Wisdom from Woody

  "More than at any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly."

   These days many who are religious see signs of the “End Times, while many more have good reason to believe we are living in the “Grim Times”. I suggest that our era could be characterized as the “Whim Times” since citizens all around the world are affected by the capriciousness of one unstable and powerful autocrat in one country. As Dylan might say, “The answers, my friend, are blowin’ in the whim.”
   “Weltschmerz” might be the word that the Germans or the more learned would use to describe the general consensus held, at least, by the non-MAGA people, that things are not good. Given that things are bad, one might think that the wisdom of Woody was revealed very recently. That is not the case.
   Woody’s thoughtful remark was written at the end of the 1970s, a decade which would not generally be defined, by even the most nostalgic, as one containing a large number of the good old days. Still, 1979, the year of the Woody quote, must have been better than any since, say the inauguration of 2017. While many of the religious are anxiously wondering “What Would Jesus Do?”, I think the much more interesting question is now “What Would Woody Say?”

Source:
(And much, much more since my wife insists you don’t look at this part.)

The quotation is found in, “My Speech to the Graduates,” by Woody Allen, The New York Times, Aug. 10, 1979.

   I wondered if a closer look at his speech and the entire issue of The New York Times on Aug.10, of 1979 might reveal why Woody was feeling so glum. Many of the headlines then were similar to ones found now. Israel was an issue even at that time: “Giving Up Sinai is Deeply Painful to Israelis There” and “Mideast Plan is Offered and Quickly Disclaimed in Bonn,” are examples. Some things were simpler in the summer of ‘79. When the 24,000-member American Academy of Pediatrics announced that “The Girl Athlete” was to be the subject of a seminar at their next meeting, no mention of gender (trans or all the others) was made and the discussions were to be about such matters as athletic injuries. Woody could have been upset about the athletic endeavours of the NY baseball teams since the Yankees lost to the Sox, 5-1 and the Mets to the Cardinals by 4-0.
   Some things were better back then. At least for that one day in August in 1979, there was no mention in the NYT of the crook from Queen's, who in the 80s was to be often referred to as the “short-fingered vulgarian", and in this century to be elected as President of the United States - twice!

   Like Woody, I was around in 1979, but in Canada where maybe things were better than they were for Woody in the U.S. But, I doubt that he ever thought the situation there would be as bad as it is now. He does offer us some additional wisdom at the end of the article which does make one feel better:
“Summing up, it is clear the future holds great opportunities. It also holds pitfalls. The trick will be to avoid the pitfalls, seize the opportunities, and get back home by six o’clock.”
 ----
                               "Making Light of Heavy Things Since 2016"

Sports and Money

     Having just written about BOOZE, I will now turn to two subjects which are even more important. Sports are infrequently mentioned in MM and I have generally lost interest in watching most of them, but I am sure you remain interested and will read on because of the mention of money. Although they are often related, they are treated separately here since I have already covered gambling and betting. Short bits are offered while we await the return of the muse who will produce lengthier and very thoughtful posts. (Note: If you actually make it to somewhere near the end of this post, there should be some mention of a guy who owns 7,000 cars.)

Event Planning:
  You are reminded here to start putting games in your calendar since many fans already have. These were noticed a while back in a Facebook post:

Those are college football games, but don't forget about the NFL. As Jason Gay noted in the Wall Street Journal: “Everywhere I look, the page has turned, and turned long ago — to football, football, football. Forget what the calendar says. The N.F.L. media is now the pharmacy that puts out its Christmas stuff during the first week of June.”

And before you do your Christmas shopping, do buy tickets for Dec. 25 for basketball games.

"NBA Christmas Day, Opening Night games feature Lakers, Warriors, Thunder,"
"The first NBA game on NBC in 23 years will feature the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder against perhaps their chief competition in the West, and the Cleveland Cavaliers are back on Christmas Day for the first time since the LeBron James era, league and network sources confirmed to The Athletic on Friday....
This coming season is the first of an 11-year, $75 billion national TV contract for the NBA, which features a new partnership with Amazon and a reuniting of the league with NBC. ESPN and ABC remain partners — and will carry Christmas Day games per usual...
ESPN was the first to report NBC’s opening night slate as well as the five Christmas Day games, which are:
Cleveland at the New York Knicks
San Antonio at Oklahoma City
Houston at the Lakers
Dallas at Golden State
Minnesota at Denver.

