Boccaccio’s Decameron

Books & Reviews / Literature / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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I never read The Decameron in any original, or complete translation. I have a bowdlerized edition I read in part some time ago, perhaps the 1970s. I recall seeing an art film based on the book, in the 1970s (directed Pier Pasolini). But I can’t recall it in any detail, except that it was subtitled. I have an old Penguin edition upstairs, its pages yellowing, mostly unread, but saved for that time in my life I felt able to tackle it. Seems that time has come. This week I found a copy of a recent translation of the Decameron at ……… click below for more ↓

Team Assessment

Books & Reviews / Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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Following my last piece on the relevance of Patrick Lencioni’s book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, to Collingwood Council, I felt I should explore some of Lencioni’s ideas, as well as look at how a team’s performance is assessed. Teams (or groups) can be assessed several ways: the best way is internally (by their own members). The second is by a professional outsider who has the competence to do so after observing their behaviour in meetings. The third is by outsiders whose role is merely to watch them (as we watch council online or on TV). The three methods ……… click below for more ↓

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Municipal Politics / What I'm Reading Now4 Comments

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You can’t help but think, when you read that title, of five block-thinking, dysfunctional members of Collingwood Council. But, relevant as that description may appear in our political sphere, it is actually the title of a book by Patrick Lencioni, about how teams fail to coalesce and work together. I found it at a local bookstore this week and read it in a single night. Unlike many of the self-help books on management and leadership I’ve read over the years, this one actually made sense and explained itself well. As I read it, I realized quickly that Lencioni’s model of team ……… click below for more ↓

The Horns of a Dilemma

Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviourOne Comment

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Poor Borg. One almost feels pity for their confusion. The members of Collingwood Council’s block-thinking collective were faced with a difficult dilemma on Monday: should they stick to their pettifogging ideology or break from it and support one of their own? Dogma versus friendship and loyalty. Monday night, another report from the Integrity Commissioner bashed the behaviour of one of the politburo. The purpose of the IC is to examine public complaints about whether members of council acted in an ethical, moral or even appropriate manner. This time the target was Councillor Tim Fryer. Read the report here (page 157). More principled people ……… click below for more ↓

The Venereal Game

Books & Reviews / Language & Grammar / What I'm Reading Now / Words & etymology3 Comments

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The Venereal Game is the provocative subtitle of James Lipton’s 1968 classic, An Exaltation of Larks (reprinted in 1977, and later expanded in the 1993 “ultimate” edition). Venereal, in this sense, comes from venery which in turn comes from the Latin venari, to hunt or pursue, rather from the sexual connotation.* The collective nouns in much of Lipton’s book come mainly from hunting terms (terms of venery), many originating in the 1486 Book of St Albans and similar contemporary works that Lipton documents. Since that publication, creating collective nouns has become a game for many of a lexicographical bent, hence the venereal game. Even Conan ……… click below for more ↓

Hats, Manners and Society

Manners & Civility / Social Order & DisorderLeave a comment

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I was at a local restaurant on the weekend, enjoying a nice meal with my wife. Of the six males – I hesitate to call them ‘men’ for reasons below – in the particular room in which we sat, I was the only one not wearing a baseball cap. I was also the only one not under 30. Wearing a hat indoors, as I was taught by people whose manners were impeccable (my parents and grandparents), is gauche. Gauche: graceless, awkward, unsophisticated. Wearing at hat at the table during a meal was so crude as to be viewed in social terms in ……… click below for more ↓

Anthony and Cleopatra

Arts / Books & Reviews / Culture / Literature / Personal Reminiscences / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

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While Julius Caesar is my favourite of all Shakespeare’s plays, I think Anthony and Cleopatra is my second favourite. I know it’s hard to choose any favourites from his plays, they’re all so good, but this one seems to resonate with me more than most others, enough to encourage me to reread it this week. Perhaps it’s because both lead characters are past their prime (as I am), but – like all of us who have put a few years behind us – reluctant to acknowledge it and still see themselves as their younger selves. In that, Cleopatra shines, while Anthony ……… click below for more ↓

The Road Not Taken

Books & Reviews / Culture / Poetry & LyricsLeave a comment

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I was surprised to read a recent piece in the New York Post that suggests a poem I have long loved was actually not what I thought it was about. It was one of those epiphanies that made me reassess my attitude not only towards the poem but towards what I had assumed it meant. The poem is Robert Frost’s famous piece, The Road Not Taken. You might remember it as “The Road Less Travelled” by which it is sometimes misnamed. It’s a short poem, only 20 lines long, each with a mere nine syllables. Many of us read it in ……… click below for more ↓

