Why Is Everything a Subscription?

I have spent the last few weeks trying to cancel subscriptions I didn't even realise I had. At this point, I'm fairly certain I'm financially supporting half the internet.

It starts innocently enough. You buy a program. An app. A streaming service. A photo editor. Makeup. Something that promises to organise/beautify/fix your life, improve your photos, teach you Italian, make you fitter, thinner, smarter or somehow transform you into a better version of yourself.

You click "Buy Now."

What you don't realise is you've actually entered into a lifelong financial relationship. Nothing belongs to you anymore. You don't buy software. You lease it. You don't own music. You rent it. You don't own movies. You subscribe to them.

We've somehow accepted the idea that paying once is old-fashioned.

Now everything politely helps itself to your bank account every month while sending you cheerful little emails thanking you for your continued membership. Membership?

I only wanted to edit one photograph. The worst part is cancelling them. Signing up takes approximately twelve seconds. Cancelling requires an archaeological expedition.

The "Cancel Subscription" button is never on the first page. It's hidden somewhere between "Manage Preferences", "Account Settings", "Privacy Choices" and "We're Sorry To See You Go."

Then comes the guilt. "Would you like to tell us why you're leaving?" Because I don't want to pay you forty-three dollars a month forever, Karen. Then they offer you fifty per cent off. Then seventy per cent off. Then a free month.

It's a bit like breaking up with someone who suddenly becomes the perfect partner the moment you walk out the door. And somehow, they all renew at three o'clock in the morning.

Nobody ever gets an email saying,

"Congratulations! We noticed you haven't used this service in eleven months, so we've cancelled it for you and refunded your money."

No. That would be ridiculous. Instead, they quietly keep collecting money while I continue to forget the app even exists.

The other day I looked through my bank statement and discovered subscriptions I'd completely forgotten about. One was teaching me a language. Based on my progress, I can now confidently order one coffee and ask where the train station is.

For several hundred dollars.

Companies love subscriptions because they're predictable. Consumers hate subscriptions because they're invisible. Twenty dollars here. Nine dollars there. Another fifteen somewhere else. Individually they don't seem like much. Collectively they're funding someone's beach house.

I miss the old days. You walked into a shop. You bought a thing. You owned the thing.

The end.

No monthly fee. No automatic renewal. No reminder in six months that your "introductory offer" has quietly become a premium package.

Maybe I'm just getting old. Or maybe we've all become so used to renting our lives that we've forgotten what it feels like to actually own something.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go and cancel three subscriptions I only remembered while writing this.

Assuming, of course, I can actually find the cancellation button.

Apparently Size Matters...

Yesterday I listed my coffee machine for sale.

Perhaps I should put it into context… We were going out for lunch, so we dressed; I put makeup on, so we are looking good! We start off down the highway and when we are about halfway there, my brother-in-law calls. It seems my call to check the time we were expected caused a catastrophe. My sister went running for the phone, tripped and went down hard on the tiles. So, lunch is out and they are off to the hospital.

We were near JB HIFI when the call came so the Squeeze suggests going in for a look as it is end of tax year sales (June). So, we went in.

We were only in there half an hour tops! Came out, $5500 lighter… Came out with a new TV, Coffee Machine and new Sonos sound bar and a sub. I'm convinced those shops pump some sort of gas through the air-conditioning.

So, there is absolutely nothing wrong with my coffee machine. It makes excellent coffee. Every morning it faithfully delivers caffeine into my bloodstream without complaint. But apparently, we've reached that stage of life where perfectly good possessions are discarded because we've bought something else.

Then came the television.

Not because it's broken. Not because the picture is bad. Not because it catches fire occasionally. No. Because it's only sixty-five inches.

Apparently seventy-five inches would be better.

Now, for context, this television lives in the bedroom. The bedroom. You know... the room where you're supposed to be asleep for roughly a third of your life.

Our current television is so large that if I wake up suddenly, I briefly think I've been admitted to a private cinema. I genuinely don't understand how another ten inches is going to transform our viewing experience. At some point you're no longer watching television. You're being stalked by it.

Men have an extraordinary relationship with size. Cars. Engines. Barbecues. Power tools. If there's a larger version available, somewhere a bloke is already convincing himself he absolutely needs it. Which does not fit with the Squeeze. His weird relationship is technology… He couldn’t care less about Cars. Engines. Barbecues. Power tools. But put him near technology and he is preaching from the handbook!

"It'll be so much better." Will it?

It's the same Netflix. The same football. The same news reminding us that the world is on fire. Just... bigger. The funniest part is trying to sell perfectly good things online. Within minutes someone messages, "What's your lowest price?" I don't know, Karen. What's your highest?

Then someone else asks if I'll deliver it. For free. To the other side of Victoria. Another asks if it's still available, then disappears forever, only to reappear three weeks later asking exactly the same question.

Facebook Marketplace isn't a marketplace. It's a psychological endurance test. I swear it's designed to find out exactly how many stupid questions one person can answer before they snap.

So today I'm saying goodbye to my faithful coffee machine and trying to convince complete strangers that a sixty-five-inch Samsung Frame television is somehow inadequate. Personally, I think it's enormous. But apparently around here...

...it's just not big enough.

And my sister... A broken arm!

Getting Older Is Like Running Windows 95

When I was younger, I imagined getting older would be a graceful process.

You'd become wiser. More patient. More sophisticated. You'd sip wine, read books, and dispense life advice to younger people who'd finally realise how brilliant you were all along.

Turns out, getting older is less like becoming a wise elder and more like trying to run Windows 95 in 2026.

Technically it still works.

It just takes a while to boot up.

Every morning begins with a series of loading screens. Knees first. Then hips. Then lower back. My neck usually joins the conversation somewhere around breakfast.

If I stand up too quickly, my entire operating system freezes while it decides whether today's going to be a good day or whether it's going to throw an unexpected error message.

"Balance.exe has stopped working."

Then there are the updates.

I went to the hairdresser yesterday to get my lovely silver hair back. Instead of silver, it had developed a rather attractive shade somewhere between yellow and swamp water. Apparently it could be the shampoo. Or the water. Which means I now need a shower filter.

A shower filter!

When did washing my hair become a chemistry experiment? Nothing is ever simple anymore. I buy silver shampoo. Now I apparently need a different conditioner. Then a treatment. Then a filter for the shower. By next week I'll probably need a laboratory technician standing beside me with a clipboard.

Every problem seems to generate three more purchases.