 Fighting:
   UFC stands for "Ultimate Fighting Championship" and it involves men fighting in cages. Such brutality is reluctantly allowed up here as long as the affair is conducted in English and French. But, the political importance of the UFC has been noticed even in the Globe & Mail:

"All the Rage: How the UFC Became America’s Most Important (and Misunderstood) Political Powerhouse," Sam Egan, Aug. 8, 2025: 
   "The UFC played an unexpected role in the second election of Donald Trump to the White House. But politicians of all stripes in the U.S. should take heed of its followers if they hope to retain, or gain, voters."

  Wait, there's more:

"White House Cage Fight Is 'Going to Happen' --- Dana White's Octagon Behemoth Gets a $7.7 billion Deal with Paramount. Now the Promoter is Planning a South Lawn Event," Jason Gay, WSJ, August 13, 2025.
     
Fishing:
   I told you about the White Marlin Open in "Fishing For Money" and lots of money was won again this year as you can see from the chart below. "Catch 23" is the clever name for the boat owned by Michael Jordan, who flew in on his private plane to participate. His boat is an 82-foot Bayliss that costs about $15 million. The $389,377.11 should cover some of the fuel costs.

Boating:

   Some wealthy people just like to float around and a couple of large boats were spotted off Victoria: "Two Super Yachts Spotted in Oak Bay," Oak Bay News, July 28, 2025. 
"The vessels are owned by Las Vegas billionaire Lorenzo Fertitta....

The larger of the two vessels – the 87-metre Lonian – can accommodate dozens of passengers and crew, and even a helicopter."
    And, guess what: The UFC Again
"Two super yachts owned by 56-year-old Las Vegas entrepreneur Lorenzo Fertitta, who Forbes says sold his stake in the Ultimate Fighting Championship for billions in 2016 and 2017, were seen anchored in Oak Bay."

  

   If you are really into boating, why not just buy the shipyard:
"Superyacht-obsessed Gaming Billionaire Just Bought the Entire Shipyard Behind Some Very Iconic Vessels," Henry Kelsall, Superblondie.com. 

   "Gabe Newell has made billions from video games and also has a love for luxury superyachts. However, he has now decided to take that love to another level.

   Instead of just buying another yacht, he has bought the whole Oceanco group, one of the world’s largest superyacht builders, and now owns the company....

   He used to own the Dapple yacht, and recently acquired his $400 million, 367-ft Oceanco yacht, Project Y722.
   With so much money on hand, it’s no wonder that Newell has a net worth estimated to be $9.5 billion."

Flying:
   Avoid Air Canada and buy your own plane so you won't have to worry about your dog. Two examples involve a goldendoodle and a cavapoo, which are apparently some kind of new canine.

1.   "When Maxx Chewning sold his sour-candy business to Hershey for $75.5 million, the first thing he did -- before buying a Rolex or dream home -- was jet his wife and six friends to Vail on a Dassault Falcon 900.

   They skipped security lines, zipped straight to the runway and seated themselves in leather recliners with gold accents in the wood-paneled cabin. The price tag for this adventure: $100,000.

   Chewning's goldendoodle, Dood, sprawled at their feet. "The joke is, I had to get a private plane so I could bring my dog," the 35-year-old said. "I didn't really care what the price was."

 2.  "Tennille Holt, 44, retired in 2023 and now spends much of her time traveling the world with her husband and 8-year-old cavapoo, Hudson. Hudson has his own Instagram account documenting his life, including his private-jet flights, where he is often served his favorite: grilled chicken.

   She and her husband spent about $200,000 to fly Hudson from Australia to Los Angeles in a Bombardier Global 6000 and avoid the commercial flight. She recalls dreaming about this flexibility while working long days and nights as an entrepreneur.

  "The goal was to create the freedom to live life on our own terms, which now includes plenty of travel and the ability to fly privately whenever we want," Holt said. "It's the best and most comfortable option for Hudson."

