Linwood Barclay - Aug. 11
Okay, so maybe we can't get the Olympics to be held in Toronto, but we've got a lock on the International Truck Rollover Games. Odds are you might have a front-row seat.
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August 11, 2007
August 10, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Aug. 10
Holding the door open for people and letting them in ahead of you is a fine and wonderful practice, everyplace except the doughnut shop, where it's much too risky
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August 06, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Aug. 6
We know city drivers are nuts, texting while they drive, cutting people off, but at least they don't drive in the wrong lane to make a left the way country drivers do.
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August 04, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Aug. 4
We figured if it was good enough for governments of all types to open up casinos to solve their financial problems, surely it would work at the household level.
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August 03, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Aug. 3
Does anyone really believe that NASA needed to have it written down in a rule book someplace that if you're an astronaut, you're not allowed to get blasted before blastoff?
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July 30, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 30
My idea for a movie involves sending the writers and producers and directors of the Hostel and Saw movies on a European vacation where something unspeakably awful happens to them.
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July 28, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 28
For a couple of things that don't really serve much purpose, my nipples have certainly been a source of aggravation around here since I got my new shirt on Father's Day.
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July 21, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 21
I got on this whole Facebook thing by mistake and want it out of my life as soon as possible -- it's the virtual equivalent of being asked to watch a million neighbours' slides.
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July 14, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 14
Reader mail seems to suggest you already know the Star tells me what my opinion on any given subject is, but here's how the process works, including 'the helmet'.
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July 13, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 13
If you're thinking of becoming a quality control inspector in China, you might want to listen to the test. A hint: Get to know the differences between motor oil and maple syrup.
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July 09, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 9
It couldn't have been a happy day at Al Gore's place when his son was arrested doing 160 kilometres per hour in a hybrid, but it was a pretty good day for the environment.
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July 07, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 7
When an able-bodied person is using her car to drive a distance of 16 parking spaces -- side to side, no less -- is it fair to say the message just isn't getting out?
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July 06, 2007
Linwood Barclay - July 6
If Ontario Conservative Leader John Tory can persuade us that he really cares about the arts, when that's never exactly been a priority with his party, isn't he the ultimate Transformer?
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June 30, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 30
How will the toddlers of today manage in the working world of 2020, having been raised without exposure to germs, hurtful comments, the concept of failure, or a scuffed knee?
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June 29, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 29
If Dick Cheney can get away with defying U.S. constitutional law, what's to stop him from ignoring the laws of gravity? And if he does, will Macy's want him for their parade?
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June 25, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 25
We went to the movies the other night to see zombies running amok, but the real drama started in the seats when a guy's cell phone kept going off.
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June 23, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 23
While fashion may not be my area of expertise, here's a tip: Wearing light-coloured slacks during the summer is a bad idea when you've sat in something dark and sticky.
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June 22, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 22
If you're taking in a flick this weekend, you might want to see Stephen Almighty, the one about the prime minister who's kind of picky about who he lets on the boat.
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June 18, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 18
If you believe Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty's promise that he won't raise taxes if re-elected this fall, then he's also got a special football he'd like you to kick.
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June 16, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 16
Prime Minister Stephen Harper is rescuing kids from wells, risking his life to save kittens from burning buildings, and now those nosy media types think they're entitled to write about it.
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June 15, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 15
Things are a bit on edge around here since The Toothpick Incident the other day, and it will be awhile before we know just how serious the repercussions are going to be.
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June 09, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 9
All I wanted was a safe place to park my car, where it wouldn't get dinged by somebody else, but what I hadn't counted on was the law of unintended consequence.
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June 02, 2007
Linwood Barclay - June 2
I never thought I'd be the kind of person to meet people in dark alleys, making nefarious deals, but when you need a plastic bag, you do what you have to do.
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May 26, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 26
Astonished as I was to learn that our friend Annie had never eaten peanut butter, I had to concede that it took me a very long time to get around to trying scotch.
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May 19, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 19
I wasn't a huge fan of those self-service checkouts at the big-box hardware stores, until using one actually got me more personal attention than customers in the regular checkout.
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May 12, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 12
When you bring out your lawnmower for the first time, here's a helpful tip: Keep pulling on that cord until the sucker starts, or your arm falls off, whichever comes first.
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May 11, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 11
When you want to get the dirt on two Toronto city councillors who aren't taking advantage of their lavish expense accounts, who are you going to call? Barclay Investigations, of course.
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May 07, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 7, PM Books
Yann Martel's campaign to educate the prime minister about the arts by sending him a book every two weeks is well intentioned, but could the books be a little more fun?
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May 05, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 5, Same Paige?
Something very strange happened to our daughter Paige while she was away at school this year. She learned to tidy, and it wasn't even one of the courses on her curriculum.
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May 04, 2007
Linwood Barclay - May 4. Flick Off
The province's 'Flick Off' campaign was such a huge success, Ontario's premier is launching several more, including one to get schoolkids to wear gloves on wintry days, called, 'Show Us Your Mitts!'
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April 30, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 30
We knew from the beginning the Harper Conservatives could be mean and dismissive and uncaring and contemptuous, even brilliant, but who could ever have imagined they could be dumb?
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April 28, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 28
My son and I aren't into keeping secrets from each other, unless they happen to concern grinding the gears going from first to second. That type of thing stays in the vault.
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April 27, 2007
Linwood Barclay Apr. 27 - Stop Reading Week
It wasn't until "Stop Wasting Your Time Reading Week" that I realized how many hours I spend with my nose in a book or newspaper that I could spend watching TV.
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April 23, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 23
Breaking up is hard to do, but it's even harder when the one you're breaking up with is Jack Bauer. In fact, as I found out, it's nothing short of torture.
