this week

A favourite corner of my living room, especially around 4:30pm this time of year, when the light is fading, necessitating candles and fairy lights.

Didn’t I just do one of these?! Does anyone else feel like the weeks are flying by at the moment?

Let’s get to it!

Favourite experience/s of the week

A pre-paper selfie I took for my friend in Melbourne sending supportive “go get ‘em!” texts - I don’t look nervous but I was!

Despite all of the nervousness leading up to it, I actually loved giving a paper to my UTAS colleagues and fellow HDRs at lunchtime today. It’s so funny, I know that I know my material and I always feel such a buzz afterwards. I even enjoy it while I’m doing it, dry mouth, racing heart and all. But the lead up to giving a paper is always excruciating for me. What am I so afraid of, that I’ll go completely blank and be rendered speechless? Or that there will be a technical malfunction that my peers will use as an excuse to tease and humiliate me? In my brain’s defence, that has happened to me before, but only once and I was 13 years old at the time which was the best part of 30 years ago now (what?! That can’t be right). It was a very scarring experience, but perhaps it’s time I stopped giving those memories so much power. I find giving a paper regularly is the best remedy for getting over my stage fright. I also discovered an excellent podcast this week that really helped (see the Listening section).

My darling husband also bought me some flowers because he was proud of me, which was so sweet. I love having flowers in our home.

I also loved seeing my family on Sunday for a belated birthday gathering - which felt very strange, because my birthday was at the end of May (while we were in the UK) and now it’s the middle of July! But whatever, it’s been a weird year. Mum made my favourite dip (hummus) as the centrepiece for her usual amazing spread and a delicious cake, and my nephew and niece helped me blow out the candles. It was lovely!

Reading

Bedtime reading is The Bloomsbury Cookbook which I’m finding fascinating. If time travel were possible, one of my choices would be to attend a pre-WW1 Bloomsbury Group meeting - what a bunch of characters they were. Though I daresay I would have become infatuated with the wrong person and had my heart broken - it seems to be a common theme so far!

Also related is Square Haunting: Five Women, Freedom and London Between The Wars which I am loving - it’s both a pleasure read and very relevant to my research, because I too am exploring ideas of female subjectivity and self realisation in relation to place. I’m focusing on colonial Hobart and Sydney, but I really admire how Francesca Wade has structured this and it’s given me lots of ideas. It’s absolutely fascinating so far!

I finished The Missing Ingredient by Jenny Linford, which was a birthday gift from a dear friend in London. It was such a thought-provoking book about the role time plays in creating great flavour in food. And you might be surprised by the kind of food that responds well to a bit of extra time taken - jam, for example! It was a really interesting read that I enjoyed dipping in and out of. And it made me wish I had read it before we went back to the UK so I might have sought out some of the products mentioned (not that we had much time for shopping in the end!) - but there’s always next time!

The Village by Matt and Lentil Purbrick - I borrowed this from the library as I’m missing my vegetable garden (which is currently asleep for winter) and wanted to get some inspiration and ideas for spring planting. I’m excited to plant some companion plants this year, like marigolds and Queen Anne’s lace, which will hopefully distract the pests! I have also learned my lesson and will PLANT EARLY this spring! I can't wing it here like I used to in my London courtyard. If you want some inspiration for your home veggie patch and living more sustainably and in a more community-minded way, this is a great book to get you started!

The Guardian: Growing up trans in country Australia by Candace Bell

Open Book (State Library of New South Wales): On literary merit by Kerryn Goldsworthy

The Offing: Fourteen Ways of Looking by Erin Vincent

BBC News: We found a baby on the subway - now he’s our son - get tissues for this one!

The Audacity: Knee Deep by Sandy Silverman

Listening to

My “writing beats” playlist which is perfect for client work, editing, writing emails, writing blog posts and also getting psyched up before giving a paper! It’s also great “getting ready to go out and party” music, not that I do much of that these days!

Lots of affirmations this week too on Insight Timer, the meditation app I have used for the last six years. I hit 1900 consecutive days this week which is a bit scary…in terms of how many years that is, but in days it doesn’t seem like that long.

My inner autumn playlist was on repeat.

WILD with Sarah Wilson: You are weird! Here’s the scientist who can explain why

The Imperfects: Glenn Robbins - Listening To The Voice In Your Head - I loved this interview with Glenn and the message felt particularly resonant for me this week. Glenn spoke candidly about how he has battled performance anxiety and nerves for pretty much his entire career, and how he has learned to listen to the encouraging voice in his head rather than the one that tells him he isn’t good enough. It got me through this week and the nerve-wracking thing I had to do! This is my new favourite podcast, all about resilience and vulnerability, and I can’t wait to listen to the back catalogue!

The Full Vegan

Eating

Have I introduced you to The Full Vegan yet? This is a brunch meal that Tom and I started making in January when we accidentally went vegan and enjoyed it so much we’ve kept it up (like many things I decided to do over the summer!). It’s avocado toast, hash browns made in the air fryer, baked beans, sautéed mushrooms - those are the Big Four (even though Tom isn’t a fan of mushrooms, their vitamin B12 make them a great vegan food so he has a few!) and then we usually add some seasonal greens, maybe vegan sausages if we have them in. A blob of ketchup, a glass of orange juice and The Full Vegan is complete. It is absolutely delicious. And so hearty and filling, I honestly don’t miss eggs, halloumi or any of the other things we used to have for brunch at the weekends before. This week’s Full Vegan had no avocado but extra mushrooms and sautéed sprouts (very good!). We also got a new air fryer at the weekend because our old one completely died the weekend before, which I was very grumpy about - but all the grumpiness dissipated when Kmart suddenly got some stock in of the one I’d had my eye on! It’s an upgrade every sense of the word!

Spinach, risoni and lemon soup - recipe here

Bread in the bread maker!

I also made a giant pot of my favourite soup which was delightful - I hadn’t made this soup for ages, possibly not since last winter. It’s so comforting and tasty. Alas, my local grocer was out of fresh dill so I made this batch with tarragon instead. It wasn’t quite the same and I missed the dill (in my top 3 favourite herbs for sure) but it was still amazing!

