Gary's Art

My son-in-law has recently returned to drawing. It's something he did earlier in his life and now he's taking lessons and drawing frequently. One of his drawings has won a prize and he has also sold a commissioned piece.

You can see his work here.

http://www.fanartreview.com/listart.jsp?forsaleonly=0&contest=0&id=0&edt=0&bookid=null&usercontest=null&createpoem=&keywords=&author=76382&category=-1&photos=0&sort=0&fsView=0&art=0&dart=0&forsaleonly=0&recstatus=0&page=1

Books

I was thinking I ought to make more room on my book shelves, maybe by selling or giving away some of the books I already have. I was thinking that before I went to Toronto on Thursday and came home with another book. It's a small paperback so I can probably fit it in somewhere. Then, on Friday, a friend gave me a huge Oxford Dictionary of Canadian English and two large art history books. I'm delighted but the books are still on my kitchen table since there is no room for them on the shelves.



I may have the solution though. There are big sets of shelves in my bedroom and one set holds clothes that I have no room for in my closet. It's time to do a clothes purge so that I have more room for books. Wouldn't you do the same thing?

Rejoicing for My Friend

Late yesterday, I heard from my friend Lori Hahnel. Her story, Art is Long, will be published in that Holy Grail of Canadian literary journals, The Fiddlehead.

Virtual champagne is now available to all readers of this blog in honour of Lori's success. I've happily been the first reader for some of her stories including this one and hope to read more in the future.

Here's looking at you kid! You are indeed, In Like Flynn.

Cheers!

Got Guilt?

If you don't have enough guilt, please let me know and I'll send some to you because I have plenty.

Guilt about not writing - guilt about not cleaning - guilt about not responding to facebook questions and friend's emails - guilt about spending too much money - guilt about not looking for a job. Need I go on? Probably not.

Therefore; let me talk briefly about the Ontario election and the very divisive issue of "faith-based school funding." I think John Tory was mistaken in choosing to emphasize that issue and now he has discovered that most Ontarians didn't agree with his stance. I certainly didn't agree. The next step in dealing with the issue will require a government with enough courage to phase out the separate (Catholic) school system, as Quebec has already done. That may not happen for a while but I think, eventually, it will.

Why not have one school system for all? It makes sense in this most multicultural society and then, it would also be possible to fund schools properly. That's extremely important for all our children.

Election Weirdness

The Provincial election takes place on October tenth. I wonder how many people will foget that due to Oktoberfest shenanigans?

I received a flyer in my mail box today from the P.C. candidate for my riding. There's a picture of McGuinty on the front, he's the face on the Wanted for breaking promises poster. The picture does not look any worse than my passport picture, and I suspect that Ontario still wants McGuinty and the Liberals. I looked at the local P.C. candidate's website in order to be fair, but it contains little except a couple of other pictures of him.

I'm not sure if Ontario wants to continue with first-past-the post election winners or choose the new and confusing system. I'm not even sure that I understand the proposal, but that could just be me.

And, interestingly, no one is mentioning Toronto's huge financial problems. Mr. Harper didn't mention them either, when he was in Toronto making a speech. He did however tell everyone that he is going to apply the $14 billion surplus to the debt.

All elected parties tend to break promises sooner or later and those that keep some of their promises sometimes keep the wrong ones. Thus sayeth the cynic.