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It’s lovely. The weather is warm, of course, but less humid than on my visit last year. Or so my body thinks.
I have been to the pool every morning so far. Yay me. It is so convenient as the pool is downstairs. At home I have to drive for 20 minutes so it’s an event, rather than every day.
We caught some of the birthday fireworks. It’s not Singapore’s birthday yet but these are the lead up. We are right next to the stadium so the fireworks sounded like bombs going off. Very scary. We caught the last one.
Last hoorah of Singapore’s fireworks on the weekend.
I have started working on the revision to Gentleman Magician. I need to get a move on with that. However, it shouldn’t be too long if I knuckle down.
I’ve also been editing audio files for The Founders’ Legacy. And well that takes a lot of time and some of the errors (pickups) I can’t do here. I tried but the sound quality is different and I hate the sound of my voice so much anyway and the way I stumble over words that I feel that I might start over again, again, again. At least I got the whole book down this time, instead of redoing chapter one over and over again. Practice makes perfect.
But again, I winkled some more typos out so I have updated the files, yet again. I’m going to stop typo hunting now so I can move on. I found the issue was really in Vellum, the program I use to format the books. Somehow I had an option on to automatically correct spelling errors. I didn’t even know that option existed. My novel has a whole lot of made up pronouns, strange names and Vellum changed them and created chaos. All that careful proofreading torn up. However, I believe it is sorted now. But if someone mentions typos I may go up in flames.
For Russell Kirkpatrick’s memorial, which I’ll miss in person, is on Friday. Kylie kindly asked me to talk about Russell’s writing and links to the writing community. I have sent that video off but damn that was hard. In the end I just had to run with it, be as natural as I could, even though I hated listening and looking at me and I didn’t want to become emotional.
In other news, The Founders’ Legacy is for free on Kobo for a little bit. Hopefully this universal link will work. Barnes and Noble is inaccessible from Singapore for some reason. Link for The Founders’ Legacy. Here.
I arrived on Thursday evening and I’m adjusting to the slight time difference. I’m not quite there yet. I am here mostly to chill and be with my son and my daughter-in-law. There are a couple of things I’d like to do. Maybe visit the science museum on recommendation from a writing buddy. Also, a Portal exhibition of SF and fantasy miniatures came up on instagram so we will go to that. And catching up with a couple of friends.
I usually set some goals when I come for a long visit. Five weeks is a long visit. Enough to get a break and settle my mind. First goal is to get to the pool to walk everyday, usually early morning. Two days in and I’ve done that. This is to help keep me fit. Something I have been neglecting. To eat good food but to be food smart because I have gained 5 kilos since I was here last year and that’s not good. I am meant to be losing kilos not gaining them!
Writing wise, I have a few things on. My original plan was to start drafting Amethyst Way, the next Cry Havoc novel. However, I need to revise Gentleman Magician first and I have booked it in for an edit so best get going.
The other thing was edit the audio book of The Founders’ Legacy. I’ve recorded it but not edited and mastered it. I did a bit of that yesterday but I may switch to Gentleman Magician as that’s more pressing (and less frustrating).
The audio book recording is such a challenge. Sometimes your mouth does not obey your commands and you mumble or say the wrong word. Eep. Then there are words you can write but not easily say. For example, self-congratulatory which I can say but not when I’m recording myself etc. There are other tongue twisters like ignominy, preliminary and many others. And dealing with non-gendered invented pronouns! Oh well, hopefully I will learn from this.
Anyway, the only picture I have taken is of the pool and noodles from last night oh and the delightful meal my daughter-in-law cooked when I arrived. Did I mention that noodles are my friend? My daughter-in-law and I bond over noodles.
Next post is a tribute to Russell Kirkpatrick, who passed away fairly suddenly.
Sometimes you just have to live with whatever. Sometimes you might feel you are in a vortex of shit.
On Monday, which was a very lovely day in Canberra, I went for a walk around the lake and then on to the Botanical Gardens with friends. Just near the end of my walk in the gardens, I did not see a step. And wow does landing on your knees hurt! I managed to hobble out there and put on a brave face. When I got home, I asked Matthew to clean the grazes with alcohol wipes. I might have screamed. However, they had to be cleaned. I managed dinner with friends being dropped by the door of the restaurant.
Some pictures from the walk.
