Category: Lifestyle
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This Birthday, JOMO Replaced FOMO
It was my birthday yesterday. In some ways, it’s hard to believe that I am now 53, in others, it feels like it has taken me bloody ages to get here. The most important part, I suppose, is that where I am, feels right. The kids and a good bunch of friends came over for…
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The Twelve Questions To Ask Yourself Before You Get Married
We go through different phases in our marriage. Sometimes we love each other with the intensity of Jack and Rose in Titanic; sometimes he’s George and I’m Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Normal, right? It didn’t take me long to work out that marriage involves a lot of hard work and luck. There…
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Snoring: First-World Marital Problems In Middle Age
There’s no doubt that there are certain times in a marriage – like right now as the old man’s feelings of disdain and disappointment penetrate the bedroom wall because I am still in bed at 10am on a Saturday morning – that prove more testing than others. But if Trump thinks he’s got problems with…
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‘Making Self-Love Habitual’
‘Self-lovers don’t diet. They eat what they want, when they want, but do so mindfully.’ (Jacinta Tynan, Sydney Morning Herald) Admittedly, I’m still working on the ‘mindful’ part of this comment, but I’ve been doing a lot of research recently about loving yourself and this article – How To Make Self-Love An Instinctual Habit – confirmed to…
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The Eternal Battle of Comfort V Style, And If I Really Have To Get Back Into My Jeans?
Sportsgirl curtains, I mean, culotte pants. DON’T MAKE ME, PLEASE DON’T MAKE ME try to get back into my jeans… I dread this time of year as we approach winter and the weather turns in Sydney, because I have to think about squeezing my lardy-ass back into my jeans. Although currently, we are being lulled…
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Stiffness In Middle Age
Sorry to mislead you with the clickbait of my title, but no, this isn’t a titillating article about the benefits of Viagra in middle age. It is, in fact, a piece on the more boring topic of stiff joints and aching muscles at this stage of our lives. Because it seems to me, that as one…
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Cooking For A Family Of Dietary Heathens
Anyone who is responsible for cooking the evening meal knows what a mindfuck it is. It takes a lot of preparation – you have to remember to defrost, to check you have all the ingredients and that there will be enough food to go around, and if you have kids like mine, one of the…
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Anxiety, Stupidity, And Why The Next Time I Leave The House Will Be In A Casket
After what feels like an interminable period of drought, Sydney has been hampered by the kind of rains we usually only see on Christmas Day, at birthday parties or weddings over the past few days. Unlike my British alter-ego, I have come to enjoy the rain here – a few precious days when I can’t…
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Your Fifties: The Make Or Break Age Where Bad Decisions And Bad Genes Can Catch Up
It is always a shock to hear about the death or illness of celebrities around our own age. While I don’t believe that their lives are more special than mine, it can be hard not to secretly suspect that their barbeque areas aren’t paved with gold. Which was why the passing of Emma Chambers at 53…
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When You Kid Yourself That One Night At The Opera Makes You Cultured
I had steak tonight. It was one of those spontaneous decisions brought on by the anxiety that we’re all going to die soon and I might never taste steak again because I rarely eat red meat these days. I am one of those people that get sucked into the latest health advice about what you…
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Teaching Your Kids The Value Of Money, Hard Work And How Boring It Is To Adult
My father returned to Sydney for the Ashes and took the whole family out to dinner the other night – as in, he paid for all of us, naively telling us that he was going to BEFORE we had ordered from the menu. Like kids in a candy store My kids aren’t used to a…
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Fuck Holidays and Resolutions And Bring Back Routine
Michael Buble took us into Christmas again this year, so I’m going to allow him to take us back out gently and buoy you with optimism for the year ahead with his classic rendition of ‘Feeling Good.’ There was something very anally fulfilling about creating my new January 2018 folder for this month’s blog posts…
LOUISA SIMMONDS 