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April 21, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 21
When the Saturday newspaper arrives it's all held together by a rubber band that's been stretched well beyond its limits, that's when we call in the newspaper deactivator.
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April 20, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 20
If you don't want to buy a university degree from some stranger on the street, you can always turn to the internet, where "genuine" degrees, with typos, are always available!
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April 16, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 16
If Stephane Dion can keep a Liberal out of a Nova Scotia race to help the Green party's leader win, why can't Toyota step down to help Kia topple Honda?
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April 14, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 14
When Stephen Harper's people started showing off their fancy campaign headquarters, their buses that transform into giant robots, and their jet packs, no wonder the Liberal leader is feeling nervous.
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April 13, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 13
So Conrad Black and Barbara Amiel spent $600,000 on a trip to Bora Bora and it turned out to be a total disaster. Well, you know what they say. You get what you pay for.
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April 09, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 9
Even though it duplicates some DVDs I have, this new set with every episode of every season of every TV show ever made is just the ticket, except for the fact it's the size of a house.
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April 07, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 7
When you're 900 kilometres away and lose a contact lens on a hotel room floor just as you're getting ready to drive home, there's a lot more to the situation than meets the eye.
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April 06, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 6
Now that the Washington Post is following the lead of other U.S. papers and closing its Canadian bureau, how will Americans quench their insatiable thirst for north-of-the-border news?
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April 02, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Apr. 2
If Stephen Harper can just hang in for another five or ten minutes, there's bound to be an opinion poll that will tell him what he wants to hear regarding a spring election call.
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March 31, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 31
I hope this doesn't make me a bad person, but I don't want to adopt a highway, but if I did, I wouldn't look for one in Asia. I'd adopt one here at home.
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March 30, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 30
In tonight's instalment of the crime drama David Caplan, Private Investigator, our hero helps a woman whose $500,000 winning ticket was ripped off, if he can stay awake long enough.
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March 26, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 26
If President George Bush's right-hand man Karl Rove doesn't have to take the oath when he's dragged before a Congressional committee, I don't see why I should either.
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March 24, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 24
I tried persuading a New Yorker that Canadians are not the type to take the time to stop and smell the flowers, but being married to a nice person weakened my argumant.
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March 23, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 23
What do you do when you can see, from your airplane window seat, your bag sitting out there on the cart on the runway, and they've already closed the luggage doors?
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March 17, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 17
Our new home theatre system comes with hundreds of pages of manuals, hundreds of buttons, hundreds of channels, and dozens of wires. Could someone turn it on for me?
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March 16, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 16
I don't know how women manage with such deadly devices as curling irons and hair straighteners. For guys to face an equivalent risk, we'd have to shave with chainsaws.
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March 12, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 12
There was tension between Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Liberal leader Stephane Dion even when they roomed together at MP School, and that's not even counting the nipple-twisting incident.
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March 10, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 10
Once you learn to ignore the evidence and stop worrying about this whole global warming thing, you'll find bad news from your mechanic and doctor easier to ignore too.
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March 09, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 9
David Suzuki-bashers take note! If he's really concerned about the melting polar ice caps, would he let the ice in his drink melt before he got around to drinking it?
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March 03, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Mar. 3
When we went out with our friends for breakfast the other day, we had a hard time getting served, but it had nothing to do with the waitress or the restaurant.
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February 26, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 26
At the annual Canadian Mudslinging Games, Prime Minister Stephen Harper did such a great job slinging the opening batch for the cameras, there's talk that he could go pro.
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February 24, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 24
My ads praising Ontario PC leader John Tory are without a doubt the best ones so far, when you consider no one else can claim he gave them a kidney.
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February 23, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 23
Some librarians in the U.S. who want to ban from their shelves an award-winning children's book that includes the word "scrotum" may find themselves in a sack of trouble.
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February 19, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 19
When Telus researchers figured how to download pay-porn to a cell phone, was there a historic quote, like "Lance, come in here, I've fit a threesome onto this tiny screen"?
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February 17, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 17
Today's etiquette dilemma: Picking up a Valentine's Day card for your buddy, for his wife, is no different than picking up a case of beer for him, am I right?
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February 16, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 16
I'm not prepared to risk plunging to my death over Niagara Falls for my cell phone, or any other fancy gadgets I own, with the possible exception of my toaster.
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February 13, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 12
It's a terrible accusation to make only a couple of days before Valentine's Day, but I think my wife is trying to ruin the relationship I have with Diana Krall.
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February 10, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 10
Think of the calories you'll save if you eat the toppings, but skip the dessert underneath.
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February 09, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 9
It'll be great having a place to send misbehaving Toronto councillors once the new time-out rooms are built.
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February 05, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 5
As the flesh-eating zombies approach, will the government's negative ads be able to save us in time?
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February 03, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 3
When I take a trip to pledge my loyalty to the 407's leader, it's nothing short of an odyssey.
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February 02, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Feb. 2
When the doctor asks if you've had a colonoscopy, don't play dumb. It's not the sort of thing you forget.
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January 29, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Jan. 29
When kids go off to college, it's the anxiety of separation from cable that hurts most.
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January 27, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Jan 27
There's no funny business when you're a guest judge on OPP Idol, the show that'll pick the new Cam Woolley.
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January 26, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Jan. 26
Stephen Harper turning green isn't good news for the environment. It's a huge boost for human transformation technology.
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January 22, 2007
January 20, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Jan. 20
The Bush Plan: If it ain't fixed, keep breaking it. The TV in the White House bedroom was acting up.
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January 19, 2007
Linwood Barclay - Jan. 19
Have things seemed a bit squirrelly on GO lately? A Notice To Our Passengers From GO Transit:
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Rumsfeld ignored warnings from retirement experts.