I slept with my legs elevated because I expected swelling and the next morning I was not surprised to have jelly knees. I spent the day vegging in front of the TV, eating all the inappropriate food I could find. I contacted the office of orthopaedic surgeon who did my partial knee replacements and he requested an Xray. My view of the Xray is that it’s all okay bone wise, no breaks, the arthritis on the knee cap is worse that previously. I’m guessing it’s just soft tissue damage. The surgeon hasn’t called so I’m thinking there are no issues with my prosthesis either.
A picture of gumnuts!
Anyhow I can mostly walk okay. Occasionally the right knee gives and the right knee does not like leading the way upstairs. The swelling has come down somewhat.
In amongst all this are some family issues, some friends adversely affected by health news and I wonder if the stars are in the wrong quarter or something. The world is pretty shit too and all in all it is quite difficult to stay positive.
I moved out of my craft room on the weekend too. And it looks like I’m going to sell my floor loom. I’m not using it enough to justify the space it takes up. And I’m hoping I kept my craft makings accessible this time but with the knees I cannot assemble shelves and finish the tidy up. The test will come when I want to work on something. These days it is sewing that floats my boat. If you can believe it, I actually culled some fabric and a lot of yarn. It went to the local buy nothing group. I found things too that I had totally forgotten about.
As part of clearing the craft room, I finished the walking bonnet that I started in a workshop at the Regency weekend. It is made from violet dupion silk. I don’t have much in violet so I thought why not.
A little bit of writing has been achieved. Mostly the restructure of Tainted Lady. I have some beta reader feedback coming for Gentleman Magician that I hope won’t take long to address. All in all, I am a bit behind schedule.
I also need to organise a launch, virtual and real of, The Founders’ Legacy. So I must start with a blurb and that requires brain power.
Given all that is happening in the world right, it is hard to deal with things. My doomscrolling is almost non-existent because I can’t bear it.
With my economics learning, I know things are just going to get worse in Australia as we deal with the Iran war fall out. Inflation is not anyone’s friend and coming so close after the pandemic and all those income support payments people got (that have to be paid back somehow) it’s a double punch. The Iran war situation is not over and we were already priming for this oil shock. We thought it might be a short one but alas…no. The Government’s budget is a tough one. I can feel the austerity vibes.
Forget tarrifs! They were hard, unpredicatable and so on. Forget the old world order. The rules have been tossed out.
I think wars, famine, disease outbreaks make one feel a bit hopeless and disempowered. There isn’t much one individual can do about any of it.
I try to think of ways to influence what is going on around me and ways I can help contribute to mine and others’ well being.
I walk in the neighbourhood a lot. It’s suburbia, there were are hills, trees, birds, magnificent sky. People walk their dogs, or just walk about. I figure if I want a nice neighbourhood, I should say ‘hello’ and ‘good morning’ and ‘Cute dog. Can I pat it?’ People usually say hi back. This might seem a small thing but it helps create a neighbourly, neighbourhood.
Also, getting out in a beautiful day lifts the spirits. How can you not be calmed by trees, and nature. It kind of fills me up. Today I went in a different direction. Up the hill into the nature reserve. I was taking a picture of the view when someone said ‘Morning!’ I hadn’t heard them approached and startled. Once I had got myself together I said Good morning back. He said ‘It’s a great view.’ Walking back toward home, there was a big group walking towards me, a men’s group maybe. We exchanged good mornings and it felt nice, you know.
I also started looking a view from say a water colourist perspective. Not that I am a watercolourist, but I do aspire to try one day. The photos below are some that I took.
Our street has a Signal chat group. Our neighbour next door dropped notes into people’s letter boxes and asked if people wanted in. Most of us did. It aslo incorporates the street behind as well. Great for organising things like Halloween for the kids and so on. It is a really nice group of people. I had Christmas drinks on our decks one year. Not everyone came but a few did and it was nice to put faces to names. I think this chat group has helped create a lovely neighbourhood. We can post about snakes, or kangaroos on the street. Sometimes neighbours say ‘I’ve put a box of lemons out. Help yourself.’ OR “Zuccinis going if you want them.” Anyhow, I think this is a positive thing. We even tell the street if we are going away and there are housesitters. Or if someone has a teenager to feed the cat etc.
My partner volunteers at the Food Co-Op and he really believes in their ethos. He picks up left over bread from a bakery and delivers it to the Co-Op and one day a week to our local community centre. The bread goes to people in need, rather than the tip.
Other things we can do to whether difficult periods is donate a can of food to the local food bank. We have one in the next suburb and we can also leave food at the Pool and Leisure centre. I drop books there to the community book swap thing as well.
