Category Archives: A to Z April Blogging Challenge

My A to Z April Blogging Challenge posts and posts about the Challenge

Today I Give Myself Permission To Heed The Red Flags #atozchallenge

Letter HFriendship. There’s nothing like it.

Even in marriage, friendship is the foundation upon which love is based. No friendship and marriage can be a real lonely state.

Hand in hand with friendship comes loyalty. Hand in hand with friendship comes give and take.

Can there come a time when enough is enough? And how come we usually never know we have reached “enough ” until long after that point has passed?

And why are we wracked with guilt even when walking away was the only real option left to us?

Who can argue with Kenny Rogers’ great line from The Gambler?

You gotta know when to fold’em, know when to hold’em, know when to walk away, know when to run

But how do we really know when the time comes?

Loyalty is a huge one on my list. I was always taught to stand by my friends.  In midlife my friendships mean even more because I have a healthier appreciation of the odds against really connecting with someone. But loyalty can’t be blind.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

It is said that in midlife people commonly go through their phone books and scratch off names. The realization usually comes that it is better to focus on quality rather than quantity. I haven’t deliberately done that exercise, but I have become a bit more discerning about with whom I spend my time. That’s not to say I’m not wracked with guilt about those I choose to distance.

So, I have to remind myself to heed the red flags.

The following saying has become my recent favorite:

true colours

I want to believe the best of people, I think most people do. But it has come at a personal cost. Perhaps I have befriended too easily in the past. The challenge, I think, is to remain open and receptive enough to avoid the cynicism that comes with being too protectionist. There’s totally safe and then there’s social.

Liars, drama queens, attention seekers, manipulators and passive aggressors need not apply.

Today I give myself permission to heed the red flags.

Is this a tough one for you, too?

Today I Give Myself Permission To Go With The Flow #atozchallenge

Letter G Well, I’m back for another week of A to Z Challenge posts.

This week is brought to you by the letters G to L and by the numbers 7 to 12 and I could tell you how to get to Sesame Street, but I left my GPS in my other bag.

Yesterday was a blog free day  – one of only four in April and so in keeping with my new-found permission, I decided to just hang and go with the flow. This ended up in me cutting the pad of my left index finger with a kitchen knife in trying to tame a piece of pork shoulder. So far it’s pork shoulder – 1, Judy – 0 and all I’m going to say is I’m looking forward to the rematch. What this means though is that my key board skills are currently compromised. Do you know how essential the index finger on your left hand is to touch typing? Even if you’re more than a two finger typist? So every time I type the letters “r”, “t”,”c”, “d”, and “v”, the pork shoulder comes back to trumpet its victory. And whilst my writing skills are almost legendary, I have yet to master the art of writing a blog post without the letters “r” and “t” and “d”. I’m thinking “c” and “v” are probably more dispensable, but the Challenge is not the time to prove that theory. And just to rub salt into the wound, guess what came next after cutting my finger. That’s right, I had to rub salt into the pork shoulder and you can guess where some of the salt ended up. It seems my pain impulses are in perfect working order, seriously good to know! Anyway, now that I have set the scene for the week of blogging ahead with the appropriate degree of pathos, never let it be said that the show hasn’t gone on.

Yes, I could have pre-programmed my Challenge posts, but I didn’t because there is some part of me that loves the thrill of winging it and of being flexible about writing what I feel like on the day. The irony is also not lost on me for the topic of this post….. for there it is, a perfect example of going with the flow.

Control, what an illusion? No really, it is. And it only took me forty plus years to realise. Clearly, I’m a slow study. Over recent years, I have become acutely aware of what I can’t control and have come to accept that that’s the case.

Escape key but still here

The notion of objective fairness used to loom large in my life. My expectations of certain outcomes as a result of other people acting fairly or life treating me fairly were keeping me hostage. Mind you, I expected no less of myself (and I still don’t), but then it occurred to me that the only one who was interested in my expectations was me and the only one who suffered when my own expectations were not met, was me. There was no lightening bolt from the heavens on the person or circumstance that didn’t exhibit the appropriate degree of fairness. They carried on as if nothing had happened, because in their reality nothing had!

How many times have you heard or said the following expressions?

He/She should have done this 

I can’t believe he/she didn’t/did do that

She/he should have realized X and therefore done/said Y

This is the language of control and I’m not going to lie, I used to say these quite a bit.

