Dr Amy felt like a sister when I came across her for the first time, on Twitter of all places. That was maybe a decade ago. Staunch and unwavering, socially conscientious; yet deadly clear, and academically wise. I remember that stood out on ‘Blaktwitter’ at its height.
I learned A LOT more from Amy’s amazing memoir, Tell Me Again! What a struggle, what strength. It enthralled me from start to finish. It’s equal parts upsetting and uplifting. At times I had to put the book down and just feel the feels. It’s important for everyone to read, to understand the unlimited positivity that’s possible – in seemingly impossible circumstances.
Before the memories fall into a dateless mix of my life, or worse and completely forgotten, I wanted to chronicle some key moments from the last twelve months for future reference. I’m hoping my recordkeeping is good enough to support the new habit of producing a yearly report. My own State Of The Union.
Events
20/01: Some mates and I attended the Geelong Beer Festival again. Each year it seems to get bigger & better. What made it interesting for me was our dubious attempt to archive the event by recording videos of the different beers we tried, with thoughtful reviews which just got louder and less articulate as the day went on. Well, until my phone died altogether – along with my method of payment.
A mate and I also navigated a very creative route from Johnstone Park to a nearby bar, which I learned the next day that I had helpfully saved to Strava.
24/02: Pakofesta, Geelong’s multicultural festival (on Pakington Street) we lock in to attend each year. This time we had my parents staying with us, and as always we all enjoyed eating various delicacies from around the world. It’s our challenge each year to eat from more countries.
27/06-04/07: One of the most significant events of the year was our full family trip up to Queensland. It was under the pretence of my brother’s 51st Birthday Party (as Corey & his family came down to celebrate his actual 50th birthday milestone with us). The night out at Redcliffe Leagues Club was actually a surprise celebration for our Mum. She got to see so many of her former colleagues, friends & family from various parts of Australia without having to wait for a birthday, or to put it morbidly as we did, for her own funeral where she’d be disappointed to miss the party.
We combined the trip with a few memorable activities, like flying into Coolangatta where we stayed and caught up with our old Dubai friends who had moved back to the Gold Coast, whom we haven’t seen for quite some time. We even went Go-Karting with them the following day. There it became very obvious they’re a family of petrol head / motorsport enthusiasts and my kids & I clearly are not. It was definitely fun tho.
Lewis, Owen and I stayed up in Qld for another couple of weeks as we had no work/school pressures to get back to. It gave us time to stay up with my brother on the Sunshine Coast for longer, and even drive up to Hervey Bay to stay with my cousin John/Jason for a night and explore the region a little – including a selfie or two with Mary Poppins.
It’s a little perplexing that we had such a great time and fitted in so much, yet I posted nothing online during or immediately after this trip. In hindsight, it was probably too daunting to do justice to such an awesome holiday. So I did keep the photos to myself and just shared with family. And we certainly enjoyed being in the moment.
Movies
It’s pretty rare for me to visit a cinema, but I did go to watch two films this year. 03/04: I kind of reluctantly watched Kung Fu Panda 4, which wasn’t bad. Just felt maybe longer than necessary, and predictable.
25/08: And Lewis & I went to watch Deadpool & Wolverine. It was such an epic movie, we seemed to need quite a debrief afterwards to check on some of the content & gags that we struggled with, which maybe only true fans might get.
Sports
2024 was a wonderful sporting year for me in many ways.
Brinky boys sport
Lewis & Owen both won their first rugby union premierships, after moving clubs to join the Wyndham Rhinos.
Lewis had another significant year in rugby. He captained his school team, who went undefeated to become Rebels Shield premiers of Victoria. He also became a key player in the Super Rugby Under 16s competition for the Melbourne Rebels in their final season. And he joined the Lloydies Aboriginal team with Uni of Sydney again for the Ella Rugby 7s competition in Sydney. His performances got noticed by others as well. A player agent reached out, and has supported him to take a new trajectory with his rugby. It will now see Lewis shifting to Queensland in 2025 to join in the private school’s GPS rugby competition. He’s looking forward to it, with far fewer hesitations than his parents having a first son leave home.
