Writers
Susan Grimsdell
After retiring from audiology some years ago, Susan’s finding life’s pretty good with lots of time to do what she likes. That includes walking, reading, having coffee with friends, and a bit of activism thrown in. Also, day by day doing her best not to worry too much over the many threats to our gorgeous planet.
Read Susan’s Blog
Trevor Plumbly
Meet Trevor. He’s had quite a colourful career, from his early days as a pub manager in Tunbridge Wells he went on to become Dunedin’s leading auctioneer. Trevor is a published author and was something of a TV personality in the 1980s as a regular panellist on a show about antiques.
Read Trevor’s Blog
Emily Smart
Emily is very loud, and has really bad taste in cheesy pop music. When not at work flogging goods to the public via advertising and marketing campaigns, she can be found hiding from her partner and children at the local pub. If you’re easily offended or don’t appreciate the constant use of profanities, then you probably shouldn’t read Emily’s posts. You have been warned!
Read Emily’s Blog
Angela Caldin
Angela has had many roles in her life including: schoolgirl, student, daughter, friend, civil servant, wife, lover, mother, manager, magistrate, landlady, teacher, grandmother, blogger, editor and proofreader.
Read Angela’s Blog
The latest
The eyes have it! By Trevor Plumbly
Dirty politics This month will see me reach my 80th birthday. It is, for me, a time to reflect on my place in the scheme of things. What’s concerning me is that the ‘we know best’ lobby won’t give up, and I reckon they’ve been shoving campaign leaflets in my letter box. As a result, someone in the family must have found something like the ‘How to be a happy blindy’ app and suggested that my path to contentment lay in getting out and about more. I wasn’t present when the vote… Read More
Dangling modifiers by Angela Caldin
Most people know a modifier when they see one. A modifier is a word, phrase, or clause that clarifies or describes another word, phrase, or clause. But do they know a dangling modifier when they see one? I like the term dangling modifier because it is so evocative and so unlike any other grammatical term. I imagine someone hanging off a cliff or escaping by clinging on to a window sill. With a dangling modifier, the thing it is meant to modify isn’t even in the sentence, so it seems to modify… Read More
The source of happiness by Susan Grimsdell
We’re living in an age of self-fulfilment, finding ourselves, getting to our inner selves, mindfulness, meditation, all about looking deep into ourselves to find happiness. Self, self, self. Ancient values When I was a kid, we had no idea who we were or what we were all about – such notions never entered our heads. It was drummed into us that we didn’t matter, other people mattered – don’t be selfish, stop thinking of yourself, share your toys, share your lollies, children should be seen and not heard, don’t talk about yourself… Read More
Getting the message by Trevor Plumbly
We all strike moments when we doubt our intellect and I had one the other day. I was listening to the radio and this bloke, a Prof of some sort, was explaining the inner meaning of Bob Dylan’s lyrics. Dylan was pretty deep but this bloke was even deeper! Dissecting the great man’s thoughts like an emotional coroner, he left me verbally stranded after about five minutes, but what I did catch left me gobsmacked by his grasp of the unspoken. He shamed me into thinking that, by taking the piss all… Read More
The tale of the sealion and the shark by Susan Grimsdell
Recently a sealion was bitten by a great white shark and lived to tell the tale. Well, the sealion didn’t tell it, a reporter did. A feel-good story The tone of the news story was very upbeat – a happy story told entirely from the perspective of the sealion. If it had been told from the shark’s perspective it would have been quite different. Perhaps it might have been told like this: “There has been an unprecedented and alarming increase in the risk of extinction of great white sharks. According to “Nature”… Read More
The Writers
We’re four Brits who made the big move from the UK to the other side of the world. We love New Zealand, the English language having a good laugh and the occasional moan. Ah, just read our posts and you’ll get the gist.
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