On February 12th 2023, the upper North Island of New Zealand was hit by Cyclone Gabrielle. It was a major event, causing widespread damage and destruction throughout the upper North Island. Bridges and roads were washed away, power and communications infrastructure was destroyed and people were rescued from the roofs of their houses by helicopter as whole towns and suburbs were inundated with floodwaters. Eleven people lost their lives, thousands were displaced and in some areas, the recovery will take years.
Locally, the damage, although significant, was not as extensive as further south. A large slip took out one lane of the main road through the village where I live and, due to flooding, the surrounding roads in every direction became impassable for a couple of days to anyone driving a people mover.
There’s no way I’m taking my Mazda MPV through that.
Hundreds of trees blew over; the power was out for a day at my house and for several days in places nearby where the fix wasn’t quite so simple.
There’s no need to bow.
On our property, we have an old, two-bay, corrugated iron shed that is mostly used for storage. It’s located at a low point and floods on an intermittent basis. As a result, everything stored in there is raised off the ground and last year, after a couple of significant inundations, I constructed a shelving unit along the back wall to lift everything up even higher.
It was lucky I did because, in the cyclone, the water level in the shed rose higher than I’d ever seen it before.
If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.
I had some nervous moments as the rain continued to bucket down throughout the night and I set alarms every couple of hours to get up and check the water level. Beyond the fields next to our property, the land drops away into a river gorge. During the cyclone, the run-off from surrounding farms sent water rushing across these fields. The flooding around our house rose to a point where it also fed into this flow, so that it reached its maximum level early in the night and thankfully, never got to the point where it threatened our house.
I’m sure this is where I parked my tractor.
While the extreme winds continued for another couple of days, the rain had eased off and the water level had dropped a little by the following morning. When I ventured out to inspect the damage in our shed, I discovered the water had, at its highest point, got to within an inch of the bottom shelf of the unit I’d built. As you can see in the image above, the one thing that wasn’t lifted high enough was my cherished beer fridge. In the night, the water had risen above the bottom of the freezer door and into the space where the electric motor is located. By the next day, the water level had dropped enough for me to drag her out of the shed. I suspected she had probably cooled her last beer and that my next job would be to dig a big hole in the backyard and prepare a eulogy, but after leaving her in the sun all day to dry out and with the local power supply finally back on, I plugged her in to see if she still worked, standing back in case there were any sparks and/or explosions. There weren’t. Instead, my trusty girl gave a little shudder as her electric motor kicked in and then began purring away like a happy kitten. I was so excited to hear that sweet hum that I cracked open a lukewarm beer on the spot and chugged it down in celebration.
Now, six weeks later, I’ve got a fridge full of cold beer and, after cutting down the trees that blew over in the backyard, enough firewood to last at least the next two winters. While surviving Cyclone Gabrielle required my wife and I to endure the horror of our kids complaining for twenty-four hours straight about not having a wifi connection, aside from that, we came through almost completely unscathed. Many others were not so lucky. We’re feeling very thankful as a result.
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A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
Feedback from some of the beta readers for my second novel, Staking a Claim, suggested my protagonist, Kate, was too unlikeable. My solution? Why, have her adopt a cat of course! Below is the resulting chapter.
It was raining. A cold front had come pouring up from the Southern Ocean, transforming the dry heat of the afternoon into a steady downpour that pounded a low and vigorous rhythm on the roof, a curtain of droplets sparkling silver in the light from the kitchen window. On the streetside corner of the house, the spouting overflowed, sending a slender waterfall crashing to the ground below.
Kate took her mug of steaming tea and collapsed onto the couch. Corbin sat on an adjacent armchair, watching a DVD. He should’ve been in bed but after the trials of her day, she didn’t have the energy for that battle. Considering it a win that she’d managed to get his pyjamas on, she was hoping he’d eventually fall asleep where he was and save her some trouble. Adjusting the cushion behind her, she leaned back and sipped her tea. The sound of the TV and the rain was comforting. She took another sip, closed her eyes and was wondering whether a short nap might be on the cards when a noise that sounded suspiciously like a doorknock interrupted her brief moment of peace.
What the… She opened a tired eye, wondering if it was her imagination. Who’d be dumb enough to be out on a night like this? It was the kind of thing Evan might do, but Evan was back at his flat in Queenstown. Besides, she had his car. Then the sound came again, more insistent this time, and there was no mistaking it. Muttering under her breath, she perched her mug on the nearest unpacked box and went to answer the door.
There was a figure on the landing but it wasn’t Evan, nor anyone else she recognised. She switched on the outside light but the weather and the corrugated glass panels of the front door obscured what little there was to make out. The only thing she could be sure of was the figure’s colour: a dark, olive green.
“Who’s there?” she asked.
“Tabitha,” said the figure, the reply almost drowned by the rain.
Tabitha? Kate racked her brain. The name was familiar for some reason but she couldn’t attach it to a face.
“From downstairs.”