Myles’s Aussie rules team, the Anglesea Reserves struggled more in 2024. I think it’s fair to say it was a rebuilding year. And despite the coaches placing Myles into defensive roles for significant parts of the season, he still had a wonderful year and in the final match kicked four goals to narrowly leapfrog his competition to win the coveted leading goal kicker award.
We recognised these amazing achievements with our own “Sporting Legends” dinner at Squire’s Loft for the family. And we felt it important to reiterate that their successes are amazing achievements and not something we can’t take for granted.
My own sporting exploits were definitely hampered this year due to my age and a string of reoccuring injuries. I “played” in both the VACSAL Basketball Tournament in Shepparton (09-10/03), and the VACSAL Football Carnival in Portarlington (05-06/10). But each resulted in me having pretty bad (and different) knee complaints. At the basketball I’d put it down to me doing too much before the tournament began. At this stage I was playing basketball every week or so with the AMC (old farts) league, and usually doing well with 2-3 casual games on a Thursday evening. But while in Shepparton I thought it’d be a good idea to run from the hotel down to their ParkRun, do that & run back again. Then, by no surprise at all, after the 2nd or 3rd game, my right knee had enough and started swelling. We played better as a team this year. In 2023 I was frustrated watching from the sidelines, with the same knee issue the year before. But this group made it one game away from the grand final. Once we were done there, the kids and I still managed to climb Mount Piper on our return journey.
At the footy carnival, I’d put my knee injury down to me thinking I was young again and trying to match the athletic kids leaping high for a mark. My body has clearly become unfamiliar with such heights, and on the landing I hyperextended my left knee. I was able to play one more game very sheepishly, then sit on the bench for the final game of that day. Day two I had to play a couple more games, on account of our team lacking numbers. The correct taping of my knee joint by a proper footy strapper though made it bearable and allowed some pain free movement. Apart from those limitations it was wonderful to be out with our local Aboriginal community and have lots of fun.
Golf
On the 01/01/2024, Myles and I with another father & son played a round of golf at Anglesea. The scoring went a bit off, but it was great to start the year right by getting out and having a social hit. And I’m happy to report it’s become an annual tradition now, after we played together again on 01/01/2025. That’s been great, if we ignore that we all said last year that we should do this more often. HA!.
Myles returned to working at the golf course this year, and has taken more of a shining to playing golf in recent months. So with Lewis, we’ve played a handful of times almost weekly. It’s been lovely to see the boys figuring out their games and rapidly improving. Myles in our final game beat me for the first time. I’m sure it won’t be the last.
Sports spectating
When the kids or I aren’t playing sport, I enjoy watching most sports. I’d say I enjoyed some mixed results this year.
Olympics
Just five months on, I had almost forgot that 2024 was an Olympics year. It was hosted marvelously in Paris. There were many highlights, and sadly for breakdancer Raygun quite a few lowlights that will be the main memory for many. I see in my notes from the time, I made the most of the timezone difference on a few evenings to watch the whole Olympics program until our morning. Australia did amazingly well. The Australian team came fourth overall, winning a record 18 Gold medals.
Aussie Rules
The Brisbane Lions are AFL Premiers, after beating the hapless Sydney Swans (their 2nd Grand Final loss in 3 years). What a HUGE relief for Brisbane after losing the grand final the year before, against Collingwood of all teams. We couldn’t get any grand final tickets (for less than $5000). So we happily watched at home, well initially it was more nerves than happiness. The game finally finished 9.6 (60) – 18.12 (120). In many ways the grand final was an anti-climax after the Lion’s two preceding games needed massive come from behind wins. Being behind by 44 poinst against GWS in the Semi-final, and winning a tight contest again Geelong Cats (our local team) after being behind by almost 30 points at one stage.
Two months later Brisbane almost pulled off ultimate bragging rights, with their AFLW team also playing for the premiership in the women’s comp. Sadly that wasn’t to be. It flipped the outcome of the 2023 season, where the lady Lions won, and the men’s team lost.
