The foot bone’s connected to the leg bone. The leg bone’s connected to the knee bone. The knee bone’s connected to the thigh bone. The thigh bone’s connected to the back bone. The back bone’s connected to the neck bone. The neck bone’s connected to the head bone. Your head bone’s connected to my shoulder…. Read more »

I was in a used bookstore the other day, leafing through a yellowing paperback copy of Peter Schaffer’s play Amadeus, about the life of Mozart. My index finger found the beautiful passage in which the embittered and mediocre composer Salieri speaks of the first time he heard the music of his detested rival: It started… Read more »

The weatherman says that things don’t look good today. It’s triple witching hour in the heavens, with a perfect storm brewing offshore. I’m lying in bed listening to the rain coming down. Crows are being tossed around like black snow in the wind. When I go downtown for coffee beans, the water is ankle deep…. Read more »

Over the years, a slightly obsessive curiosity has led me to gather up a store of somewhat esoteric but useless information in a number of obscure areas of human endeavour. For this reason, if I were to find myself on a quiz show, I would be happy to take on my fellow contestants in specific… Read more »

I know people dedicated to lost causes and forgotten arts. People who spend hours in butcher shops, fish sellers, and fruit and vegetable markets on the way home from a long day at work. People who cut, slice, knead, peel and scrape when it’s much easier and cheaper to just buy something from the supermarket… Read more »

So I’m twenty-three years old, every inch the tragic romantic, and my Guardian Angel just kicks open my door one night and comes in with a suitcase in each hand. True story. First thing she does, she goes to the fridge and opens a cold beer, then takes out a tub of leftover chicken. She… Read more »

Hi fella, I hope you don’t mind me pulling up a spot on this bench. Nice to sit for a while in the sun, feel it warm up these old bones of mine. Hey, nice suit, by the way. What is it, Italian made? Yeah, I can always tell quality when I see it. You… Read more »

I’ve carefully planned it all out. In university laboratories across this great country, teams of scientists are working around the clock researching ways to bring our love back to life. Working on my behalf, Stephen Hawking and Madame X are comparing quantum mechanics and star charts, searching for a loophole in the way things are…. Read more »

There is a lone figure sitting on a bench. From this distance it is impossible to tell whether the figure is a man or woman. He or she is dressed in tattered black rags or perhaps robes of crimson silk. The details are indistinct. The sun is beating down out of a clear blue afternoon… Read more »

Three boys playing marbles in the rain. One day in the years to come the one with the flashing lights on his battery-operated sneakers will be the manager of a car dealership where every month they fire the worst-performing salesman. He will hit his wife on the nights when he drinks too much. Every week… Read more »