Other friends I know do things like make scarves for homeless people or Ukraine. These were woven, but crochet is fine. A beanie with left over wool.
To help others doesn’t have to cost much money but it usually costs time. I am still working on where I want to put my effort in. I am currently working parttime but that is going to end soon.
I’ve done my share of committees in local associations-community housing, writing, writing centre.
I feel grateful to have been on this Earth for 66 years. It has not been easy but I am here now and like it or not I have to live through whatever gets thrown my way. I also recognise my priviledge. I have a roof over my head, food and clothing. I can indulge my craft pursuits.
So here are the photos I took this morning. I thought most would make a good water colour painting.
I took a wrong turn but thought this was an interesting composition.
I know nothing much about water colouring and I am not an artist. But I though the dark foreground and the layering of hills, cloud and sky was interesting.
Another view with contrasts.
I thought the road curving away was interesting. I don’t think the photo does it justtice.
The new year is done. The many January birthdays are celebrated. The cake is eaten.
I’ve been doing grandma stuff with my youngest granddaughter. She went back to her mum yesterday. As a result of all this activity and due to spending time in Sydney with granddaughter, not much writing got done. Yeah.
My wall planner fell off the wall. This may be ominous. I have not sat at my desk until now to spy on my desk planner either. However, it is a long weekend in Canberra this weekend and I have good intentions!
World politics tend to distract me. I listened to Carney’s speech at the World Economic Forum. I passed the link onto my partner and friend. I tried talking about it to Matthew (partner) but burst into tears. Basically, Carney summed up what has been brewing in my gut for a while. The rules-based international system is broken. It’s not coming back. We need to do something different. I listened to Macron and to Von Der Leyen’s speech and Trump’s. I’m going back to listen to a few more. It helps me to know that other world leaders are planning and taking action.
But you couldn’t write this stuff. This is worse than a bad dystopian SF novel. But I have hope, even though uncertainty is really gut wrenching.
Appearances
Meanwhile, I am looking at events…
Some of my books are for sale at Cancon this weekend at Epic at the CSFG table. I’ll be doing a shift at 12 noon on Monday so I’ll be there.
I’ll be at the Romantic Rendezvous in Sydney on March 22nd. Link to info and tickets Here.
I’ll be at Books and Beyond on April 12 in Ourimbah, on the central coast.
I’m hoping to get a table at the Geek Expo in Canbera during July but I’m currently hunting up expression of interest forms.
September I will possibly be at Books and Beyond again.
And for some reason I have three events 10 October, Once Upon a Fairy Tale indie book event in Campbelltown.
Hopefully I’ll have a stall at the Goulburn Steampunk Victorian Faire on the 17th. Noting certain as of yet, but I’ll be there in any case.
Books in Sight, Canberra Rex, on 23rd October
I shall post again if anything else comes up. I’ve put in for things.
Travel
In between everything else, I am travelling a bit. NZ in Feb, then in March doing a tour with a visitor from the UK, I’d like to fit in a trip to Singapore for at least a month and possibly to Adelaide in April. I was hoping to go to Canada with my sister in October but I have a lot going on then.
Writing
Matthew has three big projects this year so that will limit travel somewhat. But it also means I will be encouraged to write also.
Meanwhile Gentleman Magician is at just over 12000 words.
Reading
I’m going to keep a spreadsheet of my reading this year. I don’t read enough these days. I listen to audio books more.
PS I got my hair done today. Totally pink. It looks floofy in this photo.
I’m up reasonably early on the 1st of January. I managed to sleep later than normal. Yay!
Happy New Year! May 2026 fulfill your hopes and dreams.
I hope for peace and good sense to prevail the world over. I want to be optimistic for the future of the world. Being a science fiction (and fantasy) aficcionado and Star Trek fan, I have had faith in Humankind and that we will move beyond wars and famine and that we will survive into the future. However, I admit that that faith has been shaken of late.
I hope for me that I can find that optimism again. That my faith in us will be restored.
Now for more mundane things.
I have to admit I piked on staying up until 12 and left the party around 10pm. We had a family get together.