We had a friend round for dinner at the weekend and we had a vegan cheese platter to start (delicious) and for main course I made the fennel, walnut and sun-dried tomato pappardelle from Special Guest by Annabel Crabb and Wendy Sharpe, a book on whose brilliance and delicious recipes I have waxed lyrical before. I didn’t have pappardelle so used orecchiette instead, and it was just as good as using long pasta! I have also made my own vegan Parmesan which is pretty delicious too - I’ll write up the recipe soon.

I also dusted off our old bread maker and made a loaf in it for the first time in a while - and the house was filled with that utterly divine smell of bread baking. It was a lovely loaf with good structure, it held up well for toast all week. I enjoyed it so much I might set it going tonight so I can wake up to the smell of fresh bread! I also bought some more of my favourite Maggie Beer Seville marmalade this week….so I don’t see that I have a choice but to make more bread, frankly.

Watching

Not much this week. More Parks and Recreation (Netflix) because after some long days, I just needed some escapism and I so enjoy this show. And also The Babysitters Club (Netflix) - the last pure thing on earth. Wonderfully entertaining, enough nostalgia for me to enjoy it but updated to be inclusive, fun and modern. I adore it!

I can’t remember if I mentioned it - jet lag is real and I’m only just feeling back to normal - but we rewatched Frances Ha (we bought it on iTunes and also own it on Blu-Ray) a few weeks ago, and I adored it as much as I did when we first watched it. Greta Gerwig is one of my favourite directors and writers, and I think her work has only got stronger in recent years. I can understand why some people might find Frances Ha overrated or frustrating to watch...especially in 2022, a film about privileged 20-somethings trying to get to grips with adulthood seem to be ten a penny. But in 2012, I think it captured something. I loved it and still love it, even though my twenties were quite some time ago now! I think the film spoke to me because I was a bit of a late bloomer myself and, as long time readers will know, my own twenties were a time of great transformation and flux. I was both Frances and Sophie in some ways - I floundered for many years, and then steamed ahead and people felt like I'd left them behind. I think the movie captures that melancholy and resistance to change quite well.

Quote of the week

“Because you are alive, everything is possible.” - Thich Nhat Hanh

Thank you Jo for inspiring this weeks’s quote!

If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post, or anything else, with me, please do! Stay warm, or cool, wherever you are, and I’ll look forward to chatting to you again next week…which I’m sure will be here before we know it! xx

this week

A few of my favourite books by First Nations writers!

This week has been NAIDOC Week in Australia - a week to celebrate and amplify the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It’s something I have started to really look forward to over the last few years. As someone who spent over a decade away from Australia, the small changes are very noticeable to me. When we were catching a connecting flight on our way home from the UK a few weeks ago, the Qantas boarding gate in Perth had “Naarm, Wurundjeri Country” as the destination as well as Melbourne, which made me quite emotional and proud to see. I’m not suggesting for a moment that there isn’t far, far more progress still to be made but I have noticed many changes in the time I was gone, particularly more acknowledgements of Country, which makes me feel hopeful that things are moving in the right direction.

You won’t be surprised to hear that I like to mark NAIDOC Week with literature! I have many favourite books by First Nations authors, as pictured above, so I always make a point of rereading some in NAIDOC Week, and discovering some new ones. Anita Heiss, one of my favourite writers, has an excellent recommendation list on her blog and my personal recommendation is Anita’s book Am I Black Enough For You? which I think is essential reading for all Australians. It’s not only funny, wise and insightful, it makes you challenge and think deeply about your own assumptions about what it means to be Aboriginal in Australia today. She has just released a tenth anniversary edition of the book too which my friend Kim has just reviewed on her blog (side note: Kim is an excellent reviewer and I have bought so many books because of her reviews!). But in short, if you have not yet discovered Anita Heiss and her brilliant books, I am envious! I’ve been a fan for about 20 years, since she was a guest lecturer in one of my undergraduate units. Fabulous then, fabulous now! I’m so excited to see what she writes next.

I was also excited to see that Clothing the Gap have an Ally Friendly section - as someone who wants to be a good ally, I often wondered if it was appropriate for me to wear clothing like this and most certainly didn’t want to cause offence if it wasn’t. I’m grateful to Blak businesses like Clothing the Gap who make it easy for us to show our support. In their words: “when we see Aboriginal designs in the world, it means we’re not invisible in the landscape. It makes us feel seen and heard.” I’m looking forward to wearing an Always Was, Always Will Be shirt and hope it’s a starting point for some important conversations.

Favourite experience/s of the week

Apart from seeing all the NAIDOC Week activities? And Boris Johnson’s resignation?!

Starting a business with my husband, which we’ve been talking about for years.

Reading

To mark NAIDOC Week I started another read of Larissa Behrendt’s novel After Story, one of my favourite books of 2021. Beautifully written, with so many wise and insightful observations about life, loss, trauma, connection and family, I think it’s just fabulous.

Sydney Review of Books: Re-Mystification: Adele Dumont on the Writer Laid Bare by Lee Kofman. Such a great article about a book I have been savouring slowly and enjoying very much. Dumont writes: “One of the things I love most about Kofman’s writing is her suspicion of fashions. She questions popular writing maxims, such as ‘show don’t tell’, and is critical of students’ over-use of dialogue, which she attributes to the influence of film. She believes social media is damaging our brains: ‘when not petty or nasty then nice, saccharine, friendly and chit-chatty daylight of our online interactions encroaches on the silent, dark spaces within us’.” OH GOD YES. I have so much I want to say about this. On Sunday it will be six months since I last used Instagram or Twitter. Six months. I have so much to say, mostly about how I feel I have my life back. It’s extraordinary.

Also from SRB - Snail Trails: Jessica White on Gentle and Fierce by Vanessa Berry - two writers I love! I also attended a writing workshop with Jessica White a few weeks ago which was so refreshing and fun. It got me thinking about nature and sensory detail in my writing, and being more conscious of which of the senses I automatically tune into when I write (sight and taste, interestingly).

