Mummy blogging is dead; long live mummy blogging
Yesterday, Mia Freedman contributed to the media landscape in her usual way of telling other people why everything they are doing is wrong. ‘Mummy blogs are almost over,’ she says. Today, a woman who runs a business that relies on bloggers getting paid came out and
Get a job, na na na na na na na na
This piece relates to what we chat about in Episode 4 of The Anxiety Shut-In Hour. Pop over and have a listen to our extended thoughts (and ranting). The Abbott government loves the idea of “having a go”, doesn’t it? Want
Billie wins Masterchef, Heston’s heart
More than two million Australians tuned in to watch Billie McKay’s coronation as Masterchef Queen, after she pipped runner-up Georgia Barnes in a doozy of a final challenge. With Georgia leading by four points, we welcomed none other than Heston Blumenthal
Are creative people self-centred?
Someone sent me this question on ask.fm: It's interesting that Amanda Palmer is the kind of person of whom people ask this question. There's a certain loadedness to it: you wouldn't say "what do you think about Nelson Mandela?" or "what
Stop risking people’s lives for clicks, please
You might already know from Twitter that about 35 years ago, my dad's dad took his own life. I don't know if dad is thinking about this more than usual, but we've talked about it twice in the past two days. 35 years ago, men were mostly not meant to be depressed. I mean, men are still mostly "not meant" to be depressed. That's a big part of the reason men die by suicide at a rate of more than three times that of women. The stigma surrounding men's mental health is massive, ill-informed and also deadly. Anecdotally, it seems to be improving, at least in people I know. I talk to the men I know about how they're feeling. I'm not sure if this is because I talk so much about how I am feeling, but they sometimes come to me and ask for my support and even advice.
Having a gifted child shouldn’t be aspirational
This bright spark has decided he's not going to call his child "gifted". The fact that his child is apparently not gifted doesn't seem to have factored into this decision, but you know, just in case anyone was wondering, in the event that his child had a brain transplant down the track and became a different child. I have a gifted child. I also have a not-gifted child. So here's your first lesson, Christopher: they are both really smart. Off the charts smart. One is gifted. The other one is just regular smart. Gifted is not "smartest". It's a way to label behavioural traits, to assist with learning development and needs analysis.
When someone gets off the boat
Beware: triggers lurk here. I've never cried at a celebrity death. In fact, I've watched others do it with some disgust, like, Why are you making this about you? I've never read a celebrity's death notice and thought, here is something that affects
What Peaches Geldof did
When it comes to dying of a drug overdose, you can expect to be thought of, postmortem, in one of two ways. Here is a quiz to help you predict the media fallout after your untimely demise: 1. Do you come
When you are only one thing
We each comprise many things: we are people, first, and then perhaps we are people who stand in courtrooms or people who find gum behind chairs or people who carry children on their backs or people who stand in wind
The instillation of fear
Tracey Spicer wrote an article. Yes she did. In her article, she talks about making decisions for her child based on an emotional response. In this case, she would prefer that her child not sit next to a man on a
“Saner heads prevailed.”
In a move that should shock precisely no one, inexplicable TV anchor David "Kochie" Koch has used his place in the public eye to speak insensitively about something he doesn't understand. So out of character, right? It appears that Kochie decided, as