MANNERS AND OTHER MATTERS

The floral memorial in Martin Place, Sydney (photo news.au) This time last week most Australians were riveted to the live streaming of the hostage situation in the Lindt Cafe in Sydney's Martin Place;  tragically the outcome was the deaths of two of the hostages. The situation was made particularly poignant for me because my daughter  knew the husband of one of the hostages and had spoken to him as he raced to the cafe where he knew his wife regularly enjoyed her morning coffee with colleagues after hearing of the hostage situation.  Australia has reacted to this crisis in a spirit of "mateship" and mutual support.  As the floral memorial has continued to grow at the scene politicians, local Sydneysiders, visitors from other States and from other countries, children and the elderly have made a pilgrimage into the centre of the city which, despite the tragedy, is filled with preparations for Christmas and the other religious occasions which occur at ...

A little hand feeling spring for the first time... This post is not so much about manners but spring...its influences and inspirations.  While I have written about spring and its impact on me previously, somehow this year the burgeoning rose buds, and flourishing new wisteria plumes have meant so much more.   Spring for me has always had a huge influence...the change in the light as the dawn calls me at 5.30 for a walk along the river with my dog...somehow the energy of the light infuses me with enthusiasm.  Ruby and I revel in the dawn light... And this year I have become  a grandmother for the first time; it is an extraordinary experience and can give, if one accepts it, a new view of the life which remains to be lived. The opportunities which are offered are more shiny somehow...the difficulties which were part of the last two or three decades somehow feel now like necessary experiences... I live a modern life.  My grandchild lives ...

My iMac is now at home.... After much deliberation I decided last week to upgrade my computer.  It was a decision not taken lightly, because a computer, used for many purposes during the trials and tribulations of daily life becomes a close ally, and most of the time, a friend. Mine had been my daily companion for over five years, and we knew each other's foibles.  However, with the passage of time, and I have no doubt some unrealistic expectations on my part about its performance after such a relatively long time in "computer life", it became obvious that, like me, it was slowing down and needed a gentle nudge into semi-retirement.  And so it is confined to the rather boring process of accounts and bill paying and mind-numbing record keeping, rather than the excitement of new voyages towards beckoning horizons in the world of the internet. I took the leap of faith to an iMac from a PC, and despite my incredulity about it's beauty and accessibility, I felt some...

The training room prepared for private clients (photo LP) Over the past few weeks I have trained two teenagers through my program Modern Manners for Today .  They are both highly intelligent young adults but in both cases their mothers felt that their social skills could use assistance, not only to encourage greater participation in the social life around them, but to help them in gaining confidence. The first client, aged 16, has been accepted to attend Magdalen College in Oxford this year.  She is extremely bright but socially very young for her age.  She is very pleasant but with virtually no social skills and a tendancy to say whatever comes to mind at the time.  She has few friends and spends a great deal of her time in chat forums on the internet with like minded people. A formal western table setting (photo LP) Perhaps the most surprising aspect of our day together was at the dining table.  Included in my program is a three course...

(Source unknown) This is  humorous etiquette advice sent to me by a friend…we Australians can be quite irreverent...… ************************************************************ " Aussie Bush Etiquette is recognized throughout the civilized world but we all need to be reminded from  time to time. In General:   1.       Never take an open stubby ( a beer can )  to a job interview... 2.       Always identify people in your paddocks before shooting at them. 3.       It's tacky to take an Esky ( a portable cooler )  to church. 4.       Even if you're certain you're included in the will, it's rude to take your ute ( an open back utility vehicle ) and trailer to the funeral.  The vastness of Australia...  Guilderton, Western Australia (photo LP) Eating Out: ...

Forget standing when women enter the room or calling all men “sir”. Modern western society would suggest that is behaviour from a forgotten time.  But what are the modern manners every child should have? When I was thinking about this post I returned to the memory of my father answering the telephone…the sort which was attached to a  wall and was shared among all members of the family. “Is Louise there?” would ask the tentative teenage male voice.  “Yes” was the response of my father as he put the telephone handset back into its cradle. Oh, the humiliation!  Whoever  the new “boyfriend” of the moment was, he had not asked the correct, and polite by my father’s standards, question: “Good evening…may I speak with Louise please”.   Then the answer would have been, perhaps:  “No, we are in the middle of dinner.  Why don’t you call back in half an hour”.  And then I would have to suffer through another half hour of polite family...