Ahh, right, my mysterious neighbour. Works shifts, keeps to herself, Kate recalled. Not the night I’d choose to make an acquaintance, but whatever. She opened the door and was greeted by the sight of a short, plump woman covered from head to toe in a long, flowing, rain poncho. The woman’s feet were covered by the poncho’s hem, her face hidden in the shadow of its hood, and she could almost have passed for some demonic minion of the underworld were it not for the incongruous addition of the bedraggled ginger cat she held clutched to her chest. She’d grasped the sodden creature beneath its forelegs, leaving the bottom half of its belly and its back legs dangling. There was an evil gleam in its yellow eyes and Kate took a step backwards.
For a moment, neither woman spoke. Then the cat let out a pitiful meow and Kate remembered her manners. “Would you… like to come in?”
With a nod, Tabitha shuffled across the threshold.
Moving aside to let her pass, Kate closed the door behind her. “Can I take your raincoat?”
Tabitha’s head swivelled while the rest of her stayed in place, giving an uncanny, robotic quality to the movement. “Piddles!” she squawked.
“What?” said Kate, taken aback. “Oh, you mean the cat? You want me to… I’m not quite sure I… err, hold on then, I’ll grab a towel.”
Darting down the hall to the laundry cupboard, Kate returned a moment later with two of her oldest and ugliest towels. She draped one across both arms while Tabitha carefully placed the sopping moggy onto it. Kate squinted, half expecting to feel the pain of a slashing claw, but the creature remained compliant throughout the transfer. “You can hang your coat there.” Kate dipped her head towards a steel hook screwed to the back of the kitchen door.
Tabitha complied, removing the poncho to reveal an outfit consisting of a pair of baggy grey Nike track pants and a matching sweatshirt. The ensemble was well-worn, with the lettering on the sweatshirt cracked and peeled so that it now read ‘U DO IT’. Kate passed her the cat again, then used the other towel to mop up the puddle of water that had collected at Tabitha’s feet.
“Umm,” she said once she’d finished, “I was just having a cuppa. Would you like one?”
Tabitha’s round, pale lips, which had remained expressionless up until that point, broke into something resembling a smile. She nodded.
“I’m having peppermint. Will that do?”
Another nod.
“Right then. Come and sit down.” Kate arranged the towel at the foot of the door to soak up the water leaking from Tabitha’s poncho, then led her into the lounge. “This is my son, Corbin. Corbin, this is Tabitha, our downstairs neighbour. And her cat… Piddles. Say hi.”
“Hi,” said Corbin, sweeping his eyes over the visitors. Then, the appeal of a strange woman and her cat clearly not matching that of a talking steam engine, returned his attention to the TV.
“Here,” said Kate, removing a pile of clothes from the couch and placing them on top of a stack of boxes. For a moment, she thought the tower might topple, but it held fast. As Tabitha lowered herself stiffly into the vacated space, Kate headed back to the kitchen where she flicked the jug on and dropped a teabag into another mug. Tapping her fingers on the bench as she waited for it to boil, she asked, “would you like some honey?”
“No, thanks,” came the reply.
Kate filled the cup and, returning to the lounge, used her feet to guide another unopened box in front of Tabitha. She placed the cup on top and then, retrieving her own mug, settled into her seat at the other end of the couch. “Sorry about the mess.”
“That’s okay,” said Tabitha, her eyes on the curtains covering the sliding door to the balcony, their absent glaze suggesting she could see right through to the storm outside. The cat lay nestled in her lap, her hand moving rhythmically along the length of its back and by degree, the dangerous glint in the creature’s eyes mellowed, moving from murder to mere mistrust.
“So,” Kate ventured, “Piddles, huh? Is that because she—”
“He.”
“Right, he. And does he, you know, ahh—”
“Oh, no, he’s fully house-trained now,” said Tabitha sternly, transferring her gaze to meet Kate’s, “but he was only a few weeks old when I got him. I was going to call him Slayer but… well, you know what kittens are like. Piddles seemed more appropriate.”
Slayer? Kate doubted pursuing that thought would explain Tabitha’s appearance on her doorstep, so decided to get straight to the point instead. “Well, Tabitha, it’s nice to meet you, but I take it you’re not here to borrow a cup of sugar. So what can I do for you?”
Her brows knitting, Tabitha took a sip of tea before answering. “I need to leave town for a while.”
“Err, okay.”
“Tonight.”
“Really? It’s not great weather for driving.”
“No,” said Tabitha matter-of-factly, “it’s not.” Her hand trembled for an instant, slopping hot water over her fingers, but she didn’t seem to notice. “However, I don’t have a choice.” Her expression morphed, becoming familiar somehow. With a start, Kate realised why — as a champion crier herself, she had plenty of personal experience — it was the face of a woman on the verge of tears.
“Are you o—”
“Mum’s had a fall,” Tabitha squeaked. “Broken hip. She’s in hospital.”
“Oh, God, I’m so sorry.”
“Dad’s a mess. Without Mum… he hardly knows how to boil an egg. I have to go.”
“Of course, of course. You poor thing, what terrible news. Is she going to be okay?”
