Rose's Cantina

Dearest Mayor and Ottawa City Council: Congratulations! You managed to piss off an entire city with your bone-headed agreement to go ahead with a ghastly addition to the iconic Chateau Laurier. Ottawa now boasts a population of one million people, and I reckon, the only people who agreed with the addition were you lot and the owners. You chose to ignore the wishes of the populace of Ottawa, ignoring calls of Shame and boos from the gallery and a hasty petition of 8,500 people, and went ahead and gave the deal the green light. Did it even occur to you, as you tried to manage the torrent of angry emails from constituents, that maybe you needed to pause and reflect? The whole situation reminded me of a scene from the movie Father of the Bride 2 when George Banks decides to sell the family home to a guy named Mr. Habib because George was going through a mid-life crisis. Mr. Habib immediately begins to topple the home where George sketched the heights of his kids growing up, and bu...

Embed from Getty Images The only thing the owners of the Fairmont Chateau Laurier could do worse is slap a Trump sign on the venerable Lady on the Rideau. Nobody I know likes the new design. Nobody, at least, in Ottawa. And yet, their proposed monstrosity of an addition to the grand hotel is slated for construction as early as this fall. The owners will tear up the backside of the building, blocking traffic for months, and months, keeping their customers awake half the day and night for something that has the aesthetics of the Trump Border Wall. Or an Amazon warehouse. To be fair, this reno idea has been bopping around Ottawa for years, probably ignored by people because they were distracted by the LRT fiasco and the anxiety inducing talks to put a hockey arena on LeBreton Flats. The delays of these projects have demonstrated the absolute ineptitude of the National Capital Commission and Ottawa Council and have cost taxpayers millions. So it's understandable that Larco...

Sixty-three years ago today, my mom had just put a roast in the oven, when the bun decided to come out instead.  The day was as hot and sticky as a cinnamon bun; it was Dominion Day as they used to call it, and Vera was irritated that baby Rosalie had ruined her holiday. It was the first time, and it definitely wasn't the last. Even though I was actually born on July 2nd, not the real holiday, the grand day was being celebrated on my birthday because it was a Monday. I got a kick out of that. The government moved the holiday in my honour. That was the law back then, to celebrate it on a Monday so people could get a three day weekend. Not like today, when Canadians celebrate what is now called Canada Day on whatever random day it falls on. Like a Wednesday, or worse, a Tuesday. That seems so wrong. In 1956, because it was a holiday, my dad was probably in the pub hoisting a few when he got called to the bar. Vera always knew where to find him. He was either under a car wo...