This was taken about 7:30 a.m. in a neighborhood park where we’ve spent several lovely afternoons this summer with Jeanne. We go with sand pail and shovel, which she tosses…
One of my neighbors who just spent a pretty penny to landscape her small front and back yards tells me that our borough administration wouldn’t give her a permit to…
Yesterday’s post about a small Quebec town forbidding front yard vegetable gardens sent me thinking about the urban agriculture movement. It certainly is alive and well in Montreal–there will even…
A couple in Drummondville, a town about 100 km from Montreal, have run into problems with a city bylaw that limits vegetable growing in front yards. Drummondville would like to…
Temperature has dropped. Ought to get back to work on the next thing. But I came across this: a great spoof of the writing life.
Until today, we’ve had more than two weeks of drought, along with horrendous temperatures. Water levels in the rivers and lakes are as low as they usually get in August,…
Way Number 1: Take your breakfast to the park. This couple were reading the weekend papers early the other Saturday morning, and I was charmed at the idea of escaping…
Lee, after more than a year of post-fire tribulations, is back in business as a furniture maker. He had to spend 8 months away from his work shop while the…
I heard the first cicadas on Sunday–just one, tentative buzz. But by now the buzzing begins in the early morning and continues through the heat of the day. One of…
Goodreads finally caught up with me, and so I’ve joined. One of the things they have is book giveaways, so here’s one for my novel about people who make mistakes…
The rumor mills are buzzing with the news that Jean Charest’s Liberals are going to call an election for Sept. 4 or Sept. 10. Which makes it quite apparent that…
Yesterday Canadian scientists protested the cuts to scientific research included in the recently passed omnibus budget. Facebook was full of “shares” of this photo and others similar showing scientists and…
In an op ed piece in The New York Times today, Thomas E. Ricks says: Let’s Draft Our Kids. He writes; “In late June, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the former…
Two very interesting things coming out of the Portuguese connection. The first is the Portuguese Sundays being held on Montreal’s St. Lawrence Main for several Sunday this summer. Music, dance,…
Just got back from delivering Jeanne and Elin home after a shower for Sophie and baby Thomas (not to mention Lukas.) It was delightful to see how Sophie’s friends wanted…
Great reportage on the life of a corner store owner in Quebec, done by the National Film Board and Le Devoir. Check it out: part in English, mostly in French,…
Somebody posted a variation of this on Facebook recently, and I’m back to musing about just how destructive this bit of “wisdom” is. I have always thought Yoda is saying…
The face of the United States is changing, no one can deny that. Recent census figures show that more than half the babies born in the US are non-Hispanic whites,…
Earlier this year I spent a slew of evenings reading entries in the Canada Writes non-fiction competition. Very interesting, with some sterling entries in the lot I was given. (There…
Like to see anybody in the US of A take on “Oh Say Can You See” in the same spirit And if you’re feeling beaten by the heat, here’s the…
