Why you should quit your job and travel around the world...

Found via @vickiah on a site called The Art of Non-conformity, so who's up for it?

What is dangerous, however, is when delayed gratification becomes an excuse for not living the life you want.

How many people do you know that actually do the things they say they are going to when they reach arbitrary ages of leaving the jobs they have given their lives to? Far more common is the downsizing of dreams along the way.

If you want to play golf all day and take your medication at regular intervals, the 40-year career track plan should work well for you. If you have other ideas or ambitions, though, don’t kill yourself as a slave for the future. Instead, go and figure out where you want to travel and do something about it.

Like Hawaii threw up on my plum pudding

or the 70's...that's how I'm describing this picture taken on Christmas Day. Well I had to do something to entertain myself and what better than an ugly tablecloth, some punch and umbrellas in my drink. Super stylish I know.

I made that pudding myself as well, but that involved hours of recipe research, extensive fruit soaking, a trip to pick up my pudding calico, soaking said calico, making the pudding, fussing about with how much flour was required to be spread on the cloth for skin forming, constructing a complex hanging method so the pudding is neither completely submerged nor not submerged enough...hours of waiting, a complete failure, a do-over, more hours of waiting...and then a week or so of worry before pudding time...but that is a much longer story!

Coasting-it...

Hello dear readers,

I've just returned from a week's respite up on the Central Coast of NSW. This former haven of relaxed beachside living has seen some dramatic changes over the many years my family has holidayed in the area...and most of them aren't that great but here's a collection of thoughts, random of course, but they seemed important at the time, so indulge me...

I miss being 16 but there is no way I would go back

On my numerous beach days I was subjected to the inner most thoughts of the 16-18 year old psyche as numerous groups landed on the beaches around me...ahhh to have a life once more where the controversy of the day was what happened at the formal after party and where one would go for schoolies. As I watch their awkward interactions I realised how most of us deep down are still 16 at heart but also feeling a world away from their cares and worries.

They paved paradise and put up parking lot OR my version of the multinational that swallowed the little guy

This is the story of a local shopping strip, an IGA and the car park that now sits on its site. I won't go into a chorus of 'paving paradise to put up a parking lot' and I will admit, I did enjoy being able to buy my usual yoghurt brand...but surely when Coles moves into your holiday area...it's no longer a small out of the way destination. It's serious urban (coastal?) sprawl. And I'm not sure I like it. I mean, for the people who live there it's probably most convenient to have a Coles open to midnight where you can pick up your Jalna...but will the awful Coles bakery kill the local bakehouse where if you get there after 11am all the sticky buns have been sold but pies are only $2 after 2pm?

What is it with the smiling at people?

Everybody smiles and says hello as you pass them...I'm not complaining, only I think I spoke to more people in the past week than I have in the previous 3 weeks in Sydney. And actually wished them well. Good morning to the man whose campervan blocked the access to my accommodation. Hello pregnant lady with toddler at the ocean pool...hello man fishing on bridge as I ran past you...(you probably thought I was crazy running the lake circuit)...

The smell

And I don't mean a bad one...rather there is something so quintessentially holiday- smelling for me when you get paper-bark mingled with a soft breeze coming over the lake front mixed with the slightly dense humidity when you are just over a row of bushland to the ocean...

Miles of beachfront...no one there...bliss.