Columnists

Bags and bails of soil have been stacked in greenhouse parking lots for months. Each week the pile gets smaller as the bags are brought inside and used to start bedding-out- plants. Similar bags are starting to appear parking lots of large box stores.

More Alberta anglers than usual are choosing the off-shore option to open their fishing season as, here at home, we are experiencing yet another slow, cold spring. They delight in emailing me pictures of themselves in tropical scrubs or shorts holding their catches: bonefish, snook and jack crevalle.

One of the best ways to prepare children for success in a democratic society is to teach them the “give and take” that comes with co-operative problem solving or decision-making. One excellent way to do this is through “Family Meetings.”

My daughter is engaged to my boss’s son, who also works for the company. On a recent out-of-town business trip, I observed my future son-in-law taking a “lady of the evening” into his hotel room. He did not see me.

In mid-April, there is a wind storm.It blows through the night and into the next day.

My brother is married to a woman I will call “Devon.” She is an only child and accustomed to having her way.

The North Coast of B.C. is one of my favourite places.

As the economic downturn deepens and job losses across the country mount, more Canadians may have to look beyond their town, city or even province to find work.

When a kitchen fire destroyed the lakeside heirloom cottage of Mike and Alice Ogden back in June 2005, they decided to rebuild in a way that blended appropriately with the lakeside setting of their property, while also allowing the new cottage to become a year-round retirement home.

You can practically hear the sproing, sproing, sproing of spring springing to life all around us as all the pretty flowers poke up their pretty heads in bloom and the meadowlarks sing their happy Spring song and Mr. Sun winks at us from his happy place in the beautiful blue sky.