Pompeii: Swords-and-Sandals Flop

Film & Reviews / History & Biography / Places & GeographyLeave a comment

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As a film setting, the town of Pompeii in the first century CE is a lot like the deck of the Titanic in 1912: no amount of special effects or clever script writing is going to save it from the disaster awaiting. As a film, Pompeii has a lot of the former, but precious little of the latter to rescue it. That’s probably why it’s in the $7 section at the DVD store. Let’s start with the history. Pompeii was a Roman town on the west side of Italy close to the slopes of an active volcano, Mount Vesuvius. The recipe ……… click below for more ↓

Revelations about Revelation

Books & Reviews / Christianity / Faith / Religion / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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It’s got treachery, betrayal, politics, violence, skullduggery, sex, war, philosophy, politics, religion, an empire teetering on the brink of collapse, mystical visions, rebellion, emperors and slaves, angry priests accusing other priests, unrepentant martyrs going to their deaths in the arena, and the end of the world looming over it all. What more could you want? It’s all in Elaine Pagels’ book, Revelations: Visions, Prophecy & Politics in the Book of Revelation. Reading it has been quite an entertaining experience, as she takes you through the turbulent early church history, through the philosophical and scriptural precedents, the fight to establish orthodoxy and the ……… click below for more ↓

Thurber’s Writings & Drawings

Books & Reviews / Personal Reminiscences / What I'm Reading Now / Writing & Fiction2 Comments

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Books of James Thurber‘s cartoons and writing were always on the shelves at my grandparents’ home, as well as on my parents’ bookshelves. I read them, as I did everything else on those shelves, when I was quite young. I still remember his odd, eccentric cartoons with their primitive lines but sharp and bizarre wit, although I can’t recall much if any what stories I read of his back then (and I am looking forward to reading today what I haven’t read since I was in my early teens). Yet despite my fuzzy memory for literature of my past, I still recall the enjoyment ……… click below for more ↓

Abdicating Responsibility

Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviourLeave a comment

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Collingwood Council has, in its short time in office, abdicated much of its responsibility to the business of government and to the people of this town. Council has sloughed off the duties they were elected to shoulder with remarkable alacrity. Some of that responsibility landed on staff, who assumed control of the budget process and drive most of the initiatives that come to the table. But some of it is being passed along to un-elected residents. It began early on when this council decided not to put a council representative on the BIA Board of Management. This way, no one can ……… click below for more ↓

National Poetry Month

Culture / Poetry & Lyrics / Pop Culture / Social Order & DisorderOne Comment

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April is National Poetry Month in Canada. I don’t know if this gets widespread acknowledgement much less appreciation among the public and in the schools, but it should. Poetry is an important part of our cultural lives, although it seems to me our collective passion for it has waned over the past few decades. I blame MTV, video games, rap music, Stephen Harper and cuts to education budgets. And maybe the phase of the moon. Whatever the cause, we seem to have less poetry in our lives, in our souls than we did in the past. Okay, I don’t know why ……… click below for more ↓

Closed for Business, Hostile to Seniors

Collingwood / Council / Municipal Politics / Taxes / User fees and costs5 Comments

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Closed: that’s the message Collingwood Council sent to business during its recent budget discussions. We’re making it more expensive to run a business here, and by the way, we’re hostile to seniors and low-wage earners, too. Under the tissue-thin pretense of keeping taxes low (which they aren’t, really), council approved a staff initiative to remove the costs for maintaining hydrants from the general tax levy and add them into your water rates – where they will do the most harm. Councillor Madigan made the motion to take the costs from the fire department’s budget – where it has traditionally been, which means it came from property ……… click below for more ↓

The Responsibility of Free Speech

Critical Thinking / Language & Grammar / Social media & cyberbullying / Social Order & Disorder2 Comments

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In January, 2015, Marie Snyder, on her blog, A Puff of Absurdity, raised the question of how free should speech be. I share her concerns about the apparent limitlessness of our rights: our right to free speech is not matched to any inherent responsibilities, civic or moral, to behave in a mature manner, nor does it require anyone to speak the truth. And we are not taught in our educational system either the basics of argument (in the classical sense), rhetoric or even manners and civility. I don’t always agree with her positions (although I did like her take on ……… click below for more ↓

The Bully Pulpit

Books & Reviews / History & Biography / Politics / Social media & cyberbullying / Social Order & Disorder / What I'm Reading NowOne Comment