Eating

Dave Grohl’s bad-ass lasagna got made and eaten for three dinners - I screwed up the homemade pasta dough so it was a bit chewy, but I didn’t mind! There’s no such a thing as a bad lasagna, am I right?

Chilli non carne from Linda McCartney’s Family Kitchen cookbook that I picked up in the UK - delicious!

But everything pretty much had lentils and beans in it this week…if you are a vegan or vegetarian, you’ll understand what I’m saying here.

Nigella’s vegan gingerbread is still going strong, by some miracle (though we are down to the last few pieces now). It has only got stickier and more delectable with the passing days. A friend came round for a chat this afternoon and I served her a slice. The look on her face after she took a bite was of utter bliss. “This is so good it’s almost sexual,” she said. I wholeheartedly concur.

This is the film poster I remember being everywhere when I was a child! [source]

Watching

Parks and Recreation (Netflix) - enough said. The perfect comfort watch. Ben reminds me so much of Tom! And apparently, I have Leslie’s sweetness, quirkiness and ambition but not (too much of) her scary intensity, haha!

Strictly Ballroom (Blu-Ray) - OMG, where do I start with this film? My friend Nigel Marsh has a wonderful podcast called The Five of My Life and one of the five things he asks his interviewees about is a film that has profoundly affected them. Nigel, if you ever interview me (sorry for the spoiler!), this is the film I’d pick.

I have seen this film so many times but on this viewing on Saturday night (of the Blu-Ray Tom surprised me with for my birthday), I sobbed in a way I’ve never done on a previous watch. Perhaps I just needed a good cry, I don’t know. But for a film that is 30 years old next month, it has lost none of its emotional punch. I still think it is so powerful, moving and relevant. Some critics may deride its simplistic, predictable story and Baz Luhrmann’s style of filmmaking, but Strictly Ballroom (his first) is a masterpiece.

I may write more about it to commemorate its 30th anniversary, but in short, Strictly Ballroom is a beautifully-realised film about wanting to express yourself and follow your creativity, rather than get lost in the world of external validation, awards and “shoulds”. “A life lived in fear is a life half lived,” Fran tells Scott and that is the thread that runs through the entire story, as it slowly becomes obvious that so many of the characters are ruled by fear and how diminished they are as a result.

I saw this film when it was released in the cinema in 1992, age 11, and I just loved the costumes and the romance of it all - the deeper messages were possibly lost on me. Only when I rewatched it in my early twenties did I realise that my own life was entirely governed by fear. All my decisions had been made from that place. Like so many characters in Strictly Ballroom, I was so afraid to be myself and take chances. I can’t tell you what an influence this film has had on my life, albeit probably subconsciously, in giving me the courage to go after things I really wanted and, instead of half-living, to start creating the life I really wanted to live.

The story of how Baz Luhrmann struggled to get the film made in the first place (go to the Production History section) is also very inspiring.

Quote of the week

This is a poem from Ellen Van Neerven’s marvellous collection Throat, one of my favourite books of 2020. The image is from Jonathan Shaw’s excellent blog. Jonathan wrote a wonderful review of Throat and analysis of this particular poem which I highly recommend checking out.

If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post with me, please do! Stay tuned for another exciting weekly update soon xx

this week

Tempus fugit baby! I couldn’t resist snapping this in the Kensal Green Cemetery when we were in London a few weeks ago.

Time flies, and never more so than when you are jet-lagged! Time has taken on a strange quality since our return. Case in point, I had a phone call earlier in the week from a tradie, organising a time to come around.

“Is this Thursday any good?” they asked.

“July the seventh? Yes, that’s fine,” I said.

“No, this Thursday - June the thirtieth,” they replied, to my embarrassment. I honestly didn’t know what day it was. I still don’t, really!

I’ve always found coming to Australia harder in terms of jet lag and adjusting to the time. At least I’m no longer wide awake at 3:30am every day - that got old very quickly, especially seeing I had to present a paper at a conference on one of those days! It really is a miracle that I was coherent.

Unsurprisingly, the minute my conference was over I was hit with a little cold - cough, congested nose, the usual. We took RATs and they were all negative. So the past week has been all about laying low and taking things slow. The cold seems to have passed now and I’m back to wanting to hit my 10,000 steps a day and Do All The Things.

I really am gobsmacked that Tom and I have managed to dodge COVID with our international trip, Dark Mofo and my conference. But we have taken, and will continue to take, every precaution, regardless of the fact that there are hardly any mandatory ones in place anymore. I’m not convinced that’s a good thing but I know I’m in the minority on that score. I guess time will tell!

And as for the other terrible thing that’s been in the news this past week, I echo the words of Ann Friedman:

“My dominant feeling is still anger but lately the rage comes in flashes that punctuate an overall mood that I can only describe as ‘shrug’. It’s settled over me like a thick blanket. I’m just letting the algorithm autoplay. I am skimming the headlines but not clicking the articles. I’m sending some expletive-laden texts but mostly I’m annoyed. I’m tired. I’m resentful of having a body that’s capable of getting pregnant. Whatever. How can I feel both of these things simultaneously? Such hot rage and such deep resignation? Screaming, but also shrugging?

…I’ve been preparing for things to be so much worse my entire reproductive life. And many, many people in this country have long been living the so much worse future that some of us have the luxury of dreading. Despite the demanding emails and blaring alarms of this moment, it’s not a departure or a regression. It’s a continuation.”

Ann’s weekly newsletter comes highly recommended by me, FYI.

Favourite experience/s of the week

Being reunited with my family - those unaffected by COVID at least - who I’d missed very much while we were away. It was particularly wonderful to see our two-year-old niece again, who had grown and progressed a great deal in the five weeks since we’d last seen her. She performed a play of The Three Little Pigs for us, and then got Tom to join in as the Big Bad Wolf, which was so adorable - though he definitely adopted aspects of Negan from The Walking Dead in his portrayal, which was hilarious! I was crying with laughter.

