It's come to my attention that I need to clear something up and I'm so sorry if you have been following me here for the wrong reasons.

I'm a celebrant, not a celibate.

These are completely different things.

”Hyun, if you are living a life that is content my advice is to learn to live inside it, examine it, relish it, and most of all remember it — this extraordinary thing, a happy life:”

Nick Cave in reply to Hyun’s question on creativity only flourishing in a state of loss and longing.

Anyone else struggling getting their head in a good and peaceful place at the moment?

Luke Fletcher just sent me this pic of Luna from this time last year when we were in New York together for an elopement with The Elopement Collective.

My brain is in a constant state of change, one minute thinking about how nice it is to be at home and to pick Luna up from kindy, next minute I’m thinking about the 44 of our couples who have booked us but don’t have a new date yet and the 180 movements our couples have made to their wedding and elopement plans around the globe, then my mind wanders to the administrative nightmare that is my computer and my inbox and how I should probably accidentally drop the MacBook into a pond to save me cleaning up the files on the desktop, and before long my mind wanders to the reality of our 2020 and where we were supposed to be have been right now, and how a little virus has changed all that. From there it’s not long before I start thinking about the government policies around it all, and what that means for the state of our society and how our futures will all be dramatically different.

I feel such an emotional burden for our couples, for the people contacting me about new wedding plans, and so many of my friends that are battling the same burdens.

Like my own personal antenna in my mind is tuning into everything going on everywhere, so much noise, chaos, and pure humanity. It’s beautiful, and strange, and chaotic, and weird.

It’s a weird 2020, and I feel like it’s going to be a weird 2021, I’m not sure my head will ever be in a peaceful place again.

Shout out to Rob Bell for his podcast about our antennas. It was a weird embrace to acknowledge where my head is at today.

It’s a strange time to be a guy who stands in the middle of your marriage ceremony and breathes your marriage to life.

Got troubles? Solve your troubles. Get the MASSAGE GUN!

Highway robbery

Flag berds

I don’t like to talk politics on here, but what’s with lasagne not being a popular dish anymore?

Rob Bell {through his podcast} encouraged me to talk to my friends about our antennas.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed (like I majorly am) through this year, I think this podcast episode might soothe you.

Look, I’m not saying anyone should do this, but has anyone considered getting some horses to race around a Melbourne wedding to make it legal?

Tree

Mask fashion > mask wearing?

Hey, has anyone pinned the pandemic on the guy who invented QR codes yet? I reckon he might be responsible.

The most friction in my life this year is my longing desire to see the sun finally set on 2020, whilst also acknowledging my deep desire to be present today, to be aware of what I am learning as running a wedding business becomes ever harder, how I am developing as I attend court mediations on the phone or have hard conversations with people, what weaknesses are being exposed when it all becomes too much, and which relationships really matter when you decide who to call or text about what’s going on, through this pandemic.

Not that the actual illness has affected me, I’m healthy apart from bloody hay fever, but in protecting ourselves and our community from the virus, we’ve lost so much else.

It’s a weird situation. Every day I see people commenting about Covid policies, and I can’t help but feel that if we stopped and took a deep breath that we might draw closer together as a community through this instead of forming deeper divisions between us depending on which politician you think is better.

I think I'm the only person on the Canberra Airport free wifi network right now - I haven’t seen anyone else in the airport - because I just uploaded a 12gb 4K video to Dropbox so quickly that I'm not even sure how long it took. Maybe 3-5 minutes?!

Bernt

🌄

🌳

With the decrease in tourists flooding the Australian outback, native Australian beers are being spotted again in the wild #lifefindsaway

Well grounded beef

Posting this photo online for the next time there’s an alpaca related scandal and someone searches Alpacagate, or Alpaca Gate, or #alpacagate

The greatest shame in my life today is how the Apple Watch hand-washing detection doesn’t detect my hand-washing. How can I convince this little computer that I am cleansed?

Today our Luna becomes a two year old and you know what the worst part about it is? That all the cliches are true. They do grow up so fast, they will grow out of it, it does get easier, this too will actually pass, and she really is the light of my life.

I’m in awe of Britt’s ability to be a mother whilst also being a friend, businessperson, wife, and human - a skill I’m yet to master.

And Luna, I’m so proud to be your dad. You’re a beautiful person and you’re going to be an awesome big sister in a few months time!

