On this Flashback Friday we go back five years to February 9, 2018 when I was living in Germany. There’s a hill on the outskirts of Sulzburg that is mostly vineyard, with some trees at the top, and just begging to be climbed. Looks pretty steep, but you don’t go straight up unless you are […]
Ottawa’s annual winter carnival, Winterlude, opened on Friday. The weather hasn’t been what organizers had hoped. Last year the Rideau Canal skateway didn’t open at all, the first time that had happened in 50 years. The Canal is the centrepiece of the festival, so its closure put a damper on the celebrations. This year the canal […]
Shortly after we moved to Germany in 2017 I was walking in the Black Forest just outside of our village of Sulzburg, when I noticed what appeared to be a sign on one of the trails leading off the main path into the side of a hill. Why would there be a sign in the […]
I have been going through some of my half-finished posts. Some are no longer relevant. Some I am finishing. This one was about half-written in April 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The ending, also in italics, is from this year. It was the Google Translate message that threw me. I know my online activity is […]
Even if Trump’s ideology were not noxious, his incompetence is a threat to all around him. To say that it is amateur hour at the White House is to slander amateurs. – David Brooks, The New York Times, January 31, 2017. It is Flashback Friday, and this quote, which was the entire post from […]
I wrote the words in italics below more than a year ago, in mid-January 2023. For whatever reason, I never finished the post. Which, as it turns out may have been a good thing – I would probably have looked pretty silly to anyone reading the post today, as I will explain once you’ve read […]
I found this post from January 2021 in my draft post file. No idea why it didn’t get posted back then. These days the name has changed, as Twitter is now X – but the issues remain the same. My 2024 reflections will be in italics at the end. I’m a big proponent of free […]
Another one where my memory fails me, this time from November 2018. All I have is the title, “The Big.” Now I’m left to wonder, “the big what?” I would have been in southern Germany, but I don’t remember anything there that grabbed me according to its size. I can’t even begin to speculate as […]
If only it were that simple. The problem is, if you don’t go to work, you don’t get paid. Not a problem if you are independently wealthy, but that isn’t me. Probably isn’t you either. It is Monday, beginning of a new work week for most people, There are a lot of people for whom […]
If you have flown in recent years, you have heard the announcement. It seems to happen with every flight. The plane is full. That means space in the overhead compartments is at a premium. Therefore the airline, out of the goodness of its heart, is offering to let you check your carry-on bag – for […]
random thoughts from lorne 
Recent Comments