“I don’t know.” Kate looked from her neighbour’s stricken face to her robotic stroking hand and knew what was coming next. “But I need… someone to look after… Piddles.” Tabitha sucked in a shuddering breath. “I was going to put him in the cattery, but he hates it there. He knew something was up as soon as he saw me packing. Ran away. Took an hour to find him.”
“You should have said something. I would’ve helped.”
Tabitha gave a dejected shrug. “I didn’t want to bother you more than necessary. I hate to ask, and if there was anyone else… but since moving here… well, I’ve found it hard to make friends. And you seemed like a nice person.”
Some would disagree. Including myself, at times. “How would you know?”
“Beth said so. And I… kinda watched you move in, through the window, a little bit. It’s clear you love Corbin.”
At the sound of his name, Corbin glanced over. Kate smiled at him. That I do. “Well,” she began, while spying on me between your curtains is a little weird; given the extenuating circumstances… “I’d be glad to mind… Piddles.” Although I might have to come up with a nickname. “How is he around kids? Tabitha?”
“Sorry, I… I’m just so relieved.” Wiping a tear from her eye, Tabitha continued. “To be honest, he’s not spent much time around children, but I’m sure it’ll be fine. He’s a very friendly cat.”
“Is he? That’s good.” From within the folds of his flannelette enclosure, the tabby’s glare remained one of suspicion. Kate couldn’t blame him. She’d have to be wary. In her experience, the first thing a toddler did when faced with any cat was to yank its tail. She could imagine Piddles’ reaction to that.
She sipped her tea in silence, not sure what to say next. Tabitha followed suit. On TV, a train derailed. Thomas came to the rescue, after which The Fat Controller assured him he was a Really Useful Engine. Then, upending her mug, Tabitha downed the remaining contents in one swallow, again proving her resistance to the effects of hot liquids. Maybe she is a robot, thought Kate. “I’d better get going,” said Tabitha, shifting in her seat. “It’s a long drive to Nelson.”
“Nelson?”
“Yeah, why? Is that a problem?”
“No, no, I just… how long do you think you’ll be gone?”
There was that look again. “I don’t know,” Tabitha croaked. “I’ve taken a week off work, but… once I get up there and talk to her doctors, if it’s going to be longer, I… I’ll make some other arrangements.”
“That’s not what I meant,” said Kate earnestly. She felt the comment required an additional gesture of support and, leaning closer, sent skittering fingers in the direction of Tabitha’s knee. But then Piddles cocked his head in her direction and in the paired stares of… what did you even call a person and their cat?Master and companion?Guardian and feline?Parent and pussy?No, not that… she lost her nerve, settling for her own knee instead. “You do whatever you have to do. But this weather… are you sure you don’t want to leave it till morning?”
“No,” said Tabitha, sliding the cat off her lap and onto the couch. Kate recoiled but, while remaining watchful, Piddles made no move to extricate himself from his enclosure. “The sooner I get there,” Tabitha continued, “the better. I doubt I could sleep anyway. And if I start feeling tired, I’ll pull over. It’s amazing what a good power nap can do.” She poked a pale hand into the pocket of her track pants. “Here’s a key to my flat. There’s some food for him in the fridge. And some money to buy more. I’m sorry, fifty’s all I’ve got on me, but if you give me your bank account number, I can—”
Kate gave a dismissive wave. “Don’t be silly, I’m not taking your money.”
“Are you sure? His tastes are rather… particular. He won’t do no Whiskas.”
“Oh, a Gourmet fan, huh?”
“At a stretch. He likes fresh fish. And eye fillet; that’s his favourite.”
This earned a raised eyebrow. Jeez, when was the last time I had eye fillet? Maybe I should take the money. But Tabitha had already slipped it back into her pocket.
Crouching in front of Piddles, Tabitha scratched behind his ear. “Kate’s gonna take good care of you, so you make sure you behave, d’you hear?” In response, Piddles gave a low purr, the gentle rumble only just audible above Ringo Starr’s sultry narration and the thrum of the rain upon the roof. “Momma’s gonna miss you, my beautiful boy.” She sniffled, then with a final scratch, departed for the kitchen.
Following, Kate fired a glance at cat and Corbin on the way, but neither one demonstrated an interest in the other. She exchanged phone numbers with Tabitha before she re-engaged the services of her poncho and Kate opened the door for her to leave. A wall of cool, wet air flowed through, tickling Kate’s nose. Outside, the rain was falling even heavier than on Tabitha’s arrival. The wind had changed direction, and a fierce gust sent a flurry of drops bouncing off the concrete landing and through the doorway. Tabitha swivelled on the dampened threshold, tears welling in her eyes again, then sprang forward and thrust a pair of stumpy but surprisingly strong arms around Kate’s torso. Seconds passed while the water from the still-dripping poncho soaked its way through the fabric of Kate’s top. The moment extended through awkwardness and into the surreal before Kate discovered there was just enough freedom of movement available for her to pat Tabitha on the back in a mildly condescending fashion, hoping she’d take it as a sign to finish squeezing. It took several before Tabitha got the message and, loosening her grip with a dramatic sigh, lifted her head from where it was nuzzled into Kate’s shoulder.
“Thank you. I really appreciate this. I don’t know how I’m going to make it up to you.”