Now I just don’t want to eat more food! Everything was delicious but now I have to think about the waistline. I wish it was called the wasteline and I could watch myself waistline waste away but alas…
This morning, I took my blood pressure reading before the meds kicked in and well that’s not good is it? I thought cutting back salt was going to help there but health wise I’ve been a bit over the place. Next in the queue is a blood test scheduled for next week. I’ve been having sleep disturbances between 1-3 am most nights lately, which is very annoying. Nothing too serious except I feel like my head is in a paper bag most of the day. Aching and tingling in the fingers and toes, so much so that I have to get up and take painkillers at night, tired, fatigued, etc. I have sub-clinical Hashimotos and I have these flare ups where I gain weight, go through the fatigue, sluggishness etc and then when I’m tested they say my thyroid is reading normal. This has been going on for 10 years, since I was first diagnosed (confirmed through blood test and identification of antibodies). The other not so interesting thing is the inflammation where my partial knee replacements are. At first I thought they were loosening and the specialist thought not. However, he is monitoring six monthly, unless I have extreme pain. Each day I’m noticing it is harder to move around and my knees are stiff and sore. So after this post is done I’m going for a walk. Best thing to get the joints warm.
The new spectacles after surgery were a bit hard to deal with at first. Multifocals and two very divergent eyes now. Left eye is still seeing blurry but better than when I first developed a full thickness macular hole in August. I can report that my eyes and brain are getting used to the new glasses but when I take them off my eyes/brain go what the hell!
I have received print versions of The Prudential Light. My daughter-in-law picked up an issue with one of the Chinese characters in the book. Two missing strokes that were wiped when I did ‘remove background’. I have replaced that image with a new one and uploaded new versions everywhere. I had to redo the hardback versions because I had matt finish on the cover instead of gloss and I had gloss finish on the other hardback versions. Paperback is matt finish. That was completed this morning.
There are four different sets of Chinese characters in the book, drawn by a friend, who is a scholar of Chinese art. Modern Chinese characters have been simplified and the ones in The Prudential Light are meant to be traditional and hopefully ones in use in 1840s. As for the pinyin version, I cannot tell you if I have stuck to the Cantonese pinyin or strayed to the Mandarin. Brain is not functional. Pinyin is the romanised version of the word to help with pronunciation. Cantonese and Mandarin are two different languages but use the same characters.
Yesterday I posted my writing to do list. I also reorganised my working space. (I’m laughing because I’m on my couch with the lap top on my lap). I bought and assembled a hutch. I wish I’d taken before and aftershots. I’m camped out in my bedroom for another nine months I guess while my grandkids are living here. While I had a desk, I had a great big mess there. Along with my day job work space and my imac working space, there was just a junk yard of crap, scribbled on manuscript pages, pens (which I could never find, other desk junk. With a hutch I can lift things up, put them where I can find them. I’m so pleased with it now. I have so many pens and I threw away the ones that don’t work. So diligent of me.
I’ve also put up my planner on the wall. Time to commit to writing on the planner and getting some work done on the books I want to write. While I have a kind of full and hectic schedule for writing new books, I have some that are already written and I have to find time to tweak/revise them and send them out for submission. If I have no luck getting an agent, I guess they will be self published too by the end of the year. I was also wishing I could fit a nice epic fantasy series in my schedule too. I also mulled the idea of retiring Dani Kristoff–where I write paranormal romance with sorcerer’s and werewolves and witches under that name. It might be my lack of promotion but they are not as popular as the Dragon Wine series and Cry Havoc. Another novel I want to write is a sci fi romance that has been in my brain since the early days. So that might fill the Dani Kristoff slot in my schedule.
I find them helpful, even though I don’t use them all the time.
The big 100 days to do list fall in a heap for me. I have so many things I want to do that there are too many things to keep track of.
On work days, I use my calendar to manage the things I should be doing. That’s because in my day job I only work two days so I need a way to keep track because I forget inbetween the weeks.
On other days, well it depends on what I have on, what I want to achieve. Between Christmas and New Year I generally switch off so to do lists go out the window unless I’m hosting a deck party. Parties need to do lists. How else can you delegate?
Generally though if I am not doing the day job, I need a to do list to set myself goals or achieve something. Otherwise the day can just fritter away with a little bit of this, some couch/streaming etc. If I’m struggling there might be one or two things on my to do list.
Today (example only)
write a blog post
write Gentleman Magician for an hour
cook dinner.
Now I have done other things. I picked up my glasses, I’ve had lunch with Rob, I went to the supermarket. I’ve also fixed a Chinese character in The Prudential Light, uploaded new print files and new ebook files. They are additional things.
Whether I will write today remains to be seen. I’m giving my brain a rest.
