Day 647: Les Youths En Revolt

originally published October 8, 2013 During my recent studies at the University of Alberta, the level of student activism was remarkably low. I’ve told the tale before, of how an organized protest against rising tuition costs was thwarted when the school handed out free ice cream outside the Administration Building. This didn’t bother me as […]

Day 634: Old London’s Cobblestone Creeps

originally published September 25, 2013 Nineteenth-century London was known for a few things: Dickensian gentlemen sporting all sorts of snazzy hat-wear, Poppinsian ladies singing songs about eating sugar with a spoon, and sexually deviant psychopaths wandering the foggy London streets. Needless to say, it’s that third group I find most fascinating. Not all the smarmy […]

Day 608: Who Knocked On Our Door First?

originally published August 30, 2013 Yesterday I marveled at the frantic scramble (or, ‘framble’) to be the first to fly across the Atlantic. It seems only right that I dial back the clock and look at the previous trans-ocean pioneers, those who packed their loved ones and a whole wack o’ pestilence onto rickety wooden […]

Day 585: The Unfathomable Sinking Of The MTS Oceanos

originally published August 7, 2013 Having never spent a moment aboard an actual cruise ship – unless watching untold hours of The Love Boat counts – I know very little about the experience. As a life-long neurotic, I would probably compile a mental list of safety precautions before buying my ticket, then run through each […]

Day 559: The Loins Of Coins

originally published July 12, 2013 Next time you flip a coin, you should take a moment to pause and reflect on the lengthy journey the concept of the coin has taken to arrive at this very instant, determining your fate. Actually no, don’t do that. It’s stupid, and besides, you’ll probably get distracted and miss […]

Day 557: Ourselves As Ancient History

originally published July 10, 2013 Had I planned ahead as a child and buried a time capsule to be opened when the heavy cloak of middle age officially snuffed out the last remaining candle of my youthful jubilance, I suspect I know what I’d have dropped in there. A copy of John Williams’ Star Wars […]

Day 551: The Original Lifesaver’s Life Story

originally published July 4, 2013 With 450 days remaining in this mad dash to a million words, I can confidently state that I have reached the perfect, comfortable plateau in terms of subject matter. In the beginning I worried I’d run out of quality material in the Wiki-wide-world – though in all fairness, the fact […]

Day 536: Gracia Mendes Nasi – The Heroine Of Antwerp

originally published June 19, 2013 After having poured so many ugly words into yesterday’s article – words like ‘vivisection’, ‘starvation’ and ‘plague-fleas’ – it’s a good day to spin that gloom around and turn it into the antithesis of gloom… moolg. No wait, ‘moolg’ is apparently an Asian bathroom voyeur website. I really need to […]

Day 535: How Low We’ll Sink… The Story Of Unit 731

originally published June 18, 2013 I enjoy a good creepy story, the kind that makes you want to crawl out of your skin and find something less goose-bumpy to slip into. Every so often I find one that’ll make you want to burn that skin you just wriggled free from, because the guts of the […]

Day 534: Dancing ‘Til You Drop Dead

originally published June 17, 2013 Boogie Fever. Rockin’ Pneumonia. The Boogie-Woogie Flu. So many dances, so many accompanying ailments. But that’s all the stuff of fiction, right? Silly little catchphrases developed in order to make a new dance (and its accompanying record) sound so appealing it’s downright infectious. We all know this is just a […]