Kangaroos and Koalas: Why Wildlife is the Best Part of International Travel (sorry museums)

May 04, 2025

May I recommend

Kangaroos

We’ve been travelling for two plus weeks in Australia and have only seen a tiny portion of this enormous and beautiful country. We’ve been called “mate”, spent hours in the car practicing our Aussie accents (we have all nailed “thirteen” but we’re basically committing hate crimes any time we say anything else) and eaten our combined body weight in TimTams.

We’ve strolled beaches, swum in warm ocean water (such a novelty from Canada, where one dip sucks the air from your lungs like God’s vacuum cleaner) celebrated Anzac Day in a small town, where the band really did play Waltzing Mathilda… but the thing we have loved the most were the kangaroos.

We didn’t really start seeing them until we rolled into the Hunter Valley, but then they were EVERYWHERE. Not only are they incredibly cool/weird looking, but their movement, that insane hop — why kangaroos, why? — is really beautiful.

‘roos by the billabong — what could be more Aussie? Maybe if they were eating Vegemite sandwiches…

Soaking in the culture, wandering the city, chatting with the locals, eating the food, even navigating the recycling system are all ways that travel kind of challenges your expectations, expands your mind and shows you a different way of being. To my mind, however, nothing makes you feel more like you’re somewhere else, than spotting THE animal that locals barely register, but that you’re lowkey freaking out over…

What’s your coolest foreign country/wild animal encounter? Can it beat seeing a mob of kangaroos hop away from you with the surprising grace of Danny stunning Mindy with his secret dance skills in the Mindy Project?

Tell us about it in the comment below!

Article Roundup!

This is a fun list. I presume most people caught at least a few of these… The first one I remember seeing in the theatre was ET. Transformative life experience — I was terrified, sad and consumed with a desire for Reeses Pieces, which maybe they didn’t yet sell in Canada (or at least, that’s what my parents told me).
The Fifty Biggest Summer Blockbusters of the Past Five Decades
As accompaniment to the above article, if you’re planning what summer movies to watch, this is a good list. A new Wes Anderson is always exciting, as is (maybe) that John Krasinski one. The Life of Chuck might also be good. I am a scaredy cat, but I do love a good zombie movie, so *maybe* I’ll see 28 Years Later. I might also check out Sorry Baby, and will I go see the new Naked Gun with Liam Neeson? Perhaps! I did love the Leslie Nielsen movies… Freakier Friday is definitely intriguing me, too!
Summer 2025 Movie Preview: 25 Films to Watch
Our brains are so fascinating! They hold so much power, including to actually make ourselves feel better. The placebo effect is really so cool, and this article delves into the trend of Open Label Placebo, where the patient KNOWS the treatment has no scientific basis, and yet it still works.
You Know it’s a Placebo, so Why Does it Still Work?
In more rigorous clinical trials over the past few decades, researchers have floated a number of hypotheses for why OLPs work. Maybe it’s because doing something rather than nothing can make us feel better. (Psychologists call this “action bias.”) Maybe it’s because people living in well-off countries with huge industrial-pharmaceutical complexes have been conditioned to expect the pills their doctors give them to work. Maybe the act of taking an OLP—twisting off the bottle cap, swallowing the pill—triggers some biomedically useful pathways, just as bloodcurdling movies can curdle (or coagulate) the blood even though the viewer knows everything in the film is fake.
The headline on this one makes me VERY nervous. I read the whole thing on the edge of my seat, terrified about what might happen to this guy’s brand new phone as he walked around with it NAKED for a full month…
Is it Finally Safe to Ditch your Cellphone Case? I put it to the test
I decided to find out. When I got home, I tore the case off my phone, threw it in a drawer and committed to a month of sweating through the case-free lifestyle. I pitched my editor a story about it. He liked the idea but assured me the BBC would not pay for repairs if my experiment goes sour. May God have mercy on my soul.
Did everyone know this trick but me? I HATE reading hardcovers because they are are so difficult to manage and hold, but this might well change my mind… Go to the minute 1:30 mark on the video to see how it’s done!
How to Break in a New Book

Reels!

(Warning: you’ll be taken to Instagram when you click)

Not even joking, these are legitimately two of my moves in morning yoga regimen.

everywomanisworthy

A post shared by @everywomanisworthy

This is an oldie, but it still makes me laugh

gaglessgiggles

A post shared by @gaglessgiggles

Summer is coming

If you want a summer read set in a humid Ottawa July, check out my novel SPEAK FOR THE DEAD: It’s a stormy summer day when Ottawa coroner Dr. Cate Spencer is called to the scene of an alleged suicide. Inside a narrow vault in the Dominion Archives’ nitrate film storage facility—kept separate from the rest of the collection due to its dangerous combustibility—officers pressure Cate to rule the death a suicide. When parts of the scene don’t add up and a deliberately set spark threatens her life, Cate suspects that this death might be murder.

But don’t take my word for it, here’s what a lovely Goodreads reader had to say:

This book was so different than what I was expecting. I genuinely liked it. I loved the messy imperfection that came with the protagonist. She was doing her very best just to survive from day to day

Buy it HERE

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