Before the biggest day on the AFL calendar, I attended an AFL Grand final eve golf day. It had many promotions & special activities, sadly I didn’t manage the year’s worth of beer Hole-in-one. With so much on the line the following day with my Brisbane Lions, I had less interest in the game of golf and much more interest in contributing to the profits of CBCo, the event’s beer sponsor. It was fun day I’ll probably do again.
We attended a couple of matches this year. 07/06: Bulldogs vs Lions in the Medallion Club of Marvel Stadium was a highlight. We sat alongside some of the injured Bulldogs list in the fancy seats. Lions got a nice 40 point victory. It led many nearby Western Bulldog fans to quite hilariously complain incessantly about the umpiring which we viewed as absolutely perfect. That victory was the first in a record nine match winning streak, which was desperately needed to get the Lions back into a position to battle for the premiership. And it was also the first time Myles saw a Lions win live, after him attending matches since 2018.
28/06: While in Brisbane for my Mum’s celebration we managed to catch Lions vs Demons with nine of us. Brisbane won by less than a goal in the final minutes courtesy of a Hugh McCluccage 6 pointer, after being behind from basically the middle of the second quarter.
Rugby League
04/04: In a pretty sad annual tradition, I went to see Melbourne Storm beat Brisbane Broncos down here at AAMI Park. This time it was terribly close, ending 34-32. A couple of mistakes the only thing keeping Broncos from achieving quite the upset.
17-19/05: I loved attending the NRL Magic Round again. This time I took two mates from Torquay up to Queensland to make it a boys trip. One of the guys had not attended a single match before that weekend.
Unfortunately in the NRL, my Brisbane Broncos failed miserably in 2024. So miserably, the powerbrokers realised a change was needed and Kevin Walters their coach was dropped, along with a few other off-field changes like club stalwart Allan Langer no longer running the water on the field.
And one the other 5 league teams I support, the Redcliffe Dolphins in just their 2nd season narrowly missed out on finals again, due to a final round loss to Newcastle. Though they had a fantastic season.
Sadly, Queensland lost the year’s State of Origin Series despite looking unassailable again after winning Game 1 of 3. That result was massively assisted by (new rugby union recruit) Joseph Suaali being sent off in the 7th minute for a brazen high shot on Reece Walsh. It seemed Mike Maguire the NSW coach was worth his money, turning around the series very impressively. Now that he’s the new Broncos coach, things are looking up for Brisbane in the 2025 season! And hopefully bad again for NSW for three foreseeable future.
Rugby Union
Last year I attended only a couple of professional matches.
23/02: We saw Rebels vs ACT Brumbies at AAMI Park while my parents were in town. The stadium lived up to its informal title as the coldest place on Earth. Sadly the Rebels got smashed 30-3 in the opening round clash.
11/05: Something entirely different, was when Owen & I went to watch Lucha Fantastica (Mexican) Wrestling at Geelong Town Hall. It was so much better than I ever expected. We’re definitely on the look out for when wrestling comes to town again.
Running
I was happy to easily complete another 100km per month, finishing the year at the Dawnbuster Fun Run on the morning of New Year’s Eve with a total of 1290km. This year I was less motivated to round up and force in another run. It was the same time at the Dawnbusters two years earlier that I learned how to find my yearly km total in Strava, where I had a meagre deficit to make a 1200km year, which I rectified when home with a second run.
10/02: The first event of the year though was the half marathon at Bellarine Sunset Run, which I unexpectedly joined up with my friend Gary.
21/09: The highlight event for me was Surf Coast Century 50km trail run. What a delight that was! Training went well with the Surf Coast Trail Runners, and it was a worry to open my eyes to the potential of going further, when in the final 3 kms we actually sped up and had plenty left in the tank.
13/10: I also ran the 10km at Melbourne Marathon with Myles and our family friend again. This goal time was reduced again to support Todd, and somehow I managed it – despite the hyperextension of my knee at the footy happening the weekend prior. I thought that was a sign the knee wasn’t serious. Nope. The physio clarified running in a straight line is easy. My PCL injury is bad with all other types of movements.