“Oh, it’s no problem,” said Kate stiffly. “After all, what else are neighbours for?”
“Not everyone would be so accommodating. It’ll give me some peace of mind knowing I’ve left Piddles in such capable hands.”
Don’t be too sure. The last pet I had ended up getting flushed down the toilet.
Raising her hood, Tabitha stepped outside. Kate drew the damp folds of her top away from her skin, watching with an uncertain frown as her new neighbour descended the stairs into the rain-slicked night. Maybe it was her imagination, but she thought Tabitha had spent the duration of their friendly embrace breathing a lot harder than was strictly necessary.
As it turns out, my editor doesn’t like this chapter, so I’m going to make some changes as a result. I’m still going to have Kate adopt a cat, but significantly adjust the circumstances around how it happens. However, I’m still curious about this scene as it’s written here. And while I know it’s hard to make a judgement out of context, I’d love to know what you think. Do Kate’s actions in this scene reflect positively on her as a character and help to make her more appealing?Was I (at least somewhat) successful in making my protagonist more likeable? Let me know in the comments.
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A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
These last few weeks have been all about family. I grew up in a household of six children (I’m number five). Only four of us currently live in New Zealand and this Christmas and New Year period was the first time we’ve all been together in the same country in five years.
My sister was visiting from Norfolk Island. If you’ve never heard of it, it’s a tiny rock located in the middle of the South Pacific, approximately halfway between Australia and New Zealand. A former British prison colony, it’s a fascinating place with a colourful history and well worth a visit if you ever get the opportunity.
My youngest brother was over from the UK. He’s one of many whose return to Aotearoa was delayed by the COVID pandemic and it was wonderful to spend some time with him and his family after their extended hiatus. He has two lovely daughters who are of a similar age to our twin boys. Their shared love of swimming, trampolines and video games saw the four of them bond remarkably well and it was a joy to watch them play. One particularly entertaining activity they devised was to view episodes of Teen Titans Go! (if you don’t know it, it’s a cartoon about five superheroes who live together in a T-shaped tower) and then head outside to re-enact them, complete with dialogue and musical numbers.
In today’s episode of Teen Titan’s Go!, the gang ride a dragon!
Like many (all?) families, the Reynolds clan is a dysfunctionally functional one, encompassing a wide range of ideological stances, which means that discussions of politics and religion are generally best avoided. We’re not as young as we once were and the conversational topic du jour seemed to be our respective medical conditions. Still, I like to think that, like fine wines, at least our inner qualities have improved with age. As a sign of this maturity, I finally apologised to my youngest brother for the merciless bullying I subjected him to as we were growing up (to be fair, I was only mimicking the punishment that my older brothers bestowed upon me) and while we laughed it off, I think deep down he genuinely appreciated the gesture.
I drove him and his family to the airport yesterday day for their return flight to the UK. We’re hoping it won’t be another five years until we see each other in person again, but if it is, at least we’ll have lots to talk about. By that time, our list of medical conditions will be pages long.
Did you catch up with any long-lost loved ones over the holiday season? Let me know in the comments.
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A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
As I write this, it’s the first day of the summer school holidays and boy, am I glad to be able to say that. It’s been a gruelling year. 2020 and 2021 were challenging enough, but even without the disruption of COVID lockdowns, 2022 has provided its own special brand of crazy.
To put the cherry on top, the silly season is now in full swing at our house. I enjoy Christmas, but I prefer the celebrations to start at about 7:00 pm on December 24th and finish approximately 24 hours later. My wife, on the other hand, goes a little bit nutty at this time of year. I arrived home from work on December 1st to find our kids putting the final touches on the tree and Wham!’s Last Christmas blasting from the stereo (and yes, the exclamation mark is part of their band name, which makes punctuation a challenge).
“Oh, God,” I groaned, “please don’t tell me we have to listen to this every day for the next month.”
“What’s that, Grinchy?” she replied. “I can’t hear you over the music.”
The next morning, I woke up to discover these three naughty boys had been up all night playing video games. I’m pretty sure the one in the middle is the ringleader; he’s the silliest of all!
The other thing I discovered this week was the songs I’ve listened to the most throughout 2022. It’s the season of ‘Spotify Wrapped’ and this year, I’ve somehow managed to avoid having the algorithm contaminated by my children’s penchant for songs about bodily functions and video games and the resulting playlist is pretty good. I do have reservations about a big tech company knowing such intimate details about my personal listening habits, but I also find the information fascinating. According to Spotify, I’ve listened to 6,286 minutes of music this year, which is more than 43% of Spotify users in Aotearoa. The artist I listened to most wasLCD Sound System and my most popular song was their release, Someone Great, which I played 11 times.
This pales in comparison to my wife, who has spent an incredible 72,928 minutes (more than fifty days) listening to Spotify this year, putting her in the top 4% of Kiwi listeners. Her musical taste is poppier than mine and so her most popular artist was Kylie Minogue. The song she listened to the most was not, amazingly enough, Last Christmas, but rather Kylie Minogue’s A Second to Midnight, which she played a whopping 150 times! Typically, she did NOT manage to avoid having her algorithm contaminated by the musical selections of our children, so amongst all the love songs from pop icons in her top 100 playlist, there’s a generous serving of tracks about video games and bodily functions.
