This week, for the first time ever, I stepped out in a tuxedo. Perhaps not quite as well-tailored as Sean Connery's suit, but still very cool, and very confidence building. The occasion was the Alumni Dinner for the Cambridge University Guild of Change Ringers. This year it was
Oh, long-suffering subscribers. I haven't forgotten you, really. Last Wednesday I managed to finally do something I've dreamed of since I was a teenager: flying. I visited the Cambridge Gliding Centre and enjoyed an amazing and even sunny day learning the very basics of piloting a
This month, I'm finally back to working on the novel. It's loosely based on family history - something that my family is utterly awful at doing. In any event, I started with my mother, growing up near Dorintosh, Saskatchewan. My Grandfather and grandmother were homesteaders in
Back at the start of this century I was, for about a year and a half, manager of WMMT Radio in Whitesburg, Kentucky. WMMT's signal covers parts of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. In particular, they reach many of the jails and prisons that have been built in the
Last week I was in Western Head, in Nova Scotia, packing up all the stuff that we had stored in our farmhouse, and selling off what we decided we could live without. At the same time, with many thanks to our wonderful real estate agent Maddie Charlton, we had a
The image above is from the Air Canada website, explaining, without words or captions, how to navigate Heathrow Terminal Two. With major airports like Heathrow or Charles de Gaulle I know that it's worthwhile to do some planning before arrival. Especially since there are actually TWO Terminal Twos
That's us, on the right, at the Afandim Uyghur Cuisine Restaurant for a New Years Day feast of roast goat. It was yummy, and decidedly not vegan, and the company was delightful and fun. It was, honestly, the perfect way to start this new year. I'm
Where my mind is today.
For those who don't pay for the Globe and Mail, my latest column is now also up on my own website. There's a follow-up though. Since writing that column we've moved from Grantchester to a couples' apartment at Wolfson College in Cambridge, a
In today's Globe and Mail I write about how British people's greatest pride actually surrounds being cold, all of the time, indoor or out. The comment thread is approaching 300! https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-england-winter-cold-canada/
I cannot claim to be an authority on Thomas Mann, or the long and varied history of various incarnations of Faust. Nor have I read the many, many subsequent books and papers which followed Mann's 1947 novel. When reading it this month, the story felt eerily familiar; as
It's been a couple of weeks since Susan signed us up for bell ringing lessons. That red arrow points to the little room, about 70 narrow, winding, stone steps up, where we're learning the basics. In this room. Each big church bell has a rope that
I grew up in a household where Stampede Wrestling was a weekend highlight. I pretty much educated myself at the Kelowna Public Library, and somehow never aspired to much of anything. Dad was a used car dealer, and Mom was... well, Mom. Small town Kelowna education was nothing dramatic. There
For those who don't subscribe to the Globe and Mail, my column about dry wells in Nova Scotia is now on-line at my own site. What was touched on, but never really explored, was the question of what the role of governments should be in this disaster. There
In today's Globe and Mail I write about the Nova Scotia drought, our dry well, and why governments need to stop supporting fossil fuel use. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-nova-scotia-atlantic-drought-wells-water/
Lately I've been reading Jonn Elledge's A History of the World in 47 Borders. Pick up a copy - you won't regret it. And subscribe to his newsletter. Two things emerge from this book: The national (and internal) borders that govern our lives are
This post is strictly to give Google something to index, for the benefit of North Americans who move to the UK and are baffled by heating All that you need to know is the Rule of Twos. Your storage heater is pretty primitive. It warms up big heavy blocks overnight
More on power. When we moved in, we chose to keep EDF as our electricity company. They were already supplying the house, and we had liked them back in France, so why not? For the first time, we have a smart meter that tracks our power usage and keeps us
There are a few of these mystery switches on baseboards in the house. I have no clue what they do. For an immigrant from Canada, English power is baffling. Here are the plugs to the left of the kitchen stove - sorry, the hob. The two UK plugs on the
First off, let's be honest. This by any measure a beautiful country. The fields and streams and skies look just like they do in the paintings and movies. And, for reasons I haven't quite figured out, there are fruit, berry, and nut trees everywhere we walk.