I don't remember my mother needing an engineering degree just to wash her hair. Then there's the memory. I can remember the phone number of the boy who sat next to me in primary school. I cannot remember why I've just walked into the laundry. Or where I left my glasses. Usually, they're on top of my head.

I've reached that wonderful stage of life where I spend ten minutes looking for my phone while using the torch on... my phone. The body's no better. Bits of me make noises now. Not painful noises. Just... announcements.

Every time I stand up, my knees sound like someone slowly crushing a packet of barbecue Shapes. Apparently that's normal. So is discussing bowel habits with complete strangers. Nobody warns you about that.

At twenty-five, if someone had told me a conversation about fibre could last forty minutes, I'd have laughed. Now I'm contributing. Enthusiastically.

And passwords.

Sweet Jesus, the passwords. Every website wants a different one. Must contain a capital letter. A number. A symbol. The blood of a unicorn. The tears of your first-born child.

Then they ask you to prove you're not a robot.

At my age, I'm not entirely convinced.

Still, I wouldn't go back. Sure, the software's a bit buggy. Some of the hardware has seen better days. The memory's patchy. The maintenance costs have skyrocketed. But the older version of me worried far too much about things that don't matter.

This version laughs more. Says no more. Knows who her real friends are. And has finally accepted that perfection was never the goal. Besides...

Windows 95 may have been slow... ...but it still got the job done.

And so do I.

😊

Why Does Being Blonde Require a Degree in Chemistry?

I went to the hairdresser today.

Now, when I was younger, going to the hairdresser involved sitting in a chair, chatting about absolutely nothing for an hour, paying an alarming amount of money and leaving looking vaguely the same; just nicer washed locks.

Apparently, those days are over.

These days my hair has opinions.

I want silver.

My hair wants to be a swamp.

Somewhere between the shampoo, the water, the atmosphere and possibly the alignment of Jupiter, my lovely silver hair has developed an unattractive green-yellow tinge. I currently resemble an elderly tennis ball…

Poor Kim (my hairdresser) spent ages trying to rescue it, with first one stripper and then another (not the good kind either)

"It's probably your shampoo. It could be the minerals in your water. You might need a filter."

A filter. Not for drinking (I only drink bottled water). For washing my bloody hair.

I apparently need industrial water treatment just to avoid looking like Shrek's grandmother. Nobody warns you about this when you're young. They didn’t tell me about wrinkles. Or aching knees.

Nobody says, "By the way, your hair may one day react to municipal water supplies."

Every part of ageing seems to become a science experiment. You don't buy shampoo anymore. You buy purple shampoo. Silver shampoo. Clarifying shampoo. Moisturising shampoo. Shampoo that removes minerals. Shampoo that adds minerals. Shampoo that costs more than a decent bottle of wine (and I’d rather have the wine!).

Then someone tells you you're using it too often. Or not often enough. Or you're leaving it on for three minutes instead of four. It's like baking a bloody cake.

And don't get me started on conditioners.

Apparently, one repairs. One protects. One hydrates. One seals. One detoxifies. My hair has a better support team than I do.

The solution now appears to be fitting a water filter to the bathroom. I swear, by the time I reach seventy, I'll have reverse-osmosis plumbing feeding directly into the shower. All because I wanted to look naturally silver.

The irony, of course, is that the hair growing out of my head is naturally silver. Then, it turns into guacamole. Growing old really is fucked. Because every week you discover another body part that requires specialist equipment.

Everyone's Opinion Comes With Entrance Music

I've noticed something strange about the internet.

Nobody simply has an opinion anymore. Every bloody opinion arrives with entrance music.

You know the sort of thing. The metaphorical guitar riff starts playing. Smoke pours across the stage. Fireworks explode. Someone strides confidently towards the keyboard, points dramatically at an invisible enemy and prepares to deliver the hottest take the internet has ever seen.

At least, that's how they imagine it.

Nobody says, "I quite like this movie."

No. It's either the greatest masterpiece ever created or absolute garbage made by talentless idiots who should never work again. Politics is worse. People don't quietly explain why they support a particular policy. They march into the comments section as though they're entering a championship fight.

The crowd cheers.

The crowd boos.

Someone inevitably announces they're "destroying" someone else with facts and logic.

Nobody is destroyed. Everyone is just annoyed. The internet has somehow convinced us that every opinion deserves a dramatic unveiling.

It's all wonderfully theatrical considering most of us are sitting in our pyjamas with a cup of coffee and a biscuit that's gone a bit soft.

The strange thing is that real life doesn't work like this.

You can have a conversation with someone who votes differently, watches different television, barracks for another football team or thinks pineapple belongs on pizza, and somehow the world keeps turning.

Nobody needs theme music.

Nobody needs pyrotechnics.

Sometimes it's enough to simply have an opinion.

Colder Than A Witches Tit…

That is a teenager description, if ever I heard one; but that doesn’t negate the fact that it’s bloody freezing here. 

In fact it’s only 10 degrees but it feels much colder. 

I’m stilll in bed. I think I’ll stay here!

The Entire Internet Thinks It's WWE

I sometimes wonder if we accidentally replaced democracy, conversation and common sense with professional wrestling and nobody noticed.

Not actual wrestling, of course. Real wrestling requires athletic ability, training and a frightening willingness to wear sparkly lycra in public.

I'm talking about the performance. 

Everything online now feels like WWE. 

Every issue has heroes and villains. Every disagreement requires a dramatic entrance. Every opinion must be delivered as though you're standing on the ropes pointing at your enemy while pyrotechnics explode behind you.

Nobody simply disagrees anymore.

You can't say, "I think taxes should be lower." No. You must declare war.  You must inform the internet that the opposing side are either evil communists trying to destroy civilisation or greedy capitalists determined to grind the poor into dust.

There is no middle ground because middle ground doesn't get clicks. The algorithms don't reward sensible. They reward spectacle.

The internet has convinced us that every issue is a championship match, and every conversation is a title fight.

Maybe that's why we're all so tired.

We're living in a world where every day is WrestleMania.

And if there's one thing I've learned, it's this:

When every argument is treated like the main event, eventually nobody can remember what they were fighting about in the first place.

They just know they're supposed to keep booing.

Back To Reality...

Well, the children’s author has gone home.

The guitars have been put away. The pizza has long since been digested. The grandson has blown out the candles on his birthday cake, and the weekend of real conversations, laughter and actual human interaction is over.

Which means it's time to return to the real world.

Not the real real world.

