I can buy into this if it means ending precious localism while recognizing each part as equally valid:  •  “"No more solitudes" is the motto Michaëlle Jean has chosen to launch herself as Canada's first black Governor-General, with a ceremony that turned the normally staid Parliament Hill into a …

For no other reason than perhaps the had cold medicine I started thinking about the word "futurist" last night. Without pointing any fingers, I think it's nuts and should be much the same as "quack" - which it really is to 96.7% of the population. There are mainly techno-quack futurists but some …

Wow. The Orioles have decided to play tonight. Maybe it's because the team removed images of Sosa and Palmeiro from their website. Click if you don't believe me.  •  Later:  •  ...pleaseopleaseoplease...

Rain postposed last night's game to this afternoon. Double header. I am sure to be working diligently with the doors to the office closed all afternoon. Internet audio will be a mere background to nose-to-grindstone saltminery. Those shouts will reflect my glee at my successful achievements on …

For a guy writing on something with Gen X in the title I hardly ever reference it. I like to leave that to implication. That's it.  •  But I read Ian's bit this morning about parenting and the generations and I thought...that's a theme I can conveniently latch on to with little real effort...and …

We need to vote on this. Is the paint the moustache and glasses on the famous person thing - like this - the funniest joke in the world or not? I say yes. Folks will say this is defacement of property. Folks will say this is disrespect. But is there no something to be said for the deflation of …

In the continuing slow crash that is Stephen Harper's political career, he opened the new sitting of Parliament with one message: ignore corporate gouging!  •  “Opposition Leader Stephen Harper led off in the House of Commons Monday by saying that consumers have been suffering at the pumps all …

I have an interesting meeting first thing across town on Monday morning. Must rush. Read John. Something it up. You know it is because even Geoff Regan has piped in. Things afoot. You can depend on it.

Sometimes I wonder if one person, a typewriter and a filing cabinet in 1957 accomplished about as much as a fully staffed present day office building using the newest technology:  •  “Most office workers find computer jargon as difficult to understand as a foreign language, a survey suggests …

“[Ed.: I usually keep the two worlds of GX40 and A Good Beer Blog separate but this post this morning seems apt for sharing.]”  •  Ever since I picked up a couple annual editions of the Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture, I have been wondering why such a thing does not exist …

Remember convergence? I am almost there tonight with Major League Baseball's audio, web and game day app giving me a heck of a lot from the ninth inning of the game at Baltimore's Camden yard. My computer screen looks like this. Boston 4-2 in the ninth, BTW.

It is as simple as that. If you are to make ribs and coat them and soak them and let them come into their glory over six hours at 250º F., you should also make one of those thick savory batter corn breads that you pour in a greased pan and pull out just before setting the table. Mine includes …

The Sox played well against Baltimore in last night's 6-3 win. Big game for Manny. It is good for Manny to be having big games. Jerry Remy was even focused enough to not really go on about the restaurants of Baltimore in the 6th inning or so - which is sad as I imagine there are some nice ones. I …

CNN has some interesting but, upon reflection, oddly voyeuristic animations of streets and streets of the houses of others being flooded by Hurricane Rita.  •  And, yes, they are SFW. Who do you think I am? Master Flea?

Today is when you do all the work. I cannot keep up with your incessant demands for autographed postcards of my visit to Vienna and create HTML linkages to the same stories everyone else is. So what is on your mind this week?  •  Is there a recession coming? We have not had a good recession for …

It's getting nutty. Nut-tay. Even if gas were to go to $2.00 a litre (or $6.50 a US gallon in USD) it would just add about 20 bucks to my average weekly spending. Meanwhile, there was a fantastic sale on side ribs at A+P and I got a hefty feed for Saturday - 3.5 kg or 8 lbs for 15 bucks. I need to …

I read John Gushue in St. John's every morning on the CBC lockout situation just as I read him every morning before. He certainly puts a human face on the situation as well as a fairly neutral presentation on events. But, underneath all that neutrality, what strikes me from all this is there is …

On another fall related event, 'Nee proves that the first month of undergrad in 2005 is the same as in 1981.

I think I am trying to convince myself on this one:  •  When you get up before sunrise, you can pick listen to the morning show in Iowa on 1040 WHO Des Moines. and learn that hogs are up a dime.slow roasted root vegetables are within the realm of possibility.you don't have to be vacation planning …

You just can't over-hype this sort of thing...  •  From the US National Hurricane Center:  •  “Only 3 Category Five Hurricanes have made landfall in the United States since records began: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935, Hurricane Camille (1969), and Hurricane Andrew in August, 1992. The 1935 …

LRAD + Whisper 2000 = Scanners.

