Looking at life through a funhouse mirror
As a general rule, fine dining is not a concept that is familiar in small towns and my experience has certainly proven this rule. Not that fine dining is the only acceptable form of food you pay someone to make for you, but when chips with gravy are the pinnacle of the available taste experience, …
Here we go again: another year, another end-of-the-world prediction. To save you from wasting your time getting ready for the world to end, here are the top ten reasons why the world will definitely not end in 2012. 1. My unlimited yoga studio pass does not expire until a year from now. The world may …
When I was a kid, some years we would go and visit my grandparents for Christmas. They had a very old house, with a huge fireplace in the living room, a secret back staircase from the kitchen to the second floor, and a root cellar with a dirt floor. The fireplace was a very important …
When you call to get your credit card activated you probably have me to blame for the experience. This is because the consulting firm I was working for (which no longer exists) was hired by a major credit card company to revamp their call centre script to make it friendlier. The project landed in my …
Predictions About the Future In the 60s there were many television shows based on visions of the future, including Star Trek and the Jetsons. I admit that Star Trek actually did a pretty good job at inventing devices before their time although I am still waiting for the transporter. Probably because of the technological advances …
The Bat As you might know, the cottage was a decade-long work in progress. Many advances in degree of completion took place in the past two years, most notably siding last year and significant headway in drywall this summer. However, there were many years when it was way far from finished. We took possession once …
This week the cottage burned. To. The. Ground. We went up to look at it and it is amazing what a fire will take. The only things remotely recognizable were the cast iron frying pan and the shell of the brand new cast iron sink (minus its enamel) that we had just bought for the …
The Flower Guy About 25 years ago when I first lived on the Danforth in Toronto, we went out for dinner a lot. This is because there are lots of restaurants and because I was too lazy to cook after spending all day at business school. Just about every time we were out for dinner, …
As you may recall from a previous post , I travelled to Italy for two weeks to stay at an enclave of villas to celebrate my friend’s significant birthday. It was all women on the trip except for Judy’s son and her brother Nigel who lives in England. Nigel rushed in to fill the patriarch …
In my opinion, bicycle trips are great vacations. You are outside in the fresh air, getting exercise, and at least in my case, moving slowly enough to enjoy the scenery. That’s why I’ve taken a number of cycling vacations. This particular one was to New Mexico. Not so strangely, New Mexico has a lot of …