2024 was my most prolific year at ParkRun. I ran 21 events (in the preceding 6 years I ran just 37 times). It’s hardly a noteworthy number, with some people religiously completing 52 each and every year. But for most of the year I do have a clash with the kids Saturday sports. At ParkRun I enjoyed volunteering twice also, including being the photographer for the first time. It was definitely fun, although the whittling down & editing of 400+ photos was a mammoth undertaking.
Actually I volunteered a few other times this year:
Marshall at the inaugural Torquay Triathlon – where I basically just cheered on for all my friends out on the course
Aid station at Afterglow, which was lots of fun, and
Sweeper at the Anglesea Roo Run.
Health
I started the year with big hopes for being super healthy, returning to Yoga after many years off. It became a solid weekly practice thanks to a ClassPass benefit from my employer. I’d even pack my mat when meeting mates at the brewery, before walking on to my Yin Yoga session nearby which got a few laughs. A couple of knee complaints though put a stop to me wanting to stretch in non-mandatory ways.
Overall I think I was pretty healthy in 2024, given it’s the oldest my body has ever been. There was one further hip/adductor complaint in late July that had me painfully glued to the couch which required physio attention. The physio sorted that out without it hampering my Surf Coast Century training, which I remember being an absolute relief.
I am surprised to spot that I actually had COVID again in 2024, on 9th January missing the first few days returning to work after the new year.
One further blemish last year was that I donated blood only once. And that occasion was a #fail, with the blood flow slowing too much to continue in full. I sufficiently drank far too much water as usual beforehand to help, which I learned from past experience. But my veins weren’t playing on the day. There was a trainee nurse who did seem to struggle with the needle. And it was the week after the 50km ultra marathon. But neither of which should have mattered.
Reading
I managed to complete my 2024 reading goal of six books. Having a 2 hour commute a couple of times per week has been really helpful. I actually read 7 books, https://www.goodreads.com/user/year_in_books/2024/12648231. I noticed in the initial Goodreads summary, one of my tally was a graphic novel which I didn’t even enjoy. So I fast-tracked finishing a more appropriate book before the year was out.
This is in quite stark difference to previous year’s reading goals where I included audio books, which I was well aware I had very little recall of moments after listening to. This was particularly the case while listening during a run, to manage the final book’s completion on the final day of the year.
And that’s a wrap
2024 was another great year that I’m terribly grateful for. My family and I experienced so many joyful moments & events.
It’s been lovely to review and recount many of those moments in pulling this together.
There were a few rough days at the start for all of us. Bella was in pain and lethargic. Myles was distraught from being in the thick of the conflict, thinking he should have done more. I suspect my own difficulties might have been minimal, but it certainly didn’t seem so as each day I wiped out the bloody ooze from her inserted drain tube, and cleaned her fur.
After a couple of days Bella wanted to return to the scene of the crime – so to speak. I took her to the school on a close leash the first couple of visits. Then we tested her with a few friendly dogs and it was such a relief to see her showing no fear, and no new aggression or reaction.
First visit back to school. I SMS’d my family, that she was looking for a rematch, but how do I update her (about the other dog’s unavailability)..
At home we may have even noticed Bella has grown more attached to us. Most of the time, that’s nice with her snuggling and loving more pats. When we leave though, her fury might have actually become worse.
I let the other family (whose dog attacked Bella) know that Bella is back and doing well. They appreciated the update, even saying it might help their healing process. It turned out Vicky’s injury from the bite was serious enough to still need more recovery time.
We were all terribly impacted by the events of last Thursday afternoon. It seems though, the physical and emotional scars, may be more significant with the other family.
Bella received her final medicine this morning – to combat infection. This was just as she seems to have learned the sound of a tablet being crushed up in a bowl, and training herself to come close and sit for the reward of a small bowl of milk. I guess we can keep up the reward bit for a little while longer.
