Archive : August 2011

Slices of life on the golf course

The twisted logic of golf: • You hit down to make the ball go up. You swing left and the ball goes right. The lowest score wins.  • Golf can best be defined as an endless series of tragedies obscured by ...

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Names on the weather map

The Sun has acquired a sometime columnist named Christina Blizzard. With a name like Blizzard, you’d think she must be Canadian-born. Not so. She comes from England. Interestingly, the surname Blizzard pre-dates the moniker f...

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Remembering “Smilin’ Jack”

When reporting the passing of Jack Layton, the Los  Angeles Times called him a “folksy Canadian political leader,” adding the word “charismatic” later in the article.  “Folksy” somehow ...

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Trivia quiz

If you’re a trivia expert, you’ll probably know the answers to all these questions.  Or, maybe not! (Answers at the end of the column.) 1. What was the name of the first U.S. manned space program? 2. In ...

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Newspeak, bureaucracies or just jargon?

Some time ago, one David Tonizzo of Toronto sounded off in a Globe and Mail letter about that city’s waste and recycling receptacles or, as he termed them, “the new street furniture.” He wrote, “I took part ...

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Restoration of “royal” prefix

With announcement of Defence Minister Peter McKay that the prefix “royal” would again be added to Canada’s naval and air forces, I decided it might be appropriate to ask my father, who served in the “Royal” Canad...

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