Back in the Saddle Again

| February 23, 2012

To quell the panic that’s abroad in the land, I’m here today to assuage your fears that ol’ LFM has thrown in the towel or some such. Not a chance. Mrs. LFM and I have been grappling with the latest iteration of black death, and are now well on the mend. In the mean time, […]

A Long Winter’s Night – Let the Good Guys Win

| December 31, 2011

I’ll be looking at the past year in a retrospective tomorrow. In the mean time, here’s my favourite New Year’s Eve song, dedicated tonight to Sarge, a persecuted dog you’ll be reading more about here in the very near future because in my opinion, what’s being done to Sarge and his family in the name […]

A Long Winter’s Night – The Comfort of Ritual: This Ain’t It

| December 24, 2011

Mrs. LFM and I had traditional Christmas experiences in our mutual upbringings. We both grew up steeped in that peculiar amalgam of Christian observances,  family traditions, seasonal flavours and smells,  feverish preparation, and breathless anticipation that, for us kids, began with the arrival of the first Christmas gift catalogues mere weeks following the annual return […]

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 28: Hellfire, Damnation, and All That

| October 28, 2011

For my own part, I regard stories that involve people making a pact with the Devil, or an ever burning Hell pit of damnation, as suitable fodder for entertainment, but nothing else. As a case in point, in the course of my research for Dark Sentiments 2011, I found the original, accept no substitutes, Dante’s […]

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 25: The Shag Harbour Incident

| October 25, 2011

The skies over Nova Scotia were a source of great interest on the night of 4 October 1967 as large numbers of witnesses, including members of the Royal Canadian Mounted police (RCMP), observed moving and hovering lights in the sky off most of the province’s south shore, from Lunenburg west to Shag Harbour. At approximately […]

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 23: Trick and Treat

| October 23, 2011

A friend of mine recently brought something to light that I had forgotten about until this morning. Back in 2008, a team led by French marine archaeologist Franck Goddio announced discovery of a bowl dating from between the late 2nd century B.C. and the early 1st century A.D, inscribed with what they believe to be the […]

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 22: An Insidious Curse

| October 22, 2011

Today’s Dark Sentiment is about a very real curse that stalks our girl children, our wives, our mothers – in fact every woman. It entwines them in its evil tendrils and draws its nourishment from them by draining their sense of self-worth, forcing them to suppress their intellectual and creative spirit, and filling their hearts […]

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 18: Peter Kagan and the Wind

| October 18, 2011

On Day 28 of last year’s series I explored True Love as a Dark Sentiment. Today, somewhat in that vein but more than a little laced with melancholy, I’m going to expose you to a haunting tale titled Peter Kagan and the Wind written by the multi-talented Gordon Bok, and that only first came to […]

Dark Sentiments 2011 – Day 8: The Burning Times

| October 8, 2011

The Burning Times By LFM It was a simpler, darker age, An age of Ox and plough, When doughty farmers, iron thewed Wrought life from earth and bough. But woe is me, it came to pass That clergy came to roost, And serving up “the word of God” An awful thing was loosed. “The devil […]

Never a Dull Moment

| September 10, 2011

As an outdoorsy, self-reliant guy, I carry and use knives daily. In my personal and professional life – which being self employed tends to be the same thing most of the time – it’s a rarity for me not to find reason to use the pliers, Phillips screwdriver, and one or both blades on my […]