Musical taste is highly subjective and I won’t flatter myself by imagining there’s anyone on the planet who’d want to listen to my 2022 Spotify Wrapped playlist more than me, but if you’re a fan of indie rock, there could well be some tunes on it you’d enjoy. If you’re curious, here it is:
If you’re a Spotify subscriber, let me know in the comments what your top artists and tracks for 2022 were.
FREE BOOK!
A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
This book was suggested to me by one of my subscribers, Tom. Thank you, Tom, for your suggestion. It’s a romantic comedy about a recently divorced romance writer called Jillian Grayson and her developing relationship with her son Rob’s best friend, Brian Nash.
Jillian has done well in her writing career. She owns a nice house with a swimming pool and a tennis court. She first meets Brian when Rob brings him home from college to stay for Spring Break. When Rob heads out, leaving his mum and best bud at home, Jillian and Brian play tennis. They also go swimming. It turns out Brian loves swimming and tennis just as much as Jillian and despite their age difference, an intense mutual attraction soon develops.
Initially, for Rob’s sake, they attempt to keep a lid on their feelings for each other. This proves to be a challenge and Jillian’s best friend, Victoria (who also likes to swim), doesn’t make it any easier. Victoria doesn’t seem to serve much purpose other than being brain candy and the sexually liberated foil to our sexually frustrated protagonist, but with her encouragement, Jillian and Brian strike a deal to become somewhat more than just friends. Soon after, their physical play moves from the tennis court and into the bedroom.
The blurb says it’s a laugh-out-loud comedy. I’ve learned that whenever a book blurb makes this claim, it pays not to believe it. This isn’t because I’m a curmudgeon — it’s because laughter is a social behaviour, while reading isn’t. Like yawning, laughter is infectious and it’s easy to laugh when you’re in the company of others. When you’re on your own, it’s much harder. I love reading comedy, but any author who can elicit an out-loud-laugh from me is doing very well indeed. I treasure the few that can.
Based on my reading of Friends with Partial Benefits, Luke Young is not one of them. That doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it. It’s easy to read, chugs along at a steady pace and there are some genuinely amusing moments in the story, amongst all the swimming and tennis. There’s also a fair whack of sex, and some of that sex gets pretty steamy. Intriguingly, Young has written an expanded version of the book, under a pseudonym and with a different title, with even more (and more explicit) sex scenes. I haven’t read it so can’t vouch as to whether it makes for an improved reading experience. As an author, it seems a little like cheating to me but I guess it’s one way of getting more bang for your buck.
As an aside, in writing this post I did a little browsing to find a suitable image to go with it. The picture below is what you get when you combine ‘tennis’ with ‘sex’ as image search terms.
I get the ping-pong paddle (although God only knows why you’d hold it in this position — perhaps she’s trying to suppress a fart), but what is with the bikini and jandals (flip-flops, for those unfamiliar with the Kiwi vernacular)? I assume she’s supposed to be at the beach, but have you ever tried playing ping-pong at the beach? I don’t recommend it. In a stiff onshore breeze, the ball swirls around all over the place.
Anyway, if you’re the kind of person who’s into sweat, both of the John McEnroe-related and bedroom variety, then Friends with Partial Benefits could be right up your alley. There are also several sequels featuring the same cast of characters, so if you do like it, there’s plenty more to whet your appetite with.
Have you read Friends with Partial Benefits, by Luke Young, or any of his otherbooks? Let me know in the comments.
FREE BOOK!
A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
This last week has been notable for the passing of two somewhat momentous occasions. The first of these was my daughter’s twelfth birthday. I’m writing this post from a room strung with a multi-coloured array of mylar and latex party balloons. There would have been more of them but for the fact that we’re currently suffering a global helium shortage, exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine war, and so there was a limit of two per customer at the party store. Apparently, Russia is one of the world’s top helium suppliers. Who knew?
To be honest, there was a part of me that was glad about that, because as I was blowing up balloons the day before her birthday I couldn’t help thinking what a waste it was that they were all going to end up in landfill in a few day’s time. I kept these thoughts to myself because my daughter loves decorations and was super excited about waking up in the morning a whole year older than she was when she went to bed. She already thinks I’m Chief Sargeant of the Fun Police because I won’t buy her a smartphone. There’d be tantrums if I told her she couldn’t have any balloons on her birthday.
The other momentous occasion of the past week is a little more sombre: the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. I was driving to work when I found out. I switched on the radio and the Prime Minister was speaking about the time when she gave the Queen a gift of a framed photo taken of her younger self when she was touring New Zealand in the 1950s. That’s weird, I thought, why on earth would the Prime Minister be talking about the Queen on national radio? Then it clicked. Responsible driver that I am, rather than texting my wife myself, I told Siri to. What did I want to say? Siri asked. “I think the Queen is dead”. “Whaaaaat?” came the reply, and then a few minutes later the radio discussion confirmed my suspicions.