Several cups of tea on a sunny afternoon with a good friend, with whom I could decompress from the trip and some various other things that I won’t be able to write about for some time, if ever. Oh, how I look forward to my old age and being able to write a give-no-fucks memoir! In the meantime the “careful or you’ll end up in my novel” sign I have on my study door will suffice.

Making the submission deadline for a journal I’ve wanted to write for for at least ten years, if not more. The theme for one of their upcoming issues had my name written all over it so I felt I had no choice - overseas travel, stress, jet lag and imposter syndrome be damned! I had a half-finished draft of something I started writing in 2016 sometime that I thought had a kernel of goodness in it. I ran with the original idea but completely rewrote it. I had my usual crisis of confidence on the final read through, but pressed send on the submission anyway. There is nothing quite like the hopeful feeling that follows putting your hat in the ring. “If you’re not failing, then you’re not trying,” my lovely brother-in-law reminded me of last weekend. If they say yes, fabulous - life goal unlocked. If they say no, I have a somewhat decent story I can send somewhere else. Whatever happens, I tried. It’s a good feeling.

Reading

Anita Heiss: Five quick Qs and writing tips from author Kathryn Heyman - Anita’s blog is one of my favourites and I particularly enjoyed this interview, especially Kathryn’s answer to the fifth and final question. Start small. Lower the bar.

Oliver Burkeman: The news [is not equal to] your life

The Guardian: “He died in his 30s living the life he had dreamed of” - I can’t wait to see this film, which has just been released in the UK. I hope it gets a showing somewhere in Australia!

The Audacity: Why Are You Stranded? by Nicole Zhao

The Age: Scott Morrison’s downfall marks end of Howard-era ascendancy - seeing we left Australia less than 48 hours after the election, I’m still getting used to the idea that we have a new PM (thank goodness!) and I’m catching up on all the commentary. This is by Richard Flanagan who, as always, is right on the money.

Wintering by Krissy Kneen - I bought this book last spring but was saving it for winter, and it didn’t disappoint! I tore through it greedily in a few days. I sometimes grow weary of the Tasmanian Gothic trope so prevalent in our literature but there is a reason it works - Tassie, particularly its remotest parts, can be very wild and unnerving. It’s the perfect place to set a domestic thriller, really. I really enjoyed this book, set in a familiar landscape in a town not too far from where I grew up; the creepy shack and the ‘widows’ Jessica befriends when her boyfriend goes missing; the quite clever and haunting symbolism. If you like books set in Tasmania and you’re after an absorbing winter read, I highly recommend this!

Listening to

WILD with Sarah Wilson: Julia Cameron, how to live The Artist’s Way

The First Time: Masters Series: Michelle de Kretser

Better Reading: Catherine Deveny on honesty, dyslexia and being an ‘arts tradie’

And thanks to Glastonbury, we’ve been playing some of our favourite acts all week - Jessie Ware, Pet Shop Boys, Primal Scream, Wolf Alice, Crowded House and of course Macca!

I also discovered this incredibly soothing album of Bach keyboard concertos which I’ve had on repeat all week - so much so that Cyprien Katsaris almost knocked Ludovico Einaudi off top spot for my most-played artist on TIDAL in June. But not quite! Ludovico had the edge thanks to that 17 hour flight from London to Perth - he and Nils Frahm were the only reason I got any sleep!

Eating

It’s been such a treat being in my little kitchen again! With many new cookbooks and lots of ideas from our travels, I’ve had lots of fun cooking this week. It’s definitely, and subconsciously, been a week of spice.

This is a Sri Lankan style jackfruit curry - I found I’d somehow acquired four cans of jackfruit in my pantry and was keen to use it up. Cooked low and slow for two hours, the jackfruit becomes meltingly tender and takes on a similar texture to pulled pork (not that I’ve ever tried that, so I’ll have to take peoples’ words for it). I loosely followed this recipe but put my own spin on it - I added diced sweet potato and frozen green vegetables, and instead of sugar I diced half an apple that I had leftover from porridge that morning, which cooked down beautifully and added sufficient sweetness. I also used Kashmiri chilli powder instead of cayenne pepper. So I can’t claim this was authentic or even that close to Dini’s original recipe but it was so delicious! I even made the roasted curry powder. We ate this over several nights and I think there’s still some in the fridge…

I also made the cauliflower, cashew and coriander soup from Rachel Allen’s most recent book, Soup Broth Bread which Tom got me for my birthday. I could happily have soup for every meal, especially this time of year, and this one was particularly delicious. It gets its fluro-yellow colour from the hearty tablespoon of turmeric! Perfect for keeping winter colds at bay. I daresay I’ll make this again but I might swap half the cashews out for yellow split peas next time, for more fibre!

I made Nigella’s vegan gingerbread which is as sticky and delicious as it was when I made it at Christmas, but the deep spicy flavours feel more appropriate for colder weather! It is one of those bakes that only improves with time and so every time we cut a square to have for elevenses or with an afternoon mug of Bengal Spice, it’s even stickier and more moist than it was the day before. At Christmas, I think it lasted a few weeks. I can’t see it lasting that long this time, to be honest! It’s so good. Vegan or not, if you love gingerbread or ginger cakes, you need to make it.

Only I would attempt something like Dishoom’s house black dal with jet lag - but it was completely worth it. I couldn’t find deggi mirch chilli powder so used Kashmiri, and it was fine. I also added a lot more tomato paste and used vegan alternatives to butter and cream, also fine, if not better. It takes hours and hours to cook but if you’re home anyway it’s not that big a deal - you just have to remember to go back and stir it every now and then, and also ignore the old sock smell of cooking lentils. But once you’ve made it, you’ll be rewarded with so many delicious dinners and lunches, especially if you double the recipe as I did. And if you find yourself with a small amount left, not quite enough for a meal on its own, you can turn it into a spicy tomato soup with a tin of diced tomatoes or passatta - which I did for lunch!

Watching

Dr Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (Disney+) - a Marvel film rarely disappoints (I still don’t know what they were thinking with Eternals?!) in terms of fun and escapism, and we both really enjoyed this one. The first Dr Strange movie is one of our favourites in the entire franchise so this had a lot to live up to. I missed the grounding wisdom of Tilda Swinton’s Ancient One and think it needed an equivalent character, as things did get a bit loopy. But still enjoyable! My favourite scene was with the Illuminati - if you’ve seen it, I’d be curious to know if you agree!

