The Brown Knowser

When I looked around the room, saw all the fresh faces, I could see my class of 30 years ago. All the aspirations and promise of what was to come. The bright eyes, the smiles, the energy of youth. They were the students who followed us, who are studying today. "What was it like when you began the paper," a fresh-faced, second-year student asked me. "It was scary," I said. "We had no frame of reference. We couldn't look back at previous issues for guidance. We were it." We were it. A 30th-anniversary cake, printed with the cover of the first Algonquin Times edition. On the 30th anniversary of the launch of The Algonquin Times , I remembered all of the friends, all of the faces of the founding members of that paper. Michel, Becky, Marc, Mary, Kristen, Sean, and many more. I remember the long hours, cranking out sheets of paper on manual typewriters or, if we were lucky, some of the new computers. The developing of photographs. The layout...

Yes, we were both drunk. It was the only time that he and I were ever drunk together. I don't remember what brought my dad to Ottawa on Canada Day, in 1995, nor do I remember why I chose to invite him to party with me, downtown, on the day before my first wedding anniversary. The assistant manager to the Inniskillin wine boutique had held the second annual Canada Day party in the wine store, which was across the street from Parliament Hill, on Metcalfe Street. He had held the first party on the previous Canada Day, and that party turned into an impromptu, second stag for me. I got very drunk on that day, too. I wouldn't say that my relationship with my dad was estranged—not at that point, anyway. But it was a strange relationship. In 1995, he was trying to build our relationship to something bigger than it was, always telling whoever cared to listen about how my sisters and I meant the world to him, that there was nothing that he wouldn't do for us. Except, be ...

There's a reason why I listen to CBC Radio's The Debater s . Topics are meaningless and the debaters area always guaranteed to make me laugh. Rarely, do I watch the political debates in Canada, because they are not particularly interesting and I never make up my mind about who to vote for in listening to the candidates: by the time the debate rolls around, I already know who I'm voting for. I expected last night's American debate, between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, to be entertaining: mostly, because of what I thought The Donald would say, whether he would shoot his mouth off or what half-truths and outright falsehoods he would sputter. He went up against a career politician and, like her or not, she mopped the floor with him. Biggest zingers of the night: when Clinton went after Trump for not paying contractors for their work. She added that she was glad that her father, a fabric printer, never worked for Trump. Clinton also defended herself when Trump cla...

It was my first day on my internship, and he was going to throw it out. I don't remember his name because we were rarely in the office together, rarely spoke to one another, and it was nearly 30 years ago on a six-week gig. At the end of my journalism program, I was placed at The Ottawa Citizen for my six-week internship, and I was placed on the Entertainment team. Jay Stone was the editor and the person to whom I reported. He was disappointed with me right away because I wasn't one of the cute girls in my class who were working on the City desk. But for my first assignment, I was sent downtown, to the Parliament Press Gallery, where the government was announcing that recording artists would be receiving larger royalties for the songs that they released on their records. At that meeting, I got a chance to meet and talk to Canadian music legends, Burton Cummings and Randy Bachman. My first day as a newspaper reporter was a good one. Back in the newsroom, that now-forg...

It's a long way from being finished, but we're starting to see progress. Where there was once demolition, we have new colours and new flooring. Our home renovations are well underway. DW is totally at peace with the progress. Happy Friday!

Long before Beer O'Clock , a few years before The Brown Knowser , I was enjoying craft beer. And sporting an earring. This is me, in 2008, with a brew from a sampler at Sea Dog Brewing Company , in Bangor, Maine. The family and I were heading to PEI, via St. Andrews, with a stop for lunch in this small town. Lunch was great and the beer selection was awesome. Cheers!

I didn't make it to my high school's 25th-anniversary reunion. At the time, I was in South Korea, teaching English and exploring South-East Asia. At the time, I told my friends, "the only people that I want to see, I see already." And for the most part, that was true. Over the years that followed high school, I kept in touch with most of my close friends, even though they had moved far afield. There was one friend, who moved out to Vancouver Island, who invited me to her wedding, which she held in Ottawa, but after that, she was gone, and shortly thereafter, we lost touch. That is one person I would love to see again. I knew that she probably wouldn't travel all the way to that reunion, and so I had no regrets in missing it. "It would be nice to get together with all my friends under one roof," I told DW, "but I know I'll see them again." Several years later, after I had returned to Canada and had two young daughters, I learned that...

On a positive note, that floor was never going to make a sound. That's about the only good thing you can say about it. When we bought our house, in late 1999, we were lucky enough to see the construction first-hand. All that had been laid was the foundation and we had been through the model home. Through the negotiations with the bank, the outer frame was erected and by the time our purchase was signed, sealed, and delivered, the roof was in place and construction had begun on the second floor. We took delight in visiting the design office for the builder: picking out colours and patterns for the ceramic tiles, the counter tops, the cupboards, the carpet, and the vinyl flooring for the kitchen floor. We could have gone with ceramic tile in the kitchen, but I remembered living in one of my parents' homes, where we had ceramic. Anything that fell out of your hands, anything that hit that floor: it was gone. One autumn evening, I had just cut myself a slice of pumpkin pie,...

