Monthly Archives: October 2014

Solving The Middle East Crisis

My friend Neil Remington Abramson and I frequently engage in discussion and debate, usually on blog written by a mutual friend, Bruce La Rochelle. Neil and I are generally in agreement on most things, and we have a great respect for each others’ point of view. Some of my recent posts on my summer vacation […]

Impresssions of the European Parliament

I’m a political junkie, I’ll admit it. Wherever I am I follow the local political news. In Maine in August I bought a newspaper each day because this is an election year in the US (just not a presidential election year, so there isn’t as much frenzy). I wanted to see what the candidates for […]

A Thousand Words

If a picture really is worth a thousand words, then I don’t need to say too much today. Maybe it’s my eyes, but taking the shade into account, I don’t think the grass really is greener on the other side of the fence. But obviously this cow in Bayeux, France, thought that it was, sticking […]

Fishing For Eels, Catching Memories

We were walking along the banks of the Thames River in London, England, near Parliament, when we came upon the three fishermen. Or perhaps that should be fisher boys as they were obviously preteens. There was a bench opposite them so we sat down and watched. I never did figure out the family dynamic, though […]

A Walk Along Juno Beach

It’s peaceful on Juno Beach on a sunny July afternoon. A few tourists, a few locals getting some sun; if I had been thinking I would have taken off my shoes and socks and dipped my toes in the English Channel, just so I could say I had done that. We arrived in Normandy after […]

Answering The Call

The wall is full of plaques, almost as if there is not a spare inch of space left. St. George’s Memorial Church is an English speaking Anglican establishment in Flemish Iepers (that’s Ypres to us Canadians). The church, built after the First World War for those Anglophones working in the area, was funded entirely by […]

The Friendly Skies

I didn’t have the guts to check the box. Discretion in this case was the better part of valour, as you will see as you read this. My wife, Vivian, is the world traveler. I’m the guy who likes to stay at home and sleep in the same bed every night. Usually when she wants […]

Ghost Walk

I don’t believe in ghosts, but I do enjoy a good ghost story. Ghost stories and tales of haunted houses speak to what we are as humans, revealing our fears of death and the unknown and allowing us to confront them on one level or another. We like to be scared, a little bit anyway. […]

Peasant Village

One of the semi-regular vacation destinations of my childhood was traveling with my family to visit Upper Canada Village, a recreated 19th century town saved from the flooding caused during the construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway in the 1950s. It was an easy day trip from where we lived and was educational, something my […]

Crucifixes Everywhere

Vivian’s aunt is a retired schoolteacher. She makes certain that any visit we make to her in Lippstadt, Germany, has an educational component. There are no options, we will learn something. Or else. Since we always go along with her suggestions, I have no idea what the “or else” would be. That educational component is […]