“How do you know it’s wax? Looks pretty real to me. ‘Specially those eyes. S’like she can see right into m’soul.”
I knew straight away it was going to be one of those ‘what were you doing when you heard such and such had happened’ moments.When I first heard Kurt Cobain had died, I was walking back to my flat after purchasing a three-pack of sports socks at the nearest department store. Listening to the radio while driving to work is on par with that in terms of excitement levels, so when I tell my grandchildren the story I think I’ll spice it up a little. I’ve come up with three options:
I was riding a motorcycle upside down inside a steel globe that had been set on fiyaaah.
I was fending off a great white shark which had attacked me while I was attempting to break the world free-diving record off the coast of Costa Rica.
I was playing the accordion and eating a spicy shrimp gumbo while wrestling alligators in a Louisiana bayou (or, alternatively, playing the accordion and eating alligator gumbo while wrestling shrimp in a Louisiana bayou).
They’re all infinitely more impressive than the truth, but which do you think sounds the best?
I’m no royalist by any means, but I can honestly say I was a little bit sad when I heard the news. Counting the volume of blood spilt in the name of British imperialism would be enough to make anyone cry but it was nothing to do with that and anyway, I’m not sure you can blame the Queen for the historical actions of her countrymen. One can get cynical about these things but by all accounts, she was a pretty decent woman who did her best to make a positive impact on the world while trying to cope with a dysfunctional family, just like most of us.
On a related note, given the general atmosphere of the times, I decided it had been far too long since I’d listened to The Smiths’ seminal 1986 album, The Queen is Dead. As a typically awkward teenager, The Smiths were on high rotate through my headphones in the early to mid nineties, but it’s been ages since I listened to a whole album from beginning to end. So I dialed it up on Spotify and blasted it on the drive home from work. Boy, it’s a cracker of an album, especially the second half. It brought back some wonderful memories and when I got home, I almost wanted to go straight to bed and cry myself to sleep, just like I used to when I was seventeen. Here’s the title track, live at the University of Salford from back in the days when Morrissey was fun. What a great gig this must’ve been.
What were you doing when you heard the Queen had died? Let me know in the comments (if it’s interesting, that is; otherwise, you can keep it to yourself).
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A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
A review of The Protector (Men of the North Book 1), by Elin Peer.
I finally got around to reading this after it was recommended to me by one of my subscribers, Erica. Thank you, Erica, for your suggestion.
I enjoyed it. Not as much as Erica, I think, but it was a fun read. It’s set 400 years in the future, where some kind of apocalyptic war has resulted in a North America divided into two distinctly different countries. How’s that any different from now, you may ask? Well, in the old United States, south of the Canadian border, lives a futuristic matriarchal society, run by and populated mostly by women. North of the border (including Alaska) is a feudal patriarchal society, populated almost entirely by handsome, burly men with long hair and beards. What’s not to like about that?
Trade between the two countries is highly restricted, and the movement of people across the walled border even more so. So when the ‘Men of the Northlands’ ask for the South’s help in excavating a recently discovered archaeological site, the request comes as a surprise. The South’s decision to send Christina Sanders, a female archaeologist, is even more of a surprise for the men and results in confusion and a gladiatorial competition to find her a bodyguard to protect her from the threat of hormonal, hairy men as she goes about her work. Unbeknownst to Christina, the ceremony that crowns her ‘Protector’ is actually a wedding and the man who wins the competition will become her husband! Will the winner be Alexander Boulder (great name), the handsome, burly, bearded man that has Christina all hot under the collar? Or will it be his opponent, another musclebound yet less hirsute ogre, his villainous nature and lack of moral fibre indicated by close-cropped hair and a smoothly-shaven chin?
Sounds ridiculous? You betcha! So it’s probably no surprise that there are elements of the world-building that don’t stand up to close scrutiny (not the least of which is the fantastical ratio of men to women in the Northlands). Some might also find the implications of the gender politics disturbing, but it would be a mistake to take them too seriously. Peer certainly doesn’t. This is a story fuelled by silliness; just switch your brain off and enjoy the ride.
There’s also a healthy dose of sex. Despite all the ice and snow, Alexander really struggles to keep his shirt on. It’s all too much for the repressed Christina and her feminist sensibilities. She has a sexbot back home in the Motherlands, but it seems nothing compares to the real thing. Boulder may be a beast, but he’s a damn sexy one.
Peer is no Jane Austen and there’s no great art to her writing style. But if you like your romance steamy and you’re prepared to suspend your disbelief (like, seriously), the characters are fun and the story is an entertaining one. And, as Book 1 of the Men of the North series, there’s plenty more to follow up with.
Have you read The Protector, by Elin Peer, or any of her otherbooks? Let me know in the comments.
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A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
I’m pleased to announce that my second novel, Staking a Claim, is finally ready to go to my editor. She has a list of works in the queue to get through first so I’m not sure when she’ll be done with it, but what it does mean is that I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel and I can get on with working on the next book, whatever it turns out to be. After the two years it took to write my first novel, I was optimistic I could finish the second one in a shorter time frame. As it turns out, that hasn’t been the case and almost three years have passed since Taking the Plunge was published.