The mornings are cooler, bringing single-digit temperatures. The water is still warm and, like breathing in the chilled air, a mist hangs. Before sunrise, the sky is magical, with hues of pink and blue. Images appear sharper, not washed out by the sun's rays. Autumn is coming, and I can't wait. Happy Friday!

More than 15 years ago, I took on a role for which I was not prepared, for which no one is prepared until he finds himself up to his arms. Fatherhood. Our first-born came five weeks early and spent nearly two weeks in the Special Care Nursery at the Civic Campus of the Ottawa Hospital. I carried her from the delivery room to this ward, terrified that the slippers that they made me wear for her birth would make me slip on the clean hospital corridors. I had a nurse hold my bundle so that I could remove them before continuing down the hall. When she was deemed healthy enough, we were allowed to take her home. She barely fit in the car seat and we had to place pads around her to keep her from rocking from side to side. Both DW and I were shocked that the hospital staff would allow this little life to leave their expert care with two highly unqualified people. When we got our DD home, we gently carried her up to her crib, which was placed at the end of our bed in our room. She fell...

It was a short, simple, but very kind note. He didn't have to leave it, but he did, and for that, he made my day. All too often, people seem to feel the need to leave comments on news sites or blogs that are full of negativity, full of vitriol and hate, and are aimed to make the writer or a group of people feel bad. Thankfully, that hasn't happened to me. Not often. No, my blog posts get largely unnoticed by the trolls, rarely have any comments left behind. If there is any feedback, it's positive. I'm lucky that way. Thank you to all who have reached out. But the message that I received on the weekend was not left on my blog, nor passed to me through Twitter or Facebook. It was sent to me through my photo meetup group by a fellow member. We had last attended a Milky Way photo shoot , though I'm not sure if we chatted. I did say hello and made some initial small talk with some of the other photographers, as we set up our tripods and aimed our cameras skyw...

When I was working toward my English degree at Carleton University , way back in the early 90s, there were many late evenings where I would race up to the sixteenth floor of Dunton Tower to get a timestamp on an essay and slide it under the English Department's door, to meet my professor's deadline. I've never missed a deadline and have continued that streak to this day. (Not sliding papers under doors, but making sure my project gets completed on time.) As one of the major landmarks of Carleton University, and because I pass it on my way to and from work, I decided to make it the location for this month's Where In Ottawa . Congratulations to my dear old friend from Journalism School (which we didn't take at Carleton), Becky Garceau, for solving this photo challenge. Here are the clues that, with the photo, helped her locate the building: Rise above all others—Dunton Tower, at 22 storeys, is the tallest building on the Carleton campus. Quad = 5—when I...

This is the most-addictive app I've ever put on my phone. More addictive than Angry Birds or Hay Day . Probably more addictive than Pokémon Go , but I wouldn't know: that game has absolutely zero appeal to me. This is a photo app, and that can draw my attention on its own. With my love of photography and photo editing, I'm always looking for a new way to present my photographs. Prisma is such an app. Like Instagram, it applies filters to your photos, but these filters are more complex than those of X-Pro, or Lo-Fi, or Hefe. These filters don't just change the hue or vibrancy of your photos. Prisma applies complex algorithms to make your images look like works of art, mimicking the style of Edvard Munch ( The Scream ), or the pop art of Roy Lichtenstein, or Picasso, plus many more. There are 38 different effects that you can apply to an image. Of course, not all effects work with all photos, but you can play around and choose the best ones to suit your work...

My head is full. Work. Home. Health. Finances. All of these are weighing on me. Ten years of the same ol' and I'm busier than I've ever been. Multiple projects with different versions of the same product to keep in my head. Writing. Maintaining. Editing work of my colleagues. Keeping things straight. Keeping deadlines. Taking one document that I've maintained, in one form or another, for more than nine years, and now deconstructing it and building it anew, with a new footprint and a new approach. Much more complex than my project at home. And yet, that consumes me in my hours outside of the office. Shopping for cabinets, for appliances, for flooring, for lighting. The walls need new colours; the ceiling, a fresh coat. Everything from top to bottom, end to end. We tear the old down in preparation for the new, hoping that everything will be ready in time. And as we plan, as we prepare, as we accumulate, the sound of old-fashioned cash registers ring in my ears, so...

We didn't toil all weekend with our home reno. We did take some time to enjoy the fabulous weekend. Two evenings of dinner with old and dear friends: wine, beer, and a hot tub, which did much to soothe my old and aching muscles. Especially, my feet, which can no longer hold much more than my own weight, and not for very long. We tore down the family room: our wall unit got separated, the various parts now stashed in corners around the house, their doors and contents not accessible for about a month or so, while we lay down the hardwood and affix the kitchen cabinets. With one sofa put out to the curb, last week, the other has been carried to the basement. I'm fearful that while we managed to carry our shorter, red sofa down the narrow steps, getting it up will be a chore that will require someone with stronger feet to bring it back to the family room. The worn and stained carpet is now gone, with nothing left but the plywood floors. Care was taken to ensure every nail a...