The energy I spent in trying to determine outcomes was huge. The fact is, I can’t. Everyone has freedom of choice as to how they respond to external stimuli. YOU have freedom of choice as to how you respond to external stimuli. That’s the only thing we can control, our response and our thoughts and actions. The rest is up for grabs.

Every day brings new stimuli and situations, particularly at this midlife stage. More rapid change is now inevitable and the longer we hold on to what WAS, we cannot enjoy what IS and nor can we smooth over the necessary transitions. Flexibility and patience are needed to locate those doors that are now opening. Your flow will determine which ones you open and enter.

growing out of middle age

So, it’s time to move from control to acceptance and respond by kicking the crap out of middle age!

Today I give myself permission to go with the flow and to indulge my left index finger.

Today I Give Myself Permission to Fail #atozchallenge

Letter FThis is it, one of the major, if not The Big Kahuna of permissions.  At least for me.

No one sets out to fail. It is ingrained in us from birth that we should strive to succeed. Our parents, spouse and employer all reinforce this notion by rewarding us if we succeed. The extrinsic rewards for success are many, praise, love, respect, applause, money and validation to name a few. As a result, we spend a lot of time and energy avoiding failure. Exactly what constitutes failure is up for debate, something to consider next time you reach for a Post-It note.

But let’s start with the notion that failure is the situation where despite your best efforts you have not met your own objectives or that of someone else who is important to you. Let’s face it, it is bound to happen at some point in your seventy plus years above ground. Despite the best of intentions, we are all human. Witness politicians who we vote in to succeed and who so often fail.

What we are not successful at doing as a society is teaching our children and ourselves how to deal with failure or that sometimes you have to first fail to succeed. This focus only on success fosters a dangerous form of perfectionism and ignores the importance of resilience. Further, if we are taught to succeed at any cost, we are indirectly taught that it is permissible to push others down in our quest.

Michael Jordan famously said the following:

Michael Jordon - failure

What if Michael Jordan didn’t have the resilience to get back on the court after each of those 26 times or spent all of his time after those 300 games in self-flagellation?

I can’t tell you how many times I have been to the self-flagellation shop to buy a T-shirt over something relatively minor. I’m now done with buying any more of these T-shirts, firstly I have them in every colour and they are now out of fashion. Fear of failure no longer has me in its power, because I know I have to learn the lessons from failure a dozen times to succeed the once. Self-deprecation is a wonderful tool in the fight against this fear and it will serve me well in my second act.

Ego, you have a lot to answer for and I’m slowly putting you in your place.  And with this comes a huge relief. Relief in knowing that trying to control a succesful outcome is often futile, particularly if it depends on other people and being able to channel that controlling energy in a whole lot of other more constructive ways. For too much ego and fear of failure go hand in hand. How ironic is it that I had to fail many times to understand that?

Lincoln failure

Thanks Abe, for the most part I AM content and understand that failing is a part of trying and in particular, trying something new.

Not trying or not doing simply because of the prospect of failure? Make mine a double!

Double faceplam

Today I give myself permission to fail

Today I Give Myself Permission to Explore and Experience #atozchallenge

Letter EA couple of days ago I gave myself permission to be curious. I’m now going to extend that curiosity to the physical, by giving myself permission to explore the word and open myself to new experiences.

One of my passions is travel. I am grateful to my parents for instilling in me a sense of adventure and for exposing me to other countries during my childhood years. I have tried to do the same for my children and we have a few more family trips left in us. Time is precious and each trip now together as a family takes on another dimension and a sense that this is something special.

When I first had children, I remember receiving a pamphlet from the pharmacist which said something along the lines of:

Your children won’t remember their ironed clothes, but they will remember your shared experiences

The notion has stuck with me ever since. I’ve been busy creating shared experiences for the family (Oh, no not again!!!), but also now at middle age, solo experiences for my own memories. The realty is that my health can only decline from this point and there is a whole lot of living left to be done.

So here are the highlights of my exploration and experience bucket list. I’m getting itchy feet just thinking about these!

Egypt A

BMorroco

IstanbulC

DGreek islands

tomatina festival SpainE

Cable beachF

A = Egypt, which has long been a fascination

B = Marrakesh, Morocco

C  = Istanbul a city spanning two continents. Take me to the Grand Bazaar…

D = The Greek Islands, especially Santorini

E = Tomatina festival in Spain. Get down and salsa!

F = Sunset camel ride in Broome, Western Australia

There’s a whole lot more as well. The world is now truly a playground.

