Category Society
Perilous Surfing
Took a look at my “bulk mail” folder yesterday and now I have questions about spam. If I go to a car dealer’s website, I get inundated with vehicle ads for weeks afterward. That’s because I don’t feel the need to spend time hiding my online activities. My life is an open book. I’m not […]
Does This Make Sense?
Okay, I know it is a non-sequitur. But some days you wonder if there is a correlation. When I first saw the statistic, I figured it was a joke, but there are too many respectable news outlets with the same story for it to be ‘fake news.’ And if you read the entire article, you […]
Confronting Climate Change
Whatever happened to the out of control wildfires in the Brazilian rain forest? Six weeks ago, they were at the forefront of the daily news. I just realized though that it has been a month since I heard them mentioned. I guess the situation is under control, temporarily anyway. You can expect lots of talk […]
Stronger Than Death
It is a beautifully told story – and one of the most disturbing books I have read in recent years. I am left to confront the question: why am I not like that? Stronger Than Death, by Rachel Pieh Jones details the life and work of a woman you probably have never heard of, someone […]
Public Art in Back Spaces
I’m seeing things in Ottawa I have never seen before. Like this statue. A good chunk of my time these days is being spent in the Byward Market area of the city, not far from Parliament Hill. Despite working (and living) downtown for close to 20 years, I really don’t know the neighbourhood. What […]
Does It Matter?
I saw this sign at the grocery story. It left me with questions. Does Canadian salmon taste better than other salmon? If so, what makes a salmon Canadian? Is it spawning location or should citizenship be determined by where the salmon has migrated to? Or do salmon have dual citizenship? Do salmon even know that […]
An Act of Bravery or Political Suicide?
In 2015, as I remember it, a young woman running as a Liberal candidate in Calgary had her candidacy revoke by the party. Some old Facebook posts had surfaced, anti-Semitic statements she had made at 16. She said she no longer held those views, but that wasn’t good enough for the party. They replaced her […]
And They’re Off…
I know some people don’t like it when I compare politics to sports, because they think I am trivializing the political process. But there are similarities. You have winners and losers – and a lot of heartbreak. The stakes are higher though. When it comes right down to it, it doesn’t matter who wins the […]
The Transformation
I’d never been in the place before, despite it being across the street from our apartment. Respectable people didn’t frequent Pembroke Ontario’s Windsor Tavern. My biggest memory of the place came from my days as a newspaper reporter on the court beat for The Pembroke Observer. The place was the focus of a domestic assault […]
random thoughts from lorne 
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