The second book by Sedaris I’ve read, and again I enjoyed his perspective throughout. This book – loosely arranged around events culminating with his father’s death, gave a clearer visual of his family’s dynamics. It obviously helped make him the interesting character he is, with so many entertaining takes. But you should probably look up his sister Amy, I hear she’s even more so. 😛
ADDENDUM: I saw the library also had a copy of “Pretty Ugly” (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/165940550-pretty-ugly), the first children’s book David Sedaris has authored, which was illustrated by Ian Falconer shortly before he passed away.
I saw Sedaris spruik it on an American late night show, although not very convincingly. He claimed it took a few minutes to write, which did NOT fill me with confidence.
While I can tell it probably took longer than that, it was not a book I’d proudly gift a friend’s kid. Which strangely might be my new measure of children’s book quality. But I thought the book was kind of fun, with an obvious message coming through after all.
While I was finishing my morning run I saw a Mum with a pram and a dog, dropping off her 5 year old girl at school who was protesting that she didn’t want to enter. I heard a chorus of her little classmates already inside, chanting something of encouragement, but the girl continued to hold back. The Mum’s body language seemed to say, Not this again as she began pleading with the girl. I got within earshot by this stage and heard the girl’s response, “I can’t go in until I get a kiss”. I almost let out an audible “Ohhh” witnessing such a treasure, the daughter needing a goodbye kiss from Mum. But I misunderstood. The girl walked back to the dog (who was standing dutifully by Mum’s side), bent down and gave a peck on the ageing-grey head of her black labrador. She then practically skipped through the gate to join her friends.
Later that day, events abruptly made me forget that joy.
My eldest son Myles and I took our dog Bella to that same school for a walk, like we do any day that I’m working from home. After she had her routine bathroom stop, she approached another dog and played her usual annoying (Pomeranian) game of barking at the dog to get a reaction, then run around or run away. I paused my kicking the footy with Myles to go apologise to the owner. Other people never seem to mind a tiny loud Pomeranian playing. I moved her on regardless, to give everyone – including me – some peace and quiet.
Her dog “friend” left soon after, then we stopped kicking the ball to take Bella around the oval for some exercise.
Bella always trails behind us. I’m rarely concerned. She’s well-behaved off the leash and never strays too far from us, and always returns. We then noticed a couple of unleashed dogs run up to Bella, seeming to want to say hello or play. Bella didn’t do her usual barking or growling to entice a reaction. She looked more cautious or unsettled, perhaps due to how close they suddenly came up to her. We paused to watch, as a third dog joined the other two, and I began to worry that Bella had no easy way to escape. I saw a lady was in pretty close vicinity to the three dogs, who were all probably 30 metres from us.
We started calling Bella to come back to us. But her tail was up, so I wasn’t too worried. Then we heard a rise in commotion, with barking or growling from one of the other dogs, and saw Bella was trying to scurry away but was completely surrounded. We called her more forcefully to come to us, but she couldn’t escape.
I told Myles “Run!” One of the dogs, a medium-sized brown & white Labradoodle began biting at Bella. Bella was tiny in comparison, and completely defenseless. She yelped out, scared and in pain, and I kind of noticed the lady trying to intervene. Myles arrived quickly to the scene and lifted Bella out, which seemed to free her from the Labradoodle’s jaws. It was only relief for a moment, as the dog started jumping up and latching on, trying to rip down Bella’s tiny hind leg. This is when I reached the scene. I screamed an obscenity at the dog, threw a poo bag at it, and kicked it hard. The dog seemed unphased by me, but it did retreat a little. That enabled Myles to lift Bella more safely away from the snapping jaws of the Labradoodle. The other two smaller dogs weren’t aggressive, but just as interested in Bella. The owner of the dogs was failing to control any of them.
I felt obliged to explain to the lady my fury wasn’t directed at her, but I had no choice as her dog was unresponsive. Our conversation could have gone in a couple of different directions. I was livid. If she had a problem, I was ready for it! She didn’t protest at all. In fact, she was happy with my actions and had already begun apologising profusely.