The internet world… The world of followers, algorithms and likes.

It's strange, really. We spend a few days laughing with friends, making memories and having conversations that don't require Wi-Fi, and suddenly it dawns on you how bizarre modern life has become. Because somewhere along the way, we decided that moments only counted if strangers approved of them.

Did you even have a great weekend if you didn't photograph your dinner? Did your grandson really turn five if nobody clicked a heart emoji? Did the guitars actually get played if there isn't a video somewhere proving it?

Apparently not.

The algorithms stand waiting patiently for our return, like needy ex-lovers.

"Where have you been?" "Why haven't you posted?" "Your engagement is down." "People aren't interacting with your content." The algorithms always sound slightly disappointed, as though you've failed some invisible exam.

Well, that is what normal people do. I don’t care about any of that. I blog because I’m an opiniated bitch. I like to voice my scathing attacks on the modern-day human. Have an opinion about the “influencers”; I mean who cares what they think? I see the “influencer” tag to describe someone and I just think “moron”.

We wonder why one article gets five thousand views and another gets five hundred. Who the hell knows or really cares?

We refresh statistics that have absolutely no bearing on our happiness and somehow convince ourselves that they do.

One day I'm thinking, "What a beautiful life. Friends, family, music and pizza. Who needs anything else?" The next day I'm checking visitor numbers before I've even downed a cup of coffee.

Perhaps that's why weekends like this are so important. They remind us that followers aren't friends. Algorithms aren't companions. And likes don't laugh at your jokes, eat your pizza or argue over which song should be played next.

The internet is wonderful. I love writing. I love connecting with readers all over the world. 

But in reality, I’d do it no matter what.

Children’s Author Stayed…

What a fantastic couple of days we had.

My friend Isobelle, who writes young adult books, came to stay with her guy. We only get to see each other every now and then, so it’s always special when we can all get together. There is something wonderful about spending time with people you've known for years. You just pick up where you left off.

Isobelle and I took charge of the important things in life and made the pizzas while having drinks. The smell coming out of the oven was enough to make us all hover around the kitchen like starving seagulls. They tasted even better than they smelled, which is saying something because they smelled magnificent.

Meanwhile, the guys started talking about guitars.

As anyone who lives with a man who owns more guitars than common sense will know, "talking about guitars" is merely Stage One.

Stage Two involves bringing the guitars out.

Stage Three involves discussing pickups, strings and amplifiers in a language nobody else understands.

And Stage Four, naturally, involves playing them.

Before long, our dining room had turned into an impromptu music session. We all threw song suggestions around, although finding the right songs proved harder than expected. Some songs you love listening to just don't work when you're sitting around with acoustic guitars. Still, that hardly mattered. The laughter between songs was every bit as enjoyable as the music itself.

After demolishing far too much pizza and somehow finding room for dessert, we sat drinking, talking, laughing and generally solving none of the world's problems.

And that, I think, is the beauty of nights like these.

Just friends, food, music and conversation. Real life, in all its ordinary glory.

The next morning, they flew back to Brisbane while the Squeeze and I headed up the freeway with my son in the back seat, on our way to my daughter's house for her son's fifth birthday.

One minute you're sitting around with guitars and homemade pizzas, and the next you're watching a small person blow out candles and wondering how on earth five years have gone by so quickly.

All in all, it was one of those weekends that remind you what really matters.

Not followers.

Not likes.

Not algorithms.

Just family, friends, laughter, and enough pizza to feed a small country.

And honestly, I wouldn't swap that for the world. 😊

Children's Author Staying – So I'm Not Blogging 😊

One of my best friends, Isobel, is coming to stay tonight. She's a children's author, young adult mostly. We live in different states; us in Victoria and them in Queensland so I don't get to see her that often. I think the last time was a couple of months ago and I stayed at her place on the Great Ocean Road. Fantastic place to write with a view of the ocean...

She's bringing her guy and so, with the Squeeze, the four of us are going to make pizzas and do that strange thing people used to do before social media.

You know?

Converse.

In the real world.

We probably won't have a phone between us. No social media. No doomscrolling. No arguing with strangers on Facebook. Nothing.

Bliss.

We'll probably have a night of music. Playing it, rather than just listening to it. Pity the only instrument I play is the tambourine. 😊 We have a couple of acoustic guitars, a mandolin, a ukulele, a slide guitar, a cigar box guitar, a Fender Telecaster and a Stratocaster, just to name a few.

And I still can't play a bloody thing.

But I love nights like this.

Because as much as I enjoy writing and social media, nothing beats sitting around with good friends, eating too much, talking rubbish and laughing until your sides hurt.

It certainly beats the Squeeze and I sitting in front of the television every night dreaming of a different life.

Although, to be fair, he's probably dreaming of a life where I don't exist.

Mind you, after twenty five years together, I suspect I've crossed his mind as a murder suspect more than once.

Still, he'll have to keep me.

I know where the guitars are hidden.

The Death Of Embarrassment

I don't know exactly when it happened, but I think embarrassment died sometime around 2015…

There was no funeral. No minute's silence. No flowers.

One day people simply stopped being ashamed of anything and carried on as though this was perfectly normal.

Once upon a time embarrassment was useful. It stopped you from doing stupid things in public. It prevented you from dancing on restaurant tables, filming yourself sobbing after a break-up, or announcing intimate bodily functions to complete strangers.

It acted as society's handbrake.

Not anymore.

These days people record themselves crying and upload it to millions of strangers. Couples broadcast their arguments. Families reveal every scandal. Influencers discuss things with the internet that previous generations wouldn't have discussed with their doctors.

And apparently this is now considered authenticity. I'm old enough to remember when people suffered humiliation in private.

If you tripped over in the street, or at the shopping centre as I did… You got up as quickly as possible and scurried away for checking on the bruises.

Now you end up on Facebook with dramatic music and hundreds of views.

They film themselves having emotional breakdowns. They confess things online that should probably remain between themselves, a close friend and perhaps a licensed therapist. Nothing is off limits anymore.

Births.

Deaths.

Divorces.

Medical procedures.

Family feuds.

The strange thing is that nobody seems embarrassed by any of this.

Meanwhile, I still apologise to mannequins if I bump into them. I whisper when discussing personal matters at the chemist. I still lower my voice when talking about money. And if I accidentally wave back at someone who wasn't waving at me, I spend the next six years considering emigration.

Perhaps I'm showing my age. Or perhaps embarrassment existed for a reason.