There are multiple reasons why it’s taken so long, not the least of which was I kept falling asleep while working on it. I don’t have a home office, or even a desk, so I’d get up early every morning before work to sit on the couch and write with my laptop resting, funnily enough, in my lap. With a cup of coffee on the bookshelf next to me, it was the perfect setup, cosy and comfortable, and it worked well for my first book. However, it was clearly too cosy and comfortable because the second time round, day after day, more often than not, I’d fall asleep. Writing a book while asleep is very difficult, hence my progress was considerably impeded.
A few weeks ago, after months of struggling to stop myself from sleeping on the job, I finally arrived at a simple solution. It’s so simple that I don’t know why I didn’t figure it out a couple of years ago, but there you have it; life’s like that sometimes. My solution was to move my writing setup from our cosy couch to our ancient dining room table with its petrified and bum-numbing wooden chairs. When I say ‘petrified’, I’m not exaggerating; sitting on one of our dining chairs is literally akin to sitting on a slab of rock.
Here’s the dining room. A little minimalistic, perhaps, but the view more than makes up for it.
I still do nod off occasionally but, unlike the couch, where I can easily fall asleep and wake up an hour later, our dining chairs are not conducive to prolonged snoozing and after a few moments, my subconscious brain tends to snap me awake with the warning that if I sit still for much longer, I’ll be so stiff there’s every chance I’ll never move again.
And if that doesn’t work…
The result has been much-improved progress over the last few weeks and I’m feeling more optimistic about my writing. It helps that we’re through the worst of winter. It’s my least favourite season and the lack of sunshine always takes a toll on my mood. Now we’ve got daffodils blooming in the garden and there were at least one day last week where it didn’t rain, so things are looking up. Roll on, Spring.
FREE BOOK!
A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
A review of Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording and Discording with Wilco, Etc. by Jeff Tweedy
I’m partial to the occasional rock star biography, so when I saw Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back), by Jeff Tweedy,the lead singer and songwriter of Wilco, one of my all-time favourite bands, amongst the pile of books for sale at the 2019 Auckland Writers Festival, I snapped it up.
There’s no guarantee that just because you can write great songs, you can write great books, but on this occasion, Tweedy manages it. As is usual with rock star biographies, some space is devoted to exploring the personality conflicts between bandmates, but there’s a warmth and humility to the writing that is atypical for the genre. There’s no braggadocio to these anecdotes, nor does Tweedy have any axes to grind. He’s happy to admit that he only got to where he is today with the assistance of others, most notably his family. The book includes a couple of transcribed conversations with his wife and children which provide an authentic insight into their family dynamic. It’s a little gimmicky, perhaps, but it works. It also delves into Tweedy’s struggles with mental health, drugs, and addiction in a way that is refreshingly honest.
What I most enjoyed about the book was the personal exploration of both Tweedy’s dedication to songwriting (he tries to write a song every day), and his songwriting process. Tweedy’s lyrics are often open to interpretation, and it’s no wonder when one of the lyric writing exercises he uses is to take a list of random verbs and another list of random nouns and then pair them up. “It might start as gibberish,” he says, “but it’s amazing how hard it is to put words next to each other without some meaning being generated.” Inclined to agree, I thought I’d try it out. Here’s the list I came up with (I swear these were the first words that popped into my head):
Nouns Chicken Refrigerator Tractor Laptop Children
Verbs Run Fry Smoke Swim Love
And here’s the resulting ‘lyric’. Appropriately, for a verse inspired by Jeff Tweedy, I can hear it as an Alt-Country song called something along the lines of The Modern Farmer.
Hangry Laptop fried and tractor smoking, I run inside and scan the refrigerator. It’s empty. Aside from a lone chicken wing, Swimming in brown sauce. I love my children But man, can they eat.
Anyway, back to the book. If you’re a Wilco fan, then I highly recommend it. If you’ve never heard of Wilco but like rock star biographies, you might enjoy it too. Then go listen to some Wilco. They’re awesome.
Are you a Wilco fan? Do you like rock-star biographies? Read any good ones lately? Let me know in the comments.
FREE BOOK!
A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
This past weekend I mostly finished the all-consuming DIY project I’ve been working on over the last couple of months. I wish I could say it was something exciting like a new BBQ area with a swimming pool, jacuzzi, and a wood-fired pizza oven, but the reality is we’ve just redecorated the three least exciting spaces in the house: the toilet, the hallway and the laundry.
There’s nothing like a good DIY project to test the strength of your relationship with your significant other.
Still, despite the everyday mundanity of the spaces, there are few things in life better than that warm, happy feeling of satisfaction you get on completing a substantial DIY project, especially when it all comes together without any major cock-ups along the way. There were a couple of minor cock-ups (more about that later), but I managed to get this project done without losing any of my fingers, electrocuting anyone, falling off any ladders or putting any holes in walls, floors, or ceilings that I didn’t intend on being there.
The new multipurpose front loader from Bosch. It both washes your clothes and stores all your shit.
