I broke my nose pole dancing.

Now, this was not a misguided foray into the world of competitive pole dancing or exotic dancing. I took it up mainly for the fitness aspect (great arm and shoulder workout), but also because it builds body confidence, something I sorely needed in my life. I was still reeling from my then partner dumping me for a younger woman, my mother’s death only a couple of months later, followed by the death of my beloved cat, Alex, who had comforted me through those dark times.

Anyway, this particular class night was humid and sticky, and not in a good way. I’d spun my way up the pole and was positioned upside down about halfway up. To this day, I’m not 100% sure what happened other than I lost traction and headed for the floor. I put my arms out to brace for impact, but not quickly enough, and I hit the ground face first with a sickening crack.

My teacher was horrified. She’d seen the whole thing happen but couldn’t reach me in time to stop my rapid descent. She helped me to the edge of the room and I slumped on the floor, my back against the mirrors, my face tilted up, desperately trying to stop my nose bleeding all over the place.

The guy who owned the studio kindly provided me with an ice pack. He was actually quite gorgeous, vaguely reminiscent of Keanu Reeves, a male stripper by night, and a landscape gardener by day. Possibly a good one if the beautiful Japanese garden out the back of the building was anything to go by.

There I sat, bloodied, ice pack on nose, feeling like a total idiot, when he said, “Wow, you must’ve been really pushing it for that to happen. Awesome!”

I remember staring at him blankly and thinking “What the fuck”, but in retrospect, I’ve decided that everyone needs a hunky male stripper cheering one on when one has just broken one’s nose in a klutzy act.

My teacher had another class and wanted me to wait so that she could take me to a hospital, but I really didn’t feel like hanging around for an hour. So I headed outside to flag down a taxi as I knew there were doctors still open in the city.

I managed to get a cab really quickly, and as I slid into the backseat, the cabbie said, “Do you want me to take you to a police station?”

I realised then that I must have looked like a victim of a beating and I felt an overwhelming need to explain the situation. But as I opened my mouth I thought — do I really want to admit that I’ve been pole dancing? What will he think? This was when pole dancing was still regarded as something strippers did.

Instead I said, “It’s okay. I was practising a handstand in yoga and I lost control.”

Even now that excuse sounds like total bullshit. But it was the one that I then used with the doctor, and after that the surgeon, and just about everyone to whom I told my tale of woe.

It’s time to put the record straight. I was pole dancing. In a place owned by a male stripper. Being taught by a showgirl, stripper and pole dancer. And that is awesome.

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But as I’ve aged, I’m drawn to writing older protagonists, especially female ones. So it only makes sense that I would also explore my own ageing within this Substack. In fact, Cummings et. al in 2025 Aging Cell argue that ageing is entropy.

One of the undeniable aspects of ageing is that the body can no longer behave the same way it did when it was younger. Even for those who have remained physically fit most of their lives, there is an inevitable decline in ability and an increase in aches and pains.

The desire to throw one’s hands up in dismay and frustration is understandable. We wonder if we should give up, push aside all the things we did when we were young, and resign ourselves to something more “age-appropriate”.

I recently heard a woman declare she’d given up any thoughts of doing ballet because she was “too old” and would “never be a ballerina”. Aside from the fact most who do ballet never become ballerinas, I thought this woman was being overly hard on herself.

It made me think about my own situation. I did ballet, tap and jazz through my teen years and my 20s. I stopped because of a combination of work commitments and the tyranny of distance. i.e. I no longer lived close to dance studios that catered for adults, and gym sessions were much easier to coordinate with my work schedule.

A Return to Love

However, I took dance up again in my 60s, mainly because there are now specific dance classes for over 55s in jazz and tap, and ballet for osteoarthritis sufferers. There’s a lot evidence for the holistic benefits of dance, and having classes that cater to the older person is truly a blessing.

I’m quite aware that my body no longer performs as well as it did in my 20s. Full pliés aren’t possible, my pirouettes are decidedly dodgy, and my grand battement à la seconde is much less grand than it used to be.

I could be discouraged, but I refuse to be. Despite the loss of ability, I still love dancing. I will never be a ballerina. I probably won’t get back en pointe. I may not be much better than an average fourth grade student. But I am still doing ballet and loving how it makes me feel. That’s the most important thing,

However, I completely understand the desire to give up. I was the same way with classical guitar. My hands have become a tad arthritic and my eyesight is poor thanks to the macular degeneration. I’ve avoided playing my guitar because it is a more challenging nowadays.

Yet when I do play, I feel an undeniable sense of peace and fulfilment. So why would I want to avoid that feeling? Sure, learning new pieces is more of a stretch. However, the process is not only a physical one, it’s a cognitive one, and that is exactly what I need do to save off cognitive decline. And the sense of fulfilment when I do learn a new piece, or when I play an old piece with as much flare and meaning as I did twenty years ago, is something I definitely need in my life.

The Gift of Acceptance

This year, I chose a theme word of acceptance. Clearly, my intuition was warning me what was ahead! I’ve certainly needed acceptance to get through these first few months.

Acceptance is a misunderstood concept. It doesn’t mean giving up, rolling over, and letting everything beat you down. It means accepting how things are, without any expectation of how much better or worse it could be. Once you let go of expectation, you can see more clearly what you can do to improve the situation.

I’ve now learned another aspect of acceptance is the ability to let something be enough as it is now, even if we wish it were more, and keep going regardless.

And somehow, I feel this is the most important lesson in accepting an ageing body.

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Badass Betty

I can’t help but be inspired by 97 year old, Betty Bromage, who recently broke the Guinness World Record for being the oldest female wing walker. Now, I’m not saying I want to walk on the wing of a plane mid-air. I see no point in being on the outside of a perfectly good plane cruising at altitude. But it is these words from Betty that resonate:

Well said, Betty. Here’s to doing the things you can do.

Writing Adventures

Once upon a time I considered writing a memoir. I even made a start and gave it the working title of “Stories I Never Told My Mother”. The idea didn’t stick, as my heart wasn’t in it. I had no idea who I was writing for given I have no descendants. As a result, the work was shaping up to be nothing more than a collection of random reminiscences.

I think we only remember the events that shape us, no matter how trivial they may seem at the time. So I’ve decided to relegate these anecdotes to Substack and have created a new section in Narrative Entropy called “Stories I Never Told My Mother”. First post coming soon.

My fiction writing is still in hiatus. I haven’t written anything new, and I’m STILL plodding along editing two novellas. What’s holding me back is that I have no end goal other than finishing the editing and that doesn’t excite me at the moment.

I’ve been taking pictures instead. (Procrastination is a wonderful thing.) Here’s one from the latest batch.

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These were practice shots. I haven’t done any self-portraits since 2014 when I completed a year long exercise in getting comfortable in front of the camera, and I’ve forgotten many of the tricks that make the process easier. I’m also using a different camera now, and the shutter remote and flash I used last time do not work with it. I didn’t attempt to set up lights - baby steps.

As a result, these images were taken with a mix of natural light, LED light, and in-camera flash. I am not wearing any makeup and my clothes are round-the-house chic, i.e. turtle neck top, track pants and sheepskin slippers. I look every millisecond of my seventy years.

I wasn’t going to post any of them, but changed my mind. This exercise is supposed to be warts and all, the good, the bad, and the ugly. So here we go…

This last one is my favourite.

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So let’s begin at the beginning. This is a personal post, but given my original intentions for Narrative Entropy, it will also contain links to and snippets of information you may find interesting.

