Today’s challenge was to write about: a word or phrase that you use constantly. The only one that I can think of, which is ‘cool’, and that seems completely superfluous to write about even in this challenge, so I’m going for a word I don’t like and a phrase I do. Continue reading Starting sentences with Look and I Think
Tag: language
Why we need to stop talking about refugees
— rethinking the language we use to talk about refugees and people seeking asylum —
It is a truth universally acknowledged that campaigns based on evidence, universal human rights, or even plain common sense, are sadly not guaranteed success. Continue reading Why we need to stop talking about refugees
Choose your words carefully
The first piece of education I remember receiving was in Year One, at Our Lady Queen of Peace Primary School in Greystanes, Western Sydney. I would have been six. Mrs Szukalski – a tall, blonde woman in her early twenties, coincidentally (or not) my first crush that wasn’t fictional – told the class that for homework we had to write a one-page story about dinosaurs. My story was four pages long, and probably included dragons and space ships. I was an early reader, an inquisitive, imaginative child, and that creative task fused everything into a clarity of purpose. I became hooked on the power of words.

The problem with expensive things
If I tell you that something is expensive, what do you think? For example a few years ago I bought a second-hand copy of George Orwell’s essay collection England Your England for $35. Is that expensive? On Amazon a second-hand hardcopy edition of the same collection is $25. Does that change your impression? Continue reading The problem with expensive things
Will they sing THIS when they’re winning?
I know I should be getting serious and writing some kind of obituary for George Bush’s Presidency, but it seems that I can’t shake sport from the brain this week.