I could float around like a Queen if I felt like it (my friend Tim from Hepburn Springs actually alluded to me and Her Maj in the same sentence, although I doubt Liz would wear fake flowers from Sportsgirl in her hair…). Surrounded by loving friends and family, I realised like never before that it really was OK to be me – imperfections, hang ups, trials, tribulations, triumphs, the whole shebang – and still be loved and lovable. And as for the men, well I’ve still got up to 50 years to change the pattern (we are, of course, living longer and longer). Meanwhile, as American singer and song writer Carrie Underwood is reputed to have said: “The more boys I meet, the more I love my dog.” Thank God, indeed, for beautiful Bertie. Ladies and Gentlemen please raise a toast to my devoted hound.