It wasn’t always this way.

Punishing heat, from 28° to 35° Celsius, day after day after day, almost biblical in proportion, oppressive, life-altering and dangerous for person and pet alike.  Throw in runaway out-of-control fires, the new normal it seems, and you’ve got what we now know of as summer.

I hate it.

I hate to sound like grandpa here, but in my lifetime, the prevailing climate conditions have changed for the worst dramatically.  Yes we had temperatures like those listed above, but they were exceptions, and certainly not the norm.  Summers could be hot, sure, but they were mostly moderate, and going outside was something that was thought to be pleasant, not hazardous.  Yes, this is climate change.  But it’s a climate transition that’s taken place over the lifetime of a man of 64 years, a truly dramatic and alarming turn of events, where the Earth’s climate changes dramatically over a period of maybe twenty years, maybe even only ten.  I hate to get overly dramatic, but if not already so, this is a situation that can become legitimately existential for us.

For some people, it already is.

As heat domes and incessant heat events become more the norm,  more and more of society’s most vulnerable people feel the effects in a way that’s exponentially greater than the rest of us who may have the luxury of working and living in places that can offer respite from the harsh conditions outside.  For the homeless, and those who make the streets their life, there is no escape, save death or significant heat-related illness that causes intervention and hospitalization.  These people are always at the forefront of the effects of calamity, and this is no different.

You know, I was just starting to warm up to the idea that, despite his foibles, Doug Ford was an okay guy.  And I guess I can still retain some of that warm and fuzzy feeling for Ontario’s premier, and I will, but one of those foibles has reared its head and made me sort of wonder.

At the end of Friday, as all of Ontario geared up for a long Canada Day weekend, Ford and the provincial Tory government slipped an announcement into the media stream proclaiming the reinstatement of the King’s Counsel designation for the province’s lawyers who excel in the legal sphere.

One catch.

You don’t have to be particularly good at the job, you just have to be politically connected to the folks in power.  So all sorts of party hacks, who happen to be lawyers by profession, some of whom are not even practicing law, can now apply the KC designation after their names.

The differences between Canada and the United States are many despite the two nations having the appearance of being essentially the same.  But they are, of course, not.

And one area where the differences are extremely marked is in the area of how they conduct their respective democracies, and the processes by which they govern themselves.

American founding fathers are mythologized, worshipped even, and their creation of American democracy is seen as perfect, absolute, and sacrosanct.  Canadian founders, though, are largely unknown, save for the first prime minister, John A. Macdonald, and even he’s had his past policies held up to critical scrutiny, sometimes resulting in his statue being defaced or pulled down.

NOTE: Current information is different from what was initially made available yesterday. As it turns out, the perpetrator was not a member of the class, and is currently under investigation related to the possibility of the commission of a hate crime. Also, the class is listed at having 40 students, not 20 as previously reported.

As a former teacher, I can recall how difficult it sometimes was to generate a class-wide discussion on a topic that students would be, by default, disinterested in.  Sure, you’d always have a few gamers who’d be up for just about any topic, but there was a consistent reluctance or wariness on the part of many others that would result in a class discussion that was really a conversation with one or two students in front of crowd that was either disinclined to participate or even reluctant to participate as they didn’t want to speak in public.

They don’t have that problem at the University of Waterloo.

Hey Galen! Wake up! We’re gonna fight back!

The Competition Bureau is after you again. Remember that restrictive covenant clause you grocers insert into lease agreements that prevents other food-related businesses from occupying properties that you no longer use? How you can prevent other grocers, independents, family grocers, etc from setting up shop where you once were? Kiss it goodbye, baby. Kiss it goodbye.

Just another underhanded move by Canada’s grocers in cahoots with real estate companies. You close down a store, but make sure no other store can locate there. It creates what’s called a food desert, where neighbourhoods and communities lose their access to nearby grocery stores and must travel further afield, all because you guys can’t stand competition.