Maybe not every thought needs to be shared.

Maybe not every moment needs an audience.

Maybe some things are meant to remain private.

And perhaps civilisation began its decline around the same time people started filming themselves crying for content. Because if aliens landed tomorrow and spent ten minutes on social media, I suspect they'd quietly return to their spaceship and decide humanity wasn't quite ready for first contact.

And honestly, I couldn't blame them.

Why Is Everyone Filming Everything?

Nobody experiences life. We document it for strangers.

I don't know exactly when it happened, but somewhere along the way we stopped experiencing life and started documenting it. Filming it. Apparently nothing happens anymore unless somebody records it.

Nobody just goes to a concert anymore. They record the concert. They hold their phones in the air for two hours filming something they'll never watch again while blocking the view of the poor bastard behind them. Annoying? Well, I've been that poor bastard, so yes. I've also had the pleasure of being the blocker at times. Jon Stevens on Saturday night, for example. But I only filmed a little of it, just so the world would know I was there.

That seems to be the way of it now. People don't go on holidays. They create content. Nobody eats lunch. They photograph lunch. Nobody sees a sunset. They film the sunset. Nobody attends weddings. They spend half the ceremony trying to capture the perfect angle for Instagram while the bride and groom are standing there wondering if anyone actually saw them get married.

My son got married last year and the celebrant asked everyone not to film. They had professional photographers taking millions of fantastic shots that anyone could have later. They simply asked everyone to enjoy the moment. Sans phone, at least for me, was fabulous. Well, it was after I got over the first withdrawal symptoms!

I saw footage recently of people filming fireworks. Fireworks! As though there won't be another lot next year. As though their grandchildren are going to gather around one day and say, "Grandma, please show us that blurry video of New Year's Eve 2024 again."

And don't get me started on people filming complete strangers having meltdowns in supermarkets. Once upon a time you'd quietly think, "Hell, that bloke's having a bad day," and move on. Now everyone whips out a phone and hopes to go viral.

We're no longer participants in our own lives. We're unpaid camera crews. Everything has become content.

Birthdays. Engagements. Car accidents. Marriage proposals. Gender reveals. Funerals. Apparently nothing is allowed to happen unless complete strangers can watch it later. And the strange thing is, I don't think we're even doing it for ourselves anymore. We're doing it for people we don't know. People we'll never meet. People who will scroll past our precious memories in about three seconds before watching a cat fall off a sofa.

Maybe I'm showing my age, but sometimes I think the best memories I have are the ones nobody photographed.

The holidays where nobody carried a phone.

The concerts where everyone sang instead of filmed.

The dinners where we talked instead of taking pictures of our food.

Perhaps memories were never meant to be content.

Perhaps they were just meant to be memories.

The Professional Wrestlingification of Everything

I've come to the conclusion that professional wrestling escaped the ring years ago and quietly took over the rest of society.

Not actual wrestling, of course. Nobody is getting hit over the head with folding chairs in Parliament. Although some days, I'm not entirely convinced that they shouldn’t be…

No, I'm talking about the “spectacle”.

Everything has become bigger. Louder. Angrier. More dramatic.

Nobody simply disagrees anymore. They destroy. They annihilate. They humiliate. Apparently, every argument must end with somebody being body-slammed into oblivion while a cheering crowd waves digital signs in the comment section.

Politics became wrestling years ago.

Then social media joined in.

Then the news.

Then celebrities.

Then influencers.

And now ordinary people seem to have joined the cast. Every opinion requires an entrance. Every disagreement requires a villain. Every discussion needs heroes, betrayals and shocking plot twists.

Even corporations have learned the game. Once upon a time companies sold soap powder. Now they issue statements. They take sides. They apologise. They clarify. They release carefully worded responses to controversies nobody had heard of six hours earlier.

Everything has become theatre. Nothing can simply exist without an audience. If a celebrity breaks up with their partner, we pick teams. If two billionaires have a disagreement, we choose sides. If somebody says something stupid on Twitter, half the internet grabs popcorn while the other half searches for a folding chair.

The strange thing is that professional wrestling has always known exactly what it is.

Entertainment.

That's the joke.

Meanwhile, the rest of us are pretending this endless drama is perfectly normal. Perhaps that's why everyone seems exhausted. We're living inside a twenty-four-hour pay-per-view event. And there are no off-seasons. No wonder people are tired. No wonder everyone is angry. No wonder we're all permanently waiting for the next shocking betrayal, devastating comeback or explosive revelation.

Personally, I miss boring. I miss the days when the most exciting thing that happened was someone forgetting to put the bins out. These days, civilisation apparently collapses three times before lunch.

And somewhere, in the middle of all this madness, common sense is lying unconscious under a folding chair while Karen from Facebook climbs onto the top rope to defend her views on seed oils.

Honestly, if aliens landed tomorrow, they'd probably assume humanity settled its differences through professional wrestling and YouTube comments.

And frankly, I wouldn't blame them... 

So You Want to Become a Professional Wrestler?

I suspect nobody wakes up at six years old and says, “When I grow up, I’d like to wear sequins and jump from ropes, on people.”

And yet, somewhere out there, a young person is watching grown men in tights insult each other before body-slamming one another through a table or chair and thinking, “Yes. That’s the career for me.”

Professional wrestling is fascinating because it might be the only occupation where being loud, dramatic and completely unreasonable is considered a job skill.

And I don't know; I'd say the money is pretty good. I mean look at The Rock...

The first thing you need is a name. You can’t just be Steve from Geelong. No. You need something terrifying. “The Crusher.” “The Executioner.” “The Viper.” Or if you’re over sixty and your knees click when you stand up, perhaps “The Arthritic Menace.” lol and you'd be too scared you'd break something so there is no jumping off the ropes for you!

But, then you need a costume. Normal people wear sensible clothing. Wrestlers apparently raid the reject section of Spotlight and emerge covered in glitter and fake leather and usually, bad hair.

Of course, wrestling isn’t just about athletic ability. It’s about creating a character. A villain. A hero. Someone the crowd loves or someone they desperately want to see punched in the face.

Come to think of it, that’s exactly how politics works these days.

Nobody debates ideas anymore. They create personas. They insult opponents. They perform outrage. Their supporters cheer wildly. Facts are optional. Drama is mandatory.

Perhaps politicians should simply stop pretending and embrace it.

Imagine Question Time with entrance music.

