Auntie Lilian, my father Frank’s younger sister turned 90 and I threw an afternoon tea for relatives to celebrate . The old lady, who lives in a self-contained hostel unit, is the matriarch of our large extended famil. My 93-year-old dad and my other two surviving aunties, Yvonne and Betty, her widowed sisters-in-law were other […]
Grand old auntie at 90
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Mandy marries lesbian love
Former Adelaide business leader, Mandy Keillor has been as straight as her black bob hair style all her life. Now at 47 years of age, she admits to having turned lesbian in her late 30s after being wooed by a gay woman who was her pilates instructor. “Natalia is a lesbian and left a female […]
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Time for a Miracle
Those words of wisdom by Regina Brent when she turned 90, currently on the Internet are comforting as I mull over the worsening situation with husband Olivier’s cancer. He is in hospital once again, this time with abdominal pain and we wait with trepidation for the results of more blood tests and xrays taken today […]
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Lashings of Frenchness at Film Festival
The Alliance Francaise French Film Festival, opening in Adelaide on March 20, promises yet again that alluring mix of emotion, passion love, and drama – as well as a new genre – “A French Touch Around the World’’. It will present four films of the 45 in the festival this year, which will celebrate co-productions […]
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Once Were School Days to Holiday Stays
Denise and Frank Kuss had a yearning for a different life from the typical suburban cycle of work and busy city living. Here is their story becoming B&B owners of the old Stanley Grammar School, now their Stanley Grammar Country House, Watervale, Clare Valley. “I had worked for The Advertiser as a secretary for many […]
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Hey presto! Petit chien is now a poodle!
Our petit chien, cute puppy Oscar has metamorphised. We thought we bought a Shi Tsu Maltese X with a shaggy, long-haired coat just like his mother. And, sure we saw the daddy dog, a handsome grey poodle, but our little bundle of joy was surely mainly Maltese, he wasusuch an adorable puffball. How wrong […]
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A Taste of the High Life on the High Seas
It is an idyllic April evening cruising in the Gulf St Vincent and I am enjoying a once-in-a-lifetime experience “steering” for a nonasecond, the multi-million dollar boat owned by renowned housing developer Gordon Pickard of Fairmont Homes fame. I am one of 13 women invited aboard for a special fund-raising think-tank for the Women’s and […]
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Simple French Cuisine for Australians
It’s Easter Saturday and I plans to make a tasty lunch for Olivier, whom I expect will be allowed day leave from hospital today. However, this delightful April Indian summer means I must water our new garden plantings first before the heat of another day wilts them. I have planted pansies around the garden borders […]
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A-List Lunch aids Cancer Research
The prestigious South Australian Women of the Year lunch at Ayers House today had an emotional element when cancer researcher Dr Michelle Lee received a $4000 cheque to continue her research into bone cancer. She will leave soon to spend time in Hong Kong to study holistic treatment methods for the painful life-limiting cancer. The event was […]
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A Living Angel
Australia’s first professor of palliative care originally set out in the world to become a medical missionary. But life and fate had other ideas, as SAMELA HARRIS reports on the man some people call… * * * IT’S as if an aura of serenity surrounds him. When Professor Ian Maddocks steps into a room, […]
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Hope for Breast Cancer Cure
A new study holds hope that breast cancer treatment could be far more tailored in future with the discovery that tumours can be classified into 10 specific types. Researchers analysed 2000 tumour samples from women which they say will lead to more tailored breast cancer treatments. Cancer is one of the main causes of death […]
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Quel Horreur! Cry French Chefs
Quel Horreur! France’s most distinguished chefs are trembling at the prospect that disgruntled diners can describe dining fiascos in the world’s most influential restaurant guide. The august Michelin Guide – the bible of gastronomy – has catapaulted into the social media with a new website that has opened to public comment. The move has “les […]
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Farewell to my lovely Frenchman
It is time to share with you that my darling husband, Olivier Foubert died peacefully on Friday, May 11, after a 16-month journey with advanced prostate cancer. One of my Facebook friends wrote that I was so privileged with “the main event of life”, which she says is to experience love at a deep and […]
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Every rose tells a love story
Our garden was a “work in progress’’ when Olivier died and at his funeral I told the congregation that it would now become his memorial garden. I shared that we had intended to add roses, irises, flowering hibiscus and deciduous trees to the eclectic planting selection of landscape designer Diana McGregor. We had meant to […]
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Grief Grabs Like Fear
It was C.S. Lewis who stated on the death of his wife that “I never knew grief felt so like fear’’. However, I would say my grief is like a juggernaut, a frightening feeling which squeezes out all joy, happiness and any sense of normality in my life. Instead of happy emotions – contentment and […]
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Marie’s Take on Hindley Street A Winner.
It’s known as Adelaide’s seedy strip, but renowned naïve artist Marie Jonsson-Harrison has captured Hindley Street in a whole new light – as a colourful, eccentric streetscape – and her images are to be taken to the world on a new range of contemporary bed linen. The naïve artwork has been reproduced on the Art’N’Bed […]
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A Memorable Encounter with Music
Today, June 23, is Olivier’s birthday and a strange thing happened. Friends Ruth and Graham Bettany invited me to visit them at Oakbank in the Adelaide Hills to keep my mind off the significance of the first big “anniversaire” since his death six weeks ago. Ruth took me to Avalon, a new purpose-built cafe in […]
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Mushrooms and memories on hillside stroll
I am trying hard to nudge out grief from my mind by paying attention to the joy of life around me. There is delight simply by walking down my street with Oscar on his lead sniffing at every blade of grass and piddling to claim his territory. It is strange to do it alone, but […]
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France’s fleshy fungi taste “Magnifique!”
What to do with those two cepe mushrooms I found on the roadside? Well, a French recipe is a must because I first ate the fleshy fungi in France. I find a perfect recipe in Auguste Escoffier’s book 2,000 Favourite French recipes, which is the only one of his works written for the home cook. […]
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The bitch factor in French politics:
It comes as no surprise that former International Monetary Fund chief French politician Dominique Strauss-Kahn and his high profile wife Anne Sinclair have split. The once-powerful French couple have parted after 20 years of marriage following yet another scandal involving Strauss-Kahn according to the French weekly magazine Closer. The separation was on the cards […]
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