Alex Carrick’s Blog

In early September, Leonard Smith covered over his family’s backyard pool and started swimming at the local health club. It wasn’t a fancy club, but it still required a membership fee. This restricted the number of people who had access to the property. Nevertheless, whenever Lenny tried to get in a swim, at lunch or […]

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Pedro Martinez had entered the United States illegally. There was no denying the fact. He was part of a group of 20 individuals brought over in the false back of an 18-wheeler from Mexico in early spring two years ago. To pay for the privilege, he made a cash contribution to his wife’s distant cousin, Jose […]

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I have a story I know needs to be handled with delicacy. Thank goodness “finesse” is one of my middle names. The media often give coverage to some hapless and usually incompetent bad guy who robs a liquor store. However, this time it was the liquor store that robbed me and I’m not happy about it. Nor […]

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At the end of the day, Donna and I lie in bed and send messages out over Twitter by way of our new i-phone. The following is one of our typical conversations.   ME: Ho het yourwelf a hoof bool to reaf? That’s not what I typed.   DONNA: What did you mean to say? […]

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My nose knows and it is telling me that I need to write about Toronto’s garbage workers strike. We’re about to enter the fourth week. Negotiations between the mayor’s office and the union are getting overheated. Everyone is sweating over the details. The situation has become sticky. You see the problem? There is going to be a lingering […]

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The weekend started off badly for me when Donna, my wife, announced she had purchased a couple of inflatable boats to take with us to the cottage. These were to help amuse two friends of Ted, our middle child, that we were bringing with us from Friday night through Sunday.   I hate rafts. They are […]

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Everybody’s crazy, some more than others. I don’t mean to make light of people who have deeply rooted problems that make their lives much more difficult. I’m talking about the large proportion of the population that passes for normal.   Among everyday acquaintances, everyone is bonkers. Some have addiction issues. Some have anger issues. Others […]

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Sometimes, I feel worn out and I think I know what the problem is. It’s the extra five minutes. You must know what I mean. We’ve all been saddled with a whole list of extra chores that nominally are supposed to take five minutes each, but often take longer. Plus just about everything now takes five minutes more than it should or used to anyway.

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You know your working day is probably going to seem “not too bad” only in retrospect when one or more of the following happens early on.   (1) The “chimmy changas” you ate last night have stopped dancing and have now turned surly.

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Today, I’ll continue with a discussion about the perils of watching movies at home with the children. I’ll cover the embarrassment of violence, pornography and bad language.   As for violence, Donna and I haven’t wanted our kids to be over-protected, so we’re pretty liberal in our viewing habits. Besides, you can’t get away from […]

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