However, that being said, to do lists work for me when I’m enthusiastic, need to get things done. If I’m not enthusiastic, then I’ll put one thing on that to do list that is important for me, just to get me going.
Motivation can sometimes be thin on the ground. There is a push pull-thing going on with what I want to do and making the effort to do them.
I’ve bought a wall planner and a desk planner. I’m going to fix up my workspace tomorrow when the new hutch arrives for my desk. I want to achieve a lot in 2026. However, sometimes it’s hard.
A wall planner is one massive to do list really.
The downside for to do list though can be where you do things not on your to do list. Or as you are marking things off, you add things you forgot! The list doesn’t get smaller.
Anyway, here are my writing to dos for 2026. Wish me luck.
The day has come. I have surgery, a vitrectomy, this afternoon. To say I’m not looking forward to it is an understatement. I have a few fears. One that the surgery won’t happen. Two that I will lose the plot while having it. (Shit scared might cover it) I’ll be awake you see (Holy moley!). That it won’t work and I’ll have to have another surgery and you know loss of vision. That I’ll have to have a cataract surgery in about a year, if the predicted rapid growth of cataract after surgery happens. That I might have other eye issues in future or with the other eye. The macular hole was totally unexpected. I get checked annually for macular degeneration and glaucoma.
I will be missing the RWA in Hobart! I will have EMO (experiencing missing out) as Matthew told me as FOMO is fear of missing out and I’ll be definitely missing out.
I only got half of my conference fee back and I was lucky to get that. The committee’s advice is to take out travel insurance. A bit late for me though. However, in future I will consider it as I usually don’t take out insurance when I travel domestically. Recall how Matthew and I got COVID when we were heading to the Terror Australis Writing Retreat? That was a lot of bucks and luckily we were able to stay and do the workshops via phone. Not ideal but the best outcome in the circumstances.
A win though for me. I have been able to massage my draft of The Prudential Light into something beta readers can wade through. I sent that off to four of them so it will be interesting to see the feedback. My take on it that I will need to really hone the structure down. I thought I had been introduced to a good editor but they did not answer my email about a quote and timing and I’m afraid a non-responsive editor is a horror story I don’t need. I even texted them and they said I’m in holiday mode will respond tomorrow and they didn’t. Oh well. Time to look for another. Not that I have issues with editors I use at the moment, but as this is a complicated structure for me and has memoir elements I thought I needed to find a specialist and someone who can suggest things, rather than a copy edit, if you get my drift. In the worse case scenario I can do it myself. I did study editing and considered hiring myself out but that’s a lot of creative energy that I can use for my own work.
Anyhow, time to go write a newsletter and send that out.
Yesterday, I did zero work on my current WIP, The Prudential Light. I did not have the excuse of the previous couple of days of recovering from my shingles vaccination, which really did knock me about. I did procrastawriting.
I wrote and sent a newsletter, and prior to that I signed up to Benventi for preorders for Books and Beyond 28 September. That took time. Here is a link to that preorder form. This is evidence and also if you are in the Central Coast and want to check out the event, please do. I’d love to say hi. It’s a first time, small writer event, which I think is free for the public.
I’ll be at the Geekmarkets on the CSFG table in the morning of 19 July with some of my books on offer. Also, free and fun.
I’ve signed up to Gamacon 6 September and I will have another appearance in August to announce soon.
Early October, it’s Conflux in Canberra, where I’ll have a table too. Not sure if I’ll make it onto any panels yet. That’s 3-5 October over the long weekend. A great SF con and a real experience if you have never been. I am hoping to launch The Prudential Light there but if so I need to get cracking.
I have other events later in the year as well but that’s the next few.
I have ordered book covers for The Prudential Light and Edward Huntington Esquire: Gentleman Magician so keep your eye out for those. I’m super excited about those.
While I have mucked about for two days, I actually did do some work this morning on The Prudential Light. It requires some additional structure so I had to write some new bits and one section needs a bit of research. The word count is now 53,000 word and I am not sure if this will reach 70,000 by the time I’m done.
I am in the ‘this is a mess, everyone will hate it, I can’t make it good’ stage. Or trending that way. I am still having fun with Jemima and Aunt Prudence.
Now as you can see I am writing a blog post. Is this procrastawriting? Or a heavy dose of writerly admin? I find it a bit of a diversion and I like blogging. Often I think of things I want to blog about and then don’t get around to it and then forget.