Jet

To begin, good news! Some kind soul has adopted Jet, the little kitten that I socialised and saved from a life on the streets as a tom. To facilitate the adoption, I had to surrender him to a re-homing organisation, and they handled the rest. I’m pleased to say he only stayed there four weeks before before his adoption, and he was in quarantine for two of those weeks.

I was sure someone would fall in love with him because he really was a little rock star. So sweet, affectionate, and cheeky. The staff reported that they’d give him his daily cuddles and scritches, and put him back in his cat apartment so they could spend time with other cats. However, Jet learned how to escape from his apartment and come right back for more cuddles. I was proud of him.

The downside is he took an enormous piece of my heart with him. I didn’t want to give him up, but it was clear my cats would never accept him. I wanted Jet to be in a place where he would not have to worry about jealous older cats, where he could get undivided love and attention. I know I did the best thing for him, but it hurt to say goodbye, and it still hurts. I tear up even thinking about him now.

Death comes a-calling

Anyway, before I could get my head together to write about Jet, I received the news that my half-sister, Lorraine, had died. Even though this was not unexpected, as she had been ill for a very long time, my heart broke a little more. Especially since I found out about her passing via social media because no one close to Lorraine had my phone number or my address. I can understand why this happened.

Our father died when I was a toddler, and my half-sisters moved back in with their mother simply because they hated my mother. We didn’t keep in contact for a long time, but that changed in my teens when they turned up on the doorstep one day. However, I never really became part of my dad’s side of the family or of Lorraine’s other life. And apparently, although my number was on my sister’s phone, no one could access her contacts list.

In hindsight, I should have realised something like this would happen, as I wasn’t told she’d entered a nursing home. I only found out when I sent the police out to do a welfare check after several failed attempts to contact her.

Once I found out about her death, I did everything I could to contact my half-nephew, as I knew he would arrange the funeral. He did not get back to me. It turns out he no longer uses the number I’d been ringing but had left it connected because it was part of a rural telecommunications bundle (he’s a farmer). I was leaving messages he would never hear. It took me another month to track down anyone else and sort the whole mess out.

I am sad because they denied me the chance to say one last goodbye to my sister. I missed her funeral and her wake. I can’t even visit her grave because they’ve scattered her ashes at the farm several hundred kilometres from where I live.

But I now know the lack of communication wasn’t intentional and give thanks for our last interaction at the nursing home. We both said “I love you” and made peace about the gaps in our relationship over the years. So I guess I have said my goodbyes. I just didn’t know I was doing it.

And speaking of medical facilities…

By April, I was decidedly unwell. I thought it was just emotional stress. But no. I experienced a full-blown diverticulitis flare-up. Now, this wouldn’t have been a problem normally. The first two times, both over three years ago, I changed to a liquid diet and visited the doctor, who gave me antibiotics if necessary. This time was no different.

Unfortunately, I had a terrible reaction to my usual antibiotics and could not keep pills or fluids down. After slightly over 24 hours with zero response to anti-emetics, I attended the emergency department. Five hours later, the ED doctor admitted me to hospital and gave me intravenous antibiotics and fluids.

Luckily, I responded to treatment well and only spent three days in hospital. Also, luckily, my next-door neighbour could look after my cats for me. This has always been a big concern of mine. If I know I’m going into hospital, then I can have the cats boarded. But if something happens and I’m admitted in an emergency, I have few people living close enough to me to feed them. Lack of people to call on for help is an issue for many older folk living alone.

Around this time, I stumbled upon Sue Falgade Lick’s Substack Can I Do It Alone? Sue was traversing her own health issues (much worse than mine) and her words of advice struck home. Worth reading if you are older and live alone, or have family members or friends in a similar position. It’s not something most of us think about, yet in Australia around 35.1% of women and 19.0% of men over 65 live alone. These figures are similar elsewhere in the Western world.

Look around. You may not be as alone as you think.

I’ve spent the last few months recovering. The frustrating thing is that just as I was feeling better, I had to go back into hospital for a couple of exploratory procedures, which meant taking a prep that completely stripped my innards of good bacteria and a procedure that made me ill for four days with post-anaesthetic issues. So that’s put my recovery back by at least another month or two.

The downside of strength training

Despite setbacks, I am on my way back to robust health. I’ve even gone back to the gym! And this in itself has been an eye-opener, as apparently, those with diverticular disease have to be careful about the exercise we do.

Any exercise that puts pressure on the abdomen is a bad thing for DD sufferers. To understand why, one must understand the nature of diverticular disease, but as not everyone wants to know the gory details, I will refrain from elaborating here. If you are interested in finding out more, please read this excellent summary, Diverticulosis is common, by Dr Arif Hussenbux at The Gut Group.

For the record, I’ve done “all the right things” to prevent issues like this. I’ve followed a high-fibre, Mediterranean-type diet for over 30 years, hitting between 30-40 grams of fibre a day, yet this did not stop me developing diverticular disease. I also exercise regularly, the exception being my crazy days in contract-based IT, where I left home at 6:30am and arrived back home at 7:30pm, with only thirty minutes for lunch if I was lucky.

The causes of diverticular disease are complex. Regarding what triggers a bout of diverticulitis, recent research is revealing how stress affects the gut, and in particular, its role in triggering a flare.

Around the time I lost both Jet and Lorraine I’d upped my strength training. I was lifting the maximum weight that I could lift for three sets, a weight where I was almost on the point of failure on the first set and might even fail on the second and third sets. Nothing radical about this approach, but pushing hard physically combined with the stress of losing loved ones likely triggered my diverticulitis flare-up.

I now use lighter weights and do three sets of twelve to fifteen reps. I’m already seeing a difference as I’m more energetic after training and recover faster. A bonus is that this way of training is better for older folks, anyway.

Okay. I think I can get on to better news unless you would like to read about...

The Saga of the Stove

I have a stove I can best describe as ancient. It probably dates from before the early 70s because the dials are in Fahrenheit, and Australia introduced metric measurements back in 1972. Over the past few years, two hot plates have died and I can’t replace them because the parts don’t exist. I’m now down to one hot plate and the oven.

Enter Plan A to get rid of the stove, free up the spot where it lives for more bench space, and do all my cooking with an induction hot plate (which I have because it’s more efficient than the hot plate on the stove), a microwave, and an air fryer, (which I bought and haven’t used yet, because I have nowhere to put it).

Even though the plan felt right, part of me nagged I should be a grown-up and buy a new stove. So that is what I did. I went with a company that would not only connect the new stove but would disconnect and remove the old one.

Delivery day arrived, and I bounced about with excitement at the new stove’s impending arrival. (Yeesh! How exciting IS my life?) The installation guy walked in, looked at where my old stove sat, and frowned. “We have a problem,” he said. “The space for the stove is noncompliant. It may have been compliant when they put it in, but it’s not compliant now.” He suggested putting in an aluminium splashback to cover the wall and part of the windowsill, took measurements, and said the company would get back to me on that.

I won’t go into the ensuing drama involving lacklustre customer service. To put it simply, I am without a new stove. Given the noncompliance issue, the company stated that it couldn’t sell me any stove and issued a refund. The reason? The space for the stove is too close to the window. It’s an electric stove, for crying out loud. Why does this matter? I don’t know. I couldn’t get a straight answer. The only two pieces of information I received were a) I would need to get the kitchen remodelled to install a new stove, or b) I could buy a second-hand one and find a dodgy electrician who might install it. The latter is not an option. If, God forbid, there were a fire in the kitchen, the insurance company could refuse to cough up because of noncompliance. Sigh.

