Rotating Pineapple

When I was in my early 20s, I fell into the stupid (and destructive) habit of going to nightclubs and trying to befriend people by doing magic tricks. It rarely worked. I was too stupid to realize that I was just a fleeting novelty, that young drunk people had more important things to do than watch me turn the five of clubs into the Queen of hearts. One girl, Belinda, asked for my phone number. Belinda was about five years older. She did not want my number so we could date. She wanted it so she could hire me to do a magic show for her daughter's birthday. Gail lived in a house in the northeast part of the city . She had a roommate named Julie, who was very drunk on this particular night. She told Belinda that maybe the magician could also come to her, Julie's, birthday party the following month. This I agreed to do. And so I found myself pulling into the driveway of the house of Julie and Belinda on the evening of Julie's birthday. The driveway was filled with pickup trucks...

Tell you what, friends and neighbours, we were preparing for a major ice storm last night. We filled the bathtub with water in case we needed it to flush. I had my power bank fully charged and was mentally preparing myself to throw out everything in the fridge and freezer. But it wound up being for naught. Our friends at the weather network told us we were in for a doozy - something that had the potential to knock out power grids and turn this stretch of Ontario into a massive skating rink. That didn't happen. We escaped the worst in this corner of Ontario. Looking out the window, I see a coat of ice on my car but that can surely be removed with a few minutes work. Even now, the temperature hovers around zero and the normal mid-afternoon traffic can be heard on the highway below the window where I am typing this. We might have dodged a bullet. The CBC headline reads that "a mix of freezing rain, ice pellets, sleet, strong winds underway as power outages spread" and that ...

 "The loveliest lady that ever I saw in my life." Hey, that might be a compliment if you were a comely young woman looking for a suitor. But it might be an insult if you were a boy. And such is the case. The above quote is ascribed to the English diarist Samuel Pepys, who was describing the boy actor, Edward Kynaston, who plied his trade in the 1600s. It was the era of Elizabethan drama, a time when women were forbidden from acting on the stage. And so, prepubescent boys were tasked with portraying Juliet and Ophelia and Desdemona and - God save the Queen - Lady MacBeth. Oh how awful to ask an 11-year-old to reach into his soul and pull out such black hatred. It is a terrible shame that women were forbidden from the stage, but it was a time when women were expected to exist only in the domestic sphere - it would have been scandalous for her to perform in a play. Indeed, it would have been akin to prostitution. God bless the brave soul who exposed that for the stupidity that i...

 I have this idea for a novel where the government suddenly decides that society's biggest problem is overcrowding. Sprawling metropolises like New York City and Los Angeles do nothing but fester crime and loneliness. The solution is to outlaw big cities and randomly reassign everyone to different villages spread throughout the continent. Today, you could be a resident of Atlanta. Tomorrow, you and your spouse are packing your bags en route to your new home, Marchandville, a village between Port Hope and what was once known as Toronto. Like so many of my ideas, this one stalled at the concept phase. It's a bit like Kurt Vonnegut, who explored a similar premise in Slapstick, but I have to admit that the premise intrigues me. The sudden shift in geography would be good for so many of us, though it would upset a few. - Let's take some imaginary guy in New York City - we'll call him Leon. He's not well educated, came from a broken home, drug addict. He can't find me...

 1. I usually wind up doing something with my son on Boxing Day. That’s because by the time that day rolls around, we’ve usually been cooped up in the house for at least two or three days. Last year, we went for pizza and watched a world, junior championship hockey game. Today we’re at the trampoline park in Ottawa. 2. There is a world junior hockey game being played tonight. I think Canada is playing someone in a couple hours, but I doubt I’ll have the opportunity to watch it. 3. Today I found out what a gainer is. It’s a running backflip. They are forbidden at this trampoline park. 4. The trampoline park is not as crowded as it usually is, which doesn’t surprise me given what day it is. There are some birthday parties and I happen to glance at a couple of the birthday party tables. One of the birthday boys is named Alexander and he’s turning 10. There is a present on the table and there’s an envelope on it that says merry Christmas and happy birthday. Poor Alexander is suffering ...

 ...somewhere in new york city, two goth girls decide they're going to have an anti-christmas. one calls herself death head. the other calls herself no mercy. as christmas eve bleeds into christmas day, the two are walking down a street in manhattan, buzzing on marijuana. the two will spend christmas day in death head's bedroom. her mom will be out with her new boyfriend. her dad is dead. they will listen to the cure and marilyn manson and talk about how much they hate school, their families, the government, society, organized religion, basically everything except each other. around two in the afternoon, they will light another joint and laugh at some cruel joke. no mercy, whose real name is karen van estabrook, will suddenly remember a christmas memory from before the accident that took both her parents. dad had made her a dollhouse. he'd worked secretly in his warehouse for months, and little karen was delighted with her gift. i wonder where the dollhouse is right now, sh...