Thoughts on the referendum…
If you don’t know which way to vote, the simplest approach is to apply the philosophical principle of harm. On a personal level: could ‘yes’ do me any harm? No. Could ‘no’ do someone else some harm? Yes…
What is worse than ignorance?
If you’ve never been to an art gallery, or haven’t been lately, or you’re at risk of being too easily led into a cultural conversation that will expose your ignorance or hypocrisy, let me remind you what you’d find if you did.
The Club
The Droste effect or Mise en abyme––an image of an image in its image, in which that image wormholes into an abyss, recurring ad infinitum. An imperfect metaphor, but what comes to mind…
Why philosophy?
Someone says you’re idiosyncratic. You take it as a compliment though it was delivered with indeterminate tonality. A lovely word – its Greek stems idios ‘own’ and synkrasis ‘mixing together’ – an exacting neologic combination. It's very much a mix of…
Something like a phenomenon
To date this piece, I write at the time of the worst ever domestic shooting in the US. Which at the time you’re reading, may not be the worst anymore. As it is, I’ve got 49 dead, 53 wounded.* What have you got?
The terrific périphérique
When underwear shopping, try as I might to avoid it, there’s always that moment I inadvertently find myself in the big-bosom brassiere aisle. A teenage boy or young girl I’d understand, but me, a grown woman? I panic, blush…
Remembering Petit-Jean
‘One day, then, as we were waiting for the moment to pull in the nets, an individual known as Petit-Jean…pointed out to me something floating on the surface of the waves. It was a small can, a sardine can…
The Dutch family
I travelled. And as Australians who travel can do, I wound up with a partner not from here. In my case he is European (politically, culturally, socially); and Dutch, more specifically. With elderly, unwell parents (in law) we now travel annually to the Netherlands to check they’re still alive…
Flat pack philosophy circle
A project with an aim of creating a safe, shared, public space for philosophy, The Circle combines contemporary principals of accessible, open source design with critical thinking. Here, there is no ownership, no self, no opinion – only a love of wisdom. There is also no test – wisdom need not be attained, but it must be the goal…
Car city bitch
Clocked ten weeks back in car city. Within six hours I got my first speeding ticket, and after a hundred-odd hours since spent penitent on Sydney buses…
I, human
Luton airport as a last goodbye to London is a bit of a comedown... but the preceding week was a love-in with a no-shoes-please party after which Jake went home wearing Nico's and Nico went home in nought but his patriotic, ironic, Aussie flag socks…
They'd say I had it coming
Somehow, despite an attitude problem and tendency for insubordination, I got through high school without a detention. The penalty point system, which in many ways was 'soft on crime' but also a precursor to mandatory sentencing…
Even clean hands cause damage
Los guantes. I'm pointing at them. Blue, latex, M-for-medium, stuttering 'g' 'g' 'g' imploring my brain for more, but again get only as far as 'g...'. The Spanish dishy puts me out of my misery and says 'los guantes'…
Mauvais, mal, misère...
I'm laying bare my hand. I have, no tricks. Something similar is happening in America: the Great. Trump is naked irony amassed while over here the press wets itself with concatenation (Brexit/Regrexit). Summer is happening and while summer's definitely nice, it does enhance the smell of piss in the Kingdom's capital…
To care about voting nowadays
The minute you emerge from the home to the olfactory frenzy of the city, you’re on. Like it or not, this city of smells, few of them good, serves that small, but not unimportant purpose of letting you know you’re alive…
Commune of good cheer
My thighs have exploded, I fear permanently. Running is not an option, and the most taxing thing I've done since lending my bike to B all winter (I know, what sacrifice!) is a five hour stint in Harrods, styling our very own AB, on the same day as the London Marathon…
Counting beans
Spring, and the daffodil-laced strip-parks of this very nice, Corbynite, northern suburb stop abruptly when you step out onto Holloway Road––a dart of reality, that cuts from the permanently screwball Highbury and Islington squareabout, and deposits you on the A1 past Archway…
Hetero-queery juvenalia
There's a pressing need for intellectual thought to be de-institutionalised before an irreversible rigor mortis takes hold. My lecture notes are mainly asides to stop me screaming. I scrawl instead: 'shut the f- up'. Still, I, no-one acts…
A little bit of Devon, a whole lot of baloney
Ufff, February. Where were we? Oh yeah - we were back in 2015, heading for Devon, where brown with mud to the rim, my mid-shin gumboots almost went under on more than one occasion––a fine line I won't risk again–– upgrading to knee-highs before I next venture to England's soggy lowlands…
So, this is Christmas
It was midway through December when I realised we'd arrived in this most latterly month of the year, the one that throws up Christmas with its tinsel, baubles and epileptic lighting, and your therapist asks with extra intensity: are you ok?