Just for the record we are at 1.048 down from about 1.399 a couple of weeks ago. I saw under a buck on the road to Peterborough. $41.92 for a tank down from $55.96.  •  Here is a comparison chart for average prices in Ontario, NB and regulated PEI using this tool. The odd thing is that the …

15 - 2.  •  You will just have to face facts and expect that I will share my anxiety-based (aka "faith-based") relationship with the Sox over the next few days and hopefully weeks. Would it be different if David Ortiz hit fewer home runs? If he wan't such a pretty man?

It used to be "what's good for GM is good for America" but now it seems "what's good for Google is good for the world":  •  “Google has a grand plan of "organizing the world's information and making it more universally accessible and useful". It hopes to pump $200m (£110m) into creating a digital …

I had a vineyard. It was the most unproductive vineyard but it had 200 plants and faced south east and made this in 2002. So when I saw this photo from the BBC on the 2005 bumper harvest I thought - that ought to be me in 2025.

The first 80s remake I really am looking forward to. The Frantics apparently have made a one-hour special for CTV. They were the best on radio as it is easier to imagine a man with a canoe welded to his head fighting crime without actually seeing it. Nonetheless, I will park myself in front of the …

I listened on the radio as that ugly echoing crowd of 127 in Tampa Bay cheered on their team 8-7 over the Red Sox. Ortiz was speaking:  •  “The Red Sox and Yankees both have 63 losses, putting the rivals in a virtual tie. The defending World Series champions have 12 games remaining -- including …

Ian is as unapologetic about being anti-Bush but after all it is his country, too. But was I the last guy to know what he wrote today?  •  “Our friend Josh Shenk has a cover story for the Atlantic Monthly right now (as well as a fabulously well-reviewed book) about Abraham Lincoln's clinical …

Listening to BBC Scotland's show Air this afternoon, I heard the new single "Do You Want To" from Franz Ferdinand which mentions a "transmission party" - I thought I was the only one that held parties for especially pleasing radio broadcasts anymore. Click here and the song plays from a point near …

Mainly for portland, I point out this happy, happy news:  •  “When the Montreal Canadiens open their pre-season Sunday night, on hand will be the team's new mascot, Youppi!. The Habs have "adopted" the bright orange creature from the defunct Montreal Expos. Youppi!, whose name comes with an …

Via the good Flea, digital slackery tips.

In the past we scraped stones across plastic to listen to music.  •  This past weekend, I traded my pal back on a trade we did over 20 years ago. He is a painter and I had one of his. He is also a music nerd like me and got a few things like the copy of Exile On Main St. with the postcards I …

Looks like the public only find the new Tory TV ads useful for identifying the people they plan not to vote for:  •  “The federal Liberals had the support of 40 per cent of respondents in a new poll — virtually the same level of backing they received in rolling to their majority government in 2000 …

A jetsicle by the city zoo next to the river and St. Veronus, too. We had a grand time in Peterborough.  •  More jetsicle love here. Rest assured that we continue the thankless task of preserving Canada's jetsicle heritage, at least visually, as it is being destroyed by the protectors of Canada's …

Who knew? It's a real place!

I have limited entertainment news staff around here and that is probably for the best. But this tidbit of wisdom from one Ms Zellweger is quite interesting so we have brought in extra weekend staff:  •  “Actress Renee Zellweger has said she hopes her split from husband Kenny Chesney after four …

A Saturday featuring a second-cousin-in-law's wedding will be tempered by a visit to an old pal's in Peterborough for lunch - sweet flag. A pal old enough we are going to do a swap of each other's stuff first swapped twenty years ago. Lps, extended 45s and other art. Stuff. I have fallen into …

With both the global war on terror and the war in Iraq as well as the consequent gift of the reconstruction of Iraq to pay for without raising taxes or creating war bonds, the off the cuff decision to reconstruct the South to its former state with Federal Funds must be coming to a shock to the …

They played Beck this morning. They are trying to sway me towards management. Why does labour never play Beck on the morning show on CBC? When did I last head bop to CBC in the morning?

I have no ideas why Fridays are the quietest day of blogging. Could it be people yak on blogs to divert themselves from work and you're not really working on your Friday? Do you have day dreams of a lawn chair and a brown pop to keep your mind occupied? Please do me a favour and trigger a long and …

Here is what the BBC had at the end of one of its reports on President Bush's speech last night:  •  “People have been very surprised about the president's line on poverty and the federal funding promises. Some conservatives, particularly those in think-tanks, are already saying this is a real …

"Bureautic" (pron. "byur-aw-tic"): used for "bureaucratic" but sort of merged in the pronunciation with "neurotic".

