Different Drummer: #Robinpedia

Different Drummer in Glebe

As Earnest Hemingway famously said, “write drunk, edit sober,” forever solidifying the place of liquor in writing. Let’s be honest, it was pretty intrinsically linked prior to Hemingway. Aeschylus, anyone? The modern drink of the writer is whiskey courtesy of the likes of William Faulkner, Raymond Chandler, and Dylan Thomas. However, thanks to Ashley Kalagian Blunt I have been introduced to cocktail writing. Enter the Different Drummer in Glebe.

The Different Drummer is a tapas and cocktail bar in Glebe, New South Wales. What makes it so attractive to writerly folk? Firstly, it’s in Glebe, which is an awesome suburb.  Secondly, happy hour from 6pm – 7:30pm daily. This involves two cocktails for the price of one. That’s a 90 minute opportunity to smash down drinks and smash out words at half the price. Remember that writers are all either poor, or tight with the pennies, or both.

You may think cocktails are a little full-on for writing, but might I remind you that Hemingway drank Absinthe, so this is positively tame. I have tried to write on Absinthe… it did not go well. The cocktails, however, went down a treat. Always listen to Ashley Kalagian Blunt (ALAKB). And my writing was fine.

The Different Drummer has a drink called The Last Word which consists of gin, chatreause, marschino liqueur and lime. I’d imagine that is their most writery of writerly drinks. Personally I had the Passionatefruit Collins, delicious and the Amaretto Sour, amazeballpointpens. So, happy hour, happy writing, at Different Drummer. I secretly hope they add more cocktails to their list in honour of the sacred craft of writinghood.

Find the Different Drummer’s website here.

Find the Different Drummer on Facebook here.

What was that? You want me to drink you?

Just to be clear, this is not a sponsored post, I doubt the staff or owners know I exist. Robinpedia is a labour of love, not for money. However, should anyone wish to sponsor me, I like moscato, semi-soft blue cheese, pens and tea, so definitely happy to accept any companies that want to give me free wine, cheese, tea, pens. Notebooks and laptops, also good. Just putting it out there… I also like money, money is probably my favourite, so feel free to give me that too. Call me. Actually, don’t call me, I never answer, text me.

Find out more about Robinpedia here.

If there is any information you have a burning desire to be added to this entry, please leave it in the comment section.

I Think I Met Nouha Taouk Today.

I think I met Nouha Taouk, writer of Whispers from a Lebanese Kitchen, today. I might be crazy but I swear I met her… okay, I am crazy but not the delusional kind. So weird to meet someone who wrote a cookbook that you own!

I’ve met authors of books I’ve read before but because I was at a workshop they were teaching, or I was attending a festival that they were speaking at, or had offered to be their slave (Kerri Sackville, that offer is still wide open), but I’d never seen one just sipping coffee out in the wild. The wild being at a shopping centre… I have three kids under Primary School age, that’s as wild as I get. She even noted that my two boys seemed quite cheeky, so I can testify that she is an excellent judge of character.

It was quite exhilarating so now I have to go have a lie down. What exciting things have you done today?

Emerging Writers’ Festival Roadshow: #NSWWC #ewfsyd

Yesterday New South Wales Writers Centre hosted the Emerging Writers’ Festival Roadshow. A day of all things writing and emerging. Walter Mason instructed us to let out our inner fanboy/fangirl, Robert Watkins introduced a new level of clashing patterns with a sublime ensemble of a forest print shirt with a striped bow tie,  and Benjamin Law created a sense of excitement about accountancy and taxation. But I think the main emergence, apart from writerly stuff, was the emergence of fear…. as we lined up on the hill of death there were several near accidents. I nearly toppled into Walter Mason,  I’m sure he would have been impressed that I’d taken his advice on being a fan so seriously that I literally threw myself at him, Claire Zorn nearly fell into me, as a fan I told her it would be my honour to catch her if need be and then Robyn Ridgeway almost came toppling down and I got to assist her down the hill. All in all very exciting stuff.

Now I don’t want to give away too much of the content of the day, because then those who didn’t attend would have no burning desire to attend other festivals because they could get it all in the comfort of their own computers,  and I like meeting fellow fledgling writers so I selfishly refuse to give it all away. But I know if you’re reading this you want to know more than just how we all nearly experienced death by desire for burritos. So I will compromise with you, I’ll give you a few highlights from the 5 x 5 Rules of Writing seminar,  the very first talk of the day but that’s it. If you want to know more you’ll have to check out my twitter feed @RobinRiedstra.

Tom Doig (AKA- The Most Writiest of Writers)
1. Seek out books that move you and then reread them again and again until you can imagine yourself doing it.
2. Write what you know unless you know nothing… then you should probably go learn something.
3. Work harder than you think you can, then work even harder.

Delia Falconer (AKA Zen Writer)
1. Don’t get too stressed, it’s just a story.
2. Break your work into doable parts.
3. Play to your strengths.

Benjamin Law (AKA Business Time)
1. Writing works your brain really hard, so make sure you also work your body really hard to let your brain go dead every now and then.
2. Get a good accountant.
3. Marking on your calendar daily ‘write big thing’ is not the same as planning.

Laura Jean McKay (AKA The Muse Killer)
1. Don’t wait for a muse to inspire you because she’s not real.
2. Write first, talk later.
3. Your first ten years are your apprenticeship.

Walter Mason (AKA Mr Charisma)
1. Be terribly nice to people.
2. Be enthusiastic.
3. Entertain new ideas because YOU CAN DO ANYTHING!

Now you might notice that the talk is 5×5 and wouldn’t that indicate five points. How very astute,  but I’m not that type of blogger, I won’t just give it all away. I’m a lady blogger, sniff. So please, next time there is a festival at New South Wales Writers Centre,  do come along,  all us aspiring authors are terribly nice and would love to meet you. You are not alone.