Glenn Kubish

  Happy end of the week, friends! Once a week here I try to notice three things that made me feel happy or grateful, things I noticed I noticed, so, the shabby noticing equipment doesn’t completely rust over. This week's Three Things podcast is episode 49 . 1. Take a bough 🌲 In Edmonton, the snow is with us again, or least, it’s pushed over to the side and next to us again. The snow falls and the work to remove it happens next. Remove it from sidewalks, streets, driveways, windshields, highways, bike lanes, staircases, remove it from rooftop, from bridge decks and skating rinks, alleys and driveways and bus stops and boots. Remove it from playing fields, too, so, in the case of the snow on the pitch at Commonwealth Stadium, the men’s soccer team could jump into it after scoring that winning goal against Mexico. Okay, it was last month, but ‘tis the season for reminiscing… Where are we again? Right, here. We use brooms, shovels, scrapers, brushes, snowblowers, salt, plows, blades,...

The star is a few degrees off, the garland sags here and there, and the tree itself is quite fake, but this is our Christmas tree. It's our family tree. It points to the real places we have been. I still get up early to watch it twinkle and I squint and squeeze lens flares out of the tiny lights. Its branches bloom with new ornaments every year. 1988 was Christmas #2 for Shelagh and me. I confirmed this math with Shelagh earlier today. We've been to San Francisco a few times. I wish I could find a bicycle bell that sounds like the cable cars saying hello. This is the Bellingham ferry. We have not yet been on the Bellingham ferry. We found the ornament in Fairhaven after a night in the town square under blankets watching To Kill A Mockingbird with the boys and others munching popcorn. At one edge of the square was a booth where Democrats were registering voters. That was 2004. Shelagh brought this disco ball ornament and a love for the Bee Gees to o...

What a great day... ... on this, day 58 of the six months in Edmonton that cannot sustain winter bicycle riding. Foul weather? No, fowl weather. Thanks to B's Diner for the community commitment, and thanks to the beauts in the #yegbike community for giving your time, and your poultry. 

It's not quite "Hark, the herald angels sing," but "Mrs. Peacock with a knife in the study" sounds like Christmastime just the same. In the basement of the north-end house I grew up in was a rumpus room done up in homage to John Wayne and Clint Eastwood. There were wagon wheel chandeliers, log panels, swinging bar doors, gun holsters, and I think there was, as a nod to the emerging multiculturalism, a couple of sombreros on the wall. At the far end of the room, in front of the fake brick wall, stood a long bar stocked not with rum and whiskey, but with board games. Ludo There were chase games, like Ludo, Sorry, and Trouble. And the classics, including Monopoly and Clue, checkers and chess. We had goofy games, like Barrel of Monkeys and Buckaroo. There was Stratego and Rummoli. Ker Plunk. Twister. Operation. Mousetrap. Let's Make A Deal. Emergency. Mastermind. Waterworks. Battling Tops. Hungry Hungry Hippos. Snakes and Ladders. We had a CN Rail boa...