With the danger now over, Myles and I, and the lady started to talk through the shock we just experienced. I checked Bella’s foot where the dog had latched on, and was happy to see no painful reaction. We also saw no physical marks, so we were relieved to think the attack might have been ‘more bark than bite’. The lady continued to apologise, and tell us how embarassed she was, and that it had never happened before. She gave me her details – let’s call her “Vicky”, and mentioned they would pay for any vet bills to get Bella checked out or whever was needed. Also shared her fear that this event would be all over the local Facebook page, which seemed an odd concern at that point.
We then noticed blood streaming down Vicky’s own fingers. The Labradoodle must have also bitten her in the skirmish, but she deflected any concerns we had for her, and worried only for our dog. Poor Bella did have a growing red stain on her fur, around her neck near her right shoulder.
Myles & I were still worried for Vicky’s well-being. She was bitten badly, clearly in shock, struggling to speak, and almost at the point of tears over what her dog had just caused. We offered to help get her home, and make sure she was OK. But she didn’t want our help. It turned out their house backs onto the school oval. Bella & I walk past their place almost every single morning. She was clearly embarassed and was scolding & muttering her worries to the three dogs, all now finally leashed. Myles & I tried continuing our walk with Bella, hoping things could still be normal. It didn’t last long though. Bella was too shaken and the blood on her fur was starting to increase.
We have a friend who works at the local vet, who I phoned while Myles was carrying Bella home. I really just wanted advice whether her vet was open, or whether we’d need to visit the animal emergency – 30 minutes away. Instead, she kindly drove straight over to take a look. She shaved away the fur near the wound, and washed it out with a few items she picked up. We could then see there was a single puncture mark, just over a centimetre wide. It continued to bleed. Bella was clearly stressed from the attack, and nipping at some of our advances. We were hopeful though, at the vet the next morning they’d find nothing too serious, and maybe just add a couple of stitches.
I sent a text message to update Vicky that night, with a couple of photos that showed the damage. Soon after, I received a call from an unknown number, who turned out to be Vicky’s husband. He asked if I could communicate with him, as Vicky was too shaken up. The guy then explained that they were on their way back from the animal emergency themselves, where they had just been, …. to put down their dog!
I fell silent. Even though their dog had allegedly never attacked before, they felt they couldn’t trust the dog from then on. I said I respect their wishes, but it’s (DEFINITELY) not what I wanted. Earlier I wasn’t even clear myself, whether it was right to report the dog to local council. After the attack I deliberately stretched my hand out in front of the dog to check if I’d consider it a dangerous dog. Which I guess given what it just joyfully did to Bella, should be utterly conclusive.
The next morning at the vet, it turned out the damage was more severe. While it seemed like a clean puncture wound into her skin, the bite in fact tore quite long, length-wise parallel to the skin’s surface. They learned this after putting her under general anaesthetic. They cleaned the area, and stitched her up after inserting a drain which they hope to remove next Friday. The drain is even more disgusting than it sounds. It’s there to allow fluids to release from the area, and prevent infection.
Altogether our vet bill #1 was $1,280. Although the other family would be grieving the fresh loss of their dog, I didn’t hesitate to send the paid invoice onto them, which they promptly reimbursed. In our communications I asked again how Vicky was doing. It turned out she went to work to take her mind off it.
It’s terribly upsetting to see your dog wounded from an unprovoked attack. This whole episode was made worse, knowing it led to a family having to say farewell to their dog.
And to think, my day started so lovely, witnessing a sweet little girl unable to start her day until she kissed her canine companion goodbye.
But as always, the loudest with the least interest in facts, scream Blue Murder. Their paranoia hinges on the known (extremely low) risk of blood clots identified with the AZ vaccine, and that the company’s business decision is actually a clear admission of the true, severe, and ongoing harm of the jab^^.
In hindsight, I think I’ve never been disappointed not hearing about the news. I should just ignore it all more often.
^ “dumbterances” is a portmanteau I think I just invented, combining dumb and utterances, which seemed useful here.
^^ We really need a way of highlighting / tagging text that indicates it’s what someone may believe, instead of something that is written as a correct statement. Maybe like if some text is being said sarcastically it can be italicised. With the rapidly increasing spidering of content to teach Large Language Models and AI, it’s essential we don’t teach the robots the precise things we are in fact mocking.