Opinionated ‘gulls

“It’s an article of faith in the United States that more speech is better and that the government should regulate it as little as possible” - The First Amendment in the age of disinformation. By Emily Bazelon, in the New York Times

Today is the first, and I’m guessing probably the last, flight I’ll take from Gold Coast to Canberra on a) a 717, and b) with Qantas. What a time to be alive.

I’m the father of a two year old (well tomorrow I will be)

Let's get some real talk happening.

Is this bit crosswalks, or is it not crosswalks?

Out of all the books I've read that are not about the 45th president of the United States of America, but are about climate change, Volcanic Winter is the most enjoyable one of all!

A helmet might seem a bit extreme for cake, but we’re taking no risks after the dancing incident a fortnight ago.

Politics takes up a lot of our mindshare today.

Lots of people agreeing with a policy, politician, or party, or disagreeing with.

I don’t think that’s how it’s supposed to work. The joke about “there’s only two types of people” is a joke for a reason.

It’s not supposed to be an us and them situation, where you’re either for or against Dan Andrews, or the Liberal Party, or Trump, or lockdowns.

It’s so lazy to outsource our societal creativity, community problem solving, love for others, to a select group of politicians.

I want to be in the room, wrestling over the ideas, lovingly disagreeing, or not even disagreeing, but agreeing through gritted teeth because we can see the greater good despite the pain it might cause elsewhere.

Don’t put yourself, or me, against others over politics. The policy, the community, our society, deserve better than two teams battling it out to be right.

The truth is, if all you want to be is correct, to be cheering for the right team, prepare to be disappointed.

I don’t want to be on the right team. I’d just like to be the annoying guy on your team.

You know, over the years, we’ve all made a lot of fun of Melbourne. But I’m pretty keen to experience a Melbourne cliche sometime again real soon.

Mon, Dec 21, 2020. Victorian Premier Daniel Andrew’s takes the podium

Hello ScoMo, it's Dan here, I hope you're keeping well. It's the 21st of December, and now they're ringing the last bells. If I get good behaviour, I'll be out of here by July. Who’s gonna make the gravy?

📷 #ADayInTheLife of Luna.

Gold Coast, Australia.

4:51pm, Wednesday, October 14, 2020.

Marketing isn’t that hard, you just need to put the right story in front of the right people.

When’s the right age to start pile driving your daughter?

Asking for a friend.

I don't know who needs to hear this, but Rove McManus's actual first name is John.

One year ago today I dressed my daughter like a nerd after visiting Cupertino. I have no regrets.

Companies collecting data for pubs and restaurants to help them fulfil their contact-tracing duties are harvesting confidential customer information to sell.

– The Times, UK

Marilyn Nonroe

Hollywood Stunt Driver Show, still the best show at Movie World

A little FYI that we’re going to be socially distanced from contemptible people until scientists do the impossible & develop a vaccine for fools.

I know this will be hard on the contempt industry, but we will not be offering any support despite rumours of a FoolKeeper subsidy.

📷 The Covid lockdowns and restrictions have resulted in far less tourists in Australia so we’ve seen the native Australian blow up animal flocking back to Gold Coast hinterland homes in great numbers this year.

📷 Rearview sunsets

Study reveals link between internet access coming to people and scepticism of government - The Economist

“Discovering things is clumsy and sporadic, and the results don't at first compare well with the glossy and lauded works of the past. You have to keep reminding yourself that they went through that as well, otherwise they become frighteningly accomplished.” - Brian Eno

I have a memory of seeing someone eat avocado on toast and it being something I couldn’t have.

Skip forward 30 years and my almost two year old requests it for breakfast.

My new favourite iPhone game, Upspell It’s like your own personal 2 minute game of scrabble without a scrabble board, plus you can duel others.

On the chance that you were wondering how the different levels of government in Australia worked, in the 19th century all the states we now know as Australia (and for a second there, almost Fiji and New Zealand) agreed to federate, but all the states would keep their governments.

They agreed to give these powers to the new federal government though, as you can read in section 51 of the Constitution. Local governments are different again, each state’s Local Government Act determines what the councils can do.

So that’s the weird thing about Australia. The Prime Minister parades around like he’s Kingpin but he’s basically working for the states on a little to-do list put together 120 years ago.

Every now and then the PM has a nuanced little opportunity to flex some muscle with money, but basically the state Premiers are the real MVPs.

In hindsight it’s quite the odd system. If you were starting fresh today you’d probably design a country very differently.

“Here’s a deal to a place you can’t fly to right now, but maybe soon, but who knows, look, I don’t know, I’m just in charge of sending emails and convincing people to buy tickets to places, my job is hell, is there a state election soon?”