Right now all of my work colleagues are planning overseas trips within the next 12 months. There’s a lot of planning and travel talk, glossy brochures and yearning on my part and I’m living my vicarious travel dreams through them.

In the meantime I content myself with road trips within a two to three hour vicinity and create my own local experiences. After all everything can be an experience, depending on what you make of it.

It’s time to get busy making memories!

Do you yearn for farawy places and experiences? What places are on your exploration bucket list?

Today I Give Myself Permission to Deal #atozchallenge

Letter DI started my first job at the tender age of 14 years and nine months, which in this part of the world is the minimum age without having to obtain parental consent.

It was a part-time gig working at McDonald’s. And I loved it. My gateway to teen financial independence, it also provided a social life (there were boys!) and (at the time) free food. I am grateful for the start that McDonald’s gave me, because say what you will about McDonald’s, it has one of the BEST employee training programmes I have experienced. And in the ensuing thirty something years I have experienced many.

Beyond the mandatory “Would You Like Fries With That?”, it tought me about systems, structures and teamwork and all at a tender age when knowing these skills made a huge difference to a young life.

One of our mantras at Maccas (the Australian version of the term, Mickey D’s) was:

Clean As You Go

The concept was that if you make a mess, you deal with it then and there or as soon as the situation practically allows.

Now, I would love to tell you that I have religiously applied that philosophy to every physical mess I have ever created. But sadly, that’s not the case as the pile of notes, articles and clothes lying around my house will attest.

However, I believe that I have made up for this physical deficiency by applying this mantra to my metaphorical piles. I clean my messes as I go, meaning I DEAL.

Avoidance is the opposite of dealing. The problem with avoidance is that it’s a chancy strategy. Whilst the possibly of the mess disappearing all of its own volition or by having someone else deal with it is there, it’s by no means a certainty. The possibility of the mess compounding into something larger and more permenant whilst we wait for others to deal or for a miracle is much more likely. What could have been dealt with at the start with a small amount of pain, effort or unpleasantness now requires way more pain, effort or unpleasantness because mess tends to attract mess. The avoidance strategy also means that you give the mess time to creep and ooze into other aspects of your life, making the dealing all that much harder when the time to deal actually comes. And in my experience, the time always comes.

The consequence of not dealing was sheeted home to me at the age of 23. Like most people, I hated going to the dentist. Really, really hated it… as in anxiety, the whole nine yards and so much so there was a period where I avoided going to the dentist for five years. I paid for my avoidance however, when I finally went to the dentist. Instead of an hour of unpleasantness every 6 months if I had dealt, I was rewarded with 6 hour long sessions in the chair at the hands of the torture master. NEVER will I repeat that experience, it was a lesson of a lifetime.

Dealing with emotional pain is no different. Avoidance of emotional pain will come home to roost. At some point you have to do the hard yards and deal. And to deal, you want mole hills, not mountains.

It has been said that Carl Jung once observed that more people enter therapy at the age of forty-nine than at any other age. This is because this is often a time of life and death struggle between the old and new. It’s time to decide on your new way of being, it’s time to deal.

mole on a hill

Today I give myself permission to deal.

Today I Give Myself Permission To Be Curious #atozchallenge

Letter CSome people are content with being an expert in what lies behind their front fence.  Then there’s me.

Whilst I enjoy my home and my front yard, my imagination and thoughts have always had a wider calling. I have always believed that good things lie beyond my front fence and that the world offers endless possibilities for the curious. I remember that in my circle of friends growing up there was always one fascinating individual who knew a lot about a lot. In those days, given that we were not of driving age, that knowledge would have come from reading a wide range of sources. From science fiction to world politics, this dude understood it all. As a result, he was fascinating to be around and fascinating to talk to.

These days, I feed my curiosity in various ways. Reading blogs on a wide variety of different topics is but one. It is certainly refreshing to be able to hear different viewpoints from sources other than the mainstream media. Our press here seems to have a developed a homogeneity to it and what I personally feel is an element of intellectual snobbism. Information and news should be accessible, digestible and debatable by all but that’s a whole other topic and blog post. Another favorite way is to talk to people I haven’t spoken to before. You never know where such a conversation will lead, what nugget you may glean.

Remaining open and receptive is key.

When I first starting work after graduating from university, I found that I missed academic learning. Don’t get me wrong, there was plenty of learning to be done on the job, but most of that was of a practical nature. I

photo courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net

photo courtesy of freedigitalphotos.net

craved something that involved digging a little deeper. So after a year out, I returned to undertake postgraduate studies and my curiosity was appeased for a time. Then came children and my learning curve and curiosity transcended a whole other level. However, in our little work team, I was the one that would ferret out new developments and report them. The ferreting was a welcome distraction from the day-to-day churn.

