Non-viral news stories you may have missed

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Even when the world is assailed by an invisible foe – a global pandemic – the ordinary news cycle continues. Not that you’d know it, with electronic and print media obsessed 24/7 with the virus and its long-term effect on the global economy. (That is, the economy has been seriously affected – not ‘impacted’, please- the latter referring to something jammed together, e.g.  wisdom teeth. SWAG(SheWhoAddsGrammaticalNotes)) The Guardian Weekly has taken to presenting 15-20 news…

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The joys of gardening

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This week, determined to write something without uttering the C word, I decided on a blow-by-blow description of our efforts to establish a garden. Great minds do think alike, apparently, as The Conversation published a timely piece on Monday. “It’s a great time to try – a vegetable patch.”  The Conversation’s thrust is that we (the people) have more reason now than at any other time in recent history, to grow our own food. If…

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Martial Law Or Just Do What You’re Told?

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This may be Good Friday, but by any definition it’s not all that flash, given varying states of emergency in Australia and attempts to police COVID-19 restrictions (emergent but not quite martial law). Well may you scoff, as hysteria spreads in the US about the very real prospect of the Commander in Chief ordering the armed forces to take over. Outspoken New York governor Andrew Cuomo has dismissed martial law rumours in his state, although…

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Working From Home In The Time Of COVID-19

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Fifteen years ago, just after SARS but before the GFC and COVID-19, I opted out of full-time paid employment and started a consultancy business, working from home. This was an era when many large organisations did not want their employees working remotely. The resistance was hard to understand, given that even in 2005, the technology to do so made it easy, particularly for people in the communications industry. Now, in plague-ridden 2020, many employers have…

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