Obi Wan Kenobi (Disney+) - I’ll watch anything with Ewan McGregor in it. And I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this, as I find Star Wars as a whole quite hard to get excited about (mostly because it all goes over my head!). The acting in it is quite brilliant, particularly from the children.

Man vs Bee (Netflix) - a surprisingly compelling show, we watched all nine episodes in one sitting (they’re only about 12 minutes each, admittedly) because each one ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. Rowan Atkinson plays Trevor, a recently divorced man who needs both a home and job - he finds both by house and dog-sitting for a wealthy couple who are off on holiday. The designer house is full of priceless art and the dog has a very particular diet and routine. Add to that, Trevor is a tad obsessive about things - we learn that he got fired from his job at Asda due to a supposedly “evil trolley”. So when a mischievous bee flies into the house and Trevor can’t rid of it, you just know disaster is afoot! I was surprised by how enjoyable this show was, and by the twist at the end. Highly recommended!

Quote of the week

“Anything worth having has its price.” - Joan Didion

If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post with me, please do! I hope you’re well and finding things to enjoy and savour too xx

these past few weeks

Where do I begin? As I tell myself when I sit down at my desk each day - begin somewhere. Anywhere.

As you might have been able to guess from the above photos, I’ve just got back from nearly four weeks in the UK - my former home, the site of so many important and happy years of my life. This visit was not for happy reasons, however, and given that we’ve been in the grip of a global pandemic for the past two years (and with still around 300 deaths a week in Australia this month alone, I do not believe it’s over yet), I personally wouldn’t have chosen to make this trip at this point in time. But we did, and we made the best of it. More importantly, we survived everything that needed to be faced, and are safely home.

Having not left Tasmania since January 2020, it was a very welcome change of scene, despite there being a lot of stressful things to negotiate and our time being limited. However, we definitely tried to make the most of being there. I saw sites related to my PhD which I had long made my peace with never seeing in person while writing this book, so that was incredible. We made pilgrimages to literary sites I had always wanted to see but never made the time to go to when we lived here, which I’d since very much regretted. We drove over 1,000 miles all over the country. We saw some dear friends, as many of them as we could, and even made some new ones. We spent a lot of time in cemeteries. We even got to enjoy the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, which was lovely - no country does pageantry quite like the UK, am I right?

I love the UK, and always will. There are many things I miss about life there, my friends especially. But this trip confirmed for both of us that Hobart is definitely our home and moving back here four years ago was 100% the right decision. In many ways, this trip was like returning to an old life for a few weeks and while that was great fun in some respects, it was also a reminder of what we had outgrown or grown tired of. We felt very homesick for Australia while we were gone; a longing that on my part felt marrow deep. When we were finally on our flight back to Perth, I’m not embarrassed to admit my lip was trembling when the Qantas theme started playing!

I’ve spent the last week waking up at 3:30am (!), ploughing straight back into work including a conference and giving a paper on four hours sleep, and making food that requires long, slow cooking because that is my mode at the moment - go slow. To have gone from a heatwave in London and tanned forearms to an icy, dark winter and flannelette sheets on the bed has been a bit of a mind-bend, in more ways than one. But we’re deeply relieved to be back. It was nice to have an adventure, but even nicer to come home.

I’ll do my best to share the trip with you via my usual This Week headings!

Favourite experience/s

Our first tube ride, fresh off the plane. We have, of course, done that journey a thousand times - the Piccadilly line from Heathrow out to Southgate, almost at the other end of the line, which takes about 75 minutes. Our Oysters still had a little credit on them! From the moment we touched in to riding the escalator to alight at Southgate, we were both overwhelmed by how nice it was to see it all again - how nostalgic we were as the train passed through all the familiar stations that used to signal the end of the working day. The comforting familiarity of it all, how innately we knew the system, exactly where to go and what to do, as if no time had passed at all. At the same time, we were seeing it with fresh, new eyes and it felt kind of wondrous.

Surprising our old neighbours with an impromptu visit! I love surprises - both planning them for others and being on the receiving end of one - so I got a real thrill out of seeing how blown away our old friends were at finding us on their doorstep! We sat and chatted in their living room as the sun went down that first night, next door to our old flat, and it felt just like old times, like we had never been gone.

A morning run around my old neighbourhood park, and brunch afterwards at our old favourite cafe. It was nice to see how many local businesses had survived the lockdowns (and also sad to see how many hadn’t).

Experiencing the new Elizabeth line! We arrived on the day it opened and I was stunned at both the transformation in the stations that I had grown used to being building sites (cough, Moorgate, cough!) and in the efficiency of the line. You can be in Liverpool Street in two stops from Tottenham Court Road now. Mind. Blown.

All PhD related site visits - some in London, some in other parts of England, but all made the world of my characters (I say that for ease, they were real people, but I’m writing fiction) so much more alive and vivid for me. Being able to smell the air, to hear the sound of the wind in the trees, to see what flowers grow wild there in the summer, to see buildings that were already a hundred or so years old when they were living there or to feel the energy of a place where the buildings are long gone….it was beyond anything I could have imagined.

Reunions with wonderful people I love. I wish we could have seen everyone, but sadly it was a very jam-packed schedule and it wasn’t always possible to give people enough of a heads up. I worried too that in between jet lag and all the stress of the reasons why we were there, people weren’t exactly seeing us at our best either. But I needn’t have worried - everyone was very kind, understanding and accommodating, for which my gratitude is boundless. And while I’m also deeply grateful for the modern wonders that are FaceTime and Zoom, nothing quite beats seeing friends in person.

Norwich - a fabulous city we unexpectedly spent quite a bit of time in! I love it there. Wonderful places to eat, great pubs, decent coffee, a branch of my favourite UK clothing brand (Seasalt Cornwall), charity shops full of hidden treasures, an awesome bookshop, and so much history! We saw the cathedral, which dates back to 1145, and a pub that’s been open in the same spot since 1249. The mind boggles.