From: "Private-Jet Money Is New Wealth Yardstick," Gunjan Banerji, WSJ, August 54, 2025.

Golf:

  Rory McIlroy has had a pretty good year and decided to buy a house back in the UK, for which he paid $9 million. The neighbourhood competition is tough, however, and it is difficult  to keep up with the Joneses, when one of them is the Sultan of Brunei. "Meet Rory McIlroy's Billionaire Neighbor with 7,000 Cars, 39 Tigers and $15K Haircut Habit," Jackie Longo, The Sporting News, July 21, 2025. He probably won't be around much: "He primarily resides in the Istana Nurul Iman in Brunei, a residence considered the world's largest palace, boasting a staggering 1,788 rooms."

"A Tradition Unlike Any Other"

    Since that was more related to the Sultan than golf, here is a bit about The Masters. At some point soon, those who attend will need to be more like Members of Augusta than mere fans of the sport. This is from Dan Wetzel, ESPN, Aug 14, 2025:
"Let Them Eat Wings Somewhere Else: The Masters and Masses Part Ways."

  "Sporting events, including the venues that house them, were once designed mostly for the masses. Now they are increasingly being repackaged to deliver more and more luxury and exclusivity -- an understandable attempt to maximize profit, but with an associated cost nonetheless....

  Last week, Sports Business Journal detailed the 2026 "Official Masters Hospitality" program. It included offers of housing, transportation, catering and so on to the corporate and/or well-heeled. Consider the "Full Scale, Private Home Program," which will run you a mere $219,600 for the week.

  That bit of news came days after the announcement that a local Hooters restaurant, just a short stroll from Augusta National Golf Club, is closing.

   Nationally, the chain is known for its wings among, uh, other things. The Augusta Hooters, however, was very much a Masters week institution, a spot for the everyman to relax after a day at the tournament.
  It spoke to the dichotomy of Augusta, the club, and Augusta, the city. The former is the nation's most exclusive country club, located on formal and pristine grounds. The latter, especially on Washington Road leading from Interstate 20 to Magnolia Lane, is a snapshot of strip-mall, middle-American consumerism. Traffic lights and turn lanes, Taco Bells and tire shops.
  Maybe nothing comically defined that contrast as much as the Hooters, which capitalized on its location by setting up a huge tent to handle overflow crowds. It hosted a "Miss Green Jacket" contest and clung to the chain's slogan -- "Delightfully Tacky, Yet Unrefined" -- which is antithetical to the prim and proper country club.... [wasn't it worth reading the entire post, just for that slogan?]

   The Hooters was most famous for, in recent years, having John Daly park his RV outside, allowing fans to drink, smoke cigarettes and buy merch from golf's ultimate folk hero. The party, unsurprisingly, often raged loud and late. Daly once told me his presence was even written into the restaurant's lease -- "As long as they don't get mad at me for signing girls' asses, I'm OK," he joked....
   The club is famously secretive, but it wouldn't surprise anyone if the ultimate goal was an exclusive ramp from the highway to the club, lined with club-controlled housing and hospitality, bypassing Washington Road altogether.

   This is a trend where stadiums increasingly have built not just luxury boxes but numerous exclusive clubs -- from courtside to behind home plate.

    Sports is a business, so this isn't to condemn anyone from meeting a demand. Organizations are just cashing in on the "next door" phenomenon of people wanting something more special than what's already special."

  We visited The Masters a couple of years ago and the pimento cheese sandwich and beer were still affordable and one barely notices Berckmans Place along one fairway where the entry fee is around $10,000.

The Bonus:

  Even if you are a loyal reader of MM you likely missed all of The Masters information I have already provided. That is because it is cleverly hidden in this post - The Canadian Masters. Read it to find out what "The Canadian Masters" is, and what the sports commentator Gary McCord said to be banned from Augusta. And, if you look at "The Bonus" you will learn who committed suicide near Ike's Pond on the Augusta course.

Local BOOZE

  Paradigm Spirits Co.