Then there’s the curiosity about other lands and cultures. Travel just ticks so many boxes. I see a lot of it in the future of my second act.

Curiosity in my midlife years has taken on new life and new urgency as the search for answers and new ideas escalates. I love having a variety of teachers, from the very young to the very old. We can learn something from everybody, whether they deliver the lesson with eloquence, articulation or just gesticulation.

And just to show that I’m still totally insane curious, I have just started a new course of postgraduate university study in a field that is totally different to that in which I work. The last four weeks have been a real eye opener in terms of what learning is like in the technological age and have been wonderfully gratifying even in those moments of pure stress during the submission of my first assignment. Last weekend was a real fun time in our household with mother and son engaging in a fascinating discourse on the Harvard in text method of citation. We both had assignments due either side of Easter – he as a university freshman, me as a postgraduate student. But THE very best thing about this experience is that I am undertaking this course of study simply because I want to. This is purely to expand my world. If something comes out of it in the job sense, then great, if not that’s great too. Whatever the case, I will have gained something other than just a university fee debt.

And remember as an undergrad how you looked upon mature age students as slightly freaky and not quite understanding why? Well, now I AM that mature age student, motivated and grateful for the opportunity to do it all again.

So did curiosity really kill the cat? I think not.

 curiosity killed the cat

 Are you curious by nature? Would you ever contemplate undertaking further formal study? Maybe you are already engaged in further formal study. If so, I would love to hear from you!

Today I give myself permission to be curious.

Today I Give Myself Permission To Be Bodacious #atozchallenge

Letter B officialI wonder how many of you landed on this page thinking you were going to see something related to the OTHER meaning of bodacious? Well, sorry to disappoint, but there is none of that here, although if you stick around a bit you might find something entertaining.

Bo·da·cious also bow·da·cious (b-dshs) or bar·da·cious (bär-) Southern & South Midland U.S.
adj.
1. Remarkable; prodigious.
2. Audacious; gutsy

It is also said that the word “bodacious” is a likely amalgam of the words” bold and audacious” with a resurgence in popularity in the ’80’s and ’90’s.

Remember the last time you did something audacious or bold? Your heart may have been racing and your palms may have been sweaty, but how good did you feel? I’m talking here about something subjectively audacious, not something that’s going to put you on the evening news for all the wrong reasons. It may be something as simple as approaching someone you revere or don’t know to ask something or wearing something you have not dared to before. And doesn’t it feel great?

I have found that midlife is THE best time to be bodacious. Possibly because midlife has helped to wake up the maverick inside me or because I don’t accept that we should necessarily stick to someone else’s script, midlife is the perfect foil to do something remarkable. A decade earlier and I would have been too self-conscious to do half the things I do today. But little by little I learned that most people do outrageous things, the world still turns for them and those that judge generally covet the ability to do something outrageous themselves without having to worry about external opinion. And the biggest empowering step? Faith. Faith in myself that I could deal with whatever consequences would follow – whether they were predictable or not. You don’t get to mid-life without acquiring a certain level of skills and smarts.

Bodaciousness accounts for those midlifers who change their career or start their own business. Whether they do so out of design or necessity, boldness and audacity are mandatory requirements.

Take a look at some of these bodacious midlifers:

  • Harland Sanders, also known as “Colonel Sanders”. He opened his first Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise location when he was 62
  • Clint Eastwood didn’t direct his first film until the age of 41 and is the oldest person to have won an Oscar for best director
  • Wally Amos opened his first Famous Amos cookie store at the age of 40

These are all noteworthy achievements, but remember that your bodacious move doesn’t have to be of this magnitude. Pushing your personal envelope, even just a little is all that it takes to be bodacious. Just take a leaf out of the book of this bodacious reader who stumbled upon my site today via the search term “frangipani google nose” .

Midlife is a great time to be bodacious. It will set you up for a lifetime of aging disgracefully!

Thanks for sticking with this post and reading it through to the end. For your patience and persistence I reward you with a bodacious

Letter T Official letter a officialLetter T Officialletter a official

Today I give myself permission to be bodacious!

