Observation for Today, a Day of Finishing up Odds and Ends
Despite 35 years of metric in Canada, construction is all in the old inches and feet mode, while temperature, speed and some kind of food are metric. What accounts for…
Mary Soderstrom
Saturday PHoto: The Beauties of Mount Royal and the Cemetery
The gates to Mount Royal cemetery don't look like this now. About a year and a half ago fissures were found in the mortar holding the big stone blocks--put in…
Music and Images: Where the River of Music Can Take You
Back to working on the next novel, called River Music. One of the main characters is a Canadian woman pianist who becomes celebrated, in part because her version of Debussy"s…
Some Sounds Only Emerge from Cooperation: Montreal’s Musical Swings, a Lesson for Us All?
These musical swings (each one produced a particular tone) were around for a short period this spring, and I had hoped to try them out, but each time I passed…
As We Adjust to Our New/Old House: A Story about a Hobbit’s New/Old House
As I ran around trying to found what I've put away while admiring the nice things about our reconstructed house, I came across a story in today's New York Times…
Putting out the Fires in Britain–and Elsewhere–Is Not Going to End Trouble: What Happens When the Social Contract Fails
The pictures of burning buildings in Britain are extremely disturbing, not least because we know first hand how much damage a fire can do. But the question arises: why? It…
Stephen Harper’s in Brazil: Dilma Smacks down Standard and Poor
Stephen Harper was in Brazil yesterday, and met with dthat country's former guerilla president Dilma Rousseff. He listened, apparently, while she told reporters about how solide Brazil's economy was and…
The Importance of "Legacy" Media in Telling It How It Is: The Case of The New York Times
" On of the pleasures of being back in an almost-settled house is that we have more time to intersting things. Friends called yesterday to ask if we'd like to…
Saturday Photo: Fruit Salad for an August NIght
First special dinner since we've moved back. Jeanne and her parents, paella and fruit salad with Ontario peaches and BC cherries. What a nice prospect!
More Jobs, Maybe, But the US and the World Are Worrying about the Wrong Things.
Just in case you wondered if things were getting better, here's a link to a breaking story in The New York Times. The job figures for July in the US…
Excuse Me While I Pause for a Little Rest: the 400 Boxes are Unpacked…
The guy in this video is a piker--on 64 boxes. But we had similar surprises as we opened boxes. Perhaps it should be no surprise that I've filled 8 large…
Recreating Eden 2011-08-03 08:26:00
Last week Elin and company spent time in Greater Chicago. She taught at the Viola da Gamba Society of America's annual Conclave, and the rest of the family spent some…
Connection with the Universe Re-established, the 400 Plus Boxes are Opened…
but the stuff hasn't been put away yet. The house is nearly as big a mess as the state of the world.I'll be back with before- and after pix as…
More Than 400 Boxes: Going to Disconnect in Order to Reconnect
There is not likely to be much here over the next few days. The boxes arrived yesterday--something like 450 of them containing about 5,000 books and the various collections of…
Advice from Paul Krugman That Nycole Turmel and the NDP Should Find Useful
As usual, Paul Krugman today is right on the money. "Republicans have, in effect, taken America hostage," he says. Part of the problem is "the cult of “balance,” the insistence…
WalMart Heiress Funds Big New Art Museum
As a sidebar to the previous posting about WalMart advertising on classical music stations, check out the interesting article in The New Yorker about WalMart heiress Alice Walton and her…
Advertising and Classical Music: If CBC/Radio-Canada Doesn’t Deliver, Private Stations Make Money
We've been listening to the commerical classical music station a lot over the last few months. Partly, it's fatigue--there is so much to do just keeping afloat plus taking care…
Jack Layton: Another Fight for a Man of Courage
Shocked, although maybe not too surprised, to hear that Jack Layton is battling another cancer. Here's a link to a place where you can send a message of encouragement to…
The Intimacy of Facebook and Men Who Cry in Public on It
Just a quick comment on the day the furniture comes back (the boxes including 5000 books arrive Thursday!): the most emotionally over-the-top posts I've seen on my Facebook network have…