   The muse responsible for much of the content in MM (especially the bad stuff) went  AWOL a while back when the sun began to shine and, like most Canadian workers, has been reluctant to return to the office. On this rainy day a short post is provided under a title likely to be attractive to many people searching the Internet. I also will throw in here the words "bourbon" and "whisky", as well as "whiskey."
   Trump and tariffs are also mentioned since they are responsible for what follows. Given that free trade is no longer an option with the U.S., Canadians finally realized that they could not freely trade with Canadians in the other provinces in this country. For example, an award-winning whisky produced here in London at the old Kellogg Plant could not be purchased by a Manitoban.
   The irony involved was noticed in a foreign newspaper and both the irony and the article have not been reported on in the local press, since there isn't much of one (although De Bono does what he can.) Here is the important part of the piece about Paradigm Spirits:

"Trump’s Tariffs are Promoting Free Trade — in Canada: Politicians and Industry Leaders Have Long Pushed to Remove Barriers to Interprovincial Trade. Trump’s Tariffs are Giving the Effort New Momentum," Amanda Coletta, The Washington Post, July 26, 2025:

TORONTO — "In 2024, the grand prize at the Canadian Whisky Awards went to Paradigm Spirits. Its entrant, made with Canadian corn, aged for 19 years in American oak barrels and blended with a splash of Spanish sherry, beat some 200 competitors to be crowned Whisky of the Year. A judge called it “remarkable.” 
   It was a break for Paradigm, which had opened in an old Kellogg’s factory in London, Ontario, just a few years earlier. The women-owned-and-operated distillery was soon inundated with messages from Canadians across the country eager to buy the award-winning spirit, co-founder Irma Joeveer said.
   But there was a problem: Canada’s internal trade barriers. With few exceptions, alcohol producers in one Canadian province are prohibited from selling directly to consumers in another. Vintners in British Columbia, for instance, can often more easily sell their merlots to oenophiles in other countries than within their own.
   Politicians and industry leaders have long pushed to knock down these and other internal trade barriers, a patchwork of federal and provincial laws, regulations and professional licensing standards that add costs to doing business and complicate the flow of goods, services and workers inside the country."

   You can learn more about the award-winning whisky here:

"Paradigm Spirits Co. Crowned 2024 Whisky of the Year by Esteemed Judges at the Canadian Whisky Awards," Canada Newswire, Jan.25, 2024.

LONDON, ON, Jan. 25, 2024 /CNW/ - "Paradigm Spirits, a young and innovative distillery based in London, Ontario, is proud to announce that its 2022 Heritage Collection Whisky has been named 2024 Whisky of the Year by the distinguished panel of judges at the Canadian Whisky Awards. 
   The enduring yearly awards ceremony took place on January 18, 2024, coinciding with the Victoria Whisky Festival. It stands as the singular competition exclusively devoted to Canadian whisky. The panel of judges, numbering 10, meticulously sampled and rated close to 200 competing whiskies during blind tastings.... 
   This prestigious recognition reinforces Paradigm Spirits' commitment to excellence in crafting exceptional whiskies that captivate a broad spectrum of whisky enthusiasts, from newcomers to seasoned connoisseurs.
   Michelle Debus, partner at Paradigm Spirits, expressed her excitement stating, "We are thrilled to receive this prestigious award. As a young distillery, our passion for whisky drives our commitment to innovation. The 2022 Heritage Collection, a 19-year-old, 100% corn whisky, showcases our dedication to pushing boundaries in Canadian whisky making."
  To learn more about the company - Paradigm Spirits. To buy some, visit 100 Kellogg Lane.

SYLLABI

 Course Catalogues (Part 2)

   Last year I wrote a piece about how the examination of descriptions of courses offered at universities, could be a useful way to determine what is being taught at them. I figured that the ones now offered might be quite different from the ones that once were, but I thought that finding and sifting through them would be rather difficult. That post can be read by clicking on the link above. 
   That post about "Course Catalogues" has attracted some attention. That is a surprise, but after reading it again, it is highly likely that the attraction was the mention of "Bird Courses," which are eagerly sought after, and not mentioned as such in "Course Catalogues".
   For those of you who now may have stumbled upon this post because of my mention of "Bird Courses," I will just say that there is nothing more offered about "Bird Courses."
  This post is about "Syllabi", as advertised, and to let you know that there is a way to "see" millions of them. Others had the idea that such documents would be a useful way to find out what was being offered, which is not the same thing as finding out what is actually being taught. Still, to find out what students are expected to read, what they have to write (or not) and whether they have to go to class and participate, would be one way to assess the university experience. And to find out, for example, if the place is a 'safe' or 'dangerous' one, intellectually speaking - to use criteria mentioned often these days. 
   If you are the rare reader who is interested in "Course Catalogues", not "Bird Courses," here is what you need to know to access a large number of them from over 6,000 universities. I will mention here that the actual syllabi are not offered, just the data they contain.

