Rose's Cantina

Excerpt from Distressed Pavement coming in July.  Katrina Lemieux twirled around in her ergonomic chair to look out at the spectacular view from her Gatineau office, which overlooked the Ottawa River. At thirty-eight, she was the youngest Deputy Minister that Climate Change Canada had ever had. She had all the credentials: a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Studies from Simon Fraser University, an MBA from McGill, and a certificate in digital marketing from Ottawa University.  She was regarded as a both an expert on environmental policy and a communications guru who had more than a million Instagram followers. But she was also a human lightning rod, adored by the left and abhorred by the right.  Her head was on the block now that the Tories had taken over the reins of power, and she knew it. Soon this office would be inhabited by some oil-loving, environment-gouging creep from Alberta. She had heard that her job was being shopped around at the Petroleum Club in...

The media has been a-flutter recently, ever since Quebec media mogul Pikachu Peladeau announced he was running for the Parti Quebecois in this weird winter provincial election. It's like he is some kind of weird Sigfried and Roy character who has mesmerized all the typists and deep thinkers with his bedazzle. Or a Moses who is standing on the banks of the Ottawa River ready to part the waters, once and for all. Quebec will separate, Pikachu has ordained. So it is, and so it shall be, for now and all time. Put on the brakes a minute. Settle down, already. Nobody's going anywhere. The day after we wake up, and the PQ wins, if that happens, the sky will not fall. Poutine will not lose its flavor. Molson Canadian will taste just as good. We've seen his ilk before, he's a paradox. Handsome in that French sort of way, Pikachu is a wearer of shiny Hong Kong suits and slave to meticulous grooming, save for a serious case of bed head. He is a friend of Brian Mulron...

I came across a job description the other day, one that suited me to a tee except for one "mandatory" requirement. The person to be hired needed a master's degree. Usually, I just virtually throw these job ads in the garbage because I've spent too many years getting rejection emails from recruiters and h.r. pros because either my French wasn't good enough or my security clearance wasn't high enough. This time I called to plead my case. For thirty years, I've been working in the health and social policy sector as a speechwriter, researcher, editor and general wonk. I have often bragged that I wrote the social policy section of the first-ever Liberal Redbook. Remember that old saw? The job ad was looking for someone with a specialty in mental health, and I had spent several years as the editor of a prominent magazine for psychiatrists. I'd also written speeches for both the federal and Ontario ministers of health. The project in question was someth...

At ten minutes to midnight, I turned off the television and went to bed. Kathy Griffin still had her top on and Anderson Cooper still had not penetrated a woman. Not much else to see after watching Miley Cyrus prance around a cold stage twerking a little person with gigantic cone-shaped tits, right? As a result, I'm sitting here in the dark at 6:30 on the morning of January 1st drinking a weird concoction of carrots, ginger and apples and waiting for the Chai tea to brew. I've already checked the job boards and I'm still not a backend developer or a digital strategist. Gosh, the jobs out there sound dirtier and dirtier. The job boards have become a bit like that old obituary joke. If you don't see your name (or occupation) then you're still alive or unemployed. I am still unemployed, but not for long. You see my New Year's Resolution is to get a job. That and make sure nothing else breaks in my house, including Gordie the pug. In 2014, I hope to bec...