Glenn Kubish

Many Edmontonians complain about the meanness of our city, because we are convinced that we are born for a brief span of summer, and because that spell of the fair season that has been given to us rushes by so swiftly and rapidly that with very few exceptions it ceases for many of us just when we are getting ready for it. Seneca Okay, yes, that's more Seneca from  On The Shortness of Life re-keyed for life in Edmonton around this time of year than it is me, but when (your imagination is) in Rome, blog as the Romans do. Seneca is good to read at this time of year. Actually, Seneca should be required reading at this time of year, this dripping time of year. September in Edmonton drips leaves and it drips regret. In small talk we drip things like: "Do you remember how it used to stay light until 11 and now it's so dark now? Kinda depressing." And: "It is so cold in the morning these days. I mean, it was two degrees when I got up! Brutal." And...

Here are three new words now ready to be sent into the world! improvidence  noun          The sense of the protective care of God, nature, or alcohol as a spiritual power during a live comedy performance in which the technique of making up the scene and dialogue on the spot is employed. In this pic from the Sherwood Park News, comedians Donovan Workun, Mark Meer,  and Graham Neil  surrender to the embrace of improvidence litternature  noun         Written works, especially those of stylized nature and of superior and enduring artistic merit, or not, describing the fast-food detritus thrown from passing vehicles in national parks by idiots willing to leave crap in their bodies but not the crap it comes in in their cars and trucks. This tweet is an example of litternature replyrony  noun           The expression of one's stated meaning in exhorting colleagues to ...

There are a host of fragile things in this world of dirt and danger, and one of them is a pink balloon in a puddle. I was quite taken by this balloon. And then it by me.

The many formulations for what makes for a compelling story all, by routes straight or serpentine, boil down to something this: "Man starts power tool on first try" is just not as good as "Man struggles  to start power tool." Here, in video from my bicycle commute to work, is why I'm thinking about power tools and stories tonight. So, a few provisional conclusions: 1. Lindi Ortega can sing in my head on the way to work anytime. 2. If that first pull of the cord, or even the second, had brought the machine to life, who cares? I wouldn't have been late to work hanging around wondering what would happen next if it was simply a case of "thing works as it's supposed to." 3. The incongruity of "man pulls cord to start machine, machine responds with nothing" suggests all kinds of  next scenes, including the possibility of violence, and that unknownness, that cloak around what will happens next makes it difficult bordering on i...