The Open Syllabus Project (OSP)
   Here is a description: 
The Open Syllabus Project (OSP) provides the first “big data” look at the primary activity of higher education: teaching.  It collects and analyzes millions of university syllabi to generate novel academic and public applications of the expertise embedded in these teaching choices.  This data has a wide range of uses in scholarly metrics, educational research, and the sociology of knowledge.  It supports the work of teachers, publishers, and librarians, and opens up new ways of connecting academic expertise to wider publics at a time when those connections are being attacked.  
   Here is the link to the "Open Syllabus". (There is also a Facebook page.)

   Before heading to the OSP, a look at the Wikipedia entry is useful. See, "Open Syllabus Project." Among the "Notable Findings" area you will see some examples of what people are looking for among the data. These days that includes not just information about the books and articles being used, but the colour or gender of the authors of them.

   For an article written when the OSP came out see: "What a Million Syllabuses Can Teach Us," By Joe Karaganis and David McClure, New York Times, Jan.22, 2016:
   "COLLEGE course syllabuses are curious documents. They represent the best efforts by faculty and instructors to distill human knowledge on a given subject into 14-week chunks. They structure the main activity of colleges and universities. And then, for the most part, they disappear. Some schools archive them, some don’t. Some syllabus archives are public, some aren’t. Some faculty members treat their syllabuses as trade secrets, others are happy to post them online. Despite the bureaucratization of higher education over the past few decades, syllabuses have escaped systematic treatment.
   Until now. Over the past two years, we and our partners at the Open Syllabus Project (based at the American Assembly at Columbia) have collected more than a million syllabuses from university websites. We have also begun to extract some of their key components — their metadata — starting with their dates, their schools, their fields of study and the texts that they assign…..
   Such data has many uses. For academics, for example, it offers a window onto something they generally know very little about: how widely their work is read."

   For an example of how the data are used, see this working paper and the brief summary offered:
   “Closed Classrooms? An Analysis of College Syllabi on Contentious Issues," John A. Shields, et al. Working Paper. July 10, 2025.
   “This essay shines a needed light on college classrooms by drawing on a unique database of college syllabi collected by the “Open Syllabus Project” (OSP). The OSP has amassed more than 27 million syllabi from around the world primarily by scraping them from university websites. They date as far back as 2008, though a majority are from the last ten years. Most of the data comes from universities in the United States, U.K., Canada, and Australia. And while the OSP doesn’t provide all of the raw data to scholars, it provides limited access via a searchable website and useful analytic tools to assess the data.”
   We used the OSP to explore how three contentious issues are being taught: racial bias in the American criminal justice system, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the ethics of abortion."
A copy of the 66pp pdf is available here.

Cancon:
   The syllabi of some Canadian universities are included. For the analytics relating to some of the syllabi at Western University, see here.
The Bonus:
   Princeton University Press has produced a book about this subject. Interestingly enough, it doesn't appear to be available at Western or many other Ontario university libraries. 
  Syllabus: The Remarkable, Unremarkable Document That Changes Everything, William Germano & Kit Nicholls.
   "Generations of teachers have built their classes around the course syllabus, a semester-long contract that spells out what each class meeting will focus on (readings, problem sets, case studies, experiments), and what the student has to turn in by a given date. But what does that way of thinking about the syllabus leave out—about our teaching and, more importantly, about our students’ learning?"

