Author: Geoff Micks

• The worst phone call of my life (or, how I earned $50 for not caring if I got fired)

  It’s time again for another one of my long and rambling annecdotes. Today’s story from my not-so-ill-spent youth: The worst phone call of my life (or, how I earned $50 for not caring if I got fired). When I was seventeen I came back from England and got a job working for a Sprint Canada…

  Geoff Micks

  April 30, 2010

• The Weakerthans: Sun in an Empty Room

  I have already spoken at length about my admiration for The Weakerthans, but I left out a song that has really grown on me with repeated listening. Sun in an Empty Room from their Reunion Tour album is a classic example of the band’s ability to approach a story obliquely, leaving it up to the…

  Geoff Micks

  April 27, 2010

• Meditations from the Barber’s Chair

  A couple of days ago, I got a haircut. Haircuts are one of those peculiar male rituals that huge swathes of the population don’t understand without even understanding there is something deep and weighty there that has escaped their notice. The rules of a man’s haircut are handed down from father to son and through…

  Geoff Micks

  April 26, 2010

• Update: The Blog So Far

  Hello Everyone, It’s been seven months, fifty-four posts and sixteen thousand views since I started this blog, and I’ve learned quite a bit so far. First of all, there are a surprising number of people who google ‘Guns used during the Great Depression.‘ Second, if you have a nifty stock image on one of your…

  Geoff Micks

  April 26, 2010

• The South African War: The First Total War of the 20th Century

  I came across this old university essay the other day, and I thought it blog-worthy (after a few minor edits, corrections, and of course a healthy contribution of pictures). I already have one post about the Boer War on this blog. You can find it here. I’m aware that anything I put up on the…

  Geoff Micks

  April 5, 2010

• Best of the Web: Rives, the Wordsmith

  One of the true joys of the internet is when you find something you weren’t looking for, and then pursue it down the rabbit hole of the world wide web until you end up someplace you never thought you’d be. In that moment, new worlds open up to you, and you look around with fresh…

  Geoff Micks

  March 15, 2010

• The Day Stephen Harper Shook My Hand and Called Me a Liar

  From time to time people talk about meeting celebrities. I suppose I’ve met my share, but the one story that everyone always wants to hear is the day Stephen Harper shook my hand and called me a liar.

  Geoff Micks

  March 13, 2010

• Stopping to smell the roses: 111 things that always make me smile

  It’s been a rough month or so, following my grandfather’s death, but I’m ready to get back into the habit of blogging, and I think I should start again with a list of things that always make me happy. Life is too short to walk around with a heavy heart. Sometimes you just need to…

  Geoff Micks

  February 25, 2010

• Murray Anderson’s Eulogy

  My grandfather, Murray Anderson, who I’ve mentioned before at least in passing here, here, here, here, here, and here on this blog, passed away last Sunday. He was a few months shy of his eighty-sixth birthday, and he was the finest man I have ever known. I gave a eulogy at his funeral yesterday, and…

  Geoff Micks

  February 5, 2010

• My Grandmother, Serena Anderson

  I mentioned last month that I’ve scanned in a number of pictures from my grandparents’ old photo albums. Everything I’ve put up thus far has been from my grandfather’s youth, and so I thought I’d mix things up a little bit by putting up some information on my grandmother. A great deal of the following…

  Geoff Micks

  January 18, 2010