Chicago via Adelaide, Port Moresby, Alice Springs, Brisbane, Bondi Beach, New York City, Newport Beach. And several other places in between.

I began my career as a journalist at Brisbane’s Courier-Mail, at the time Australia’s third highest-circulation newspaper. After a dozen years, several cities, and too many reporting fields to count, I landed at JFK in June 2001 as the New York Correspondent of The Australian Financial Review, and spent the following two-and-a-half years covering 9/11, its aftermath, and the shifting of the planet’s tectonic plates.

Wanting to stay in the United States, I quit and freelanced for everyone from The New York Times and Financial Times to Men’s Health, Essence, men’s style australia, and Outside. I was also a columnist for Australia’s biggest-selling newspaper, the Herald-Sun, wrote a book, got my green card, joined Bloomberg, and then McKinsey & Company. As a management consultant, I made a really good writer and editor. I did, however, learn PowerPoint, Excel, and enough jargon and acronyms to have the authority to tell people to never use jargon or acronyms.

After a lot of time on the east coast punctuated by a year in Southern California, I’m now in Chicago. It’s a long way from Adelaide. Everything’s a long way from Adelaide. I’ve learned to drive on the wrong side of the road, adjust my accent so people understand me, and appreciate the over-engineered spectacle that is the NFL. In return, I provide living proof Aussies are not genetically wired to surf.