Today I Give Myself Permission To Appreciate My Achievements #atozchallenge

Letter AIt’s 1 April marking the start of the A to Z April Blogging Challenge. As this post is brought to you by the letter A, it’s time to give a huge thanks to Arlee Bird for conceiving the Challenge and for giving more than 1600 bloggers the impetus to fire up their blogs this month. Arlee is a true blogger and gentlemen and deserves the tag of awesome – another great A word.

Now, onto the Challenge post!

Most of us arrive at middle age wishing we had achieved more. More what exactly is up for grabs, but it’s just more. Whether we have visions of how midlife was for our parents and wanting our own experiences to be different and yes… more or whether we feel we have not met our own expectations, the feeling of something not being enough lurks.

Somehow, somewhere along the way we picture a different midlife scenario, one were we have ticked most, if not all, of the metaphorical boxes that one is supposed to tick off by mid-life. The weight of expectation feels heavy and rather than asking “Are We There Yet?”, we don’t ask at all, because we are afraid of the answer. Either that or we are just too tired to savour what we have done.

About four years ago, I came to realise that every big achievement is made up of many small achievements. The prize of the big achievement can never really be yours until you build a solid  foundation, until you have put tab A into slot B. Putting tab A into slot B requires patience, persistence and postponement of the need for instant gratification, so why shouldn’t it be appreciated? I know a good many people who fail to see that putting tab A into slot B is still an achievement, so focused are they on achieving the bigger goal. This is fine, except that when the bigger goal is not reached fast enough or the focus is solely on how far there still is to reach it, feelings of despondency and failure kick in.

I spent quite some time over the last couple of years castigating myself over what I felt I had not achieved. The film reel in my head was playing but intermission never came, all I felt was a greater sense of urgency to reach the end of the film.  Expectation will do that to you.

So, you’ve reached forty something and feel you have much left to do? You’re right, you do  – there’s the whole second act to live through BUT stop for a minute and savour what you have achieved so far. Chances are you have achieved a great many things from the time you graduated from high school, even if the film reel of how it is supposed to be in your head is not your current reality. Whether its surviving more than a decade of marriage without killing your spouse, becoming a parent and surviving the sleepless nights, building the foundations of a career or business or just being able to greet each day and your fellow citizens with a kind word and a smile you have achieved something. Whether it’s having travelled the world or some part of it, created a home, forged community connections, being a good sibling, maintained a blog for a time you have achieved something.

In his book, Life: A Guide, Adam Fuller describes the years between the ages of 43 to 49 as being in control, but only just as the demands of others tend to take precedence over our own issues. It is time to let our spirits catch up with us otherwise the sacrifice will be to lose the relationship with ourselves and our dreams.

Appreciating all of your achievements to date no matter how small is a great first step to letting your spirit catch up with you.

Achievment

 Today I give myself permission to appreciate my achievements.

What is the one achievement you truly relish?

I Give Myself Permission To …Reveal My #atozchallenge Theme

If you’re around my vintage, you might remember the television show Welcome Back Kotter.

The show which ran from 1975 through to 1979 brought many memorable characters to our screens and provided more than a few laughs. As a moon struck teenager I used to eagerly wait for the weekly time slot so that I could feast my eyes on one Vincent (Vinnie) Barbarino played by a youthful John Travolta. Apart from his machismo, who could forget Vinnie’s classic retort:

Up Your Nose With A Rubber Hose?

cast-of-welcome-back-kotter-5Vinnie was one of the students in Mr Kotter’s class (played by Gabe Kaplan) and he and his fellow class mates, Arnold Horshack (Ron Palillo), Freddie “Boom-Boom” Washington (Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs) and Juan Epstein (Robert Hegyes) kept us entertained with great one liners, bravado and compassion. One of the great “non-characters” in the show was Epstein’s mother. Epstein’s mother, who we never saw on air, was a prolific permission note writer. In many an episode, Epstein (the guy in the denim vest in the photo) would miraculously produce a cleverly worded permission/excuse note from his dear old mother when placed in the hot seat. So close were the pair, that when Mr Kotter would read the note aloud, Epstein would mouth the words verbatim. Epstein’s mother certainly sounded like a formidable woman!

The concept of Epstein’s mother and the class permission note has stuck with me over the years. Self-permission has become particularly relevant to me in recent years as I take the journey through midlife. It’s the time for taking stock, for shedding the old skin and charting a solid course to the future. In short, it’s time to say it’s OK and to find the reasons why those dreams can and should be pursued instead of focusing on why they can’t.