The Prime Minister bursts through the curtain to AC/DC. Which kind of reminds me of when Joan Kirner was premier; she dressed in leathers and sang Joan Jett, I love rock and roll. I think White was on guitar (the Minister for Health)

It was hysterical!!! I loved her for that... Joan Kirner

The Opposition Leader enters riding a Harley-Davidson while smoke cannons explode.

The independents come out carrying steel chairs.

At least we’d all know what we’re watching.

And unlike politics, professional wrestlers have the decency to admit it’s entertainment.

Your Opinion Is Not A Wrestling Personality

I have noticed something rather strange about modern life…

People don't seem to have opinions anymore. They become them.

Once upon a time, you could think pineapple on pizza was an abomination against humanity and still get on with your neighbour who thought it was perfectly acceptable. (I actually think its perfectly acceptable to; but I like heaps of chillis! So Pineapple goes out the window.

Now? Apparently, you must defend your position to hate pineapple, to the death.

Everyone has become a professional wrestler.

Not literally, of course. Nobody is leaping off the top rope in Woolworths. Although give it time…

But we have all developed wrestling personas. There are the heroes. There are the villains. There are the loyal fans. There are catchphrases. And heaven help anyone who wanders into the wrong corner of the internet wearing the wrong colours.

People don't simply disagree anymore.

They issue challenges. They cut promos. They deliver verbal body slams.

They announce that they've "destroyed" somebody with facts and logic, which generally means both parties spent three hours arguing with complete strangers while neglecting to empty the dishwasher.

The strangest part is that nobody is allowed to change their mind. Changing your mind used to be called learning. Now it's considered betrayal. You must remain faithful to your tribe, your team and your chosen champion until the bitter end.

Meanwhile the rest of us are sitting in the cheap seats wondering when having an opinion became a full-time identity. I miss the days when people argued, had a cup of tea and then moved on. Now everyone behaves as though civilisation itself depends upon whether a stranger on Facebook agrees with them.

Honestly, the only thing missing is entrance music, sparkly underwear and a bloke with a folding chair.

Why Is Everyone Filming Everything?

Nobody experiences life. We document it for strangers! I don't know exactly when it happened, but somewhere along the way we stopped experiencing life. Instead, we film it. Nothing happened that isn’t filmed or documented somewhere… If you pull your head back from the phone, you can see what is really looks like! Sigh...

Nobody just goes to a concert anymore. They record the concert. They hold their phones in the air for two hours filming something they'll never watch again while blocking the view of the poor bastard behind them. Annoying? Well, I’ve been that ‘poor bastard’ so yes. I’ve also had the pleasure of being the blocker at times… Jon Stevens on Saturday night, but I only filmed a little of it, just so the world would know I was there.

But that seems to be the way of it now. People don't go on holidays. They create content. Nobody eats lunch. They photograph lunch. Nobody sees a sunset. They film the sunset. Nobody attends weddings. They spend half the ceremony trying to capture the perfect angle for Instagram while the bride and groom are standing there wondering if anyone actually saw them get married.

My son got married last year, and the celebrant asked everyone not to film. They were getting millions of fantastic shots that anyone can have – they just asked everyone to enjoy the moment. Sans phone, at least for me, was fabulous. Well, it was after I got over the first withdrawal symptom!

I saw footage recently of people filming fireworks. Fireworks! As though there won't be another lot next year. As though their grandchildren are going to gather around one day and say, "Grandma, please show us that blurry video of New Year's Eve 2024 again."

And don't get me started on people filming complete strangers having meltdowns in supermarkets. Once upon a time you'd quietly think, "Hell, that bloke's having a bad day," and move on. Now everyone whips out a phone and hopes to go viral.

We're no longer participants in our own lives. We're unpaid camera crews. Everything has become content.

Birthdays. Engagements. Car accidents. Marriage proposals. Gender reveals. Funerals. Apparently, nothing is allowed to happen unless complete strangers can watch it later. And the strange thing is, I don't think we're even doing it for ourselves anymore. We're doing it for people we don't know. People we'll never meet. People who will scroll past our precious memories in about three seconds before watching a cat fall off a sofa.

Maybe I'm showing my age. But sometimes I think the best memories I have are the ones nobody photographed.

The holidays where nobody carried a phone.

The concerts where everyone sang instead of filmed.

The dinners where we talked instead of taking pictures of our food.

Perhaps memories were never meant to be content.

Perhaps they were just meant to be memories.

The Entire Internet Thinks It's WWE

I've come to the conclusion that somewhere along the way, we accidentally turned society into one giant WWE event. Everyone is yelling, everyone is angry and everyone is cutting dramatic speeches. Every disagreement has become a steel cage match. I don't remember signing up for this, but apparently, we're all contestants now.

Social media isn't a conversation anymore. It's Monday Night Raw with Wi-Fi. Nobody simply disagrees. No, they absolutely destroy someone. They obliterate them. They humiliate them. Apparently, careers are ended before breakfast and civilisation itself hangs by a thread every Tuesday afternoon.

The audience loves it. We seem to have convinced ourselves that every issue requires heroes and villains. Good guys. Bad guys. Cheering sections. Catchphrases. All that's missing is entrance music and a bloke with a microphone yelling, "Ladies and gentlemen, weighing in at 220 pounds and representing the Department of Outrage, please welcome Karen from Facebook!"

The news isn't much better. Everything is BREAKING. Everything is EXPLOSIVE. Everything is a BOMBSHELL. You'd think meteors were raining from the sky. Meanwhile, the rest of us are standing in Aldi trying to remember whether we bought toilet paper. Actually, I’m only guessing that paragraph because I don’t watch the news anymore! For that exact reason!

Celebrities are feuding. Influencers are exposing one another. Politicians are body-slamming each other on television. People are cancelling people because someone was offended by someone who was offended by something somebody said six years ago. Honestly, I don't even know who the dickheads are anymore.

At least professional wrestling has the decency to admit it's entertainment. The rest of us pretend we're discussing serious matters while behaving like fans in the front row holding signs and screaming for blood.

We've stopped talking to each other. We've started performing for each other. Every opinion is a promo. Every comment section is a Royal Rumble. Every news cycle is WrestleMania. Somewhere in the middle of all this madness, common sense is lying unconscious under a folding chair while twenty million people argue over who won.

I suspect if aliens landed tomorrow, they'd watch us for ten minutes and conclude that humanity's primary form of government is professional wrestling with smartphones.

And honestly? They wouldn't be entirely wrong.

😁

I have to say, "common sense is lying unconscious under a folding chair" is one of those lines I can absolutely hear in your voice.

