Rose's Cantina

  I received a request recently to raise awareness about the disappearance of a B.C. woman who vanished from her home in Costa Rica after a fight with her husband.  Jaclyn Smith Ferland, 40, was reported missing in August from her home near Playa Hermosa after returning home from a  physiotherapy session.  A Facebook page has been set up, and dedicated to the search for the Canadian forces veteran whose husband said that she left on foot in "mental distress" after becoming angry with him. She left, he said, after he went into the shower.  This is another disturbing missing person case with an all too familiar ring to it. She left. On foot. With only her passport and wallet, but no suitcase. There has been no trace of her, and no activity on her bank and credit cards.  Family and friends of Jackie say there was no reason for her to disappear into thin air, with no sightings, no cab rides, so security footage, or phone calls home.  A former acquaintance ...

A note to my readers on the occasion of my million view milestone.  People become bloggers for many different reasons. They want to express themselves creatively. They want to make money. They want to become influencers. I began blogging to save my mental health.  It all began back in 2009 when I published an essay in the Globe and Mail entitled: We're Living the $10 Life . In the essay, I wrote about the serious downturn my life had taken after a bitter divorce that left me reeling. Even though I had recoupled with the wonderful Scott, we were barely making ends meet. It was a terrible time for both of us even though we had enjoyed successful careers in the past. When we met, Scott was living in misery. He'd taken a buyout and left his career as a CBC cameraman to pay off an abusive ex-wife. I was a freelance speechwriter, and I had lost most of my income because I was a Liberal living in Stephen Harperland.  Together we were raising three teenagers, cannibalizing tropi...

  On Sunday, volunteers travelled to St. Catharines from across the province to help in the search for Katrina Blagdon, the 37-year-old Army veteran who went missing on New Year's Eve. They fanned out across the area surrounding Martindale Pond, and the Henley Course, in hopes of finding any evidence of what might have happened to the mother-of-two. Searchers included other military personnel, as well as friends and family of the well-liked woman who was reported missing on New Year's Day. The last sighting of Trina was on New Year's Eve around 6 p.m. at a local sub shop. She disappeared without her wallet or her lime green Jeep, and there has been no cell phone activity since that night. Her family, some of whom have come to St. Catharines from as far as Nova Scotia, are being supported by more than 3,000 members of a Facebook site which has been set up to organize searches and to provide accurate information about her case. She is also being supported by a well organized...

  Just be a good person, love who you can, help where you can, give what you can."                                                                                                         Trina Blagdon, December 14, 2021 Ask anyone who knows Trina Blagdon, and they will tell you that they have never known a more positive person. While others are trashing their exes, and complaining about the plague, Trina spends her time on Facebook posting positive messages. But she is so much more than platitudes. Trina is a woman of action.  She was a soldier for 14 years, and has been to Afghanistan. She saw firs...

  As John Simpson prepared himself for a return to British Columbia to retrieve the ashes of his beloved daughter Ashley, another women's family began a frantic search for their own missing loved one right in John's own backyard.  Trina Blagdon was reported missing on New Year's Day. She is 37, the same age Ashley would be if she hadn't been murdered six years earlier in the small town of Salmon Arm. John couldn't help but notice the similarities between the two women. Ashley was raised in rough places, in logging and fishing camps across the country working as an assistant to her dad who is cook. She knew how to live in the wilderness, and survive in the elements.  Trina is a military vet who retired in 2016 as a M/Cpl after 14 years in the Army. She had proudly fought in Afghanistan, and there wasn't much she hadn't seen in her young life. So going missing on New Year's was alarming for her family. People like Ashley and Trina don't vanish into th...

  Yesterday, John Simpson took his daughter Ashley for a walk in the drizzly nasty B.C. weather, and had a long talk with her.  It's been six long years since the pair were together, working side-by-side, cooking up grub up in Pink Mountain, B.C. Six years since Ashley disappeared after a fight with her boyfriend, Derek Favell, who now resides, rightly so, in a prison of his own making. Now, they are once again joined at the hip, together again forever, their fate sealed by a moment in time. The talk was one-sided, of course. Ashley will never again make cupcakes for her nieces or take a dare to toboggan down a steep hillside in a bikini. There will be no more fishing trips, or adventures. No more photos for the selfie queen.  John is bringing his beloved daughter home in a box. He only has Ashley's Ashes to talk to now, but it gives him comfort. He can feel her spirit emanating from her urn, and take some solace in the fact that she is no longer exposed to the rain and t...