I have some news! I wrote a book about land hermit crabs for kids. It’s called “Crabnapped! A land hermit crab story”.  I had the help of my great-uncle, Geoff Pike, in coming up with character names and plot. He was the artist and animator of the Louie the Fly cartoon and the creator of…

November 14th, I left Brisbane QLD Australia on a cruise to Papua New Guinea on Carnival Encounter cruise boat. I had sailed to Fiji and Vanuatu before but this was my first trip to PNG. Alotau Island, PNGKiriwina Island, PNGConflict Island, PNG

I was 17 when I visited Expo 88 in Brisbane, Queensland, from Wollongong (near Sydney), New South Wales in Australia. The expo was a highlight of my life. I had a little pretend passport to get it stamped at the exhibitions for different countries. I tried green tea for the first time and loved the…

Mine was showing my nana Downie my ‘caterpillars’ (my operation stitches) from when the orthopaedic surgeon performed a tendon operation called tenotomy at two years old. “ A tenotomy is a surgical procedure that lengthens the Achilles tendon in children with clubfoot. It’s a key step in the Ponseti method of treating clubfoot.” I’ve had…

Barbara Hazelgrove was the face of the Bega Cheese advertisement. She received $400, some cheese and lunch and was very ‘chuffed’. The advertisement shows people and referencing that their town isn’t famous for what it’s called, but Bega is famous (for Bega Cheese) “Broome isn’t famous for brooms. Punchbowl isn’t famous for punch bowls. Collector…