A developing front

A new front from my back veranda on Friday night - and that is all I have to say about that, no double entendre intended.

Hello delightful humans,

I hope you’ve had a gorgeous week.

There’s been a lot on this week on this side of the desk.

We’re back into production for our flagship podcast, Company in partnership with Rabobank Australia.

Most fun chat with Giaan Rooney and Sam Levett - who I knew at University when I was in Bathurst and he was in Orange. Giaan is a genuine gem and it was refreshing to have a bloke on the pod - there will be more of that this year, ok?!

Our survey is still in action, literally takes 2 mins, shorter if you want! It will help inform some changes we are making here this year.

Thanks to those of you who’ve already helped me - in direct response we have a new segments here which was requested by a number of you: News from the middle of Nowhere (a space for rural news stories). Enjoy xx

Podcast Playlist

Love Bernard Salt. There’s a fair bit of chat in here by him about food and agriculture - which was unexpected. Wonder what it costs to get him as a guest speaker?

This was a delightful, light, funny listen that made me smile - Ellie’s giggle is delightful. “Oh Pizza, I wake up with a big pizza by my head.” When I’m putting on an English accent - this is exactly how I sound in my head.

Noemie Fox on But Are You Happy? So much about mental preparation for big competitions and journalling, manifestation and visualisation. She’s a new fave for sure.

Lay your eyes on these Instagram accounts

@pippypaints (above) || @posies__ || @miguelito_terry (below)

This pile of things to read

This really beautiful and simple article written by an Oncologist on what he’s learned from his patients. (Washington Post Gift Link) He started keeping note of everyday things patients would say to him and then he started asking purposeful questions which he then charted. ‘What’s the secret to a long marriage?’. Put through the guise of a finite life it’s a touching read.

This Longread on Anorexia blew me away. I read it in bed so was in no hurry to go anywhere and I kept thinking I must forward this on to all my friends. It’s not an alarmist warning by any means - it’s one woman’s account of a disorder that has never left her - a well worded insight into the mental talk/tussle of both anorexia and then later bulimia.

Re-imagining International Women’s Day away from Corporate Grabs?

Meet the fashion editor for the US NFL.

Shack Life. Love. A. Lot.

This looks gorgeous for those of you in the Scone area on March 6,7,8 and 9.

Remember Ovalteenies? This is a cute read - and there’s an accompnaying podcast discussion about it too.

What does it mean to be wealthy these days?

News from the middle of nowhere (rural Australia)

If you only click on one link today - make it this one. Finalists for the Galah 2025 Regional Photography Prize have been announced. I think Annabelle makes it look easy but the level has been lifted with this Prize. It’s adequately creating an avenue for the unheralded talent of regional Australian photographers to be discovered and recognised - it feels serious, the contenders images are world class and Annabelle is running the show, so with the combination of all these things I think the trajectory is up at best and out of the current stratosphere and into new territory at best.

I love a good wool story - about a decade ago a handful of local farmers in my home town bought into a wool mill, there was always a bit of secrecy around that mill and I don’t really know if it still exists in someones garage or if its been on sold. Growing Wool then seeing it made into clothing (bypassing the auction system and processors in China or Italy) is ever wool growers dream - so this new mini-wool mill on Kangaroo Island is exciting. Members of the Kangaroo Island Wool group (about 20 of them) have set up the mill - with the huge helping hand - of a Government Disaster Recovery Grant awarded after bushfires destroyed so much of the island and its farms in 2020. But this work is just so prohibitively expensive - as we know manufacturing in Australia at large doesn’t happen for this reason. I hope this mill has a long and fabulous wool-jumper-making life! @kangarooislandwool

Still on wool - all these amazing women keep breaking shearing world records - after this one near Yass last year (395 merino lambs in 8hrs), there’s been another in WA (367 ewes, same time frame) this week. Things that matter here: lambs are smaller than ewes generally speaking and ‘merino’ sheep have wool that is less corse and easier to shear than other breeds of sheep such as Border Leister, often in Australia they are cross-bred so merino’s for wool and Border Leister for meat production. Pure Merino Wool is the best, superfine 100% Australian Merino Wool - even better. It’s the soft stuff we have in our jumpers.