So it’s back to Plan A, which is okay by me. But having already arranged for two different electricians to disconnect and remove the old stove, and neither of them turning up to do the job, I’m putting that task to one side for the moment. I’ve had enough silliness for now.

Writing

So all the above is my excuse for not writing here. I am still writing small amounts of fiction, including two stories I’ve already submitted. One of those, written especially for a themed anthology, already has been rejected. Bummer. Themed stories are often a hard sell anywhere else, and I already have one sitting on my hard drive doing nothing, along with a bunch of stories that don’t seem to fit anywhere.

I’d like to say a lightbulb flashed on when I realised this, but it was more of a slow glow with intermittent flickering and the occasional popping sound. Perhaps I could publish these stories here on Substack, one every month? Then I thought that maybe an anthology would be better. So I started compiling, rewriting and editing stories in readiness for self-publishing the said anthology.

Halfway into this, I realised I didn’t want to self-publish. Yet I’m just so tired of the whole traditional and indie publishing process. Submitted, rejected, submitted, rejected, rinse and repeat until voila! A publisher accepts and publishes the story, but no one reads it anyway. What is the point of that?

But traditional and indie publishing, or self-publishing, is what “real” authors do, isn’t it? Making money, getting lots and lots of readers, that’s the goal, yes?

Um, well, no. Maybe once upon a time I dreamed of making a living from writing, winning awards, having a huge following, blah, blah, blah, but not anymore.

Now I prefer the advice of the ever-inspiring Angela Yuriko Smith at Authortunities.

“Forget about sales figures, awards, or bestseller lists for a moment. When someone finishes your story, how do you want them to feel?”

I want people to laugh, to feel seen, to realise there is life beyond youth. Life’s far too short to muck about with people, places, and things that don’t want you. And I turned 70 recently, so life is getting even shorter.

The upshot is I’ve created another Substack called Misfits and Orphans. The first story I’ve posted, Modern Fairy Tale, is best described as an overly long dad joke and an homage to the pun-laden cartoons of my childhood, gems such as Mr Peabody's Improbable History and Aesop & Son. In real life, I have a similarly punny sense of humour. That is not a typo. Punny, not funny. The latter is debatable.

New projects

I’m also thinking of revisiting a self-portrait photography project I did in 2014. I’m planning on calling it “This is what 70 looks like” and am currently building up the courage to do it. A shout out to the wonderful Monicka Clio Sakki at Self Magic for reminding me of the importance of seeing yourself differently.

You can see some of the original photos here and below.

And finally…

As for the year so far, I can make light of it now, but honestly, sometimes I wondered if this was the beginning of the end, a downward spiral of ill health that would lead to my demise. What was the point of planning for the future?

Both my macular degeneration and diverticular disease have clipped my wings. Travelling overseas, even if I could afford it, is more difficult now, especially when my starting point is Australia. The premium for travel insurance jumps by a significant amount with these two pre-existing conditions. We’re talking specialist insurance companies, and hundreds of dollars on top of the standard premium. I need to travel to places with good hospitals as a major flare up poorly treated can be life-threatening, and should my dry macular degeneration deteriorate into wet macular degeneration (something I need to check is not happening several times a week), I could go blind without prompt treatment. I no longer feel confident travelling solo, and in the absence of a travel buddy, would need to rely on group offerings.

So, yes, there have definitely been moments of darkness and despondency, when I all but gave up. However, with improvements in my health and my energy levels rising, I feel I can cope and find new ways of doing and being. And I will remind myself of this quote from the Life Wisdom - Words of Taoism post, Be Like Water…

Be gentle. Be persistent. Be clear.
And one day, you’ll look back and see—
you didn’t conquer life.
You shaped it.

Next day she contacted me again and said she’d arranged for Jet to be desexed, microchipped, vaccinated, wormed and flea-treated at her vet on Wednesday 31 December. All I had to do was get him there but she would bring him back.

She also lent me a crate which meant I could secure him over the next few days while he recovers. This also meant he was safe on New Year’s Eve. Bonus!

The downside is I’ve had to bring Jet indoors. I’m keeping him in a room that Murray and George don’t normally use much, and although he is completely separate from my boys, the meowing and new smells are a dead giveaway. They are not happy and I have to monitor George in particular, as too much stress is likely to trigger his FLUTD.

It’s only the start of Jet’s journey, but at least it’s a good beginning. His profile is on the Pet Rescue website. Fingers crossed that there is a great home waiting for him.

It’s been a hell of a couple of days and I’m exhausted. Lots of rushing around soothing a scared, confused kitten and a pissed off Murray and George. Not to mention kitten proofing the room (aka forced decluttering) so Jet can explore outside the crate. He may be recovering but there is no need for him to be bored out of his kitty brain.

So it seems the Universe has responded to the comments in my previous post. Sort of.

It has provided the means to get Jet ready for adoption. This is true. It still is ignoring any request for financial freedom or at least being able to pay off my mortgage before I’m 89 (or dead, whichever comes first). And I have new respect for cat rescue volunteers as the amount of money that comes out of their pockets is significant. Jet’s adoption fee doesn’t even cover his vet bills, and I have been paying for his food, Uber for vet visit, registrations, etc.

I would ask that you consider donating to the smaller animal rescue organisations. The bigger ones are usually charities and get money from corporate fundraising as well as from donations. Sure, they need money but the little organisations fuelled by love and kindness need financial help more, especially as they aren’t charities and you won’t be able to claim a tax deduction. In Australia, there are places like Pet Rescue. I’m certain there are similar organisations elsewhere.

As a side note, I’ve never known my purpose in life and now, having become an unofficial foster carer for kittens, I wonder if this is where the Universe is pushing me. If so, I don’t feel up to the task. I have been a mess of anxiety, sleepless nights and tears from the moment I understood the huge emotional cost of socialising and homing a stray kitten.

I’m not just anxious for Jet’s well-being, but for that of my own two boys, who are understandably miffed by this unwelcome change in their living arrangements. And the process of socialising means you bond which means parting will painful. Though it will be less so if he goes to people who show they will truly love and care for him. However, I have to keep in mind that is Jet’s journey, and I am just a small part of it.

Anyway, I’ll keep muddling forward as best I can. That’s all one can do!

And finally…

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Everything I’ve done has been in good faith of success, but so often that success has been minimal or not at all. When I say this in the presence of other people, there’s inevitably someone who suggests it is my fault. Some underlying deficiency of my character or lack of faith or gratitude or some other airy fairy nonsense has meant the Universe hasn’t listened.

This is ridiculous. Who goes into any venture expecting to fail? Not me. I am possibly too Pollyanna about my probable success. So I am here to confirm that the Universe has listened but has a really perverse sense of humour. I ask for one thing, it gives the near opposite. I walk the high wire, it sends a stiff breeze. And it is done so repeatedly throughout my life.

For example, I have asked repeatedly for the financial freedom to retire. While small amounts of money in double digits have come my way, I’ve received nothing more substantial. I don’t expect a handout (though I wouldn’t say no to a lottery win - who would?). I’m willing to work for the extra, but every time I’ve worked second and third jobs, the tax system has eaten most of it. What little I earned from acting and writing falls into this category. And for most of my working life, I’ve been plagued by long periods of unemployment that have sapped my savings and superannuation.

On the advice of a good and clever friend, I asked the Universe again for a way to retire, this time using a simplified and hopefully unambiguous request. Has it worked? A little.

But this year, the Universe in all its wisdom gifted me with a stray mother cat and her newly weaned kitten. I am a soft-hearted soul and I could not turn them away, so I decided to feed both in the hope that I could socialise at least the kitten and find them decent homes. The mother has since taken off, and the kitten (who I’ve named Jet) is progressing well.

