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Channel: Memoir – A Glass Half Full
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Hair today…

Shelley is giving me a lesson in blow-drying my hair. I tell her I just normally blast it and it looks fine. She asks about what “product” I use. I mumble that I can never remember the names of them....

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Confessions of a rookie race-goer

What is it that makes a city stand still for four minutes?  If you live in Australia, chances are you know the answer. It is, of course, the Melbourne Cup.  But what is it about this particular horse...

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My Christmas card list

It’s the middle of December, and so far I’ve only received one Christmas card. From my mother.  And somehow, I won’t be surprised if it’s the only one I get. The art of Christmas card-giving is dying....

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An empty place at the table

Christmas can be the loneliest, saddest time of year for some people.  They may not even be alone, but there may be that sense of loneliness that comes even when in a crowd. It’s a feeling of not quite...

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Gifts, giving and gratitude

As we battle with last-minute gift-giving dilemmas, and curse roundly as we circle the shopping centre car park in a seemingly interminable search for an elusive empty spot, it’s easy to rail against...

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Passport to memories

My new passport has arrived.  It’s stiff and clean and shiny.  It’s my sixth passport, and suddenly I feel like I’ve never been anywhere before! As I add my cancelled one to the pile of old ones,...

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Slithering into the Year of the Snake

In Chinese astrology, we are entering the Year of the Snake.  I’m not a Snake, I’m a Dog. But living in Australia has brought me more than a few close encounters with snakes, and as Chinese New Year...

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A year in Brisbane

Last week marked the end of my first year “back” in Brisbane. When I returned to the city I’d lived in for the best part of 18 years – taking out a couple in the middle spent in Central Queensland –...

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Goodbye Frommer’s, I’ll miss you

After more than a decade of writing for the US-based guide book company Frommer’s, I learned this week that the popular titles that have accompanied travellers around the world for more than 50 years...

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We will remember them

Tomorrow – like tens of thousands of other people in Australia and New Zealand, and other places too – I’ll be getting up early.  I’ll pin a red paper poppy to my lapel and walk a few blocks to the...

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Hunting for a new home

Tentatively, I have dipped my toe into the piranha pool that is the real estate market. Yes, I am looking for a new home. Now settled in Brisbane, it is time to forget about renting and buy a place of...

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Home…where the heart is

I’ve just moved house. Something to be done as infrequently as possible, if you want my post-move opinion.  It’s less than two years since I last did it – and this time I’m planning to stay put for a...

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Memories of a dogsitter (For Ollie)

For six wonderful weeks at a time when my heart and mind needed space and serenity, dear friends allowed me to look after their house and…

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A letter to my sister

Dear Anne, This was a day a long time coming. Your family had been planning it for a while but suddenly the timing was perfect. It…

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Buying into the ‘burqa’ debate

At the back of my wardrobe, in a place that no-one ever sees, hangs a shiny voluminous black cloak. It’s an abaya – or what many…

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My love affair with London

“When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.” So wrote the 18th century essayist and poet Samuel Johnson. He could easily have…

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A Christmas pudding made with love

The pudding bowl is on the table, filled with luscious dried fruit and glace cherries, soaked in rum. As my daughter and I arrive for the…

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Remembering Gallipoli

The sense of overwhelming loneliness is what I remember most. Just row upon row of flat marble headstones, flanked by cypress trees and watched over by…

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Letters from Dundee

Since the age of 10, I’ve had a penpal. Does anyone still use that term? Probably not…but that’s what we’ve been, Caroline and I, for all…

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Lien: A refugee’s story

Journalists meet many people in the course of their working lives. Some of those people – and their stories – stick in our minds. Some more…

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