"On Bullshit"

   I have enclosed the title in quotes because it is not another post in my deeply philosophical "ON Series", but instead, the title of the book by Harry G. Frankfurt.  You will likely take it more seriously if I mention that the book was published by Princeton University Press, which is about to publish a 20th anniversary edition, which provides another indication that you should take it seriously. 
   I know this because I get Ron Charles' "Book Club" newsletter, which you should also take seriously because he writes for the Washington Post. Here are a few of his comments about, the book, bullshit and President Trump, who one associates more with the latter term than the former.

   A few months before the 2016 presidential election, a retired philosophy professor wrote in Time magazine that it was difficult to determine whether Donald Trump’s “unmistakably dubious statements are deliberate lies or whether they are just bullshit.” Ordinarily, such a scatological appraisal by an old academic wouldn’t have attracted much attention, but the writer in question was Harry G. Frankfurt, the world’s foremost authority on bullshit....
   “One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit,” he began. “Everyone knows this. Each of us contributes his share. But we tend to take the situation for granted.” That tone may sound casual — it is — but Frankfurt wasn’t phoning this in. He went on to cite Max Black, Wittgenstein and St. Augustine. 
  “The contemporary proliferation of bullshit,” he wrote, stems from “various forms of skepticism which deny that we can have any reliable access to an objective reality and which therefore reject the possibility of knowing how things truly are.” 
   In 2005, Princeton University Press reissued Frankfurt’s essay as a little book, which — no bull! — sold more than 1 million copies around the globe. This is not, I can assure you, the typical sales trajectory for an academic treatise on epistemic indifference. Clearly, the world smelled it too....
  In our current political climate, Frankfurt’s words sound prescient to the point of redundancy. “The bullshitter,” he tells us, “does not reject the authority of the truth, as the liar does, and oppose himself to it. He pays no attention to it at all. By virtue of this, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are.”  Last month, squatting atop the excremental culture that bears him up, Trump castigated his supporters for believing what he called the Jeffrey Epstein “bullshit.” It might be time to replace the Republican elephant with an orange-haired ouroboros — a mythical creature that swallows its own tale." 

  That "bullshit" is a serious subject is proven by the fact that it was mentioned in another newsletter I received, this time from The New Yorker, in an admittedly unserious piece by Ian Frasier, “Maybe I Shouldn’t Have Ditched That Bullshit Detector," June 6.  A detector is surely not needed now since we are knee-deep in the stuff. 

A Bullshit Bibliography
   Given the seriousness of this subject, I searched the catalogue of the London Public Library for further reading. Although they didn't have, On Bullshit the Western Libraries does and at the LPL you can find these: 

   Calling Bullshit: The Art of Skepticism in a Data-Driven World, by Carl Bergstrom and Jevin West. At the related website, this is found:
   "The world is awash in bullshit. Politicians are unconstrained by facts. Science is conducted by press release. Higher education rewards bullshit over analytic thought. Startup culture elevates bullshit to high art. Advertisers wink conspiratorially and invite us to join them in seeing through all the bullshit — and take advantage of our lowered guard to bombard us with bullshit of the second order. The majority of administrative activity, whether in private business or the public sphere, seems to be little more than a sophisticated exercise in the combinatorial reassembly of bullshit."
   The Life-Changing Science of Detecting Bullshit, by John Petrocelli.
   Post-Truth: How Bullshit Conquered the World, by James Bull

   There are even bullshit books about:
   Work - Bullshit Jobs, David Graeber.
   The Classics: Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes: A No-Bullshit Guide to World Mythology.
    And Food: The Angry Chef's Guide to Spotting Bullsh*t in the World of Food: Bad Science and the Truth About Healthy Eating, Anthony Warner.
  

Cancon: 
  I am pleased to report that a pioneer in the field of bullshit studies is Laura Penny. She also should be taken seriously since she has a PhD and teaches at King's (the other one in Halifax.) Even more serious-sounding is the MA thesis she did while passing through Western, (the one here in London) - Spent: On Economic Metaphor in Post-Structuralist Philosophy.  

The Bonus: A Related Concept and More Cancon
  The concept is Enshittification and the coiner of it is the Canadian, Cory Doctorow:

   "Last year, I coined the term ‘enshittification,’ to describe the way that platforms decay. That obscene little word did big numbers, it really hit the zeitgeist. I mean, the American Dialect Society made it their Word of the Year for 2023 (which, I suppose, means that now I’m definitely getting a poop emoji on my tombstone).

