A shaggy hedge story about urban gardening, in memory of Jane Jacobs.

What’s making the weather worse? Mayne Island, B.C. writer and naturalist Terry Glavin investigates.

Dear Old Europe: Canada had an election last month. Herewith, an explanation of the  latest electoral doings in the New World. Immigration forms available at end of article.

To mark poet George Bowering’s 70th birthday last week, a Festschrift anthology was published, 71(+) for GB, edited by Jean Baird, David McFadden and George Stanley, with contributions from more than 90 writers and artists. Here are two selections.

West Coast writer Terry Glavin makes his first appearance in dooneyscafe.com, documenting a visit with a couple of the much-reviled American Minutemen, who have dedicated themselves to protecting U.S. borders in the face of the US government’s curiously selective improvements to border security after 9/11. The piece is reproduced from Glavin’s blog, which can be found, along with other extremely interesting pieces that are far beyond normal blogging quality,  at http://transmontanus.blogspot.com/

Don’t know the first thing about philosophy? But you’re interested in questions about the nature of reality and knowledge. Where to go? Here’s the first chapter of an introduction to philosophy that gets you started on figuring out What It All Means. Well, at least, some of what it means.

Here’s the rest of what you always wanted to know about philosophy, but were too shy to ask.

Here’s the deal: Intrepid Traveler goes on 5, 6 day jaunt to “see New York.” What he sees are dead boxers, Grecian urns, boddhisatvas, unicorns, crucifixions, absent towers, armies of ghosts. New York as messages and mortality. Hmm, not your average package tour.

“All children, except one, grow up,” is the way J.M. Barrie began The Adventures of Peter Pan a century ago. One child, who thinks he is the exception, was last week tried as an adult and acquitted of child molestation.   

Brian Fawcett thinks the right not to retire is mostly about tired-out tenured professors wanting to maintain their privileges