Young or old, fit or unfit. Its all good.

So. I don’t want to jinx it because you know, it is pretty early on in our relationship. But guys. I think I have found the one. Okay so its only been a week [I told you… Its new], so we are totally in the honeymoon stages but I am head over heels. It’s all shiny, and clean, with top of the line facilities. Its full of kind and encouraging people. It has a timetable packed with options that I am excited to explore. It has a spa, and a pool, and a place for me to nap. It’s basically perfect. Wait. I think I need to back up the bus here a little bit. I might have forgot to mention I am talking about a gym. But really, it is nothing like your 'usual' gym.

I don’t know about you, but gyms usually make me feel uncomfortable. I have never walked into a gym and thought ‘I can see myself working out here’. Over the course of my adult life, I have been a member at more than a handful of different gyms. Everything from a small womens group run out of a crossfit box, to a more traditional gym full of weights machines and cardio. I have done classes, I have done HIIT training. I have done bootcamps. I have done a lot. And while I have enjoyed some significantly more than others, there hasn’t been one that has whispered “hey girrrrrrl lets make this a long term thing” lovingly at me while I sweat my wobbly ass off… until now that is.

Hello Kate // Weightloss... The grass is apparently greener.

Hi. I’m Kate. Over the last four years I’ve lost around forty kilograms. Recently I’ve put on about six kilos but I just came back from holiday so I’m trying not to beat myself up about it. Trying… unsuccessfully. Because honestly, once I lost all that weight, my life totally changed. And I don’t just mean in the way where suddenly everyone wants to be your friend, boys notice you more and you get to buy outfits from “regular” stores. I mean, food isn’t just nourishment anymore.. It’s got all these labels… it’s bad, it’s good, it’s too “this,” too “that.” There are all these rules and restrictions and it sucks.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love that I’m so much fitter and healthier now. I love that I can run for half an hour and not feel like I’m going to die, that I can go into a store and find something in my size. I love that I now have a knowledge of food where I know what makes me feel good and function well. But sometimes I really wish I could go back to Kate at 100 + kg where she just ate food without thinking about what it was doing to her body. Where she truly enjoyed food and was generally just a lot more laid back about everything.

Happily Ever Duckett: 6 Months to go.

In less than 6 months, I get to marry my best friend. I feel like that’s a pretty big deal. Plans have been made over the last 12 months, deposits have been paid, outfits have been chosen, vendors have been met with. But at the back of my mind the thing I am most excited about, always, is the fact that in less than 6 months, I get to marry my best friend.

Now, if you have never planned a wedding, let me tell you. There is a shit load to do. Wait. Let me rephrase that. Pinterest tells you that there is a shit load to do. Don’t look so offended, you know I love me some Pinterest time… but seriously. When it comes to wedding planning the Pinterest black hole is deep. Centrepieces, seating charts, hairstyles, floral installations with thousands of peonies. My God. I could go for days. And days. And days. When it came to planning our wedding, very early on we picked out the three most important things that we wanted our day to be centred around. Every decision that we have made about the wedding has been come back to those things. If it didn’t add to one or more of those categories, it was out. For us, it was… Great Food, that the whole event was a reflection of us as a couple and maybe, most importantly to us, Great Photographers.

No Means No: Rape Culture and social accountability

TRIGGER WARNING: THIS OPINION PIECE ADDRESSES RAPE, RAPE CULTURE AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE.

“You don’t know me. But you’ve been inside me. And that is why we are here today.” Those words sent a chill deep and very real chill into my soul. Unless you have been living under a rock for the last few weeks, or perhaps, in this day and age have simply decided to take ‘a break from social media’, there is a good chance you have heard the name Brock Turner. Or maybe you haven’t heard his name, but you have heard the story of a woman on a campus of a prestigious university in the United States who was raped, and her rapist was sentenced to 6 months in jail because the judge thought “A prison sentence would have a severe impact on him… I think he will not be a danger to others”. Yeah. You read that right. The judge delivered a sentence of 18 months less than the legal minimum for a crime as heinous as rape because he was worried about the impact on young man, who made a decision to drink too much [the only thing he has currently admitted to despite the verdict] and have non-consensual sex with an unconscious woman behind a dumpster on campus. A judge who, by the way, was also a member of the alumni of the university in question.

I don’t want to sit here and review the intricacies of the case, a number of fabulous writers have already looked at the whole thing in excruciating details. I am also not going to talk directly about the emotionally destroying, raw and honest victim impact statement that has been shared around the world. I could, but I won’t. Because her words should be read and taken how she had said them, and not re-framed from my perspective. [Seriously, read this is you haven’t. And get everyone you know to read it too] What I really want to talk about one of the most horrific things that has come out of this whole public review of this case. And that is; that an underlying rape culture is so deeply permeating through our community and the wider society. Perpetuated of course by social media… because you know, keyboard warriors are out in arms guys.