Living With A Wrestling Fan

I live with a wrestling fan.

Not just someone who occasionally watches it. No. I mean a proper fan. The sort of man who knows everyone's name, their history, their finishing moves and apparently who betrayed whom back in 1998.

Meanwhile, I am still trying to understand why grown adults in sparkly underpants are throwing each other through tables.

The Squeeze watches wrestling with all the seriousness of a surgeon performing a heart transplant.

"Watch this!" he'll say.

I'm watching.

I have no idea what I'm watching, but I'm watching.

Some bloke with hair down to his waist has entered the ring to music that sounds like the soundtrack to Apocalypse Now (I love the smell of napalm in the morning...) while the crowd loses its collective mind.

Apparently, this is important.

Then another bloke appears and everyone boos.

I ask why.

"He turned heel."

I don't know what that means.

Apparently, he used to be good, but now he's bad. Or he used to be bad, but now he's good. Or he pretended to be good while secretly being bad and now everyone knows. 

Honestly, it sounds less like sport and more like high school. And don't get me started on the names.

The Undertaker.

Stone Cold.

The Rock.

John Cena.

Randy Savage.

These are not names. These are things you'd order from Bunnings.

Then there are the moves.

People are thrown off ladders.

Through tables.

Onto chairs.

Onto other people.

And somehow, they all get up and continue arguing.

Meanwhile, if I sit awkwardly on the couch for twenty minutes, I need to stretch before standing up.

What amazes me most is the commitment. The fans know the storylines are ridiculous. The wrestlers know the storylines are ridiculous. Everyone knows. And yet thousands of people willingly suspend reality for a few hours and cheer like children. Hell, even my grandma loved wrestling! 

Which, when you think about it, is actually rather lovely.

The world is serious enough.

Perhaps there is something comforting about knowing that somewhere, every week, two grown men in sequined underpants are pretending to hate each other while fifty thousand people scream in delight.

And if that makes the Squeeze happy, who am I to judge?

Although I still maintain that if someone hits me with a folding chair, I'm not getting back up. I'm sixty-four. I pull a hamstring putting on my socks.

Politics Has Become Professional Wrestling

I have reached the conclusion that politics is no longer politics.

It's wrestling.

Not actual wrestling, mind you. Nobody is in the ring with Trump, lying on all fours with him. Although, give it time.

No, I'm talking about professional wrestling.

The Squeeze loves wrestling. He watches it with all the seriousness of a man observing open-heart surgery. Meanwhile, I sit there wondering how grown adults can become emotionally invested in two blokes in sequined underpants pretending to hate each other.

Then I turn on the news.

And suddenly it all makes sense.

Politics has become wrestling.

Everybody has a favourite. Everybody has a villain. Nobody changes sides. Facts are optional. Outrage is mandatory. The crowd's chant. The commentators scream. The fans buy merchandise. And every week there is another dramatic comeback, shocking betrayal or feud that absolutely nobody saw coming, except everyone did because it happened three months ago.

The amazing thing is that wrestling fans know it's entertainment. (...although won't admit it unless pushed)

Political fans seem to think it's life and death. Spartan's; in the arena - and the crowd baying for blood.

People no longer discuss policies. They discuss personalities. Nobody asks, "Will this improve the economy?" They ask, "Did you see what he said?" or "Can you believe what she posted?"

At this point, I expect election debates to be sponsored by KFC and settled with folding chairs.

And social media hasn't helped.

The internet has convinced everyone they are either defending democracy itself or fighting evil, depending on which team shirt they are wearing.

Honestly, I think we'd all be happier if politicians entered Parliament with theme music and pyrotechnics. At least then we'd know where we stood.

Because let's face it, politics stopped being boring for some people years ago.

It became entertainment for the brain dead.

And the entertainment became an addiction.

Which explains why half the world is furious before breakfast and the other half is selling T-shirts.

Personally, I'm waiting for the day somebody jumps off the top rope during Question Time.

At this point, I wouldn't even be surprised. 

Nobody Warned Me About The Passwords

When I was younger, I had this vague image of retirement.

I imagined leisurely mornings. More cups of tea. Perhaps the odd crossword puzzle. Maybe even some gardening... Anyone who knows me knows that the plants and I have a very easy relationship. My kitchen is like an indoor forest. It reminds of an old Australian Crawl song... 'the gardens full of furniture, the house is full of plants." Except in my case, my garden's full also!

What nobody warned me about was the passwords.

Sweet Jesus, the passwords.

At sixty-four, I spend half my life trying to prove I am actually me.

Everything requires a password. Banking. Email. Streaming services. Shopping accounts. Government websites. Medical appointments. My fitness watch. The television. The remote thing that controls the garage door. I fully expect the toaster to demand two-factor authentication any day now.

I like my phone, where everything compares me to the thing it has mapped and knows it is me...

Oh but passwords... Heaven help you if you get one wrong. Not only have you entered the wrong password, but now you're locked out because apparently you are a criminal mastermind attempting to infiltrate your own Outlook account.

Then comes the reset process.

First, they send a code to your email. Except you can't get into your email because you've forgotten the password. So they send a code to your phone, which you can't find because you've put it somewhere "safe", which in my house means it has vanished into another dimension.

By the time I finally gain access, I can't even remember what I wanted in the first place.

We used to remember phone numbers; admittedly, they weren't that complex then. I knew everybody's birthdays. I could recite addresses from twenty years ago. Now I have forty-seven passwords and can't remember why I walked into the laundry.

Apparently, this is progress.

And don't get me started on the requirement to have one capital letter, one number, one symbol, one Egyptian hieroglyph and the blood of a virgin just to sign in and check your electricity bill.

Then they helpfully ask if you'd like to save your password. Of course I would. But no. Apparently saving it on one device doesn't mean it will appear on another. That would make life far too simple.

Meanwhile, my mother managed perfectly well with one key and a purse full of twenty-dollar notes.

I don't remember her ever needing a verification code to boil an egg.
Nobody warned me about the passwords.

And if retirement was supposed to be relaxing, somebody forgot to tell the internet.

The NDIS Said No. The Raspberry Jam Said Yes.

At sixty-four, I thought life would be settling down. Instead, it appears I'm reinventing myself. Again. God; I’m so sick of it…

Barwon Health is behind me. The NDIS said no to funding my university course. I found the yummy jam I'm after online. Google knows exactly who I am if you type in "Dating a Hunchback", which frankly is not something I ever expected to put on my resume.

