I started doing a weekly column in 1985.
Remember 1985? Yeah, me neither. For me, it was a blur of diapers and pureed squash and walking squalling babies around the house at 4am to try to get them to sleep. I could sit down in the rocking chair at that time of night, turn on the TV, and have my choice of any religious program I wanted. (And that was it. Nothing - literally nothing else was on.)
I started off writing about sports, but then I was asked to write a column about politics. So I wrote scathing pieces about federal cabinet ministers and news makers, important people who, if I threw their names at you today, you’d probably say, "Huh? Never heard of him. What was he, the mayor of Moose Jaw or something?"

I started doing a weekly column in 1985.
Remember 1985? Yeah, me neither. For me, it was a blur of diapers and pureed squash and walking squalling babies around the house at 4am to try to get them to sleep. I could sit down in the rocking chair at that time of night, turn on the TV, and have my choice of any religious program I wanted. (And that was it. Nothing - literally nothing else was on.)
I started off writing about sports, but then I was asked to write a column about politics. So I wrote scathing pieces about federal cabinet ministers and news makers, important people who, if I threw their names at you today, you’d probably say, "Huh? Never heard of him. What was he, the mayor of Moose Jaw or something?"

It was around three in the morning when the phone rang.
We were fast asleep. I don't know what my wife was dreaming about, but I was having that one where Donald Trump was following me around a department store and knocking over displays. Then he'd duck out of sight really quickly so the clerks thought it was me. It's not a very nice dream, and I don't know what it means, but it has really coloured how I feel about The Donald.
Anyway, the second the phone rang we were awake. My wife said, "Who could be calling at this hour?"
I'm not sure how she expected me to respond. I think she wasn't really asking who would be calling at that hour. What she meant to say was "I wonder who died or had a horrible accident?"

It was around three in the morning when the phone rang.
We were fast asleep. I don't know what my wife was dreaming about, but I was having that one where Donald Trump was following me around a department store and knocking over displays. Then he'd duck out of sight really quickly so the clerks thought it was me. It's not a very nice dream, and I don't know what it means, but it has really coloured how I feel about The Donald.
Anyway, the second the phone rang we were awake. My wife said, "Who could be calling at this hour?"
I'm not sure how she expected me to respond. I think she wasn't really asking who would be calling at that hour. What she meant to say was "I wonder who died or had a horrible accident?"

Last Saturday around 2am a stream of cars roared past my house. It was a line of cars in the dozens. I was baffled, at first, but then it occurred to me the movie must have just finished.
I live on the same stretch of highway as one of the few remaining drive-in movie theatres on the planet. Now, I say "few." I don’t know how many there are in North America. Ten? Fifty? A hundred? But oh, back in the day ...
Back then, the drive-in was an intrinsic part of summer life. They were the perfect date - inexpensive, yet fraught with opportunities for love and romance (and humiliating rejection, of course, but nobody went to a drive-in expecting that).

Last Saturday around 2am a stream of cars roared past my house. It was a line of cars in the dozens. I was baffled, at first, but then it occurred to me the movie must have just finished.
I live on the same stretch of highway as one of the few remaining drive-in movie theatres on the planet. Now, I say "few." I don’t know how many there are in North America. Ten? Fifty? A hundred? But oh, back in the day ...
Back then, the drive-in was an intrinsic part of summer life. They were the perfect date - inexpensive, yet fraught with opportunities for love and romance (and humiliating rejection, of course, but nobody went to a drive-in expecting that).

Right now, I am in the thick of a fierce contest. The big winner is the one judged to be the biggest loser.
This is not about losing weight, mind you. I am competing in an International Dork-off, with entries from around the world. And I fully expect to win.
I suppose I should explain what a Dork-off is. It sounds rather rude, but it isn’t, really.
Every one of us has, in some album or in the back of some drawer or possibly even up on our wall, a photo of ourselves where we look like a complete and utter dork. Some of us have ... well, more than one.

Right now, I am in the thick of a fierce contest. The big winner is the one judged to be the biggest loser.
This is not about losing weight, mind you. I am competing in an International Dork-off, with entries from around the world. And I fully expect to win.
I suppose I should explain what a Dork-off is. It sounds rather rude, but it isn’t, really.
Every one of us has, in some album or in the back of some drawer or possibly even up on our wall, a photo of ourselves where we look like a complete and utter dork. Some of us have ... well, more than one.

I'm checking out some career options in case this newspaper thing doesn't work out. And I think I've come up with the perfect idea. I'm going to go into TV production. I've got my eyes on the fast-paced world of reality programming.
It's big stuff, reality programming. The flagship show, of course, is the series "Survivor", which has been going for 22 seasons. A bunch of people are stranded on a desert island or a jungle or a Wal-Mart parking lot and we’re able to watch how they live and behave until, in the end, we’re fervently hoping they’ll all be left there to die.
Then came "Big Brother", where a completely different bunch of people are locked in a specially built house with hidden cameras and we’re all witnesses as their daily interactions become more and more dysfunctional. We’re transfixed with horror as they begin to act more and more like ... a family.

I'm checking out some career options in case this newspaper thing doesn't work out. And I think I've come up with the perfect idea. I'm going to go into TV production. I've got my eyes on the fast-paced world of reality programming.
It's big stuff, reality programming. The flagship show, of course, is the series "Survivor", which has been going for 22 seasons. A bunch of people are stranded on a desert island or a jungle or a Wal-Mart parking lot and we’re able to watch how they live and behave until, in the end, we’re fervently hoping they’ll all be left there to die.
Then came "Big Brother", where a completely different bunch of people are locked in a specially built house with hidden cameras and we’re all witnesses as their daily interactions become more and more dysfunctional. We’re transfixed with horror as they begin to act more and more like ... a family.