The Selfie collection
Click pics for  fun facts about me.


I just realised from the pics I have like three outfits.


A head full of La la la

May 13, 2021

I have written stories, short, long, middling all my life.  I have written a ton of short stories over the past 10 years, mostly because of the Huia short story competition which is now called Pikihuia.  I've been a finalist three times, yay, with 4 stories yay yay.  
When I say I have written "tons” I have started "tons" and finished about 30% of them.  I have to be honest here, I am a bit of a digital hoarder and I hardly ever okay I never delete word docs so, consequently I have a bajillion unfinished stories.


The truth of the unfinished story

 The problem is, these stories have been buried in the archives that is my ancient laptops memory for so long, I've forgotten the story and it is basically like reading something someone else wrote.  Until it stops for no bloody reason and I get so pissed off, I want to know what happens next, and I never will, because I have to write the bloody thing and once a story is gone, it's gone.
I should just publish a book of unfinished stories and other people can finish them for me so I know what happens.

A bunch, a collection, a anthology

 I have a bunch of short stories that I've written, with beginnings, middles and ends, over about 20 years that are about to get put into a book and sent out into the world as an anthology, which is a flash word for "bunch of" or collection.  At the moment I am in a bit of a struggle with a name for the "bunch of" stories.

For years I wanted to call it "A bag of stones" because I wrote this poem...






There isn't really a theme for the story collection, not that I know of anyway, although Scotty too Hotty who has read the stories many times say's the overriding theme is love. 

I dunno about that, but then again, I never have a clue about such things as themes in my books.  A reviewer usually tells me what it is.  Today, as I was thinking about the cover, I was wondering if " A bag of stones" is a bit...well...naff really. 

I came up with other names :

  • ·         "A head full of la la la" ,

  • ·         "a load of fiddle faddle"

  • ·         "Years of fart arsing around"

  • ·         "I wish I could think up a decent title for this book but since I can't I will call it simply 'A bunch of stories' by a crazy cat lady"

  • ·         ‘A bunch of stories by olivia aroha giles' (but I'm not famous enough to be able to do that.  If it was 'a bunch of stories' by Margaret Atwood, we might get away with it.)

  • ·          'Please buy me so the author can afford some decent chocolate'

  • ·          'please buy me so the author can help her old man pay the rates.


Alone time…

I have an assistant, she is "Princess Fluffy butt puss puss meow meow."  She is paid in 'whiskers' and water out of the indoor fountain water feature thingy the dining room. 

She assists me by falling asleep on my desk with bits of herself draped over the keyboard.  Licking my fingers when I am trying to type.  Pouncing on the mouse.  And by demanding attention constantly and being so darn cute and gorgeous I have to cuddle her all day, so I can't do any work.   She also assists me by making me sneeze and my eyes itch but that doesn't stop me from hugging her silly.  I never thought I would end up a crazy old cat lady but I am.  



 

Hey there....

April 25, 2021
I watch a lot of YouTube blogs and many many of them start with the blogger apologising for not posting for long periods of time as if people are waiting for them with bated breath.  I know that no one is waiting for me to blog and that is just fine. I talk to myself a lot anyway so this won't be any different.

Te Papa Tupu

For the past six months I have been locked in a dark room hunched over my laptop rewriting and polishing the crap (hopefully) out of my manuscript with notes from my Mentor,...
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The bird that sounds like a car alarm

November 25, 2020
Is there such a thing as car alarm bird, and what does it look like so I can get a gun and....no, that's a bit mean, that stupid feathered article has no clue it wakes me up every morning and keeps me from going to sleep at night until it stops tooting its stupid head off.  Then I saw it, a Tui.  Dang it.


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No Hugs

November 23, 2020
The ‘Covid’ did a very weird thing to my writing process.  When things of such historical significance should be written about, especially at the “grass roots” (code for poor people) level, I couldn’t write about it at all.  

The Lockdown

My life was whittled down to the barest version of itself.  It was just me and the husband, “Scotty too Hotty”, together, alone as our kids are grown and gone.  The rest of the fam were zoomed in every week for designated making sure everyone was...

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The promise of equity versus the bullshitness of equality

November 19, 2020
I can't move furniture because all my muscle strength is in the lower half of my body where it pushed out my munchkins at various points during my more youthful years.  I also can't because I am old and more to the point I can't be arsed,
As far as I am concerned that is what MEN are for.  Go on, you may bleat on about equality, I don't care, Ive seen equality and.- as far as I am concerned - yes I love that phrase and I will be using it a lot - it is a lie to get women to do even more work t...
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Having people in on your "Process"

November 11, 2020

My new writers chair which made the couch redundant.
I want to be a better writer. I want to be open to new ideas, new concepts, things that will help me. So I am reading books recommended to me by my mentor.
On writing by Stephen King
I have read this book so many times, I am like Buffalo Bill (from Silence of the Lambs not the old west guy) wearing Stephen Kings skin and hoping like hell that just a smidge of his "amazingness" will soak into me.
Yes I would kill to have his talent a...

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Te Papa Tupu and what it means to me

October 28, 2020
Libra/Tiger, mother/stepmother, grandmother, owner of cat and wife of Scotty.

I am trying to figure out how to condense 58 years of life into a blog. 
So, let’s start from Te Papa Tupu and why I applied?
I’d followed ‘Te Papa Tupu’ covetously for years.  I wanted to apply but did not feel good enough.  But, then again, I never feel good enough about anything.  Well, that’s not strictly true.  I vacillate between “I am amazing” and “every single thing I do is crap” or, as Nick H...

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Katie...beautiful Katie

January 21, 2019

 
My sister in law Kate Dalton and her husband Mike, with their son Timothy 1995




1995, Me with Tamati and Kate with Timothy, dancing 
at a family do at the Pines...those babies are now strapping 23 year olds.



If I am going to write about the small things in my life then I am going to write about the huge overwhelming events.  

A few weeks ago I put up a blog - it had been months since I wrote one not since September, Usually the first person to 'like' my blogs on the facebooks was my sister in law...

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2019, here I come, ready or not

January 9, 2019


It is New Years eve…

I am in the midst of spring cleaning.  My mother had a theory, that if your house was spotless on New Year’s Eve then it will be spotless for the rest of the year and I have always followed this advice. So I am decluttering, tidying and throwing a lot of crap out.

And “Oh My God” I have a lot of crap.

 I have clothes I never wear…(according to the KonMari method, this is the place you start purging especially the “One day I will fit into that” items from...


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Ch-ch-ch-changes

September 21, 2018

Me...no smile

I have actually been writing blogs over the past couple of months  but I haven't been telling anyone. I just wanted to get my thoughts down in words so my bwain didn't get all clogged up. 

Anyhoo...this week was pretty dramatic
.  Scotty hurt his hand Monday night; he got kicked in the fingers by an over enthusiastic guy at Karate.  My husband said it was his own fault as he had blocked the kick wrong.  He walked into the house and said, 'babe, you are going to be really pissed of...
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Not good at keeping a diary, my brain is a bit too random but will have a decent go at it.   

About Me


Olivia Giles Kia ora everyone, I am Olivia, I am a writer, and an artist, welcome to my hectic mad world.

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