Seeing Sylvia Plath’s grave. This was deeply moving - sad and strange yet beautiful. I was expecting a bit of a throng of fellow Plath fans and having to wait my turn, but Tom and I found ourselves in a deserted, quiet cemetery on a bright summer afternoon. The grave is overgrown with blue forget-me-nots and I was enchanted by the number of bees buzzing around merrily in the flowers. I think she might have quite liked being a haven for bees who “taste the spring”. It was quiet and peaceful, but not quite what one of the most influential poets of the twentieth century deserves, in my opinion.

Haworth Parsonage - what a wondrous morning we spent here! I could have spent the entire day there happily. It was a real pinch myself moment; the building and its contents have been beautifully preserved by the Brontë society and there are some truly fascinating artefacts inside. My girlhood passion for the Brontës has been well and truly reignited; this visit reminded me of why I had been so fascinated by them.

Meeting lots of lovely dogs - I had forgotten how dog-friendly everything is in the UK! Every pub we went to had a dog in it, to my delight. And they usually made a bee-line for me, much to Tom’s amusement. “Every time! I don’t know what it is,” he laughed.

Anything food-related - see further!

Reading

On reflection, I should have bought all of these books too.

I have to admit, I barely read at all while we were away - apart from the news and anything work-related, because I was still working intermittently throughout the trip. So, this section will be devoted to the wonder that is UK bookshops! I hit all the big ones in London - Hatchards, Waterstones Piccadilly, Foyles on Charing Cross Road, the Brick Lane Bookshop - as well as The Book Hive in Norwich, several Oxfams and we also made a stop at Hay-on-Wye, famous for being one of the UK’s most bookish destinations with no less than 25 bookshops in the tiny village.

I had deliberately packed light so I had plenty of room to bring books back with me. I think it would be safe to say that over half of my suitcase’s final going-home weight was in books. I make no apologies - I am who I am!

Persephone has moved from London to Bath in the years since we’ve been gone, which was not on our itinerary, but thankfully there were plenty of places to procure Persephones about the place. I snaffled a grand total of six. I will be set for Persephones for some time - I do enjoy having a stockpile of them to work my way through!

We also managed to get a SIGNED copy of Jarvis Cocker’s new book which was released on my birthday (an omen). Procured from my old favourite Brick Lane Bookshop, who were as obliging and friendly as ever.

I also loved being able to pick up a copy of Waitrose magazine again - for May and June! Oh, Waitrose - how I’d missed you!

Listening to

The theme tune of our road trip was this song. Quite the ear worm, apologies in advance!

My husband would also like to inform readers of this blog that he procured some vinyl and CDs that are nigh on impossible to get in Australia and enjoyed that aspect of the trip immensely.

Eating

Chips with beer in a pub. Need I say more?

Before this trip, I could count the number of times I have eaten a meal out over the past two years on one hand. I had forgotten what a treat it is, and how exciting it is to try new things and get new ideas for your own cooking. We had some lovely and memorable meals out, interspersed with the wonderful home cooking of friends and family, and we also sampled some of our favourite treats from our old life - Fox’s Chocolate Rounds and M&S hummus (me), Skips and M&S Dutch Shortcakes (Tom), Monster Munch (both). Some lived up to our nostalgic memories and others didn’t! It is funny how your palate sometimes changes as you get older.

Mildred’s - an old favourite in King’s Cross which didn’t disappoint. We started with artichokes with panelle (fried chickpea batter), followed by a “chicken” kebab with kachumber, and a sweet potato and green bean curry with pea-flecked turmeric rice. All so very delicious. And a much needed injection of veg after a day of eating mostly pastries!

Sicilian lemon tart at Theo Randall’s - my birthday cake this year! The meal there was stunning, as always. And I so enjoyed drinking Italian, Spanish and French white wines on this trip, as an aside. There is a freshness about them that always makes me think of happy summers during the years I lived in such close proximity to all three countries.

Wagamama - another old favourite that has had an incredible menu overhaul, with so many delicious vegan options now. I tried the spicy “chicken” ramen (pictured left) and hoisin “duck” rice bowl (right) and both were amazing. The rice bowl even had a vegan “egg”, made from coconut. It was surprisingly realistic!

My aunt is an incredible cook - everything is delicious and wholesome, yet also indulgent. On our first night with her, she had made Nigella Lawson’s liquorice pudding for dessert, which was divine. I will be making it myself very soon!

Not a particularly ambrosial eating experience but a memorable one - we had been driving all day, some 400 miles, and were finally where we needed to be. We found a Travelodge and collapsed wearily on to the bed. Unable to face the idea of going out again, or even of other human interaction, I had had the foresight to buy some Pot Noodles so that was our dinner - boiling the hotel kettle and slurping up these noodles, which were surprisingly good. It felt like we were in our own version of Long Way Round.

We stayed a night with a dear friend in Hertfordshire (readers of my old blog might remember me referring to “my friend the GP” on occasion, this was her!) and after a happy and emotional reunion, she served us a wondrous spaghetti puttanesca which was so comforting and delicious after a day of driving. Accompanied by a chilled Spanish white wine, and with the comforting smell of her cooking in the air and the evening sun golden in the garden, I breathed a deep sigh of relief that the hardest part of the trip was over.

Some amazing Indian takeaway with our friends in south London. Indian food in the UK is really phenomenal, almost as good as being in India itself!

A birthday lunch of Pilpel felafel, which used to be my go-to whenever I would treat myself to a takeaway lunch when I worked nearby. Fresh, healthy, delicious, and the felafel remain the best I have ever had.

But the foodie highlight of the trip was a meal at Erpingham House in Norwich which, if you’re in the UK, I can only urge you to visit as soon as humanly possible, whether you’re vegan or not. You won’t fail to be impressed with the creativity, the quality of the food and its deliciousness.

FSH and smashed potatoes - heaven! It’s a battered banana blossom.

