I have a new site for my blog posts: www.ianchadwick.com/blog/ This site will remain active for its archives, but comments will be closed. I’ve found the WordPress package a better tool for my work. Thanks for being a regular here.
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The Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – New blog coming soon
I’ve been tinkering with Wordpress as a new blog platform for the past week, trying out its features and layout options. very nice. Flexible, powerful and a lot more social media strength than my current package. I have watched WP develop over the year…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Idiot lights on the highway
Drove to Thornbury and back last night: a beautiful, clear fall night, dry and cool. A lot of traffic was on the road along Highway 26, many of them with their idiot lights* angrily blazing at oncoming traffic.
For those who might not be familiar wit…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – What’s wrong with Collingsaga?
This week, Collingwood Council unanimously approved the name “Beachwood” for a section of Highway 26 that runs through our town. The Ministry of Transport asked Collingwood and Wasaga Beach to come up with a name for the old highway that is being para…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Latest blog for Huff Post
I’m blogging sporadically for the Huffington Post these days. So far all about municipal issues. Roughly once a week. Here’s my latest effort:
www.huffingtonpost.ca/ian-chadwick/municipal-bonusing_b_999666.html
You can link from there to my previous po…
The Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Human rights gone awry
A lot of news stories I read while in England used the term “human rights” to describe some failure of the powers to be to come to terms with the demands of the disputants – or their perceived “rights.” But most of the stories weren’t about human righ…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Back from England
Spent the past two weeks in and around London, England, on my first vacation to that country. Visited a lot of fascinating places, mostly historical, others more contemporary: museums, historic homes and castles, great parks. And a few pubs.
First im…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Jesse James, myth-making and pop culture
In the 2007 movie, The Assassination of Jesse James, we get to see a nascent American pop culture in a collision between its pop star (James) and a displaced fan (Ford), in an episode eerily similar to the fatal collision of John Lennon and Mark David …
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Election Raises Concerns for Ontario’s Municipalities
Two questions about the aftermath of the upcoming provincial election are on the minds of councillors in most of Ontario’s municipalities: will there be downloading? And will there be another round of infrastructure funding?
Downloading provinc…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Rising municipal insurance costs a concern
AMO – the Association of Municipalities of Ontario – just released the results of a comprehensive survey of municipal insurance costs across Ontario. Just like your personal insurance, the costs keep escalating, and it’s you, the taxpayers, who pay the…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Updated software for blog
Just a quick note: the blog software was updated yesterday. The display is a little different and it has a few new features. Invision’s blogging package is not as good as that offered by other companies like Wordpress, but I stick to it because I don’t…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Not much change promised for Ontario’s municipalities this election
Ontario’s provincial leaders are promising a lot this election. It’s what they’re not promising that is more troubling to me.
I listened to the leaders of the three parties speak at the AMO convention this week, and heard a lot of promises, a l…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – A reflection on AMO’s 2011 convention
Spent most of this week at the annual AMO (Association of Municipalities of Ontario) convention. This year it was held in London, ON, and around 2,600 municipal politicians and staff from across the province attended. As always, it’s a combination of i…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Simcoe County to consider rail line acquisition
The Barrie-Collingwood Railway (BCRY) may have a little more life left in it. There’s a motion on the agenda for the County of Simcoe’s Planning and Economic Development committee for its August 10th meeting that reads:
RECOMMENDATION:
THAT staff be a…
The Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Axial tilt and evolution
What role does Earth’s axial tilt play in the ongoing evolution of life on this planet? That question has intrigued me ever since the Japanese earthquake, this spring. I read that the quake had shifted our planet on its axis by 25cm – a minute amount o…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Myth, storytelling and modern writing
Back in 1949, Joseph Campbell, a follower of Carl Jung, wrote a book called The Hero With a Thousand Faces. It traced the story of the ‘hero’s journey’ through the world’s mythology, showing how every major tale, regardless of culture, shared common el…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – The last train
A chapter in local history was written, and closed, this week. The last freight train left Collingwood on July 14, 2011, ending more than 160 years of rail service to the town. I was present when the BCRY rail line was launched and the first train left…
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – Relearning the bass and other follies
The past few weeks I’ve been a bit pre-occupied with several tasks and pursuits, so I haven’t been blogging much, although I have been busy. About a month ago, I bought an Epiphone Viola bass from Blue Mountain Music. It was the culmination of several …
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – 500-million-year-old fossils create economic development opportunities
This intriguing story is from a media release from the Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Innovation, Trade and Rural Development, posted on the Municipal Information Network. Exciting stuff when a government recognizes the importance of fossils, …
Continue readingThe Mumpsimus Blog site Community Blog List: The Mumpsimus Blog – The honeymoon is over…
It seems Council’s honeymoon ended last night with the defeat of Councillor Hull’s motion. Four members of council* opposed what should have been an easy motion to accept. But – because we had only eight members at the table – it was defeated by being…
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