It’s been a wild ride these last couple of years, ones in which I wouldn’t like to repeat as the world experienced something that touched every single one of us in different ways. I’d be lying if I said that it hasn’t affected me on some deep level despite being luckier than most. It’s been […]
Your Alternate Life
This week a couple of people connected with me to tell me that they were taking up university studies to requalify into new potential new careers. I was happy for them as is always the case when people do something like this for themselves that sets them off on a new path of learning, a […]
What Would You Remember from Your Work Life?
Last night while in bed, I was reflecting on my work life. I entered the workforce while I was in my 3rd year university holidays as an Undergraduate Entry Naval Officer. At the time, I was studying Chemistry at Monash University with the aim of doing an Honours year in it but during Orientation Week, […]
What Did You Miss in August?
Here’s the writing and videos I shared in August Blog Posts On Doing Community Service On Giving Feedback Lockdown6.0 Part 2 Fuck, I’m tired (on the tediousness of lockdown) Summer Holidays (and how I’m noticing a change of values misaligned to the country I’m living in) Writing French Stories (On Language Learning) Ideas for How […]
Radio Girl
I’m currently reading a book by researcher David Dufty called Radio Girl: The Story of the Extraordinary Mrs Mac, Pioneering Engineer and War Time Legend (what a cracking title) and the more I read it, the more I believe that Australian film makers MUST make a film or a series about her. Violet McKenzie grew […]
Idiocracy
Ever since watching this movie many years ago where Luke Wilson plays a character thrust into the future where everyone is an idiot, the more I’m beginning to think that Australia is becoming closer to an idiocracy. None more so prevalent with the situations that have been playing out during our lockdowns here with massive […]
Couch to 10K
One of the things I’ve started doing again in my mornings is to incorporate a jog rather than just walk. We have been in lockdown for over 18 months now and we are only allowed up to two hours to be outside. (During the strictest lockdown it was one hour). I like to make use […]
If You Disappeared Who Would Care?
This week, Amy Burvall @amyburvall posted this tweet. Initially curious but on reflection, confronting, she makes an excellent point. If you disappeared, who would care? On the same day, my mother calls me to let me know that it’s my sister-in-law’s name day (I’m Greek Orthodox, so Saint Days are celebrated). Mum was calling me […]
Survival Training
One of the television programs I’ve been watching recently is SAS Australia. The SAS is short for Special Air Service an elite arm of the Defence Force focused on covert operations. The program shows a group of celebrities who volunteer to put themselves through the toughest challenges and we also learn their back stories. The […]
Trying New Knitting Techniques
One of the skills I wanted to learn was to be able to knit motifs around the shoulder of jumpers and recently, I came across the designs of knitwear designer June Steingass from Knit.Love.Wool. The reason why I loved these fair isle designs is they remind me of the chunky nordic jumpers and cardigans that […]
Missing Body Language
Recently on my morning walk, I pondered about how I’ve been working from home and remotely for some years now and what I’ve been missing with regards to working with others “in real life”. In the past, while working in office, I would say that I had some positive attributes that lent themselves well to […]
Tired
There are days where I just feel like shit. Utter shit. Today’s one of them. I didn’t go for my walk or run this morning so maybe my routine was out of ‘whack’ because it didn’t start so well? The day was gloriously sunny and despite going for a mid-morning walk in the park and […]
Building my Aural Skills
One of the new things I’ve been trying to learn 220+ days into lockdown, is morse code. I wrote this in my last blog post Learning About the Secret Code Breakers of World War II. You have to understand that being close to two years and for much of it under the roof of my […]
Learning About the Secret Code Breakers of World War 2
One of the new rabbit warrens dives I’m doing to kill a bit of time is learning about the Australian code breakers during World War 2. Now I’m fascinated by stories of the past and recently I had found out that our street was the site of an intercept station in 1942 that played an […]
Lockdown Habits
I’ve lost track how many days we have been in lockdown in total. 208? 210? 220? To be fair, all days run into each other except for my work days which are on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. They bring me a little bit of variety with meetings and colleague catch ups here and there. Work […]
We Need the Social at Work
Last night, my colleagues at Rapid Circle and I took part in a fun online Trivia Night. It’s now been four weeks since our Adopt & Embrace team were acquired by this new company and given that many of us were in lockdown in Melbourne, we were unable to meet each other in person. However, […]
Be Like Eyam
A few days ago we marked the 200th day in lockdown in Melbourne. That’s 200 days over six periods of separate lockdowns not consecutive days. If it was the latter, I would have gone mad already. As it is, I look forward to the days when lockdown ends because it sends me in a frenzy […]
My New Obsession with Orwell
Sometimes I think that school texts are wasted on the young. I remember that many years ago, I read 1984 and Animal Farm which were high school texts and their meaning was totally lost on me. I guess as a young teen, I had other things on my mind that were much closer to home […]
Ideas for How People Care for Themselves
Last week, in a particular down point, I asked the question on how do people manage to stay sane at these times when all we’re hearing on the news is constantly negative? After 200 days of lockdown (over six periods of lockdown), I think many Melbournites like myself have been affected mentally over the uncertainty. […]
Writing French Stories
I am writing short stories using a French picture dictionary for inspiration. For exercise, I flip open the dictionary and look at the pictures and definitions (there’s no English) so then I concoct a story in French using those words. It’s a way to contextualise the vocabulary I’m learning and in my mind’s eye, I […]