Travel Series: YELVERTON & surrounds

This month I've decided to take a break from my world trip rehashing and share some memories of a trip I took down south of my state with a couple of girlfriends.

You can read more about Australia's South West on this website, and more about the place we stayed here.

But now I will focus on the experiences we had on our own trip southward. Our trip consisted of the following:


Checking out the natural beauty of Australia's south-west

Across the road from Harvey Cheese.

Garden path at Stirling House,
outside Harvey.

Not far from home.

Eating food

Decadence in a green and blue beanie.

So good, yet soooo sickening.

Fooood...

Exploring the region

Cave walkin'

In Augusta, the only whale
we watched was this one.

Margaret River in stormy weather.

Live music in Margaret River.

Hanging with the locals

They came right into our chalet!

We were tempted to let them inside, but...no.

And hanging with each other

Walkin'.

Board games.

Arriving at our eco-friendly chalet.

Spa!

There are so many more photos I could have shared, but this post has taken forever to format as it is, so I'm done. But to sum the whole trip all up in one last image...

Rachel Hawkins's HEX HALL series

Last year I read my first Rachel Hawkins book, #1 in the Hex Hall series, and I loved it. I also wrote a tiny little review over at GoodReads that went a little bit like this:

Okay, so I read this one pretty quickly! It was an easy read, for sure. I LOVE the character of Sophie - she cracked me up on numerous occasions. I love her voice - witty and sarcastic. I also love that she said 'shitty'. I really liked Hawkins's writing too - it was clever and funny and well paced. I look forward to reading the next book, which I have yet to order. This is definitely a book I'd recommend for anyone who likes fun, easy-to-read and pretty light-hearted YA.

It took me until well over a year later to get around to reading book #2, and I loved this one just as much. Here is my review of #2 (hey, that rhymes), slightly abridged and amended:

I finally got my hands on DEMONGLASS and finished it the other day. I wasn't disappointed with this read - Hawkins's writing is as funny as ever, and the plotline moves along at a nice pace (plus it's cool). The ending is one great big cliffhanger. And...I don't have much else to say about this story, except that I really, really hope Sophie ends up with Cal, 'cause he is TEH HOTNESS and for some reason I just can't dig that Archer guy. Sophie needs a good bitch slap back into the reality that is Team Cal, I think. ;)

Have any of you read the Hex Hall books? What did you think? I personally found myself laughing - a lot - and turning pages pretty quickly. Maybe it's not literary, and maybe it has a love triangle (which I generally am not a huge fan of), but you know what? I don't remember seeing one single typo in either of these books, and the writing is fun and entertaining, and the characters are witty and cute (and sometimes evil). But now for my final question -

are you Team Archer or Team Cal?

p.s. I gotta get book #3!

We're all just recycling

I'm weird, and I love it!

Do you ever get the impression that you can't possibly come up with anything new to talk about on your blog, 'cause it's all been said before? I do, all the time. However, I still write blog posts.

If possible I try to make them about my own creative projects, because there are already amazing bloggers out there who are doing the other hard work for me (the teaching, the sharing of their own hard-earned wisdom about writing, the industry and so on). I can go to those people's blogs and learn from what they're teaching, instead of focusing on imparting my own dubious wisdom. Oh, don't get me wrong, I think I'm totally wise. ;) Just in other ways than this, perhaps. I'm definitely still learning and I know that is something all of us can say. But I've never, ever wanted to be a teacher, and I guess that comes through in my blogging as well.

I suppose I'm more of a sharer instead of a leader/teacher/shower (and by 'shower' I don't mean, ya know, hop in the shower, I mean show-er).

So I try to focus on doing my own thing, and talking about it here in my blog. Not that that's got me very far lately, since I haven't been a frantically busy blogger. But it's generally what I do think about when I come here and prepare to write a blog post.

What is your blog about? (and it can be about many things at once!)
Do you use your blog more to sort out your own creatively tangled head (as I do) or do you aim for it to be a tool that visitors can use?
Are you more of a sharer or a show-er?

Sticking to your genre

You want me to...ch...choose?

I know they say that aspiring authors should stick to reading within their genres, to really get to know those genres well, to study the successes as well as the failures. But...what about people like me, who write in all sorts of different genres?

Personally I hate the idea of limiting myself to just one genre, or a couple. I guess I want to stay free to do whatever I want, whenever I want to do it. I've written in numerous genres so far, and there is no genre I would ever completely strike off my possibilities list.

Maybe it's because I read many different genres, too, and enjoy them all?

I guess this could be seen as a problem...but I'll admit it's a problem I don't mind having. :)

"I just don't know what to doooo...with myseeeelf..."

If I had posted my Sunday Session on Sunday where it belonged, I would have posted this video:

I've been listening to this song A LOT in the last week. Matryoshka are an amazing (Japanese, despite the Russian name) two-member band I found via Last.fm (to which I am addicted), and who provide the public with a heap of their music for freeeeeee (yes, freeeeee!) on that site. Their album ZATRACENIE is one of the most glorious collections of sound I have heard in my life, and you can get bits and pieces of it for free, straight from the band. Check this band out here.

But you know what? I didn't post that yesterday! And I haven't posted anything since the 29th of July. That's over a week ago! You see, people, I believe I have lost my blogging mojo. But at least I'm distracted by all the right things - working feverishly on a rewrite of SUNDOWN, which I am enjoying a whole heap. It's not on my Goals list, but oh well, at least I'm doing something creative, right? And I do still have my other goals on the table.

I also know that I have been kind of out of touch with you, my fellow bloggers. But I've realised that I do go through ebbs and flows on this blog, and I'm okay with it. Just as long as you know that I will be back in fine form and repaying you for all your commenting kindness at some point. :)

P.S.: