All posts filed under: Thoughts & Opinions

It was four years ago today…

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…When I, by chance, met the love of my life on a couch in a hostel in the west of Ireland. It was November 2006. The month before, I had left my comfortable, old life as a Sports Copytaker at AAP in Sydney, Australia, and moved to Ireland. I’d overcome my existential crisis (“How do I fit my life in a suitcase?”), said my tearful goodbyes to friends and family, and flew halfway around the world. I spent three and a half weeks travelling around, drinking in Galway with other Aussies who were also there for the International Rules, hiking in Killarney, partying in Cork, madness in Dublin, and meeting new friends (Hello Gill! Hello Alice!) whom I knew were more than just passing acquaintances. And then I made one of the best decisions of my life: to return to Galway and base myself there. I returned to Sleepzone — the same place where I’d stayed with the other Fanatics for the first game of International Rules. I met the local cast of (mostly Aussie) …

Mail, mail, mail… a letter to Claude

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‘Tis the season for political mail, and after all, I write the stuff, but my own mailbox is pretty clogged by the end of the week. No on Pro B, Yes on L, No on whatever… I’ve ceased caring. Except for the mail about my race, of course. But then I opened this letter today, addressed to the resident of my apartment (ie me). It was from the US Postal service and reads something like this:     Why, thank you for your letter dated 30 September, Claude (that has taken until the 16th to arrive, by the way!). So lovely to receive mail from you. It sure makes me sit up and take notice when things are actually in an envelope and are some glossy political nonsense. Now, evidently, you are telling me to make sure I write my address correctly, which I have been, but thank you for the reminder. We all need to be reminded so often just to remember where we live. But more importantly, I am supposed to be helping …

Decisions, decisions…

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Many decisions are having to be made in my life right currently, and they all seem to hedge on each other being decided first. I feel like I’m going round in circles! Decisions, decisions and none are close to being resolved! One decision I have been wrangling with is about spelling. That’s right: spelling. To others it seems a rather trivial one, but to me it’s fundamental. I have always prided myself on being a good speller, and on my extended vocabulary. So in my decision to relocate here to the US, I really didn’t think about having to alter myself and the way I communicate as much as has been asked of me. They still can’t understand me when I go through drive-throughs (not drive-thrus!), or leave voicemail messages. But the issue of spelling has been probably the toughest. My grasp of the English language sure makes me feel superior in a country that lacks ‘colour’.  I have persisted in the face of adversity with rogue substitutions of my letter ‘s’ for ‘z’ (and …