I was reading Siegfried Sassoon’s memoirs and in particular his descriptions of the front line around the time of the battle of the Somme, which are fantastic for their sensitivity and the way he captures the sunsets and the birds and notices things in the same way that i feel i would have noticed them … Read more
I should tell my fish story, about how i discovered an ancient intact lungfish skull at Burrinjuck. It was 2015 on the Taemas station (which is owned by Rupert Murdoch who owns a lot of farmland in that area), where i was on a geology field trip with ANU measuring all the folds and faults … Read more
Within a few weeks of setting out to Europe from India, I was foaming milk in the ‘Cafe Dome’ in Selfridges, the famous department store on London’s Oxford Street. I’d never heard of it before i got the job there. When i was looking for it for my job interview i asked a couple of … Read more
When i reached the end of my schooling, at Canberra Grammar, i had completely lost any taste for academia. My chance at being a star student had probably been lost during my years at Karabar High, when i learned a lot about life and the rougher edges perhaps of Australian society, but nothing much about … Read more
It started with another stinky tube ride. Everyone was loaded up with bags, sleepy and mongy, we caught the nasty-o northern line, half empty that Saturday morning. Stew and Nick had big Aussie backpacks and assorted other bits. I’d packed the previous night whilst half asleep and decided that I didn’t really need anything to … Read more
I remember the first time i saw the pacific north west from the window of my Alaskan airlines flight from LA. I was 21 and had just flown over from Australia. I had a fantastic view out the window, and was watching the magnificent volcanic mountains glide past when Mt St Helens came into view, … Read more
I arrived in the UK the second time, from Australia via a month or so in America visiting my best friend Braden in and around Seattle in October 1999 with the plan to head down to Cornwall and find work. I only got as far as Torquay where I discovered a really cool backbackers and … Read more
I had a busy end of the year as usual, lots of driving around, presents, tidying things up. On the monday before christmas i could finally relax at home alone when i felt a little pain in my chest and then decided to lie down and soon felt my heart racing and i felt i … Read more
Nana used to tell me about her great grandfathers, Samuel Downing who owned a steel works in Birmingham in the second half of the 19th century and got rich, and James Williams who was a cornishman who worked for Richard Tangye’s engineering firm also in Birmingham and apparently according to family lore “invented the crane” … Read more
I wrote this in a break during a recent zen retreat: All is one. This lies at the root of spiritual metaphysics – of the kind i know – and in a sense the story ends there. But let’s unpack it a little. What is the nature of “One” ? Well, One is God, but … Read more
I forgot to wake up for the eclipse this morning. Well it was only a tiny sliver of an eclipse in Australia. The pictures from New Zealand are superb, it rose in an already eclipsed state—how great’s that! Most of the time it was over the southern ocean below NZ and Australia. The blood moon … Read more