Adele, singing Someone Like You After my recent post  Manners, Pen Pals...and Internet Friends  I have been inundated with emails from people with similar stories about negative internet influences on their personal lives with devastatingly painful effects.  Partners, be they personal or professional, deceiving, through a virtual life. I have explored with a psychologist how such duplicity can exist in otherwise quite reasonable  people. The condition is referred to as “internet psychosis”, brought on by the self absorbed behaviour in those who live, via the writing of blogs and chat forums, in a virtual reality. They are able to reinvent themselves to a certain extent. And with blog writers, the quality of the written word, true or not, becomes paramount, and in the most severe cases, becomes delusional.   It is increasingly becoming a psychosis seen by mental health professionals. Any breakup is painful.  But when the internet is invol...

Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (Photo:  The West Australian) Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II arrives in Perth, Western Australia tomorrow afternoon.  There is great excitement among those who are traditional Monarchists and also those who will meet and greet her as the Australians who will probably vote for a Republic in the not too distant future. Quite aside from politics, Her Majesty has reigned as Head of the Commonwealth since she became the Queen in 1952.  This remarkable lady has outlasted many Prime Ministers, Presidents and Heads of State during her reign.  One can only imagine the stories she is able to tell about them. And certainly from the public images we have, Her Majesty has seen the change of century, world tribulations, crises, technical innovations and more with courtesy and graciousness. My family were staunch monarchists.  I remember my mother taking my sister and me down to stand under one of the pylons of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 196...

A sign  on our hotel balcony in Langkawi After being back at home for 5 days after a fabulous week with my daughter in Malaysia, today I am leaving for almost a month in France.  I am joining a very special friend in Paris and we are going to navigate our way through the tiny villages and coastlines of Brittany before, as we say in Australia, “going off the beaten track” to see what else we would like to explore. I am taking my favourite French recipes and some new ones on my IPad so that I can try them with the French seafood, which is so very different to ours Downunder. I absolutely love cooking so I am excited about the many possibilities I have for success, and even perhaps some failures. And I will try some "fusion" experiments with some recipes I picked up in Malaysia. Spicy crab, sauteed stingray, steamboat chicken and more... The food in Malaysia was wonderful.  From the food stalls in Chinatown where we sampled spicy chilli crab, sautéed stingray with saltwater...

I read a comment the other day about the table manners being displayed by the judges on Masterchef Australia.   And I had to agree.  At what stage did licking the knife become any style of good table manners? Apparently one of the judges, when asked about his manners, responded that his grandmother had taught him table etiquette and that it was, on occasion, OK to break the rules…does national television equate to “on occasion”? With a vast television audience, multicultural and across all age groups – with respect, a great achievement by the programme – I would have thought that  this occasion would be one where the judges would in fact endeavour to “put their best foot forward”… closely followed by their best table manners. Hopefully tonight’s Grand Final will allow them to showcase their etiquette skills. It’s not old fashioned…it's just good table manners. Good luck to the finalists, Kate Bracks and Michael Weldon. I will be watching a...

My 21st birthday dinner...Oh so formal then! I was talking with a friend the other day about friendship.  About how it impacts on our lives, from childhood and teenage friends, to becoming friends with boyfriends’s friends, husband’s friends and their wives, parents of other school children, social club friends,  friends after divorce or death of a partner, passing friendships, acquaintances…and now virtual friends. It’s complicated. And I am finding in my “middle” years that my need for friends has reduced…not that I don’t value and cherish my friends, but my actual need has lessened.  Why, I wonder?  I used always be a “People who need People” (with apologies to whoever wrote the song made famous in Funny Girl ) sort of a person.  I was always out and about, making sure that I saw my friends, knew all that was going on with them and theirs.  Afternoon tea for the girls...with bubbles! However, as the years have moved on, my children have become ind...

Camera ready...action! I had such a great day yesterday filming for the ABC show “Can we Help?”on the subject of courtship and marriage from the 1950’s to the present. While I am very comfortable with radio interviews, TV is obviously a completely different vehicle for interviews and I was nervous. But the presenter, Christian Horgan, the director, James, and the crew were fantastic and assisted in making me feel completely at ease. James directing on small matters of detail It was filmed at various places in my home, as each decade was broken up into its own segment with the filming style reflecting the style of the time: the 1950’s in the reception room over afternoon tea; the 1960’s and 70’s around the pool with Christian changing into a very retro 70’s looking shirt; the 80’s and 90’s in my kitchen, leaning on a bench; and the 21st century decades in my office with my computer and online dating sites as the desktop backgrounds. And all of this in 36 degree heat! Fortunately I h...