Modern Credulity Sucks

Balderdash & Hoaxes / Critical ThinkingLeave a comment

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People believe a lot of crazy things. I’m talking about really seriously bat-shit crazy  stuff that somehow people you thought were normal believe and now you look at them like they have grown extra heads. It’s like discovering a whole family of cousins you’ve been inviting for Xmas dinner all those years are actually Scientologists. Or Westboro Baptists. Islamic Jihadists. Harperites. That sort of crazy. The sort of crazy that makes saner folks frightened enough to hide in the basement and hope for the apocalypse to end having to suffer such people any longer. Sometimes what people believe is so damned stupid ……… click below for more ↓

Goodbye, Cleo

Personal Reminiscences / PetsLeave a comment

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Cleo was an accidental member of the family. Twelve to fifteen years ago – long enough that the exact date is hazy in my mind – she came to us. Well, she was delivered, actually. And yesterday she left us. One late winter day, back then, I was at home, getting ready to go to the shop, when a woman from the Georgian Bay Animal Rescue group showed up with a carrying case. We are in desperate need of some foster homes, she said. Short term, just until we find a more permanent home. It’s just one cat. She won’t ……… click below for more ↓

Tourism and Collingwood

Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & PoliciesOne Comment

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Tourism is the world’s fifth fastest-growing industry and growing at five percent per year. A recent story on CBC Radio this week suggests growth has been even higher for Canada, thanks to our lower Loonie: at least six percent. According to the Tourism Association of Canada, in 2013, Canada’s tourism industry: Represented more of Canada’s GDP than agriculture, forestry and fisheries combined Generated $88.5 billion in economic activity Was responsible for more than $17.2 billion in export revenue despite a growing travel deficit Generated $9.6 billion in federal government revenue Fostered 628 000 jobs across the country, spread across all 308 ridings Tourism ……… click below for more ↓

Stop Whining, Elvis Haters

Collingwood / Council / Culture / Festivals & Events / Music & ReviewsLeave a comment

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Don’t people who hate Collingwood’s Elvis Festival ever get tired of whining and bitching about it? I guess not. There’s another whining letter about it in this week’s Connection. More than twenty years the festival has been running successfully and they still haven’t figured it out yet. Just because you don’t like the event, doesn’t mean others don’t. In fact, tens of thousands of people really enjoy it and come from all over the province, from nearby US states and even from overseas to attend it. We cannot all like the same things and we certainly cannot all like what little lightens ……… click below for more ↓

Strat Plan Wrap Up: Addintional Comments

Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & PoliciesOne Comment

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Yes, the web page really does call for “Addintional Comments.” Well, I suppose consultants aren’t hired for their spelling or grammar. Otherwise there wouldn’t be all that bizarre capitalization or the missing punctuation. But you’re here to read my summation of the Collingwood’s fledgling strategic plan, not my editorial critique. Which is pretty simple: woo-hoo. I reiterate that a strategic plan can be either practical and pragmatic, or woo-hoo. This one is woo-hoo. By which I mean it is airy fairy collection of generalities, seasoned with ignorance, ideology and irrelevancies and very little actual direction. Well, most woo-hoo plans are. They aren’t ……… click below for more ↓

Strat Plan Part 6: Culture and the Arts

Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & PoliciesOne Comment

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The fifth and final objective in Collingwood’s developing strategic plan (the woo-hoo plan) is culture and the arts. For something so important to the community, with such a huge potential, it encompasses a mere two goals. Disappointingly, neither of them relate to its huge economic potential, which everyone else seems to understand except this committee and its council. “The rapidly evolving global economy demands a dynamic and creative workforce. The arts and its related businesses are responsible for billions of dollars in cultural exports for this country. It is imperative that we continue to support the arts and arts education both ……… click below for more ↓

Strat Plan Part 5: Healthy Lifestyle

Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & PoliciesLeave a comment

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I suppose we can all agree that a healthy lifestyle is better than an unhealthy one. And to a certain degree, a municipality can help residents choose a healthier one or at least give them opportunities to pursue it. But you have to ask just how seriously committed a municipality is to a healthy lifestyle when it sells pop, candy and junk food in the vending machines its own recreational facilities. How committed to a healthy lifestyle is a council many of whose members take the town hall elevator up a single storey rather than make the effort to walk ……… click below for more ↓

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