Boing has a good post making fun of razor blade manufacturers given Gillette has now introduced a five-blade shaver because you know just scraping your face is so last year - everyone now is removing their faces day by day, one thin slice at a time.

This BBC report is claiming that the effects of autumn there are spreading into both summer and winter. If anything I would think that it is summer that is expanding here. As far as I can tell we have had summer - temperatures over 20º C is my measure - since early May. Spring exists maybe from 1 …

Nice to see the good legislators of Massachusetts have lost the passion to fight the pointless fight:  •  “The Massachusetts Legislature rejected a proposed change to the state constitution Wednesday aimed at banning gay marriage, a striking reversal that preserves the state's status as the only …

The oddest news I've seen for a while:  •  “Dr Christian Koch, 55, from Kleinhartmannsdorf, said his method uses old tyres, weeds and animal cadavers. They are heated up to 300 Celsius to filter out hydrocarbon which is then turned into diesel by a catalytic converter. He said the resulting "high …

Alert! Alert! Space fire approaching the planet or so sayeth spaceweather.com:  •  “A coronal mass ejection (CME) is racing toward Earth and it could spark a severe geomagnetic storm when it arrives--perhaps tonight (Sept. 14th and 15th). People everywhere should be alert for auroras.  •  The CME …

Terrorism, war, natural disasters, iPods: is this going to go down as the biggest loser of a decade of all time or what? Apparently Mother Nature is working on a real doozie to cap it off:  •  “A silent tectonic event, so powerful it has shifted southern Vancouver Island out to sea, but so subtle …

"Giant Robot! Spare only the readers of Gen X at 40!"  •  News of things like this always concerns me:  •  “The Japanese Hayabusa spacecraft has approached within 20km (12 miles) of the asteroid it has been travelling to for more than two years. The probe will collect a sample from the surface of …

Smart move. There is only much patience going around for people who say that all was A-OK or that there will be time for blame later, as had been the party line. Making the buck stop is a lot different and a lot better than avoiding or even labelling it blame. Good move.

Watching baseball at the stadium formerly known as Skydome is painful, even on TV. The echoes. The empty seats. The goofy TV screens on the outfield wall. Oh yes...and the demoralized perennial end o'season choakers in the funny outfits - "its not grey...it's silver grey". So it was greatly …

Brian posts an email from a pal who went to New Orleans to help. Brian explains:  •  “I have a friend I know from the fire department in Austin. He's a firefighter, He's an EMT, and he's a Marine. He returned from Iraq early this year, and more recently he's been in New Orleans. Here's the …

Is anyone surprised that former PM Brian Mulroney had a habit of speaking rudely - or often merely firmly - about people and events? Apparently he is:  •  “Brian Mulroney feels "devastated" and "betrayed" and regrets talking candidly to Peter C. Newman, a spokesman said yesterday after the …

Mike Campbell found himself on a no-fly list...isn't 4.2 percent of Canada made up of Mike Campbells?

Sometimes the new e-world has to face facts like it lives within existing society and existing law:  •  “ The creator of software designed to surreptitiously observe individuals' online activities has been indicted for allegedly violating U.S. federal computer privacy laws, local and federal …

Arther recollects the emails he sent and received on 9/11 but did not retain. It reminded me that I have lost or, recently, abandoned sets of email three times. The first was an error of cleaning up a hard drive, the second was turning off an intranet and the hird a deliberate closing of an …

It is a funny thing in the Canadian character that we love to be mentioned, to be thanked as a nation. It is good to do something good, for sure - but sometimes I think we would get all gooey over being over-praised for a smallish thing than be proud in an achievement despite no much notice being …

It was a sunny beautiful day like today.  •  Here is what I wrote in 2003. Here is what I wrote last year including comments I wrote at Acts of Volition in September 2001.

Lew Bryson has forwarded news about a couple of events raising funds for the Red Cross. Have a look over at A Good Beer Blog.

An experiment today. We have had many experiments with BBQ ribs around here but our eldest is mad for pulled pork and, surprisingly, ribs are actually one of the most expensive cuts of meat going. So today is pulled pork day chez nous for under seven bucks. To the right you will see the wee beast …

This is in The Globe this morning:  •  “The developments in New Orleans came against an increasingly stormy backdrop in Washington, where Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Michael Brown was relieved of his command of the onsite relief efforts amid increasing criticism over the …

So since I added UPN 38 to the cable TV line-up all I have seen is the Sox lose, including last night as reported in The New York Times when Wells lost...though he wasn't really the problem:  •  “ It's doubtful that the portly wonder that is Wells fits into most things as well as he has the Red …