Everyone’s midlife journey is different and whilst mine has not been without its challenges, it has, in the main, been a positive time. The potential for happiness is huge, the uncertainty is becoming less and less and the future looks full of promise. I’ve determined to fly rather than crumble as I focus on all the doors that are beginning to open rather than on those that may be closing.

Over the next few weeks of the Challenge, I will be blogging a 26 point permission slip. 26 permissions that we tend to deny ourselves in our lives caring for others and wish I had given myself earlier. I’ve come to the point where I have acknowledged that I am just as worthy as those I care for and deserve to give myself a break.

permission granted

Midlife has its perks. Google “midlife” and you’ll be met with a raft of articles about the midlife crisis or about the Middle Ages. Regrettably, there are very few positive messages about middle age and I’m aiming to change that. Some of my permissions will be funny, others deep. Hopefully you will find more than a few that resonate.

So, in the wonderful tradition of Epstein’s mother I give myself permission to create and commune in April.

Please join me for the A to Z Blogging Challenge Journey.

midlife prayer

Still Sitting On The Fence? Come Join Us On The Grassy Verge for the A to Z April Blogging Challenge #atozchallenge

From your perch on the fence, you’ve seen the A to Z Challenge banners pop up around the place. You’re thinking that WordPress is looking smart, spruced up as its is with all the banner colour around and you sense a stirring excitement amongst your fellow bloggers. Your creative juices are starting to flow – the Challenge is about to begin.

blogging and fenceYou then start to seriously consider taking part and the executive committee inside your head starts its questioning. Can I handle a blog a day? Is this too big a time committment? What happens if I miss a post? Is my writing up to scratch? Will I know what to do?

Let me help you to address the concerns of the executive committee.

 

 

Dear Committee Members,

Thank you for under taking your usual comprehensive risk analysis on the proposed activity.

Your concerns have been noted and can be mitigated as follows:

  • X may not blog every day, but X knows that X has several posts in them. Sometimes X gets the urge to post more than once a day because X reads or experiences something that triggers the words. There are plenty of people who undertake the Challenge without a plan and blog off the cuff.
  • Alternatively, X may choose a theme for his/her blog posts which will give his/her alphabetical creations a bit more structure. Doing the research for the posts will an enjoyable and educating process.
  • There is always an opportunity for X to programme his/her work to post on a given day and time, so that X does not have to write every day. This is particularly useful if X knows he/she has a another commitment during April.
  • If X misses a day or two or three, X can make up the missing posts during the Challenge. There are plenty of bloggers who post multiple posts to catch up.
  • The posts don’t need to be particularly long. Whilst it’s up to X to choose the length, a rule of thumb is that the optimal length for a Challenge is between 250 and 750 words. It’s quality that matters, not quantity.
  • Every participant brings something individual to the Challenge. X’s writing and ideas are unique.
  • The concept behind the Challenge is simple, blog and comment. X is undertaking these activities already with much aplomb.

This is a unique opportunity for X to grow as a blogger.

Rest assured that the Committee’s work is appreciated, however April will be the optimal time for the Committee to take a much needed vacation.

Alphabet blocks

Still note sure?

Take a look at some of these WordPress blogs taking part in this year’s Challenge:

Daily (W)rite – Damyanti is a Challenge co-host and will be showcasing Indie books and authors

Circles Under Streetlights – first Challenge and writing about all things bookish, writing and fictiony

Sound of One Hand Typing – an A to Z chronicle of White Sox baseball players. Batter Up!

Tropical Territory – the theme of this blog is pictures from Australia’s Northern Territory, particularly the Top End. Can’t wait to see what this blogger comes up with.

Peter Denton – Writer – Peter writes flash fiction, scripts and short stories

A Common Sea – returning for a second round after last year’s Challenge

Bob’s Wife – who will be sharing little illustrations of the Islands of the Philippines … from vignettes of beautiful scenery to images of the Filipino way of life

Mental Indigestion – blogging about imaginary friends

Irreverent Feminist – a feminism theme

The Speeding Turtle Gets Fit – a new blog from a new blogger. If you do nothing else, check out the fantastic banner photo on this blog!

And there’s a whole lot more WordPress blogs taking part, not to mention a bunch of Blogger blogs. Total participants now number more than 1,200.

That fence starting to feel slightly uncomfortable?

Hop on down and join us. 1 April is just around the corner.

Join up by clicking the here.

A2Z-2013-BADGE-001Small_zps669396f9

It as easy as …..the quick brown fox jumping over a lazy dog post!