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“I suppose my critics will call that preaching, but I have got such a bully pulpit!” US President Theodore Roosevelt uttered those words in office (reported in the February 27, 1909, issue of The Outlook magazine), coining the phrase ‘bully pulpit’ in referring to the presidency as an ideal platform from which to expound his ideas and advocate his causes. Of course, in his day, bully – a word with which Roosevelt was very fond – as an adjective meant ‘excellent,’ ‘first-rate,’ ‘jovial’ or just ‘good’ – a usage we still share when we say ‘bully for you.’ His bully ……… click below for more ↓

Family, a Century Ago

Family history / Personal Reminiscences / War & MilitaryOne Comment

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The gentleman in the uniform on the right is William Gordon Pudney, Chief Petty Officer and engineer on the cruiser, Niobe, one of the earliest ship’s in Canada’s fledgling navy. William (Bill) was born in Canada, in 1893. He is perhaps in his early 20s in this undated photograph, taken a century or more ago, maybe even younger. William, my grandfather, served on the Niobe shortly after it was acquired from England, and later served on it in WWI, when it patrolled the Atlantic. He may have also served on another ship when the Niobe was put out to pasture as a ……… click below for more ↓

Canadian Ambivalence Towards Religion

Atheism & Spirituality / Critical Thinking / Faith / ReligionLeave a comment

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A new Angus Reid poll underscores the changing, ambivalent nature of Canadian attitudes towards religion, but there are many things about the poll that concern me and make me question its methodology and whether an inherent bias influenced the results. First of all, what is “religion”? That may seem obvious, but there are conflicting definitions, and often religion is used interchangeably with the terms faith and belief,  although that is incorrect usage and they are, in fact, different. I think it’s important to be clear when asking people about religion exactly what you mean by the word ‘religion’ – and ……… click below for more ↓

Bad Thinkers and the Unknown Knowns

Conspiracy Theories / Critical Thinking / New Age Codswallop / Social Order & Disorder / UncategorizedLeave a comment

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I came across an interesting piece on bad thinking online recently. In it, the author argues some of the points I’ve mentioned in the past about people who believe in conspiracy theories, gossip and other online codswallop: The problem with conspiracy theorists is not, as the US legal scholar Cass Sunstein argues, that they have little relevant information. The key to what they end up believing is how they interpret and respond to the vast quantities of relevant information at their disposal. In the piece, the author, Quassim Cassam, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick in Coventry, argues that the fault ……… click below for more ↓

Extraordinary Claims

Balderdash & Hoaxes / Conspiracy Theories / Creationism / Critical Thinking / New Age Codswallop / Pseudoscience & QuackeryLeave a comment

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As the poster for the Centre for Inquiry notes, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. It’s a popular catchphrase for the skeptical movement, but should be an intellectual policy for everyone. Regardless of what is being claimed, it requires evidence at the same level of the claim. Anecdote is not evidence, please note, especially personal anecdote even with the corroboration of other witnesses. People often “see” what they choose to see, and interpret events and objects according to preconceived ideas. Seeing UFOs instead of ordinary aircraft, or chemtrails instead of mundane contrails are examples of this. Evidence is something concrete; a body ……… click below for more ↓

Conrad Black: Off the Rails

Atheism & Spirituality / Critical Thinking / Faith / History & Biography / Politics3 Comments

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I generally read Conrad Black‘s columns for their entertainment value, but I also read them for the language. Black is the best tosser of pithy epithets since Spiro Agnew*. And like the former US VP, he’s a pompous git who puffs up his intellectual feathers like a pigeon in heat – that puffery of sound and fury that signifies nothing more than an ego he has to bring along in its own carriage. He is very amusing that way. Now to be clear, I have little respect for Black’s uber-right ideologies. We are at polar opposites of the political spectrum: ……… click below for more ↓

Reading Ukulele Tabs

Culture / Musical Instruments / Ukulele: instruments & musicLeave a comment

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One of the things I want to discuss in my upcoming ukulele workshop is how to read tab sheet music. In this post I’ve give you some pointers so you can practice on your own. It’s worth learning to read tabs because it gives you the ability to play melodies and solo pieces without having to read music. Don’t be confused when you see a piece labelled “tab” but only showing the lyrics and chords. The name is often used for that purpose, although it’s not really a tab in the proper sense. First you’ll need a properly tabbed song ……… click below for more ↓

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