I think it is good to get all cathartic once in a while, shed baggage and, well, point fingers. Colin Powell (former nicest person in what a made-for-TV-movie will one day call George Dubya, The First Years) has started to stretch his wings:  •  The Houston Chronicle says: "Former Secretary of …

Even though I suspect this here site is by new old farts for new old farts, I am sure there are more than a few interested in another flourishing of the band scene in Halifax. The weekly The Coast, the only way now to keep in touch with my old City since The Daily News website became so bad, talks …

“Elderly well dressed couples from Austin show up in the afternoon, strolling among the evacuees smiling broadly and kindly at all of us. When they asked me, with the air of Princess Diana, "How are you doing? We see you managed to get your computer out," I didn’t have the heart to tell them that …

“California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced Wednesday that he will veto a bill that would have made California the first state to legalize same-sex marriage through its elected legislators.”  •  I don't get it. When judges find constitutional rights exists some people say "the …

There are few things as satisfying as us winning on the road and them losing...to Northern Ireland, too. Hee hee! Scotland looks very comfortable in egg shell blue. Scoff if you like but it's natty.

'Nuff said.

Four up with three weeks to go. Just saying. Don't blame me for just saying if it doesn't happen. The world doesn't work that way...does it?

I have a hard enough time these days gettin up, firing the coal powered Dell (available only in Canada) and thinking of things to link to without taking the time to also create a fictitious bird flu epidemic via my blog. Apparently it is intended to be a means to educate on what would happen …

Web-pal Cyn gets to be a Rolling Stone roadie for the Moncton concert.

Someone I know says "longhair music!" with a humph when the wrong sort of classical music comes on the car radio.  •  There is another sort. I was thinking - as I am thinking too much - of the flooding down south and I remembered that I used to have a live double lp of Professor Longhair, the New …

What an odd thing to do a poll about? Apparently someone paid Leger and Leger to ask how many want oil nationalized and the results are a bit odd, too:  •  “The Canadian Press said Monday a Leger poll suggested 49 per cent of respondents want petroleum resources nationalized while 43 per cent said …

I am surprised by the interest I am apparently sustaining in reading Saul Cornell's book The Other Founders: Anti-Federalism and the Dissenting Tradition in America, 1788-1828.  •  One thing I am learning a bit about is whig republicanism, a movement that probably (if I knew anything) can be dated …

We went to the southernmost set of Rideau Canal locks, a triple set at Kingston Mills, this afternoon and...err... I went a bit overboard with the camera. But who knows? Maybe there are canal fans amongst you. If you click on the "continue reading..." link below you will see about 40 more …

It is very difficult to figure out what should have been done in the wake of Katrina. It may well be absolutely useless as well. What can my thinking and obsessing add in any way to the event?  •  I am quite drawn to the idea of not thinking about it but that is something like not thinking about …

Some pals and I are heading to Syracuse's Carrier Dome again in a few weeks to see the Orangemen play football so I, wearing my new SU shirt acquired yesterday, dedicated the afternoon to the first game of the year against West Virginia. It was like bad CFL. At one point in the fourth quarter the …

We first met Rudy's last year when we travelled over to Oswego to check out the fort and see at where that steam cloud and those flashing lights were coming from. Yesterday we had dinner again there and were again impressed. While the clams were not what you could get at a coastal shack like Sea …

Up in the middle of the night with too much road head. We went into CNY for some Labour Day weekend treat gathering, flipping back and forth between sports radio and crisis news until the Prairie Home Companion took us around eastern Lake Ontario, through sunset and dusk, north along beautiful …

I'm not one of these people who will say they don't watch a lot of TV. I watch a lot of TV. I think I have gained more from TV than I could ever describe. It tells me what I need and what I need to know. TV has shaped my life from the non-educational Jackson Five and Hot Wheel cartoons of my …

It's those "know-it-all Canadian media pundits". Man. They ruin everything...

I know this about General Honare entering New Orleans with the military is on every news service by now but I want it for my records:  •  “Honore said getting food and water to the people at the convention center was a difficult process. "If you ever have 20,000 people come to supper, you know …

I wrote this over at Michael's place:  •  “If you look at the Louisiana Constitution it does state:  •  “The military shall be subordinate to the civil power.”  •  This does allow for directed the legitimate use of the military by civil officials and, while what you say about unarmed people is …

I like this idea. To celebrate the memory of the massively influential BBC radio host John Peel, who died last year, people are encouraged to put on their own gig of some sort:  •  “The very first John Peel Day will take place on Thursday October 13th. The day will be a celebration of John's life …

What incredible bleakness in the news about New Orleans. This is what Beered wrote about the hurricane and this is what Ian said. Apparently there is some inability even to receive help from Canada including the military's water purification system that was sent to Sri Lanka earlier this year. The …