However no non-kill agency will take him until he is fully socialised. All have told me, I may have to hold on to him for up to a year before they can fit him in. In addition, most want me to organise and pay for his desexing, vaccinations, microchipping, etc. Then I will have to pay a fee for them to take him. These expenses far exceed any financial gains I’ve made this year.

I don’t want to send Jet anywhere that may kill him, so I will do all this but it really isn’t advancing the idea of financial freedom so I can retire. Quite the opposite.

As Jet becomes more socialised, he wants to come indoors. On one hand, this would be a good idea because I do worry about such a young animal being out at night, especially coming up to New Year’s Eve. However the worry of him being outside is less than that of letting him inside and introducing him to my two senior cats.

Both Murray and George, are are toothless and kept indoors 100% of the time. George suffers from two anxiety related diseases and is prone to jealousy. It simply isn’t fair for me to introduce a young cat with teeth into this household. And then there is the fact that I’m a few months shy of 70. Jet is likely to outlive me. If I have to move to a retirement facility, I already know it will be difficult to take two cats. Three is out of the question.

So thank you, Universe. I needed this extra stress and expense like a hole in the head.

I have spent much of this year looking for other solutions to help with retirement, ones that don’t involve a substantial increase in money in the bank but focus on a reorganisation of what I have already. One of the things that has pissed me off is well meaning but completely misguided advice from people who refuse to understand that I can’t indulge in risky ventures or actions.

Most people I know have a safety net. It may be a partner. It may be family. It may even be someone that they don’t really want to consider as a safety net. Yet in their heart they know if the crunch came, they would be protected. They would have somewhere to go, even if only temporarily.

I have no such safety net, and I can assure you it changes how you think. When I had a safety net, I was willing to take huge gambles. I approached risk with greater confidence. But now that safety net is gone, security and risk aversion are far more important.

I know there are women out there like me and I would love to meet them and hear what solutions they may have. However, for some reason, I tend to attract women into my life who are financially secure, often because they are married to men (like investment bankers) who earn high wages, or they have wealthy parents, or are high earners themselves. Not sure why these women come into my life - there’s a lesson in there somewhere but at the moment it escapes me.

Not all the women in my life are like that. In fact, most of those I call friends aren’t married to high-flying men, but they still have safety nets in the form of partners and/or family. But they do listen to me and for that I am grateful. I could not carry on without their support, either in real life or on this platform.

I’m not good treading the high wire with no visible means of support. I wish I was. I wish I could ask the universe for things and not be given the opposite. Maybe the next year will bring constructive change. One can only hope.

Writing

On the writing front, I’m in the middle of a big rethink. My intention was to finish writing the current novel then edit both it and an existing finished novella before self-publishing.

However, I’ve discovered that none of my books sell. I knew from the lack of royalties on “Fortitude”, “Courage”, and “The Witch Who Wasn’t” that those particular books didn’t make much money. However, a lot of my work is sold to publishers for a flat two figure fee. I didn’t realise these also hadn’t sold. What a shocker!

So, I would like to say thank you to all those publishers who took a chance on me and who haven’t even earned their money back. You are champions.

All this means that I’m seriously considering not publishing either of the new books. I don’t want to waste money on self-publishing for no return, and I can’t be bothered looking for a publisher. And to be honest, I don’t think I can go through all the effort of editing, which for me takes months and is completely and utterly demoralising.

So 2025 may represent the end of my writing career. It’s been a good year. I may not have earned much money but the publications haven’t been too shabby as illustrated in this graphic.

I’m also reconsidering Substack. I don’t have a lot to say and what I do say is often somewhat depressing, isn’t it? Dearie me, no wonder no one reads me!

There are poems I absolutely adore.

I’m a huge fan of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Coleridge is master of rhyme, rhythm and meter. The way he paints such incredibly vivid pictures exploring humanity’s relationship with nature, each other, and God touch me deeply.

Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.

Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.

O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

I adore Swinburne’s A Forsaken Garden, yet another master class in rhythm and meter with a final stanza that always gives me chills.

Till the slow sea rise and the sheer cliff crumble,
Till terrace and meadow the deep gulfs drink,
Till the strength of the waves of the high tides humble
The fields that lessen, the rocks that shrink,
Here now in his triumph where all things falter,
Stretched out on the spoils that his own hand spread
As a god self-slain on his own strange altar,
Death lies dead.

For a more modern offering, Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese soothes my soul.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

There’s a good reason I say I don’t like poetry and it’s that I don’t appear to be in step with those ‘in the know’. Many poets and poetry aficionados seem to adore work full of metaphor, analogy, and basically, lots and lots and LOTS of descriptive words.

And for some unknown reason, word overkill makes my brain completely close down. I tend to see in pictures and hear as rhythm. My head needs space to process. I drown in a tsunami of words.

I have nothing against metaphor or analogy; I often use these writerly tools. However, I prefer both used judiciously, sprinkled lightly throughout the text, not dousing the work in sauce.

Rather than being impressed or moved by such works, I feel distanced and numb, which is not what I assume the poet intended.

I prefer my poetry and prose to be clean, honed, the simpler the better. If not cut down to the bone, then cut back to the muscles that move. And the rhythm of the words as much as the words themselves are what engage my mind and heart. If I cannot find the rhythm in a poem or a piece of prose, it loses me.

And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.
from”The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe

I’ve realised that rhythm drives me in unexpected ways. I have always loved and been involved in dance and music. Apparently as a toddler I would dance the moment someone played a record (yes, I’m that old). It appears to be in my DNA. Dancing satisfies me in ways no other physical movement can. Playing an instrument is a close second.

Bur more broadly, I honestly do feel a rhythm of life (cue Sammy Davis Junior and the movie cast of Sweet Charity). I feel positive and happy when feeling the rhythm of the world around me and am depressed when I can find no rhythm.

Given my relationship with rhythm, it makes sense that some of my favourite “poems” are song lyrics. The ultimate fusion of words and rhythm.

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone,
‘Neath the halo of a street lamp,
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of
a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence.

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking,
People hearing without listening,
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one deared
Disturb the sound of silence.
From “The Sound of Silence” Simon and Garfunkel

It also makes sense that I would look for rhythm in reading and writing. I wonder how many other people feel the same way.

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NEW RELEASE!

You Ain’t Read Nothin’ Yet!

Publisher’s Blurb:

To misquote the Pointed Man (from Harry Nilsson’s The Point): “A theme in every direction, is the same as, well, no theme at all.” Which just about sums up Crimeucopia—You Ain’t Read Nothin’ Yet. A regular Free-4-All—where the theme literally is No Jacket, or Theme, Required….

So, opening the Scrabble bag of this anthology’s short fiction, you’ll find—

Jon Matthew Farber, Steven James Foreman, Peter W. J. Hayes, John B. Elliott, Merrilee Robson, Philip Pak, Tucker Struyk, Maurice Givens, Carol Willis, Veronica Gardner, Mary Jo Robertiello, Ariel Dodson, Allison Whittenberg, Devin James Leonard, David Bart, H.E. Vogl, Karen Bayly, Marula Blades and Michael Canfield

—all of whom give you a spread from cosy through to hard edged Noir and grindhouse.

And so, with all of these anthologies, as everything gently fades to black, we hope you’ll find something that you immediately like, as well as something that takes you from your regular comfort zone—and slips you, gently or otherwise, into a completely new one.

