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Aussie Expats Update – Be Alert for Aliens
Happy Friday everyone! So, yet again, I’ve left the house every day this week: tonight we’re going out with James’ class to the Fort Sill Oktoberfest. In light of this recent troubling turn of events, I really think we need to implement an emergency protocol. If I get up a running tally of continually leaving the house every day, someone please step up to the plate, shoulder the mantle of responsibility and call the FBI: aliens have definitely taken over my body. James has a secret way of making toast (I can’t tell you what it is, in case the aliens are reading this), but I have no such defence…
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A Wednesday Full of Thoughts
I’m so full of thoughts at the moment that I’m writing three different blog posts about it all simultaneously. One document I’ve got open has four separate ideas going on within it, each trying to wriggle their way out of my head, onto the page and into full realisation while I’m just trying to keep my eyes from crossing. It’s kind of confusing. Mind you, that’s still no comparison to the three-ring circus that’s going on inside my head. So the easiest way is to just start. I really feel right now that there are so many things going on in our world that deserve our time and attention, yet…
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The Woman in Red
Since I have an exam tomorrow, and I recently rediscovered some short stories (that still need a lot of extra work – don’t get me wrong!) on my laptop, I’ve decided to wimp out of actually writing anything and simultaneously give you all a break in the form of a story. “So sorry dear. How is your mother?” My reply is the same each time. “Thank you for coming. She’s well, thank you.” We repeat this over and over and over. Shaking the damp and wrinkled hands, faces scrunched with pity. The procession marches on, an sea of black upon which crumpled parchment faces float from one wave to the…
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Aussie Expats Update – Lesson of the Week
It’s Friday everyone. FRIDAY. No, I don’t feel like I’m exaggerating when I say I’ve been waiting all week for this. Yeah, yeah, I know – I don’t have a job and I need to study over the weekend for my psychology exam next Tuesday. But don’t bring me down. I have left the house every damn day this week and I’m exhausted. Don’t get me wrong: most of it was good. I mean had an awesome brunch out at Jimmy’s Egg on Thursday (the farmer’s skillet is the business people: go and try it if you don’t believe me) even though I didn’t have room for a cinnamon roll. Anyway,…
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Liebster Award!
Hey people, welcome to the middle of the week! We’re halfway there to a pjs all-day kinda day (it constantly impresses me that I don’t just wear pyjamas all day when I don’t need to leave the house. I am an adult.) But, in other news, on Monday I was nominated for the Leibster Award on Monday by the beautiful, hilarious and talented Nicole Evans over at Thoughts Stained With Ink (I’m really hoping that this will, in part, make up for the fact that I’m a non-video-game-playing loser, but it’s also all completely true). Because she’s a superlative human, she nominated me for something called the Liebster Award after she…
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A Commemoration – Three Years Post-Afghan
Today marks three years since I returned from my five-month deployment to Afghanistan. In some ways, it feels like those three years have been a lifetime; in others, like it was only yesterday that I stepped out of one world, and back into another that I couldn’t quite recognise. I left Afghanistan in mid-September with another junior officer and a number of the soldiers from our Shadow UAV contingent as part of the drawdown of Tarin Kot Multinational Base. The majority of my Troop, those soldiers under my direct command and my responsibility, remained behind. I also left behind my best friend, whom I had—unintentionally, and at that stage, completely…
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Aussie Expats Update – Birthday Celebrations in Dallas, Mini-Golf and a New Toy!
HAPPY FRIDAY WORLD!! It’s been a big week for us, in part I think because it took us quite some time to recover from the events of the weekend. Yes people, I drank… Two cocktails. At the ripe old age of 25, I’m pretty much incapacitated by a big meal and a couple of tasty cocktails (also apple pie, and a free makeshift cake comprising 2 oreos and some whipped cream with a candle on top – so in my defence, I ate a lot). We had a great time visiting Dallas. On Saturday morning we spent some time at the Perot Museum of Nature and Science, which was seriously…
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Writing, Empathy and Dealey Plaza
Empathy is a tough one. For a writer, it’s vital. Undoubtedly, somewhere in the mix there will probably have been a few great writers who weren’t overly empathetic, but the links between our capacity to empathise and our ability to create complex, interesting, relatable characters (whether they are likeable or not) seems clear. On the other hand, sometimes being empathetic can be overwhelming. Sometimes it seems that if you would let go and allow it to, the world would devour you. It can feel like a fine line between remaining sensitive to emotion, and drowning in it. We visited Dealey Plaza on Sunday morning before we left Dallas. The city…
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I’m Twenty-Five!
Happy Monday America… and Happy American Birthday to me! I’m officially 25 years old, a quarter of a century, which I assume means (since I’m living to at least one hundred, right?) that I may now commence my quarter-life crisis at any time which is convenient for me and inconvenient for James. Hurray! We had an amazing weekend in Dallas to celebrate my birthday, which included a lot of great food, some interesting sight-seeing adventures and a visit from James’ dad on his way from Sydney to Boston. More than anything else, it means the world to me to be able to celebrate something that really isn’t such a big…
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Aussie Expats Update – Arkansas Adventures
Friday has come and as I promised, so do I deliver. People, our trip to Arkansas was AWESOME. Now, I know a lot of people say this about their trips and I guess they’re probably right in some way or another, but they’re mostly wrong, because our trip was the most awesome. Probably ever. [Disclaimer: the fact that I am easily pleased and was travelling with my favourite human has not influenced this completely objective assessment of our trip. At all.] Friday morning saw us leisurely pack the last few pieces for our journey, which featured a boot-full of bags, boxes and random bits and pieces (in what was little…