I have somehow written 564 blogs and several books, most of them while working full-time. I have survived 29 brain operations, raised a family, become a grandmother and watched Geelong lose enough football matches to qualify for trauma counselling.

And now I'm investigating digital marketing courses and wondering whether Pinterest can make my sites famous. (Of course, dating a hunchback or Secretwomen haven't leapt in views so perhaps not…)

But still, this is not how I imagined retirement. Not by any stretch of imagination.

Mind you, I never really imagined retirement. I just assumed it involved more glasses of lemon water and fewer passwords. Instead, I spend my days arguing with Outlook, checking blog statistics and ordering raspberry jam directly from the manufacturer because civilisation has apparently collapsed and Woolworths no longer stocks the good stuff, nor Coles!

The funny thing is, despite everything, I'm still making plans. Which tells me something. Perhaps I'm not finished after all.

Perhaps this is simply Act Three. And it had better be a hell of a lot more financial that the first two! And let’s face it, if the first two acts are anything to go by, this one should be interesting.

564 Blogs And Still Annoying People On The Internet

Yesterday I got 268 visitors to my blog.

Now, before anyone starts applauding, let me point out that the day before I had considerably more. In the world of blogging, this means I spent several hours behaving exactly like a share market analyst watching a stock crash.

I checked the statistics repeatedly.

Maybe the counter was broken.

Maybe Google had accidentally disconnected Australia from the internet.

Maybe everyone had collectively decided to go outside and enjoy their lives.

The possibilities were endless.

The strange thing about writing online is that you start out convinced you're writing because you have something to say. Then somewhere along the way you find yourself refreshing analytics at ten o'clock at night wondering why David from Nebraska hasn't read your latest masterpiece about social media, narcissists or the collapse of modern civilisation.

Apparently, my self-worth is now directly tied to a graph. This is probably not healthy. When I started blogging years ago, I didn't even know what analytics were. I wrote things because I got to laugh my ass off. If ten people read them, fantastic. If nobody read them, I still had a laugh writing them – that was my biggest laugh actually.

Now I can tell you exactly how many people visited, where they came from, what they clicked on, how long they stayed and precisely when they got bored and wandered off to watch cat videos.

Knowledge is not always a blessing.

One day you feel like a literary genius because 2,000 people read a post about true crime. The next day only 268 people turn up and suddenly you're convinced your career is over and you'll die alone surrounded by unpublished blog posts and empty coffee cups.

It's ridiculous. The truth is, 268 people is still a lot of people. If 268 people walked into my lounge room and asked me to entertain them, I'd have a nervous breakdown. Yet online we somehow convince ourselves it's not enough.

Human beings are greedy creatures. Give us ten readers and we want a hundred. Give us a hundred and we want a thousand. Give us a thousand and we're disappointed it wasn't two thousand. Nothing is ever enough.

So today I've decided to be grateful for my 268 visitors. Thank you to all 268 of you.

Especially the one person in Brazil who appears to read absolutely everything I write. I don't know who you are, but at this point we're practically family.

The rest of you can lift your game. I'll be checking the stats later. 😏

AI - The Sky Is Falling!

The other night I had a friend over for dinner and as invariably happens, it ends up with a lively debate. She doesn't use AI... Which is probably healthy. But I spend ten minutes asking ChatGPT whether a Facebook miracle cure is bullshit (and 90% are crap!) 

She spends three hours watching cat videos and people fighting in supermarket car parks. Let's not pretend either of us is saving the rainforest. 😊  

The water usage isn’t the argument! But it is with everyone I speak too about AI.  A lot of people see headlines about AI using water and assume that every question is somehow draining a reservoir. The reality is much less dramatic. The environmental impact is real, but it's also part of a much bigger conversation about how we power and cool all the technology we use every day.

The better question is:

"Is the value we get from it worth the resources it consumes?"

That's the same question we ask about agriculture, transport, manufacturing, air conditioning, football stadiums, and just about every modern convenience. All of which uses water.

I’d say the argument should be around people. The number of authors that had their work stolen. Or musicians. Anything creative.

But the really terrifying truth is that in the newspaper yesterday (online) talked of the 80 plus jobs that are/will be defunct thanks to AI. Idiot men, thanks to them, lots of people will be out of work.

It’s okay for the Elon Musk’s of the world! It’s even okay for me who is at the end of my work life! But I think about anyone with young children; and how bleak it must seem.

Yes, AI uses resources. So does Netflix, Google, Facebook, air conditioning, online gaming, and half the things we do every day. The real question is whether the benefit is worth the cost.

Modern Society Rewards Loud Mouthed Narcissists

I’ve started to suspect that modern society doesn’t just tolerate narcissists; it rewards them. In fact, if you gave a narcissist a handbook titled How To Take Over The World, it would probably just be a copy of the latest thing... Think about it.

We now live in a world where confidence is often mistaken for competence. The loudest person in the room is assumed to be the smartest. The person talking constantly about their achievements is seen as successful. The person posting endless photos of themselves staring thoughtfully into the distance apparently possesses wisdom that the rest of us can only dream of.

Meanwhile, the genuinely talented person is sitting quietly in the corner wondering if they should apologise for existing. Social media has poured petrol on this fire.

Once upon a time, being obsessed with yourself was considered a character flaw. Your mother would tell you to stop showing off. Your friends would roll their eyes and tell you to pull your head in. (and those of us in the real world, would still say it)

Now? You can build an entire career from taking photos of yourself in a skin tight tracksuit while holding a smoothie.

The internet has created a system where attention is money, and narcissists are natural-born millionaires. They don't suffer from self-doubt. They don't spend three hours wondering if their email sounded rude. They don't lie awake at 2am replaying a conversation from 1998. (like I do)

They simply wake up every morning convinced they are fabulous; and entitled.

The thing is that narcissists often look successful because they're willing to do things most normal people won't. They'll promote themselves relentlessly. They'll claim expertise they don't have. They'll take credit for group efforts. They'll step over people without losing a second of sleep. Many decent people struggle because they're busy worrying about whether they're inconveniencing someone by existing. (they are the people we won’t kill when we take over the world…)

I've worked with people who could barely operate a stapler but somehow convinced everyone they were strategic visionaries. They spoke in corporate buzzwords, nodded thoughtfully during meetings, and managed to climb organisational ladders like caffeinated possums.

Politics isn't much better…

The danger is that we begin to mistake narcissism for leadership.