Because, in the investigative spirit of our Murderous Ink Press motto:

You never know what you like until you turn over the page and read it.

Paperback Edition ISBN: 9781909498723

eBook Edition ISBN: 9781909498730

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Narrative: a story or a description of a series of events, a particular way of explaining or understanding events

Entropy: the amount of order or lack of order in a system (social sciences); a measurement of the energy in a system or process that is not available to do work (physics)

From the Cambridge Dictionary

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This week has turned out to be bigger emotionally than expected. On Wednesday, I relinquished my drivers licence. A fair call given I don’t have a car, can’t afford a car, and haven’t driven for over twenty years.

But the biggest reason for this move is that my age-related macular degeneration (AMD) means I can’t read a car dashboard any more, even with glasses. While my perception of images is not impaired, straight lines often appear wavy and I can no longer read text without extra magnification or else specifically designed for low vision. Car dashboards are a messy blur.

So surrendering my license instead of waiting for the day when I failed my eye test to renew felt right and sensible. However, it affected me more than I anticipated.

A whole range of possibilities, however delusional, died along with that little plastic card. Moving away from the noise and angst of the city and suburbs or even to a country retirement village is no longer viable due to lack of public transport. Any plans for getting a car should I come into money have also croaked.

Admittedly, those things were close to the realm of fantasy, but now they are impossible dreams. Yet I am grieving. But that’s okay.

It is tricky trying to explain my macular degeneration to anyone who doesn’t have it. Here’s some information from the Macular Disease Foundation of Australia:

Age-related macular degeneration causes progressive loss of central vision. It does, however, leave the peripheral vision intact. This loss of central vision affects the ability to read, watch TV, and recognise faces. But, by itself, AMD doesn’t lead to total vision loss (black blindness).

For some people, AMD advances very slowly and may not impact vision. For others, AMD may progress faster and lead to vision loss in one or both eyes.

During the early and intermediate stages, you may not notice any symptoms. Once the disease progresses, symptoms include:

• difficulty reading or any other activity which requires fine vision, even when wearing glasses

• distortion, where straight lines appear wavy or bent

• difficulty distinguishing faces

• dark or blurred patches in the centre of your vision

I’m at the intermediate stage but only experiencing difficulty reading and distortion of lines. Both Mac and PC have accessibility aids which help me read text more easily (but still with limitations). Kindle has a wonderful low vision mode for which I am grateful as audiobooks aren’t a good option. I’ve listened to a few, and the narrator can completely ruin a book for me. It’s clearly a huge risk for an author to have their books narrated (authors take note!). Suddenly it’s not just what you’ve written that a reader can like or dislike.

Luckily, my image vision is still good. Small mercies. But my diminished ability to deal with text is a heartache. Even as I type this with the text greatly enlarged, the letters dance and I know I will have to stop several times to rest my eyes. I take some comfort in knowing there have been well-known authors who are vision impaired - Jorge Luis Borges, Alice Walker, James Thurber, Oliver Sacks, and Sue Townsend to name a few (source: Vision Australia). If I ever get my writing mojo back, learning to dictate my stories might be the way forward (though editing would still be trial by fire).

Sadly, there is no cure for AMD. Some of my retinal cells no longer work and there is no way to fix them as yet. Stem Cell Therapy is offering hope but an effective and safe delivery is still a long way off.

Age and smoking are risk factors and one of those you have no control over. I smoked lightly in my late teens but stopped in my mid-20s. All I can do is try to stop the disease progressing. I take a supplement with Lutein and Zeaxanthin recommended by my ophthalmologist. The Mediterranean Diet I’ve followed for decades is suppose to help as well - although you’ll excuse my cynicism given it didn’t prevent me getting AMD in the first place!

And there are all the usual lifestyle suspects to keep in order: sleep, relaxation, exercise, etc, and I pay attention to all of those. I may not be able to reverse it but I’m planning on it not progressing.

Writing update

I have a new short story, Sins of the Past, included in Crimeucopia’s You Ain’t Read Nothing Yet. Still no pre-order link but please feel free to read my heroine’s origin story for zero charge. It’s called Crown of Poppies and is published in Yellow Mama Magazine.

The other stuff…

Reading: Currently reading “Melaleuca” by Angie Faye Martin. Also read and loved “The Peak” by Sam Guthrie. Two great Aussie thrillers I can recommend.

Watching: Nothing much! There’s little that appeals to me and I’ve cancelled most of my streaming services.

Enjoying: Chilling with the cats. Felines really know how to relax.

Thinking about: What’s next for me? Not a clue. See image below.

Looking forward to: A sail on Sydney Harbour in a tall ship next weekend.

Also loving: Getting some more photography done now that my knee is better.

I have much I am grateful for, and the {insert whatever you think controls our fate or IWYTCOF} has been kind. I am privileged to have a handful of people who care for me and a roof over my head.

However, the {IWYTCOF} has not been kind in other ways. It seems hell-bent on disrupting my plans. I certainly didn’t plan to be where I am now - still paying off a mortgage at age 69 on a house that needs serious renovations, still working, with no savings, alone, without a tribe, and with failing eyesight.

I envisioned a bright existence, and vision boarded my ideal life. I have worked to make it happen and asked the {IWYTCOF} for help. I have made mistakes but have acknowledged and owned my part in everything that is unbalanced in my life.

Yet, the opportunities to correct those imbalances either don’t come or have a sting in the tail. Prime example: my mum left me the house I live in, but she made a terrible mess of the will and I inherited the house and a substantial debt. I mortgaged the house to pay for that debt (it was a small mortgage). And I sighed in relief.

Fast forward four years. I was working in IT, but all my jobs were three- or six-month contracts, often with one or two months of unemployment between them. And then I hit a bad patch. I was unemployed for over twelve months and struggling to cover my financial needs. I maxed out my credit cards to make ends meet. I’d done the maths and knew I’d be able to pay it back, provided I earned the same amount of money as at my last job.

But with the next job I earned much less. I asked the {IWYTCOF} for help to solve the issue. A friend introduced me to a financial adviser who arranged a re-mortgage to cover the existing mortgage and the credit card debt. And I sighed in relief.

I shouldn’t have. The cycle repeated two more times over ten years. I’d make progress paying debt off and even build some savings, then whammy. Unemployment and everything crashing down again. Each time, a financial adviser told me re-mortgaging was the best I could do given my circumstances. I trusted them. I shouldn’t have.

The mortgage grew bigger (although it’s still small compared to most mortgages). The jobs, while not paying less, didn’t keep up with the cost of living. My current job pays me the same as I earned fifteen years ago. I’ve retrained to upskill, but I either don’t get those jobs or I’m offered less money.

I’ve tried earning money from other sources with limited success. Last year, my writing earned me the princely sum of $175 ($114 USD) and that is the best year in twenty so far. I had a second job offered to me out of the blue that seemed perfect. It earned me a couple of hundred each week, but a committee member took a dislike to me and made my life miserable. I left after he lambasted me in an email to all committee members and a couple of external people. The company I worked for said they couldn’t do anything legally because committee members were volunteers and they had no policy covering volunteer behaviour (apparently they do now because of me). Another example of “sting in the tail”.

However, thankfully, I’ve been in my current job for five years, though being classified as a casual means it could end in a heartbeat. At 69 years old, there are unlikely to be many jobs in my future given job ageism. My failing eyes and bad knees don’t really help much either. But I’ll deal with that when / if it happens. I have contingency plans, but all are reliant on external conditions way outside my control.

