Who likes Poutine?

Harry Shannon In the Anglo-Saxon world, the President of Russia’s name is spelled Vladimir Putin.  So I was surprised to see how the French write his surname.  The picture is a still from the CBC’s nightly news show ‘The National’ on 29 December. Here’s an idea for Margaret Atwood.  Her book this year, ‘The Testaments,’ …

Doing a difficult job – my letter in the Hamilton Spectator

Harry Shannon A few weeks ago we had an ice/snow storm - the sort of conditions that cause an ice build-up on tree branches or utility lines that can bring them down. And sure enough we lost power for several hours, from mid-morning to early evening. There were several other outages in the region.  I read via my cell phone that one of them wa…

The inefficiency of the private sector

Harry Shannon A few years ago, my wife and I spent nine months in the UK.  Before we came from Canada, we had to start a bank account to transfer some money to make a deposit ahead of our arrival for our rental house.  We tried various banks; the only one that accommodated us was Lloyds.  We set up the sterling (pounds) accou…