Real leadership isn't standing on a stage demanding applause. It isn't posting motivational quotes over photos of yourself. It isn't telling everyone how important you are. Real leadership is usually much quieter.

It's showing up. Doing the work. Taking responsibility when things go wrong.

Most of the genuinely impressive people I've met spend very little time telling you how impressive they are.

The narcissists, however, will happily provide a PowerPoint presentation.

We're constantly being told to build our personal brand, promote ourselves, create content, become influencers, optimise our image and market our lives. At some point we stopped asking whether someone was kind, decent or trustworthy and started asking how many followers they had.

Maybe the real rebels these days aren't the people shouting for attention. Maybe they're the people quietly getting on with life.

Being decent human beings when nobody is watching.

Everyone Has A Journey Now

I swear everyone has a journey these days.

Not a holiday. Not a bad week. Not a phase. A journey.

You can't simply decide to eat more vegetables. No. You are now on a wellness journey. You don't start jogging. You're on a fitness journey. You don't buy a budget planner because you've spent too much money on rubbish from Facebook. You're on a financial journey. (I should be on one of those!)

Everything has become a journey.

Personally, I think most of us are just wandering around lost. I know I am. Just trying to muddle my way through life!

I see people online announcing life-changing transformations because they've spent three days drinking green smoothies and writing affirmations on their phone.

Three days.

I've had colds that lasted longer than some people's personal growth. The internet is full of people explaining how they became enlightened after a weekend retreat involving herbal tea and mindfulness.

Meanwhile, some of us are just trying to remember why we walked into the kitchen.

I particularly enjoy the wellness crowd. Oh and the influencers! Don’t even get me started on being an “influencer”.

Apparently, all my problems can be solved if I purchase a supplement/tonic/bullshit; available for only $29.99 a month plus shipping. Conveniently, they also sell it.

I have reached an age where if somebody says they're on a wellness journey, I immediately assume they're about to try and sell me something.

The reality is that life isn't a journey.

It's mostly a series of unexpected events, wrong turns, forgotten passwords, mystery subscriptions and trying not to fall over while carrying a cup of coffee. Some days you're winning. Some days you're looking for your glasses while they're sitting on your head. And that's okay.

Not everything has to be a journey. Sometimes you're just a person having a Saturday.

Why Is Every Product Is Now A Subscription?

I have spent the last few weeks trying to cancel ridiculous subscriptions I didn't even realise I had. At this point, I am fairly certain I am financially supporting half the internet.

It starts innocently enough.

You buy something online. A program. An app. A service. A thing that promises to organise your life, improve your photos, teach you Italian, make you fitter, thinner, smarter or somehow transform you into a better version of yourself (and I’ve tried them all!)

You click "Buy Now." What you don't realise is you've actually entered into a lifelong financial relationship with some fucker that you can’t get in touch with!

Nothing belongs to you anymore. You don't buy software, music or television. You rent it. Soon I'll be subscribing to socks. For just $14.99 a month, a fresh pair will arrive at your door along with a motivational quote and a reminder that cancelling requires a court order.

The best part is trying to leave. It takes days to track down an email address. Signing up takes approximately six seconds! Cancelling requires the determination of a hostage negotiator.

The button is never where you think it should be. If there is one at all! You click Account. Not there. Settings. Not there. Billing. Still not there. Eventually you're directed to a page that says: "We're sorry to see you go, but your next giraffe is already in the mail, so you'll need to pay for that one first."

No, you're not. If you were sorry, you'd let me leave.

Instead, I'm forced to answer seventeen questions about why I want to cancel. The truth is because I have absolutely no idea who you are and I’ve got 16 bottles of lymph node stuff already! Apparently six months ago I thought your service would change my life. Today I can't even remember what it does, or it was just more crap that didn’t work.

The internet has become a giant collection of tiny monthly payments quietly draining our bank accounts while we sleep.

Five dollars here. Ten dollars there. Seven dollars somewhere else. Before long you're spending enough each month to adopt a small horse.

These days I think the safest approach is simple. If someone offers me a free trial, I run. If someone wants my bank details, I become suspicious. And if something promises to change my life for only $9.99, I immediately start looking for the words "per month" hidden somewhere in microscopic writing at the bottom of the page. I assume it's about to become another subscription I'll spend three weeks trying to cancel.

Because if experience has taught me anything, it's that the internet isn't trying to change my life. It's trying to bill me for it!

Ahhhh - For my next blog, I was thinking: 

How To Stay Away From The Light

A practical guide for people who have had enough medical procedures to qualify as frequent flyers.  :)

Why Nobody Can Just Be Bored Anymore

I was sitting in a waiting room the other day and noticed something strange. Nobody was just doing nothing. Not one person.

There were six people in the room. One was scrolling Facebook. One was watching videos. One was typing furiously into their phone like they were negotiating a peace treaty. Another was listening to something through earbuds. Even the teenager who looked permanently exhausted was still staring at a screen. Nobody was just sitting there.

And it got me thinking. When did boredom become illegal?

When I was a kid, boredom was a normal part of life. You'd sit in the back seat of a car of mum and dad’s old Ford, staring out the window for three hours wondering if sheep ever got bored of looking at other sheep.

You'd lie on the lounge and stare at the ceiling.

You'd wander around the house annoying your mother until she eventually told you to go outside and find something to do. Outside… It is only a concept these days. Probably why they build new subdivisions with no yard and fake grass. You couldn’t even have a pet!

Now the second we experience three seconds of silence; we reach for our phones like they're emergency medical equipment. Waiting in line? Phone. At the supermarket? Phone. Sitting on the toilet? Definitely phone.

Some people can't even watch television anymore without simultaneously scrolling through another screen (Squeeze, I hope you are reading this…) Apparently one source of entertainment is no longer enough. We now require entertainment while we're being entertained.

We've become scared of our own thoughts. The moment our brains aren't occupied, we start looking for stimulation. News. Social media. Videos. Games. Shopping. Anything.

Everything is available instantly. Which sounds wonderful until you realise our brains never get a break. Boredom used to be where creativity lived. Some of the best ideas I've ever had arrived while I was doing absolutely nothing.

Just sitting there. Thinking. But now, we've filled every tiny gap in our day with noise.

Podcasts while driving. Music while walking. Videos while eating. Social media while watching television. Messages while pretending to work.

At some point we stopped leaving room for our brains to wander. And wandering is important. That's where reflection happens. That's where ideas happen. That’s where best sellers are written.