Every day I tell myself I am abundant, successful, etc. It makes me feel good about myself and positive about my future. That is, until something happens and everything comes crashing down again. I’ve just been hit with some large bills I have no way of paying without either going further into debt I can’t pay off or cashing out the last of my superannuation and selling out my future financial security.

I’ve spoken to financial advisers whose advice was to sell, rent, invest and live off the interest. (Note: My house is referred to as a “knockdown” and unlikely to sell for a price that will allow me to pay off debts and buy a new place.) However, we are in the midst of a rental crisis in Australia, and it is difficult to get a rental. Most also only offer 6-12 month leases, so you have zero security, especially given landlords can break the lease at any time by saying they want to renovate (happens a lot when they want to raise the rent before the lease has expired). I’ve lived in apartments before, and they are my idea of hell - constant noise from neighbours, usually in high-traffic areas, walls like paper. So, I would need a small house, and there aren’t many of those.

And worst of all, most rental places do not allow pets, so I would have to surrender my cats to a shelter. Both are middle-aged and toothless, and are a bonded pair so can’t be separated. One of them has mild but chronic health issues. The chances of finding a home for them are low. Giving them up would break my heart into a million pieces. So, no to renting. And while I’m at it, no to financial advisers who have guided me down the paths that lead to here.

Crying helps, but solves nothing. The depression is difficult to shake and I am crippled with doubt about everything I do in my life. I’ve lost all joy in doing things I used to love. I’ve stopped writing short stories. I’m considering not finishing my current book and ditching the written one I’m editing. I see no point in continuing to write. I don’t have the heart to pick up a guitar or ukulele. Same with my camera. Dance is a pleasant form of exercise, but as a creative expression, it is dead to me.

And I haven’t sighed in relief for some time.

“Fittest” refers to a species being the best adapted to thrive in its environment. That may mean being strong or violent, but it may also mean being cryptic or cooperative or a whole range of different abilities. But none of those things mean much if a species cannot roll with constantly changing situations. Those that fail to do so face extinction.

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If people read Darwin’s books or studied biology, they would know this. However, popular opinion and the media has promoted a definition that is quite vulgar to replace a concept that is elegant, thoughtful and far-reaching.

To understand Darwin’s concept of fitness, we must let go of modern ideas about muscular strength or moral worth. In evolutionary biology, “fitness” simply means reproductive success: the ability to survive long enough to pass your genes to the next generation.

Fitness is not about being the biggest or the strongest. It’s about being well-suited—well fitted—to a particular environment.

A cheetah is fast because it needs to catch prey. A giraffe’s long neck helps it reach leaves high in the trees. A cactus stores water because it lives in a desert. In each case, the trait improves the chances of surviving and reproducing in a specific context. That is fitness.

In fact, sometimes, cooperation, camouflage, or even smallness can be more “fit” than aggression or size. Evolution has no ultimate goal, no direction, no blueprint. It only favors traits that, in a given moment and place, give an edge in reproduction.

And here lies the deeper truth Darwin tried to reveal: fitness is always relative. What works in one environment may be useless—or even dangerous—in another.

Science News Today

There are many examples of survival of the fittest that have nothing to do with aggression or strength. One of Darwin’s own examples concerns the Galapagos finches. These birds, although nearly identical in all other ways to mainland finches, have different shaped beaks. But why?

Imagine this. A few mainland finches find themselves stranded on the Galapagos Islands. They all eat the same type of food and therefore occupy a single ecological niche. This limits how big the population can grow.

However, imagine that some of these finches already have slight variations in their beak structures and these enable them to take advantage of other types of food available on the islands.

These variations are genetic and heritable and over subsequent generations, get amplified. Finches with one variety of beak occupying a new niche hang out and mate with finches who look similar. Eventually, the original mainland population has branched out into twenty four new species filling a variety of ecological niches on the Galapagos Islands. Some finches end up with beaks better suited for eating seeds, others with beaks that allow them to catch insects, and so on. The phrase used to describe this aspect of natural selection is adaptive radiation.

However, this is only one aspect of fitness. It covers predator-prey dynamics, sexual selection, cryptic colouration, chemical signalling, insect resistance, plant resilience, and many, many more adaptations.

Unfortunately, it has also been misused to support eugenics, anarchy and Social Darwinism. Humans!

Writing update

Pre-orders available for my upcoming gothic horror novella, “Blackeby House” from Black Hare Press .

“Some houses want your soul—Blackeby House wants your blood.

Gemma Harcourt never expected her country getaway to become a descent into madness. When she accepts a last-minute invitation to visit her estranged cousin Henry at his newly acquired rural property, she finds herself drawn into the chilling legacy of Blackeby House—a crumbling Queen Anne mansion steeped in whispers, shadows, and something far more ancient than family secrets.

The locals speak in guarded tones. Henry shifts between charm and cruelty. And the house... the house seems to remember things that even time should have buried.

Trapped in a nightmare where reality flickers like faulty lighting and ghosts wear the faces of the living, Gemma must confront not just the horrors of the house, but her own haunted past. As the darkness tightens its grip, escape becomes more than survival—it becomes redemption.

Set against the eerie beauty of rural Australia, Blackeby House is a gothic horror that weaves psychological dread with ghostly suspense. Atmospheric, visceral, and deeply human, this is a tale that asks: can history ever truly stay buried?”

The “Steampunk Sleuths” anthology of novellas from Black Beacon Press is out now!

The other stuff…

Reading: Currently reading “Royal Gambit” by Daniel O’Malley. Also read and loved “The Life Impossible” by Matt Haig.

Watching: Still rewatching “Bones”. Halfway through the second last season. New note to self - the day to day struggles of marriage are beyond boring in a story about forensics and murder. I’m all for fleshing out your characters, but arguing over whether to have a TV in the bedroom does not engage me. I also signed back up to Netflix and caught up on “Wednesday”. Okay so far, but waiting for Joanna Lumley to appear.

Enjoying: Eating food. I had a severe bout of food poisoning last weekend and am still getting back to normal

Thinking about: Dying. Bleak, I know. But shit happens.

Looking forward to: Being 100% better.

Also loving: Classical guitar music. I play classical guitar but the years have not been kind to my hands. Still I play what I can and dream of playing like one of my heroes - Alirio Diaz.

What’s your pet peeve?

Misinterpretation of survival of the fittest is but one of my pet peeves. I have a few others (don’t we all?), one being the automatic assumptions based on age - I am old therefore I must be married, be a grandmother, be retired, be wealthy, be useless with tech, etc.

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While art is regarded as creative and juicy, science is thought to be dry and unimaginative. Yet anyone who has studied science through to the research degree stages knows this is not true. Both science and art endeavours start with either an observation, or a “what if” or “how would”question. From that single point, the process differs but is comparable.

The artist (and I include writers and performers in this definition) takes the observation or question and reacts. They then use their imagination and creativity to interpret that reaction into a form that communicates a universal truth while reflecting the creator’s talent and personality.

The scientist takes the observation or question and distils it into a testable hypothesis that, ideally, challenges current thinking. They then devise an experiment or series of experiments that proves or disproves that hypothesis. This is where creativity comes to the fore. You may hear a scientist exclaim in awe over an ‘elegant’ experiment. By this, they mean one that is beautiful, clear, imaginative, and often extremely simple (read more here). So with science both the process and the results can be a thing of wonder.

This experiment must be both sensible and repeatable i.e. other scientists must be able to repeat the experiment to discover if they get the same results.

You may argue that science is constrained by logic, but so is plausible fiction. You cannot build a believable world or characters if there is no underlying internal logic dictating how that world works or how the characters behave.