I wish we had been able to sample everything on the menu but in the end, Tom and I both had “fsh” and smashed potatoes (pictured above) and my aunt had “lamb”, and that took quite some deliberation! It’s such a treat to go somewhere and be able to order everything on the menu, not just be scanning for the V or VO options. I got so much inspiration for my cooking from this one meal here. It was simply outstanding.

And, believe it or not, the airline food was OK! I had two favourites - a paratha stuffed with coconut lentils and mushrooms that was served as a midnight snack somewhere between Indonesia and Dubai on the way over, and char kway teow style rice noodles with tofu served for lunch on the Perth to Melbourne flight. Qantas, you did good!

Watching

I discovered Mary McCartney Serves It Up by accident and ended up watching every episode I could lay my hands on - such a charming show with the elegant and charming Mary who cooks all vegan food. I particularly enjoyed Dave Grohl appearing as a guest!

Dinner Date - our old ITV favourite, a comfort watch that has lost none of the cringe factor! For those who don’t know, it’s a reality show where a single man or woman is given five menus to choose from - of those five, they pick the three they most like the sound of (or, most likely, the three the producers have decided would make the most interesting/awkward TV!) and are then subjected to three blind dates where said blind dates cook a three course meal for the guest. At the end of the trio of blind dates, the guest chooses the host they most felt a spark with and off they go, out for a meal they haven’t had to cook! The two unpicked hosts get a commiseration prize of a ready meal. It’s my favourite kind of reality TV and I so enjoyed catching up on a few episodes! I’m pretty sure there’s been an Australian version, which I’ll have to sniff out.

We were also introduced to the nature program Springwatch, which I had never seen before - it’s broadcast live from a series of cameras all over the UK, which “charts the fortunes of British wildlife during the changing of the seasons”. Some stories have a soap opera element about them, with some quite dramatic fates of certain nests of fledglings! It’s really quite relaxing to watch at the end of the day. And oddly hilarious in places, as birds really do get up to some crazy things.

We also watched the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee concert which opened with the Queen and Paddington Bear, which was so very sweet (Paddington 2 is an incredible film, if you’ve not seen it, FYI). We were also in the country during the vote of no confidence in Boris Johnson so naturally were glued to the BBC for the results of that…

Finally, finding Stanley Tucci’s Searching for Italy available to watch on the flight home after not being able to watch it in Australia was amazing! Dear Stanley, what a lovely man he is. How I would love to be friends with him and Felicity! The program is so thoughtfully and passionately put together, and some parts of it are so tender and moving. And guaranteed to make you want to eat pasta, I’d say.

Quote of the trip

“It’s always better to travel hopefully.” - Rick Stein

Whenever we found ourselves despairing or overcome with anxiety (which sadly but unavoidably happened quite frequently on this trip) about what lay ahead and all the things that could go wrong, one of us would say to the other “travel hopefully”, which is what Rick Stein says at the beginning of his Secret France series, admittedly in the very different context of being hopeful of finding some great food and wine on his travels. We were rewatching some comfort TV in the lead up to our departure, in a bid to keep all the anxiety at bay, and when we heard Rick say the words “travel hopefully”, it became our mantra. And it helped.

It’s hard to explain and I know a lot of people won’t understand, but we had not even gone to the mainland in all this time, so the idea of making such a big journey was very daunting and still felt incredibly risky. We had grown very used to overseas travel being government-sanctioned and off limits, so to be doing it again with very few restrictions felt so strange, almost surreal. And frightening at times, to be honest. I’m proud of how resilient we both were, how we just got on with things, and stayed positive in the face of some very challenging experiences.

And somehow, by some miracle (because our flights were full and we were definitely in the minority in terms of consistent mask wearing), we have remained Covid free! Masks and vaccinations for the win. And travelling hopefully doesn’t hurt either.

So there you have it. I hope you enjoyed the recap! As always, thank you for reading and if you’d like to share your thoughts on this post, or anything else, with me, then please do. I’ll be back later in the week with my usual This Week wrap up. It’s good to be home. xx

this week

The ducks in the Botanical Gardens have so much personality and always make me smile!

There was snow on the mountain and ice on our windows this week, so I think winter has definitely arrived. I wore my favourite scarf in all my Zoom meetings and video chats with overseas pals. “Ah, it’s your turn to wear the woolies now,” laughed my dear friend Lisa in the UK, who’d noted my tank tops and dresses over the Australian summer with longing!

There’s been a lot of ‘not easy’ weeks in recent history. I’m learning to roll with it. In one of the podcasts I listened to this week, they quoted Eckhart Tolle who said: “Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.” Obviously that won’t apply to everything (it would be a bit insensitive to say it to someone who has just suffered a tragic loss, for example) but I appreciate this quote for the fact that it encourages you take back some power, particularly in situations where you feel very vulnerable and at the mercy of others. What is the lesson you can take from it? If you had intended this situation, what was it that you were trying to learn? Sometimes it can help to ask yourself that question, to make meaning out of hard times rather than wallow. As I am wont to do on occasion, admittedly!

I have drawn a lot of lessons from this recent period in my life but the overriding one is to trust myself and my instinct, always. It is very rarely wrong. This week, it was proved right once more and I will never, ever ignore it again.

Favourite experience/s of the week

Having my dear friend Isabel round for dinner! I hadn’t seen her for over three years and it was wonderful to be reunited. I cooked Pip Lincolne’s casserole again, perfect comfort food for a freezing night, and we talked for hours about writing, life, politics, and everything in between. You know how some people in your life are just balm for the soul? Iz is one of those people for me.

I also thoroughly enjoyed this month’s Hidden Nerve lecture, and discussing it with a lovely new friend who I’ve met through the course over Zoom the next day. We were both stunned that we were drinking the same tea, the same way (black, no milk or sugar), in two different parts of the country! I love life’s delightful surprises and synchronicities.

Reading

Sydney Review of Books: Critic Swallows Book by Catriona Menzies-Pike which argues that Trent Dalton, a phenomenally successful Australian author, is “the definitive novelist of Scott Morrison’s Australia” which I found very compelling and deeply thought-provoking. And let’s hope that Scott Morrison’s Australia will be a thing of the past after the election tomorrow.

