Monday, August 23, 2010

Winners & How Aussie Are You? & Links



Congrats to
 #27 Grace 
and #17 Jan von Harz 

who were selected from Random.org
Your choice of one book from this selection OR
 you can also choose from the Jaclyn Moriarty Ashbury/Brookfield series.
I hope there's a book somewhere in there that you're hanging out for :) 


And thanks so much everyone for entering! You guys rock :)



Two important links


One: CHECK THIS OUT - Over @ The Book Smugglers, Jaclyn Moriarty's The Ghosts of Ashbury High (Dreaming of Amelia) gets 10/10! One of the best books they have ever read! It's also the best review I've read of the book. Here's some quotes from the review - (which instantly made me nostalgic and feel like reading the book all over again):

  • All is flawlessly linked and you only realise that in the EXTRAORDINARY ending when every.Single.Plot.Line comes together and my head exploded (gothically speaking) with the sheer brilliance of this book.
  • I can’t think of a single thing that does not work in this book and I loved it with every bit of my being (brain and heart!) and I re-read it before writing this review and still it managed to evoke this feeling of greatness and warmth and it is awesome and I URGE you to go and read it. Your life may depend on it!!!!! You know, gothically speaking.

Two: Angie @ Addicted to Books has completed her ??? round of revisions on NIkki's Wish and is holding a contest to celebrate. Up for grabs: a 50 page LBL critique (and she's very good - if you have a WIP, you want this). Plus two winners choose a book from The Book Depository. Check it out





Now for this dooby I stumbled across @ Goodgollymissholly
How Australian Are You?

So, the one's in blue are a YES from me. I'm pretty sure some of them are kinda international but things that apparently characterise Australians. Like Lemon, Lime and Bitters? Surely that's not just an Australian thing? My score's @ the end. Any that you've done that are Australian? 

I also wrote a few comments, b/c, you know, I just couldn't help myself... :)

  • Heard a kookaburra in person
  • Slept under the stars
  • Seen a koala
  • Visited Melbourne
  • Watched a summer thunderstorm
  • Worn a pair of thongs
  • Been to Uluru (Ayer’s Rock)
  • Visited Cape York
  • Held a snake
  • Sang along with Khe San
  • Drank VB
  • Visited Sydney
  • Have seen a shark
  • Have used Aussie slang naturally in a conversation
  • Had a conversation with an indigenous Australian (Aboriginal) (really? who hasn't?)
  • Eaten hot chips from the bag at the beach
  • Walked/climbed over the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
  • Used an outside dunny (we had one for three years...)
  • Seen Chloe in Young & Jackson’s
  • Slept on an overnight train or bus
  • Been to Sydney’s Mardi Gras
  • Have gone bush-bashing (fave childhood pastime - grew up in the Blue Mountains)
  • Taken a sickie (surely this is a world-wide phenomenon?)
  • Been to see a game of Aussie Rules football
  • Have seen wild camels
  • Gone skinny dipping
  • Done a Tim Tam Slam
  • Ridden in a tram in Melbourne
  • Been at an ANZAC day Dawn Service
  • Watched a sunrise or sunset
  • Held a wombat
  • You have a favourite Wiggle (Anthony - Blue :)
  • Been on a roadtrip of 800km or more
  • Seen the Great Australian Bight in person
  • Had a really bad sunburn (it's a tradition for me - I'm the palest of white...)
  • Visited an Aboriginal community
  • Seen a redback spider (kept some as pets when i was a teen. they didnt thrive... :)
  • Have watched Paul Hogan
  • Seen Blue Poles in person (?)
  • Eaten Vegemite (not even interested. eww)
  • Thrown a boomerang
  • Seen the Kimberleys
  • Given a hitch-hiker a lift
  • Been to Perth
  • Have tried Lemon, Lime and Bitters (who hasn't?)
  • Tried playing a didgeridoo (yes and FAIL. It was hard)
  • Seen dinosaur footprints
  • Eaten Tim Tams
  • Been to Darwin
  • Touched a kangaroo 
  • Visted the Great Barrier Reef
  • Listened to Kevin Bloody Wilson
  • Killed a Cane Toad
  • Gone to a drive-in theatre (loads. Is this particularly Aussie?)
  • Have read and own books by Australian authors 
  • Visited Adelaide
  • Know the story behind “Eternity”
  • Been camping
  • Visited Brisbane
  • Been in an outback pub
  • Know what the term “Waltzing Matilda” actually means
  • Gone whale watching
  • Listened to Slim Dusty (unfortunately ;)
  • Own five or more Australian movies or TV series (I dont buy them, but I love Aussie films)
  • Sang along to Down Under
  • Have stopped specifically to look at an historic marker by the side of the road
  • Eaten a Four N Twenty pie
  • Surfed at Bondi (swam there, but can't surf...)
  • Watched the cricket on Boxing Day (not my idea of fun, but every summer cricket was pretty much on all day long at my place)
  • Visited Hobart
  • Eaten kangaroo (for the first time a few weeks ago @ a friend's BBQ)
  • Seen a quokka
  • Visited Canberra
  • Visited rainforests
  • Used a Victa lawnmower
  • Travelled on a tram in Adelaide
  • Used a Hills hoist
  • Visited Kata Tjuta
  • Used native Australian plants in cooking
  • Visited the snow
  • Chosen a side in Holden VS Ford (HOLDEN. choosing sides was big out in the country where I spent my teen years as was watching the Bathurst 1000)
  • Visited the desert (nah, but I've read Stolen which was sensory enough to make me feel like I was in the desert :)
  • Been water skiing (another FAIL. I'm unco)
  • Read The Phantom
  • Visited Parliament House
  • Gone spotlighting or pig-shooting (i didnt shoot anything though - along for the ride)
  • Crossed the Nullarbor
  • Avoided swimming in areas because of crocodiles
  • Listened to AC/DC
  • Called someone a dag
  • Voted in a Federal Election
  • Have been swimming and stayed between the flags
  • Had a possum in your roof
  • Visited the outback
  • Travelled over corrugated roads
  • Hit a kangaroo while driving
  • Been well outside any mobile phone coverage (not hard to do...)
  • Seen an emu
  • Have woken to the smell of bushfires
  • Subscribed to RRR
  • Patted a pure-bred dingo
  • Seen the Oils live

73/102 :) Not bad...

