Dear Barb: I am the grandmother of a three-year-old. Her mother (my daughter) has a drug problem and I do not feel she is taking proper care of my granddaughter. I have gone to her apartment in the middle of the afternoon and my granddaughter is alone in her room still in her pajamas, while… Read more »
From my early beginnings as a young introvert, the public library has always been a bit of a refuge. Years later, not much has changed, albeit with an additional affinity for endless hours spent scouring second-hand bookstores to add to my ever-growing “to-read” pile. From one bookworm to another, this column will be underscoring and… Read more »
This is not a COVID article. Computer algorithms may spot a key word, like teachers who spot head lice on children, but this article isn’t about words. And it’s not about parasites, per se. Remember when a phrase like gut fauna might have turned tummies? Well, truth is, it is the representative weeds, er, wee… Read more »
Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses (CFIB) estimates potential permanent closures of up to 222,000 small and medium-sized businesses, depending on how the situation evolves. That’s 21 percent of all Canadian businesses. The corresponding job losses would range between 962,000 and 2,951,000 Canadian workers. While most of us are struggling financially right now,… Read more »
Dear Barb: Hi, I have a dilemma. I chose not to get vaccinated from Covid. I must admit I bought into the conspiracy theories. I did not think the virus was anything serious and that it would eventually just disappear as Donald Trump said. However now we are into three years, and it is not… Read more »
Ever switch majors? Unlike New Year’s resolutions, our academic major ought to be a fully personal choice that we will live with for the rest of our lives. To be resolute about a lifestyle change (yawn) or a brain improvement (read a non-course related book each month?), implies an impossible certainty, however. We are already… Read more »
Dear Barb: Hi, my wife and I have been married for 10 years and we seem to be growing apart. We don’t have any children and that was our choice, but it’s like we don’t have anything to keep us together. It seems to be getting worse since the beginning of the pandemic, even though… Read more »
In my Minds We Meet interview with Natalia Iwanek, I mentioned that I was reading The Handmaid’s Tale by Toronto-based novelist Margaret Atwood for the first time. Having now completed it, I understand why it was among the novels often assigned to students back in high school English. Its commentary on dystopias entails not only… Read more »
I have been in Scouting as a leader, which we call Scouters, for over six years. When I first started with our group, my son was a first-year Beaver Scout. As a Scouter in Beavers, you get assigned a nickname, and I got Hawkeye. I love the name so much that I kept it when… Read more »
Artist: Beneath The Silence Album: Black Lights Denmark’s female-fronted melodic metal quintet, Beneath The Silence, are releasing their new album Black Lights on February 11th 2022 through Prime Collective. Of the album, vocalist Mette Hessellund says, “with this album we strived to push our sound further in all directions, while still keeping the core messages… Read more »