   So what’s enshittification and why did it catch fire? It’s my theory explaining how the internet was colonized by platforms, and why all those platforms are degrading so quickly and thoroughly, and why it matters — and what we can do about it.

  We’re all living through the enshittocene, a great enshittening, in which the services that matter to us, that we rely on, are turning into giant piles of shit."

   You will likely take this concept more seriously if I mention that the quotation above is from, "My McLuhan Lecture on Enshittification"  and that there is a good piece about it in The Guardian: " 'What Many of Us Feel': Why 'enshittification' is Macquarie Dictionary's Word of the Year". If that is not enough, Paul Krugman wrote about "The General Theory of Enshittification" just a few weeks ago. 
                       "Making Light of Heavy Things Since 2016"

Maple-Washing

      Buy Canadian - It's Not So Easy
   The term "maple-washing" appeared in a headline and it is our subject for today. It was new to me. Apparently "it has been coined in popular discourse to describe the lengths that retailers and producers have gone to make their products appear as Canadian as possible."  
   Misleading marketing is not new, but the surge in food patriotism is and that has led to some questionable labelling indicating that a product is "Canadian". To reduce the angst among those who are agitated about all of this, I will reproduce the relevant paragraph from the maple-washing article, which says the rules relating to food are clear about what constitutes "Canadian." I hope they are clear to you, but I remain confused. For example, although coffee is not grown in Canada, I know there are some Canadian coffee companies, as defined by the rules listed below, but I don't think it would be correct to say that Tim Hortons is a Canadian company.

 "According to the Food and Drugs Act, all food labels must be truthful and not misleading or likely to create a false impression. The rules are clear. 
  "Product of Canada" requires that at least 98 per cent of the ingredients and processing be Canadian. "Made in Canada" means the last substantial transformation took place here, and "Prepared in Canada" refers to food that was processed, packaged or handled domestically, regardless of where the ingredients originated." "Retailers Must Guard Against Maple-Washing," Sylvain Charlebois, London Free Press, July 29, 2025.

   To demonstrate the complexity of all of this, here is a bit from the Consumers Council of Canada, which also supplied me with the definition of maple-washing as quoted above.

   "In one typical social media feed, Canadians can see promotion that Cadbury’s Creme Eggs and Mini Eggs are “proudly made for Canada, in Canada from domestic and imported ingredients”, Breyer’s ice cream is “made in Canada with high quality ingredients and Canadian dairy”. Black Diamond cheese will also promote its Canadian origins and production, and sometimes cheekily notes it is made with 0% American cheese.
   Some consumers will appreciate this presentation and favour those products. 
   Of course, Cadbury is a British company, owned by Mondelez international. Breyers has a production facility in Simcoe, Ontario, but it’s owned by Unilever. Black Diamond has origins and production in Belleville, Ontario, but is owned by Lactalis Canada which is part of the Lactalis Group, headquartered in France."

  I suppose that the subject of whether your grocery item is "Canadian" is moot if you purchased it at either Walmart or Costco. 

Buy Ontarian

  Once again, my post is more confusing than it should have been. So, I will conclude by suggesting that you only buy things made in Ontario and supply the source where you can shop: Ontario Made: Great Things are Made Right Here.  You will even find a Canadian coffee company - Club Coffee Craft Roasters, in Etobicoke. 

Post Script:
   The recent concern about buying Canadian is largely a result of the numerous tariffs which have been levied, unlevied and which are about to be levied again. Ontario began the "Support Ontario" program back when the pandemic was the issue that made people think about reshoring and producing things locally. 
See, for example: "Labatt Promotes Ontario Made Label," Jennifer Bieman, LFP, Oct. 30, 2020:
  "Labatt Breweries of Canada signed on to a provincewide push to promote Ontario businesses forging ahead in the pandemic-battered economy. Ninety-six brands, including London-made Bud Light, Budweiser and Labatt Blue, will display an Ontario Made designation, a marketing initiative to promote local products....The province threw its support behind the program in early July, contributing $500,000. The campaign comes after many Ontario businesses retooled during the first wave of the pandemic to manufacture in-demand products, including masks and other personal protective equipment. Premier Doug Ford announced a second phase of the program Thursday, a consumer directory of participating manufacturers at Supportontariomade.ca."