What makes it an even tougher day for Weston and his other grocery titan robber barons is the fact that the Competition Bureau is recommending to the government that international grocers be allowed to set up shop to compete with the Big Three, who currently have what’s called a monopoly, another word for protected greed. The idea, Galen, is that more grocers having nothing to do with you or the other Big Two will offer a greater degree of competition in the market, thereby driving down prices so consumers can afford to eat again. It’s almost like, gulp, free enterprise. And free enterprise is the very core of capitalism, is it not?

So suck eggs, buddy. Right now you’re the only guy who can afford them. But when your little monopoly comes to an end, and the rest of us can afford eggs too, don’t be surprised if your limo gets tagged by egg projectiles thrown by the peasantry.

Please, just make sure you drive with the windows down.

I have to admit that when I first heard of the trade made between the Boston Bruins and the Chicago Blackhawks, I kind of panicked a bit because I, at first blush, thought we may have traded some draft picks to Boston for….what?

Boston has almost no picks in this year’s draft, so the idea of them looking to get some, even if in the second round, made sense.  And the Hawks have four picks in the second round, to go with two in the first, and a bunch more in the later rounds.  So that made it a good fit.  The question was, for me, what could Chicago possibly get from Boston that would in any way be attractive?  It just didn’t make sense that way.

My media empire is exploding!

Okay, no it’s not, but it was nevertheless fun to say. And using the word “launch” is a little grandiose sounding as well.

In tandem with the written stories found on NEWSMAGRENFREW, I’ve now started to develop a YouTube channel under the same name.  It’s in its infancy at the moment, with only two stories currently posted, but as I start to remember more and more about how to be a multi-faceted journalist, and the various technologies that make that happen, I get a little closer to being able to provide video on a somewhat regular basis.

At the moment, I hope to do a story a week, which is plodding for me, but also better for me as I inch into the whole thing.  I did a story Sunday, and today’s Monday and I’m already doing the prep work for my next story.  Tomorrow I record my commentary.  Wednesday is production.  Possible release by Thursday.  So already, that’s two stories within one week, which to me seems ideal.

I wanted to have a number of stories ready before I shared the existence of the channel, but news happens fast in the world, so if you’re okay with not a lot happening there just yet, then I suppose you could look up the NEWSMAGRENFREW channel.

Or, I suppose, I could just give it to you now, sort of like a sneak peak behind the curtain of a channel in the making.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCETT16VRX2S3ZMBjKMoVj9g

I’m super looking forward to cranking out meaningful video.  Just let me shake the cobwebs off a bit, learn not to talk too much, and we’ll be good to go.

Hope you find the time to visit!

Yevgeny Prigozhin rolled the dice mightily this past weekend and lost.  But so did everybody else in Russia, where back-stabbing is just another name for Saturday.

Prigozhin’s Wagner Group soldiers and equipment rolled across the border from Ukraine into Russia and occupied the city of Rostov-On-Don, the command and control centre for all Russian operations in neighbouring Ukraine.  One of its chief flaws, the Russian army is an extremely top-down organization where nobody makes a move without authority from much higher up the chain of command, lest they be disciplined, jailed, or even executed.  This operational doctrine is brutal enough on the army to begin with, but with the command and control centre gone, Russian units in Ukraine have no idea as to what’s happening in their rear, let alone what’s happening right in front of them.  For Russia, it was a crippling blow, inflicted by one of their own.

If you’ve visited Ottawa’s Byword Market, you’ll know all about the atmosphere of the place and the pleasure that can be had through a simple stroll through the beyond-counting market stalls and displays.  The numerous restaurants, cafes, and bistros complete with their outdoor patios gives off a sense of vibrancy and life, things that aren’t exclusively dedicated to just the  daylight hours.

But the Market has become troublesome, and in fact has been troublesome for years.

Adventure tourism has been around for awhile.

Thrill-seekers in search of that adrenaline rush have no shortage of activities to make the pulse pound, whether it be sky-diving, zip-lining, downhill cheese-chasing, para-sailing, garbage truck racing, what have you.

But if you’re a billionaire, well, that’s a whole different playing field.  And today, two prominent ways for the well-heeled are space and undersea tourism.