So the two disciplines are not dissimilar and are by no means incompatible. Both disciplines require creativity, talent, and skill, and give results that can enlighten or entertain.

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Writing update

Black Hare Press have sent the layout and artwork proofs for my upcoming gothic horror novella, “Blackeby House”. I love the cover, but am not allowed to do the reveal to the general public just yet.

Black Beacon Press still have a pre-order deal up for the “Steampunk Sleuths” anthology of novellas. These are:

Tears of the Dragon - S.B. Watson
Murder in Whitby - Karen Bayly
The Untimely Death of Clockmaster Tollsmead - Cameron Trost
The Copper Train - Diana Parrilla
The Strange Case of Private Ornshaw and the Martian Detective - David Turnbull

The other stuff…

Reading: Currently reading “The Naturalist Society” by Carrie Vaughan. Also read and loved - “My Friends” by Fredrik Backman and “The Thief of Always” by Clive Barker.

Watching: Still rewatching “Bones”. I’ve learned a valuable writing lesson from this show. Always make your secondary characters as engaging as the leads, especially if you are writing a long series. By Season 7, I was completely over Bones and Booth, and Angela and Hodgins, and it is only characters like Cam, Caroline, and the interns who have kept me engaged.

Enjoying: Splashing about in the pool. Being in water is relaxing for me, yet I’m terrible at dragging myself to the nearest pool.

Thinking about: AI. I’m doing on course on AI training. Understand your enemy.

Looking forward to: World peace and a bright future. Hah!

Also loving: Beautiful imagery.

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Read more

Where I came undone was reflecting on the suggestion “find something that inspires you”. Sara had listed many rather good quotes, but I’m not really inspired by quotes.

But what does inspire me?

It took a while for me to get past all the things I thought should inspire me before the answer hit me with a crash, bag, wallop. And I’m a little shocked to realise that humans and their achievements don’t really inspire me at all.

Not that I don’t recognise the good that humans do. I admire Fred Hollows, the New Zealand–Australian ophthalmologist who became known for his commitment to ending avoidable blindness through The Fred Hollows Foundation. I also think the world would be a poorer place without the likes of Jane Goodall and David Attenborough, whose dedication to educating humanity about the natural world is so necessary in the face those who do not wish to understand.

And there are many artists and writers who move or amaze me. Artists Universum on Instagram showcases incredible works of art. Frank Lloyd Wright’s architecture pleases me immensely and Marc Chagall’s paintings have moved me to tears. Kazuo Ishiguro, Haruki Murakami, Ray Bradbury, and Angela Carter are authors whose works have left indelible marks on my heart and soul.

I admit to being inspired to write speculative fiction by Ursula Le Guin and Anne McCaffrey. When I first started writing, some male readers and editors sneered at female writers of fantasy, horror, and science fiction, but these two women kept winning awards. If they could, then I just might (some day).

But I see inspiration as something that keeps me going through good times and bad times. Especially in bad times. When I’m poised to give up completely, what other humans do or say feels irrelevant.

Inspiration for me stems from a sense of awe, and nothing leaves me as awestruck yet brimming with hope as the magnificence of nature. Its beauty transcends its often overwhelming violence. I am powerless in the face of its fury, yet I am nurtured by its bounty. We think we may destroy it, yet I suspect we never will completely beat nature down (short of blowing this planet to smithereens).

Staring at the stars elicits similar reactions. I am nothing but a minute speck on a tiny ball of minerals and water floating in space. I am inconsequential to the universe. My failures and successes mean nothing in the grand scheme of things. Some find that thought depressing. I find it comforting, for it means I am free to be me without judgement or pressure. All that matters is that I live with kindness toward my fellow beings on this planet we call Earth. The universe does not care, so it is our duty to care if all beings are to survive.

And that I find inspiring.

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Writing update

Black Hare Press have sent the layout and artwork proofs for my upcoming gothic horror novella, “Blackeby House”. I love the cover, but am not allowed to do the reveal just yet.

Black Beacon Press still have a pre-order deal up for the “Steampunk Sleuths” anthology of novellas. These are:

Tears of the Dragon - S.B. Watson
Murder in Whitby - Karen Bayly
The Untimely Death of Clockmaster Tollsmead - Cameron Trost
The Copper Train - Diana Parrilla
The Strange Case of Private Ornshaw and the Martian Detective - David Turnbull

The other stuff…

Reading: “Demon Copperhead” by Barbara Kingsolver. I’ve wanted to read this for ages and am currently wondering why. The David Copperfield connection is all very clever but at the moment, I just don’t care about any of the characters.

Watching: Still rewatching “Bones”. There are so many seasons!

Enjoying: Sleeping for eight hours most nights. Only possible in winter. Long summer days combined with daylight saving make getting enough shuteye tricky.

Thinking about: Retiring may be a pipe dream. Retirement is for those with enough money to do whatever they want. I still need to work.

Looking forward to: A better, brighter sixty-ninth year on this planet.

Also loving: This short YouTube talk by Frederik Backman. I enjoy his novels but this talk is funny, sweet, and relatable.

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Most of us creative types are aware of Imposter Syndrome, where we fear our skill and talent is sub-standard. We believe we are frauds, despite substantial evidence proving otherwise. This one surfaces regularly for me! But I also experience something called Outsider Syndrome, the psychological experience of feeling like you don't belong. I’ve worked hard to overcome it and find my tribe, with varying levels of success. However, being socially awkward means I often misread cues and end up being hurt.

Case in Point: A few years ago I reconnected with a bunch of high school friends. I was the weird kid at school in the 60s and 70s; shy, from a one parent family, living in a working class suburb where traditional mores prevailed, bad at sports, prone to whimsy, and super smart at schoolwork. However, there were a few in my cohort I clicked with and considered friends.

So when we reconnected, I felt those friendships were renewed. That is until, I went to post a celebratory greeting on the Facebook profile of a person I hung out with through primary and high school. Here I discovered I was categorised as “Friend of a Friend”.

Ouch. That hurt. (Although the logic part of my brain questioned who was the friend I was a friend of.) I wondered how many other of my reconnections have me similarly categorised. I have decided I will not check. My sense of self-preservation demands I remain oblivious.

It’s not the first time this has happened. I often find I am excluded from full participation in groups because I am single and childless. This can come in the form of not being invited to events or snide comments about women who don’t have children. And while the solution seems straightforward (e.g. find likeminded individuals), it isn’t that simple. Single childless women are often career women (I’m not and never was), have more disposable cash (a big nope from me) and live in better quality suburbs (a working class existence is all I can afford).

Unfortunately, occurrences like this feed my Outsider Syndrome, and I begin to feel I don’t belong anywhere. I have to work to overcome this irrational thinking and reach out to those I know who accept me as I am. Luckily, I have a few cherished people like that in my life.

Writing update

Specul8 Publishing has released “Attack of the Colossal Creatures from Planet X” containing my kaiju story, “Diary of a Monster”.

Black Beacon Press have a pre-order deal up for their “Steampunk Sleuths” anthology of novellas. Here’s the blurb:

Five detective stories set in a steampunk world, brought to you by some of the most original voices in speculative fiction today. Each tale in this anthology offers a different variation on the theme, from Edo-era Japan to interplanetary war, and from a clockwork locked-room mystery to bloodpunk in Whitby... and we didn't forget to invite an airshipload of sky pirates.

If you love the sound of clever mystery puzzles with a steampunk spin of the cog, this latest anthology from Black Beacon Books is for you, by Jove!

