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The Battle with the Churn
Happy Monday to all you Americans out there! (Australians, I sincerely apologise for bringing up traumatic Monday memories for you). We’ve had a busy weekend, but this blog post has been on my mind since last week, and I’m keen to share it with you. I want to talk about the ‘Battle with the Churn’. I’m not sure how familiar a term this is to Americans (or even to Australians…?) but it’s a fairly common one in the Australian Army: basically it refers to self-generating work and/or stress. With that loose definition in mind, I’m sure the idea of churning is quite a familiar one. It’s what happens when you’ve…
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Aussie Expats Update – Prairie Dogs, Gym Equipment and Lasagna
Well fellow humanoids (and any who identify with other species and still use technology to read this blog), Welcome back again to our American Life! This week has been the first one where James has really been teaching American Army students as part of his new position, so we’ve been busy. Luckily, we haven’t been tooooo busy to have some adventures! [Disclaimer: what normal people call ‘everyday living’, I tend to call adventures. I make no apologies for this fact, but I want to ensure I’m not practicing false advertising.] James’s mum and brother we were with us over the weekend, leaving on Tuesday evening, so we wanted to make the most of…
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Getting Back into the Grooooove
Well everyone, it’s a Monday again. Happy Monday! I’m sure most people are rolling their eyes at that statement, but sometimes we just have to get excited about stuff and today I’m excited about life, so I’m wishing you all a happy Monday. I decided late last week that enough was enough: it was time to start writing every day again. Before leaving Australia, I was fighting to finish our moving admin and finalise all of my uni assignments for submission. The result of that and moving to Oklahoma meant that for quite some time, I only worked sporadically on my novel. Any excuse would do. I couldn’t decide how…
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Aussie Expats Update – Fourth of July and Visitors
Welcome back to the weekly update! I’ve been busy studying this week in an attempt to wrap my head around some new ideas and forty-page readings for uni, and have to admit that it’s a lot of work! I’m studying two writing subjects, a political ideology subject and an introductory psychology subject; there’s a bit of variety and some interesting stuff to learn every week. I can only hope that I will get more effective and efficient at the whole business! I’ve also managed to do some work on my novel this week, which is really exciting. I’ve decided to write for at least thirty minutes every day from now…
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The Great Writing vs Editing Juggle
Happy Hump Day everyone! I hope everyone in the US enjoyed their long weekend and Fourth of July celebrations. I decided not to post anything on Monday, since it was a holiday and we were spending too much time relaxing (also studying. Sigh). It was our first American Fourth of July and if that’s not exciting, I don’t know what is. We spent about $200 on fireworks and burnt ourselves firing them; we ate freedom cake and pecan pie; there was a slip’n’slide and Flip Cup (an American game that we were introduced to), and I got to cuddle a really cute puppy. It was a day that ticked all…
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Aussie Expats Update – Hiking, Buffalo, Wings and Sonic
Ladies and gentlemen! Well, here we are again for the weekly Friday ‘It’s Your American Life!’ update. I know… The title needs some more work still (it’s on my list of things to do), but I’m not on top of my game today. We were up until 3 am last night (babysitting, not even partying!) and I am consequently worn out and late in getting this post up. I also haven’t done any uni at all today. Oops. But anyway, have a pinch and a punch for the first of the month! It seems crazy to think that it’s already July, especially when we realised that Monday, 4th of July, marks our…
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Are Wednesdays for Writing?
Hey everyone! I know I promised that I would be publishing poetry on Wednesdays, but that idea has recently hit a small snag… Turns out that many magazines and competitions categorise posting your work on a blog as ‘being published’ and since a frequent condition of submission or competition entry is that previously published work isn’t allowed, I’m in a bit of a bind! I won’t be posting much poetry, or short stories up here for a while as a result, since I’m trying to get more involved in submitting my work to magazines and entering competitions. Instead, today I’d like to talk about making yourself write. Wednesdays are for writing. The alliteration is…
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The Price of Success
Happy Monday everyone! Mondays are going to be thought pieces/blogs or short stories from now on to kick the week off. As I’m sure you’ve already figured out, Wednesdays are poetry days and Fridays will see American Adventure updates. Today’s thought piece is about what it takes to succeed. I will bow my head in shame as I say it, but the other day I did a google search: ‘should I stop blogging?’ I imagine I’m not the only person who’s asked the all-knowing depths of the internet whether or not to surrender to the depressing realities of trying to build a sustainable, interesting and worthwhile blog that people want…
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Aussie Expats Update – Our Adventurous Life!
Helllooooooo everyone! Welcome back to our most recent edition of ‘I left my job and we moved to America and now we’re having adventures’! Not a very catchy title, but I’m sure I’ll eventually come up with something. Highlights of this week’s update include: wanting to buy a cat, making pavlova, a Friday night party, (almost) winning a new car and an expedition to Bed, Bath and Beyond. So last Friday night, our Aussie neighbours, Dave and Lee, held a party to celebrate our arrival. It jointly celebrated Australia Day too; since the weather over here is too terrible to have an Australia Day celebration in January, they moved it…
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A Poem for Modern ‘Beauty’
Hey everyone! A bit of a mix of blog post and poem today to talk about beauty and society (Wednesday is Poem Day!). I’m continuously fascinated by society’s expectations of what we – particularly women, but men as well – should look like. Well, fascinated and incredulous. Somewhere along the line we’ve reached the point where our appearance becomes more important than who we are on the inside. Does anyone else find that insane? How can my bust and hip measurements determine my worth if you don’t know anything about me? How can the shape of my nose mean more than my sense of humour or the length of my legs…