The bulk of the job was painting, which, although time-consuming, is pretty straightforward, and with most of the house having already been repainted since we moved in, my wife and I are well-practised. Less straightforward was my plan to install a new attic ladder in the hallway, a new cistern in the toilet, and a new tub, bench and cabinetry in the laundry. I can’t say I completed these parts of the project without any profanity, but overall, everything went remarkably smoothly, especially the attic ladder, which I was worried about, having never installed one before. But it went in almost without a hitch, and now we have a space other than our mouse, rat, and possum-infested shed in which to store some of the junk that has accumulated over the years in our household of five.
Stairway to Heaven (or at least a place with fewer rodents).
The most unpleasant part of the job was removing the ‘popcorn’ texture from the ceiling in the hallway. I don’t know why this technique ever became popular in the first place as it’s just a magnet for dirt, grime, and fly-shit and it’s impossible to keep clean. I watched a couple of YouTube videos to see how to do it – spray some water on and it just glides off with a scraper – but our ceiling had at least two coats of paint applied over the texture so there was no gliding. Scraping it off took serious elbow grease and my arms were aching after only a few minutes.
After I’d completed half the job (and taken a break for about a month) someone suggested the bright idea of using an electric sander to take the paint off the highest points of the popcorn. This allowed the water to soak in and made it much easier to scrape the rest of the texture off, but it was still a horrible job. I got covered in pale, plastery goo and looked like an extra-large baby had just thrown up all over me. It’s the kind of job that would be perfect for a teenage child who’s going through one of those phases which makes them difficult to like. You could tell them you’ve given them the job so they can learn responsibility and the value of hard work when really you would be punishing them for being rude and unpleasant. My own children, although perfectly capable of being stroppy and obnoxious when the mood strikes them, aren’t quite old enough to have lost their ‘cuteness factor’ (nor are they yet tall enough to reach the ceiling), so unfortunately it was left up to me. However, we still have to repaint the living room (which has the same textured ceiling) at some stage, so I’m thinking I’ll give it a year or three and then pass on the baton.
My biggest concern of the entire project was cutting the hole out of the bamboo benchtop for the laundry sink. I was optimistic I could do it, having done the same job when we installed a new kitchen several years ago after we first moved in, but being a $500 piece of wood, it wasn’t something I could afford to get wrong. At 35mm thick (that’s about 1 and a 1/2 inches for you imperialists out there), it’s also not the kind of thing my $20 bargain bin jigsaw is designed to cut, and there were several times during the extended process (with my entire body vibrating as I gripped the jigsaw; with coils of smoke curling up from the blade as it slowly burned as much as cut its way through the wood; with spatters of rain falling on my shoulders and one eye on the horizon where a bank of charcoal clouds was rolling in and promising to dump water all over my electricity supply) where I was sorely tempted to give up.
The reason I didn’t was that I wasn’t sure what the alternative was (heading into town to buy a better jigsaw or paying a professional to do the job seemed both time-consuming and unnecessarily expensive options) and because, as painful and slow as the progress I was making was, it was still progress. In the end, it took about forty minutes to make the cut and I was able to finish, get the benchtop in place and pack up my electrical gear just before the rain started pouring down. I also managed to tick a present off my Christmas list – with a bit of work, the piece of wood that came out of the hole will make a great chopping board.
I balanced the success of this part of the project by making a right cock-up of the next thing I attempted. This resulted in an explosion of profanity, directed at myself. When I showed my wife what I’d done I’m sure she wanted to call me names as well, but since I’d already made such a good job of it I think she felt sorry for me and her response was remarkably mild. See if you can pick out my error in the picture below.
Move along – nothing to see here.
As you can tell, I’ve tried to disguise it, but when my brother came to visit on Saturday and I showed him my handiwork, the first thing he said to me was, “Did you drill the holes for the pantry handle on the wrong side of the door?”
“Yes,” I said, “yes I did.” Bastard, bastard, bastard, I thought.
“Did you do that before you assembled the cabinet?” he added, clearly unable to comprehend how anyone could do something so stupid.
“No,” I said, “I just absent-mindedly drilled them in the wrong place.” I didn’t tell him I was humming to myself with the joy of a job well done while I was doing it.
“Pity,” he ended with, “otherwise it looks good.”
“Thanks,” I said lamely, because what else could I say?
With all that extra storage space, our new washing machine need only serve a single purpose.
The project’s not quite finished. You’ll notice the absence of a washing machine. This is because – Murphy’s Law – our front-loader started making an unholy racket a few days ago and I’ve taken it into the repair shop to see what the problem is. Until it’s either repaired or we purchase a new one, we’re using Nana’s laundry service instead.
This is why I love DIY! Not only do you get that feeling of satisfaction that comes at the completion of a project, you get all the entertainment value it provides along the way.
Do you love DIY? If so, why? Let me know in the comments.
FREE BOOK!
A gritty and engaging story of human faults, fears, and frailty, What Friends Are For is the prequel short story to my tragicomic novel, Taking the Plunge. Introduce yourself to the characters from the novel and find out where it all begins for Kate, Tracy, Evan and Lawrence.