The other stuff…

Reading: “The Light a Candle Society” by Ruth Hogan. It’s a whimsical tale about a man who witnesses a public health funeral - run by the local council with no flowers and no mourners - and is inspired to create The Light a Candle Society to honour such individuals. Sweet.

Watching: Rewatching “Bones”. It’s far fluffier than I remember, and all the relationship drama is a bit tedious, but I’m not feeling up to anything dark or overly dramatic. I was watching “Dark Winds” which I enjoy, but need a break from weird and gloomy.

Enjoying: My cats. The cooler weather brings out their crazy side.

Thinking about: Not thinking. I tend to overthink and sometimes you just have to STOP.

Looking forward to: All my current health issues being over with no surgery of any kind.

Also loving: Daifuku. Not a huge sweet tooth but love these Japanese confections.

What’s your recommended “fluffy” TV show?

I’d love to hear from you. Especially TV shows where the romantic/sexual tension is virtually non-existent.

What’s been happening?

The last two months have been ridiculously busy at work. I sometimes feel that at 68, I’m too old to be working in a stressful job, even if it is only part-time. It sucks the life out of me much more than it did ten years ago (and it sucked the life out of me then!). But I cannot afford to retire unless I become a best-selling author with a movie deal, or inherit a few hundred thousand. Such is life.

One of my cats, George, has been ill. He and his bonded pal (possibly half-brother) Murray had a pretty rough start in life. The RSPCA rescued them starving, sick with cat flu, and with teeth so rotten they couldn’t eat—and both cats were under 12 months old! While Murray (six years old) enjoys robust health, George (six and a half years old) is a stressy wee boy. He has a sensitive tummy, a tendency toward stress-related FLUTD (feline lower urinary tract disease) and suffers from chalazion in his eyes (which require physical removal once a year). This time he had a severe ear infection but didn’t show any symptoms until I woke up once morning and found he’d scratched his face to pieces. The following two weeks were a trial for both us, with ear drops and antibiotics twice daily, and the dreaded cone of shame.

Thankfully, he is a patient and forgiving cat. That’s not to say he doesn’t let you know when he’s had enough, but he is a gentleman about it. He is also the biggest snuggle bug and a cheeky, funny feline.

On top of all this, I’ve hurt my knee, badly enough to prevent me doing much walking or other exercise, but not badly enough to need a walking stick. Hopefully a mix physiotherapy, hydrotherapy, recumbent bike riding, and special exercises will have me back to normal in a few weeks.

Writing update

“The Witch Who Wasn’t” launched on 21st April. No reviews yet which is disappointing.

The next piece of work released will be my kaiju story, “Diary of a Monster” in Specul8 Publishing’s “Attack of the Colossal Creatures from Planet X”.

I have two more novellas coming out in the last half of the year. No spoilers.

My flirtation with a new genre (mystery) and writing a protagonist closer to my age came to a sudden end. I wrote a third of a novel and decided I hated it. I love reading crime and mystery, and have a few crime noir short stories in publication, but writing a straight mystery didn’t click.

Then a brief interaction with the ever-inspiring Angela Yuriko Smith on Substack Authortunities sent me in a slightly different direction, and I’m busy writing again. I’m feeling excited about this story now.

The other stuff…

Reading: The Storyteller’s Daughter by Victoria Scott. I loved The Unquiet Grave by Dervla McTiernan and Opal by Patricia Wolf, two newer crime writers whose books I wait for with bated breath.

Watching: Rewatching “The Brokenwood Mysteries”, New Zealand’s long running equivalent of “Midsomer Murders”.

Enjoying: The cooler weather. Winter in Sydney is fairly mild and a lovely counterpoint to its brutally hot and often humid summers. The night sky in winter is also awesome.

Thinking about: What I need for my best life. It changes as you age. These days, I’m more about community yet still keeping my independence than I am about making my mark on the world.

Looking forward to: Dinner tonight! I’m making a modified version of nachos. I have few food sensitivities that make normal nachos (and a lot of other dishes) a nightmare. So I’ve created a version that hits the spot without causing issues.

Also loving: Katie Sadler and her outstanding Substack Plotting.

When Tabitha Two Owls was a baby, the great wizard Odelfius pronounced her ‘The Witch Who Wasn’t’. Her best friend, Jemima Jerribode, believes that Odelfius didn’t intend any insult but merely forgot to finish his sentence. However, his proclamation left Tabitha doubting her identity. She has dedicated her life to proving her worth as a witch, with disastrous results.

Tabitha flunks her final school exam and fails to redeem herself at the Hall of Trials. The powerful Eldwitches ban her from practising magic, leaving her adrift in a sea of disillusion. But fate has a plan for the young witch. A series of events forces her to reclaim her magical heritage and lead a battle against an ancient evil threatening to destroy the land. In doing so, she understands what being The Witch Who Wasn’t truly means.

The Witch Who Wasn’t is for Middle-Grade readers and older. It will be released globally in print and ebook formats on 21 April 2025. For Australian and New Zealand buyers, stock availability may be delayed a few weeks.

Here is a brief video introduction to the main characters….

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Like all authors, some of my characters’ dreams and skills stem from mine. I have wanted to learn to fly since my teens. However, the cost of flight tuition was more than I earned. Other avenues, such as being an Air Force pilot, weren’t open to women when I was young enough to take advantage of the opportunity. Now, I still can’t cover the cost of flight tuition, but my failing eyesight might make things difficult even if I could.

Chuck Yeager was my first flying hero, and reading about him introduced me to several astounding female pilots. “The General” never seemed to care about the gender of a pilot, only how good they were. He supported many female aviators, including the incredible Jackie Cochran, the first woman to break the sound barrier. Admittedly, she did it with Chuck flying beside her, so this was also the first time a man and woman broke the sound barrier together.

Reading about Jackie Cochran, I learned of the amazing 166 female WW2 pilots in the British Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA). These women volunteered from Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, the United States, the Netherlands, and Poland. After her stint in the ATA, Cochran started the US Women’s Air Force Service Pilots (WASP). Another of these pilots, Amy Johnson, had already achieved fame in 1930 as the first woman to fly solo from London to Australia.

However, women have been making a mark in breaking world travel records since before WW1. On November 14, 1889, Nellie Bly, a reporter for the New York World, embarked on a 25,000-mile journey around the world. Bly’s journey was inspired by the popular 1872 Jules Verne book “Around the World in Eighty Days.” If you don’t already know, many consider Verne as the godfather of steampunk.

Nellie Bly had already attained notoriety by going undercover as a patient at a New York City mental health asylum in 1887 and exposing its terrible conditions. Her reporting raised awareness about mental health treatment and led to improvements in institutional conditions. Her achievement was one of the first examples of the power of investigative journalism. Now, she intended to travel by steamship and steam train in a race against the fictional Phileas Fogg.

Bly’s journey quickly attracted interest from other news sources. Shortly after her ship departed New York on November 14th, John Brisben Walker, owner of Cosmopolitan magazine, hatched his own plan. He sent Elizabeth Bisland, one of his junior editors, to compete in a race around the world as a rival.

Bly won. In a world-record-breaking feat, she completed her trip in a mere 72 days. Along the way, she travelled through the USA, England, France (where she met Jules Verne in Amiens), the Suez Canal, Colombo, Penang, Singapore, Hong Kong, China, and Japan. However, Bly’s record was short-lived as businessman George Francis Train completed the journey in 67 days, breaking her record.

There was no flying in either Bly’s or Fogg’s journeys, but both epitomise the essence of Artemis’s own journey. Although she is not attempting to break any record, she is trying to break free of her past and expectations.

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