Singular Scene

So Singular in Each Particular

Itchy Feet

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I have quite a time line. If I look back on the last 25 or so years I can see a recurring pattern that manifests as a regular need to make some kind of fundamental change to my world; just to keep things, well… interesting I guess…

Let me show you what I mean…

1985 – Age 17 – Leave school to embark on an adventure working for ‘the bank’ – the BNZ. Yeah, I was yet to learn about REAL adventure…

1988 – Leave New Zealand for the wilds of the American East Coast… epic. epic adventure including near miss with a very, very dubious church (read cult), the worst job I’ve ever had… exploitation and eventually crossing the Atlantic to the UK and Europe… but this period of 3 years living independently abroad was pretty incredible… the great far outweighed the dreadful.

1991 – Leave Europe and return to New Zealand… and leave small town family home to move to Auckland.

1995 – Leave working in childcare environments and move into the marvellous adventure that is Customer Service which included a move from Auckland to Whangarei.

1999 – Leave New Zealand again this time just to cross the ditch for Sydney and a 3 year course in performance vocals.

2001 – Finish my course and start full time work again, this time as an assistant to a music director.

2004 – World shifted significantly as the MD left suddenly and I was left in limbo until I got rescued with a job as Web Princess in the IT department (cue finding my niche.. woah.. only took 20 years). During this period I took on further study and got my Bachelors Degree.

2009 – Leave my full time job and embark on full time study – which coincided with surviving on full time freelancing as well.

2012 – So, now what?

Yeah, that’s the tricky part… that’s the place I’m in right now… I’m so,so itchy for something new, I can barely sit still. But what? What new thing?

I’m completely happy with the work I’m doing, and the prospect of more study is unappealing, really… and for what? I’m not ruling it out in the future… but for now, I don’t see it. What I CAN see is geographic reorganisation… I could move house… that’s incredibly appealing… leaving the flat after 5 years would be a headache… but I’d be leaving the Naked neighbour – THAT would have to be a good thing.

The zone I’m starting to find myself in is the prospect of leaving Sydney. And this is all at once terrifying and exhilarating… so the questions become… what’s to keep me here? and where could I go?

The ties to Sydney are strong, and all about wonderful friends and people I’ve connected with over the years. But these are all that’s left, really. Once upon a time I’d have never considered leaving my church but discovering God as something/someone way bigger than a building means where I go He goes. The fact that the work I do can be done anywhere is incredibly liberating and makes me feel like, right now, the sky’s the limit. Sydney is gorgeous, I absolutely love it, but I’m starting to think about the fact that there are so many other possibilities… and if I had to outline my top 5… these are them.





Am I actually making plans? No, not yet, but I’m entertaining the idea, and truth to tell, living in one of these places has been a recurring thought for at least the last year – probably longer … so it’s not beyond the realm of possibility for things to change before too long.

However, for now, I’ve a number of projects on the go that will preclude anything happening immediately, but I have to say… flirting with the idea of this kind of change is thrilling… feels like the sky’s the limit…

But, for now… to entertain me while I’m entertaining these thoughts.. tell me.. where would YOU go?

 

Gratuitious Gorilla Photos

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When my Dad and his wife were here visiting we went to Taronga Zoo, it happened to be a really busy day on the harbour (if you know the zoo at all you’ll be aware it sits right on the edge of the beautiful Sydney Harbour) as it was the day that Jessica Watson [her story here] sailed back to Sydney.

Understandably there was a lot of action on the harbour, and above as news helicopters hovered noisily overhead.

It was all a bit much for this precious creature who spent the whole time with her hands over her ears!

As I Went Walking

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I took Thursday off (you know, as you do when you set your own hours). I walked down to Manly, something I’ve not done much of this winter and I took my trustly little CX3 (I probably haven’t told you about that… it’s my new(ish) toy).

I’ll let the results speak for themselves. (Handy tip, if you click on a photo you can scroll through the whole gallery.)














In which I attend a physics lecture. On. Purpose. But get to go to Rockpool as a reward.

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Half a lifetime ago (literally, half my lifetime) I left my little old NZ for the very first time and embarked on what would be a 3 year odyssey of overseas travel and experience.  It was the best of times and it was the worst of times, but not necessarily in that order.

That is to say it was worse before it got better.

The worse was down to the efforts of the family I left NZ to go work for – and rather than tell THAT story, let’s just say, I was naive and innocent and they took advantage of that naivete and innocence.  But rescue after 3 months with these people came at the hand of Nobill and the Chairman, who have been mentioned in pages on this blog before.

Nobill and the Chairman are the salt of the earth kind of people who attended the church I took refuge in to escape my captors and I lived with them for the best part of 8 months while I absorbed American Culture and saved enough money for a round the US trip, which also is also a story for a different day.

In any case, it so happens that Nobill, in the years since I left fair US shores became a Nobel Laureate in the world of Physics – or more precisely Atomic Physics (which, if you’re anything like me, just makes Physics a whole ‘nother level of terrifying) and as a consequence he spends a fair amount of time travelling the world talking to people about Atomic Physics in the form of trapping and cooling atoms to make better atomic clocks.

I know, when you put it like that it doesn’t sound so hard.

When the Chairman told me they were coming to visit and that Nobill was visiting my university to give a talk then of course I had to go hear him! Even if it meant I didn’t understand a word… and so THIS is how I came to tweet “I am at a physics lecture (waits for the laughing to stop). Yes, by choice…”

Actually, as the Chairman had said, “when you see/hear this lecture you’ll come away thinking you actually know what he’s talking about. Until someone asks you a question… and you have nothing to back up what you think you know…”

In any case there was lots of liquid nitrogen illustrating the talk so it looked fantastic and went beyond physics lecture to physics performance…

As Nobill was a guest of the University and I was a guest of Nobill I was invited to join them for dinner after the show – and it happened that dinner was at a rather well known resto called ‘Rockpool’ – only one of the world’s top 100 restuarants bearing lots of stars and hats and the like.

We had the 8 course degustation menu, with the matched wines and it was gorgeous. But I’ll tell you all about that tomorrow.