Have I told you I have started a TikTok? I am very much a Noob and the platform has amazing potential but being time poor I don’t have time to explore it and I’m also distracted by all those TikToks. My lastest talk about how hard I find revision. I love drafting novels. The hard work is shaping them into something you can read. Hence, my angst over is it good enough, can I make it better and so on.
I also owe the blog some posts from China, which I will get to.
Now it is time to get another cuppa.
PS my daughter just made me tea, put the heater on, brought me slippers, my hoodie and a cookie. I’m so spoilt.
I have been here three weeks and one day. Wow, time has flown. And on Saturday we fly out to Beijing for 12 days in China. What I thought might be a short side trip has become the big China trip and I feel the excitement building.
I made a few goals for my time in Singapore. Pool walking every morning. I have done this, sometimes with more enthusiasm and a few days with less. I am sleeping a bit longer than those initial days where I woke up at 5am. However, I can’t seem to sleep in past 7.30am. But I am reaching sleep goals according to my Apple watch. I’ve also road tested these two last days taking my Apple watch into the pool. It is a much better way of keeping track than lap counting. When I count laps I lose count because I starting thinking about Aunt Prudence.
My other goal was writing 30,000 words of the novella The Prudential Light, which is Aunt Prudence’s memoir in the Cry Havoc series. Well I am at 44,000 words so I should at least make 45,000 words today but you know there’s a lot going on in this story and it may be a novel after all. I blame the condo’s swimming pool for that because many of my ideas came to me while pool walking and losing track of how many laps I did. The reason I think this is that I have written so many scenes and I think the plot might come together at 50,000 words but all the restructuring, back filling skipped scenes etc is going to bring it up in word count. Anyway, I’m very happy about that.
Next steps is to commission a cover and also a cover for the next installment, Edward Huntington Esquire, Gentleman Magician. This will cover the period of Edward finding out he was a magician and his meeting with Dr Heaton and Fulton. I probably have another story in the series, which would be a novella (god I hope so!) about Wilbur Hardcastle and Jemima’s mother. It will be a love story but not a romance because we all know that Jemima’s mother died young.
Then I might start on my spin off series.
Meanwhile in Singapore I have caught up with my mate Dev and we have hung out. Yesterday, we had a marathon Orchard Road experience yesterday from 12pm to about 7pm, including most importantly a trip to Kinokuniya. We started at Pizza Express which is fine dining in Singapore. Then we had tea and something naughty in Paul’s, which is outside Kinokuniya and then later I had a kind of Hawker Centre experience in the Food Republic, which is sort of the same thing except in a mall and airconditioned. I had some fried prawn noodles and oyster omelette. I’m not keen on oysters, I can eat them, but I really liked the egg part, which was crispy and tasty. Dev tells me it is eggs with water and tapioca starch.
Me and Dev and Kinokuniya
Lychee Fanta and Cream Soda flavoured Fanta. They were a $1 each and interesting.
To get back on the research track on Monday we went to the National Museum of Singapore to see their Once Upon a Tide special exhibition, about the history of Singapore. Well worth the visit. We also did a quick walk through of the permanent exhibition on level one. Lucky I did because I found out Rickshaws were invented in Japan later than I thought and where popular from 1880s until 1930s.
Below is an early map of Singapore in the period that I’m interested in.
I also got some good photos of things that will help in my story of Aunt Prudence and that’s the main focus of my visit to the museum.
I have really enjoyed hanging out with my son and daughter-in-law. On Tuesday we went to the island of Sentosa to check it out. We mostly did things like the free shuttle bus to check out the beaches and we did a skylift up and back to look around and at at the Shake Shack. We don’t have Shake Shack in Australia. The chips are good but this time they weren’t as hot as they should have been. The Shake Shack in Gardens By the Bay were so good! The cheese burger I had was real and yummy.
On the skyride
Today is going to be an at home day. I need to do some writer admin, hang out my washing so I can pack for the trip and write. I really need to do something with my hair but that remains to be seen if I have the energy. I thought a pink rinse would go down well in China, except I didn’t bring any with me so my hair is very blonde and curly. However, apparently Beijing will be hot but not as humid so my hair could remain straight.
My Kinokuniya purchases. Thea Guanzon is from the Philippines and Sue Lynn Tan is Chinese from Hong Kong.
Above is the emotionally needy Siumoguai who had snuck into my room and perched next to my swimmers.
Donna Maree Hanson, Author, Phd in Creative Writing 