If you give it a go - let me know and I'll come and compare our Aussieness :)

19 comments:

  1. I definitely not an Aussie...but there's still time to remedy that!

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  2. I've done most of the things you have but I have eaten Vegemite and been to the Great Barrier Reef!

    And haven't, thankfully, been pig shooting.

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  3. So much awesome Aussieness here :D

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  4. what is "a sickie"?
    I am def not a high scorer (13) but I've never even visited, so that's no surprise. The only one I scored on that is particularly Australian is that I know what Waltzing Matilda means... when I lived in the NL we got some Aussie shows and totally watched McCloud's daughters for a few years. Loved it (until Claire died)...

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  5. I only got 57. I'm a poor excuse for an Aussie :(

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  6. a sickie?

    it's calling in sick for work when you're not and having a lazy day @ home/wherever :)

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  7. Man I fail. I only got 12. When you live in England it's difficult to sleep under the stars since you'll probably get soaking wet from the rain :P. But one day I will go to Australia, take this list with me and will attempt to do everything on it (except go to the desert. I'm not cut out for that sort of thing :D).

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  8. I'm an Aussie and the quiz sounds like fun so will let you know when I post :-)
    I'm reading Stolen at the moment and can't put it down.

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  9. Ok, now you've got me curious. What does Waltzing Matilda mean?? I'd love to go whale watching, and I think I've done about a 1/3 of these things - does that make me 1/3 Australian? That'd be cool!

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  10. Wow. Wow. Wow.
    I'm going to re-read Dreaming of Amelia NOW.

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  11. I got a 17 LOL. So basically, I've tried Vegimite (hated it!), have slept under the stars, been camping (thus sleeping under the stars), been to the desert, have seen a Koala, saw an Emu (on the Wiggles so does that count?), can sing pretty much every wiggles song (so sad, heh? LOL), Have been to The Outback (okay, actually it's a chain of restaurants here in the states LOL so I don't think that counts?) I've seen a thunderstorm, held a snake, thrown a boomerang (though I think I did something wrong because it never did come back. hmm...), listened to ac/dc, hit a kangaroo while driving (no wait, that was a really bad mushroom trip in college, never mind), had a possum on my...no wait. It was a squirrel. Actually it was a family of squirrels in an apt we used to live in that almost broke in to our home through the ceiling. I still have nightmares about that God awful scratching noise. Ugh. Thanks for the memories hahahaha. Loves ya, Nomes :-)

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  12. ahh, Mel :)

    i havent even tried vegemite - smells awful!

    seeing an emu on the wiggles so does not count! ;)

    i'm curious about your mushroom trips...

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  13. Wow I only got 47. For an Aussie, I'm not that Aussie. :\ Thanks for following my blog!

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  14. After checking out your blog, I have concluded that I LOVE it! I'm following you, would follow you 10 times if I could. :P Aussie bloggers are awesome, and being one myself, I love meeting new ones. Plus, your content is great, interesting, fresh, unique and just a delight to be able to see. I'm bummed that I didn't get to enter your contest, but that's okay.

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  15. Oh, okay...make it an 18...have totally done a sickie :-)

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  16. thanks cass :) your comment made my day! and yay for Aussie YA book bloggers :)

    Mel - what do you call sickies over there? we use the expression "chucking a sickie"

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  17. Okay, so I'll reply to your comments on my blog here, since I don't like posting comments on my own blog. :P I usually just follow it up back to the source.

    I haven't read any of Scott's books either, but I'd really like to. Yeah, the Penguin Five aren't out yet here, but there are those lucky people in the US who got that pretty box set in the mail! It really makes me jealous, since it looks so amazing. I just won a copy of Mockingjay, actually. It's going to be sitting with my friend in the US for a while though, until he can ship it out in big-arse-box-form. :)

    Well, I have the US hardback of IF I STAY, from The Book Depository. I don't much care for the AUS cover, actually. It's pretty, the colours and all, but the US just makes so much more sense for me. So I'll be getting the US hardcover for the sequel. But you know, I'll be interested to see what the AUS book cover designer/s make of the sequel.

    You should definitely pick up a copy of BAD GIRLS DON'T DIE, and at $9? That's amazing, and that's why I LOVE TBD so very much. So ridiculously cheap!

    And yes, the cover of THE MERMAID'S MIRROR is really very pretty. I like how you backtracked to such an early review. I'm saddened since it doesn't come out until October or something like that. I think I'd actually give it a 4, since I had to read it on computer. :\ You know, reading a book is so much better than reading text on a comp screen... It's on sale right now, you can get it for $13.37 AU! Though, I'm a bit hesitant on pre-orders at TBD, since people say that they get cancelled a lot of the time.

    Sorry for the long comment! Haha. I seriously love how the Aussie-ness is OOZING out of my computer screen as I look through your blog. :P

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  18. Oooh, I love this! I'll definitely be doing this and letting you know here. ;) What a great idea!

    I have an award for you over at my blog, because yours is absolutely wonderful:

    One Lovely Blog Award

    I hope you accept it, and have a wondeful day!

    ●▬▬▬๑۩ Tina @ Book Couture ۩๑▬▬▬▬●

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Thanks for the commenty love :)