Celebrating my dad

I’m publishing my blog a day early this week because today’s my dad’s birthday. He’s been gone a long time, 31 years. Hard to believe. I never missed his birthday, even after I moved to Toronto.

From as far back as I can remember, my mother and I always drove ourselves into a frenzy trying to figure out what to get for him and how to celebrate. He was hard to buy for — not because he was picky — because he never wanted anything. He always said he had everything he needed. Same thing with parties. He liked to keep things low key. Except when the shoe was on the other foot and he was doing something for others — and then nothing was too good or too much trouble. He threw himself into the task with absolute zeal.

That was my dad. Kind, sensitive to the needs of others, caring and generous to a fault. He embodied all the values that are in such short

Day 324. Right? Wrong?

I think a lot of people associate the notion of “morals” with sex.  Maybe not so much anymore, but there was a time.  And not just in the Victorian era, either.  Life sure is different these days.

Lindsay Lohan declines to wear underwear; and for some reason, we have to know about it.  Everyone from Rob Lowe to Kim Kardashian has gotten their thrills by sharing their sex tapes with us (ugh!!!).  Presidents have screwed around publicly.  Prime Ministers have had sex with underage prostitutes.  And right in our own backyards teachers are having sex with students, and on and on it goes.

Looks to me like our moral fibre is unravelling pretty rapidly.  We’re on a downward spiral.

But, of course, morality isn’t confined to sex.  It comes into play with just about every decision we make.  Or don’t make, as the case may be.  It’s got to do with our standards.  Our conscience.  Our ability to differentiate

Day 312. For Shame!

For a Canadian, I spend a fair amount of time commenting on American politics; and what I think could use some improvement. So I decided it was time I turned my attention, and criticism, a little closer to home. As in right here, in my own back yard.

God knows we’ve got enough crap going on in the land of the maple leaf (and the fleur de lys) to cause us all to wring our hands, hang our heads in shame and scream our bloody heads off.

Which would be a typically unCanadian reaction, by the way. We’re known as “those polite folks to the North”. You know the type. We wouldn’t say “shit” if we had a mouthful. Not me, of course. I’ve never been shy about expressing my opinion. Making my feelings known. But as a general rule, we tend to just sit there and suffer in silence. Take one for the gipper.

Not today, though.

Let’s go to Ottawa where four Senators (that we know of) have been fudging their expenses. Living high off the