I also loved Notness by Oliver Reeson who reviewed Yves Rees’ memoir of transition with great care and insight. I found Reeson’s ideas about representation, “reinforcing difference through representation, and how this relates to social power” and what this particular book said about these things really interesting, especially the way global popular culture validates certain ways of being. Reeson writes: “In fevered discussions about the importance of representation in popular culture we are forgetting how many cultures exist, quite successfully, completely outside of global popular culture [my emphasis]. In this idea that a way of being can only be taken up if it is first modeled and seen in popular culture, we are engaging in a bizarre denial of our humanity, ignoring that most of our impulses originate in our mind and bodies, rather than being taken in from an external source.”

Write or Die Tribe: Brad Listi: On Writing Autofiction, Working Through Failure, Quitting Twitter, and His New Novel, "Be Brief and Tell Them Everything" - I enjoyed this interview because it’s always validating to hear other authors talk about the process of trying and failing while you’re writing a book, experimenting with form, realising the form is wrong and starting again, or going in a completely new direction with a work.

Nathan Bransford: I’ve followed Nathan’s blog for years and this week’s post on Breaks, permission and writing was very timely and relatable!

The Wilderness Cure by Mo Wilde - this book is coming out in August, and I was lucky to get an advance Kindle copy to review. I really liked it! A compulsively readable, engaging and compelling book about a woman who decides to spend an entire year eating only wild food - what she can forage. And the challenge begins at the end of 2020 just as Scotland is heading into winter... I think a lot of us would like to think we eat seasonally and locally, but this book showed me that there's a lot more I could be doing to tread more lightly on the earth. One scene has had a profound impact on me - when Mo floats the idea of making a video to encourage people to eat organic food. She proposes making a gorgeous dinner full of organic produce, then placing it in front of people who aren't convinced of the benefits organic food, along with a shot glass of the legal amounts of pesticide and herbicide that you'd typically ingest with non-organic food, to pour over their food like you would a salad dressing. What a brilliant idea. I think such a video would almost certainly go viral and have an incredible impact. Overall, this book comes highly recommended to anyone interested in foraging, eating locally (that's an understatement!) and the natural world. Mo's passion and commitment is obvious and admirable in this very enjoyable and, I think, important book.

I also just read Caitlin Moran’s More Than A Woman and found it very enjoyable too, but more of a memoir this time and less a gritty, full-of-fight manifesto than its predecessor, her massively successful How To Be A Woman, was. Of course one can only write what one knows, but it’s then important to note that this isn’t a book all women will relate to, as the stories are told through a white, cis and educated lens. The parts about her daughter’s illness, however, were beautifully written and very moving.

Listening to

TIDAL inner autumn, yoga, running and writing beats playlists

I’ve also just discovered the Kronos Quartet - wow! Do you know of them? I’m quite blown away.

Best Friend Therapy: Endings - Are they a bad thing? What’s the difference between loss and change? How do we make meaning? I don’t know how they manage it, but the themes of this podcast always seem to be incredibly timely for me. Lots of useful stuff in this episode.

Eating

I had to think about this and try to recall from memory because, since being off social media, I don’t really take photos of my food all the time any more, nor that many selfies, which I find very interesting. I sometimes go through my phone looking for photos to accompany my This Week post and there’s very little, in comparison to how many photos I used to take.

We had the aforementioned Pip casserole for several lunches and dinners, either thinned out with stock as a soup, or with reheated with rice. I also made this wonderful West African Peanut Stew which I’ve made many times since discovering Rachel Ama and her wonderful books over the summer. If you love peanut butter it’s a must-try, and also a great way to clean out all the peanut butter jars sitting in my pantry with a teaspoon or two left stuck to the bottom! I also turned leftovers of this into a soup by thinning out with stock. Gorgeous!

We also discovered, thanks to a kind hostess gift from Iz, these morsels of heaven:

I don’t think I’ll ever eat any kind of chocolate again! They are seriously incredible.

Picking

I’ve been picking ruby chard, celery and kale - there’s still plenty to be had out there. I planted garlic last weekend and to my delight the soil was soft, crumbly and dark, like coffee grounds, and writhing with healthy worms. Bodes well for spring planting!

Watching

The football (by which I mean AFL) with my sister and her husband - I don’t know any of the players any more! I only recognise the commentators….who were players when I last followed the AFL with any seriousness, which was about 15 years ago. My lack of knowledge is a source of great hilarity to the family, as you can imagine.

Long Way Up (Apple TV) - the Long Way series, where Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman attempt epic motorbike journeys across the world, are our very favourites. No matter our mood, we can put an episode or two of any of the series on and it’s guaranteed to make us smile and ignite that spark of adventure in us. Long Way Up is the latest in the series, filmed 2019 and released in 2020, where Ewan, Charley and their loveable crew ride electric motorcycles and electric vehicles from the bottom of Argentina to Los Angeles, California - 13,000 miles in 100 days. It’s quite the adventure! I love that Ewan and Charley did the whole thing with such mindfulness of the environmental impact and wanting to show that these kind of epic, off-road trips are possible to do with electric vehicles.

Rick Stein’s Secret France (DVD) - I don’t know what it is about cooking shows, but they are the TV equivalent of a foot massage. I find watching them deeply relaxing, nothing makes me switch off as instantly as seeing Rick, Nigella, Jamie or even John and Gregg on the screen. I particularly enjoy Rick’s shows because they combine travel and cooking. Long Weekends is probably my favourite but this one, which takes him all over the less-visited parts of France where there is plenty of good food and wine to be found, is also fabulous. I do wish he’d get another dog sometimes. That Chalky was quite a character!

Quote of the week

“I must choose between despair and energy - I choose the latter.” - John Keats

I’m going to take a few weeks off from my weekly posting, as I need to focus on some other projects, but I will be back with a vengeance in June. Until then, my friends, stay safe and well and know I am cheering you on, whatever it is you’re striving for or working through.

And as always, if you’d like to share your thoughts on this post, or anything, with me, then please do! Thank you for reading xx