Bonus Links:
  Send your kid to a Canadian Maple League University.
  Travel Locally- Grassroutes.    

   Whether a non-food item is "Canadian" can be complex as well, and that is why we have law firms. And when such firms are involved, suits follow. Take the case of a company named Moose Knuckles, which surely appears to be Canadian, even if their product was not.
   "In recent years, there has only been one enforcement action brought by the Bureau regarding a “Made in Canada” claim. In 2016, the Bureau filed an application with the Competition Tribunal (Tribunal) alleging that Moose Knuckles had marketed their winter parkas as “Made in Canada,” when they were actually imported from Asia in nearly finished form, only to be finalized with zippers, snaps, fur trims and labels in Canada. Moose Knuckles settled the action by, among other things, agreeing to donate C$750,000 over five years to charity and to clarify that some of its parkas are made with Canadian and imported components."
From: "Maple-Washing: Regulatory and Civil Liability Risks of Calling a Product Canadian," By Laura Weinrib, Jonathan Bitran, Simon Seida, Emily Hazlett and Joshua Hutchinson, Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP, March 13, 2025.

   It is also noted in the article above that "maple-washing" is sometimes called, "maple glazing".
   For another bonus, search for the meaning of "moose knuckles".  

Along the Enchanted Way

 

An Enchanting Read
   During a deep clean of the study I uncovered this book, stopped cleaning and starting reading it again. I liked it the first time and it remains good and I highly recommend it. I'll try to convince you that you will like it and, if you live close by, come and borrow it.
   If you would like to save time and get on with reading the book, note that it is described above as "captivating" by Partrick Leigh Fermor. That alone should be enough to convince you.
   The book is, however, about a very remote and rural part of Romania, so more convincing may be required. Here is a brief description typical of many that will be found and which relates to the northern region of Maramures in Transylvania: 
   On a green sward, on hills high above the valleys and the villages, I stayed the next night in a sheepfold. The shepherd spread out a blanket on the ground in an open-fronted hut made of hazel wands. What little heat there was , was provided by a fire which burned just inside the opening. Into my hands he placed a warm cup of ewe's milk. As I drank he went out and sat on a rock. Then he picked up a long metal horn, raised it to his lips and blew. The blast echoed round the hills about us. It was the first time I had ever seen a true shepherd's horn being used by a shepherd. I watched him as he sat absorbed in blowing out the plangent notes. When they were be themselves, he told me, up on the hills by the forest it was good to blow on the horn and the hear from far away another shepherd replying and not to feel alone. In front of us the mountains stretched into the distance and across the horizon. (pp.28-9).

   Blacker ends up staying for a very long period and for much of it lives in a small village in a very small house with Mihai who is pictured. 
   I realize that the passage and picture provided will not be enough for some of my readers who prefer more action. If you look more closely at the photo you will notice that Mihai is holding a tumbler of horincă, a type of brandy. 


   Things become more lively when it is consumed and gypsies are encountered and Natalia usually carries a knife.
  Marishka is her sister and Blacker has a relationship with both and a child with the latter. Things are much livelier in the household of the Hungarian patriarch, Atilla, than they are in the hut with Mihai. There is a lot of gypsy music and dancing in the dark forests for those of you who need more than descriptions of cows coming down from the mountains and peasants scything in the meadows.
   Along the Enchanted Way is a slow ramble in Romania that takes place after the Wall falls and the Ceaușescus are executed. Blacker enters a country that was "frozen in time" and wanders without a destination in mind. It is a lyrical idyll in a place that no longer exists as it was and I am sure you will enjoy it.

The Bonus: 
   Patrick Leigh Fermor walked across Europe in the 1930s when he was eighteen. If you enjoy great travel literature you will appreciate the two books about the trip he wrote years later: A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water. I have both if you want to have a look. There is an active website devoted to him and if you visit it you can read the review he wrote of Blacker's book, which appeared originally in the Sunday Telegraph. Here is the link to the review from patrickleighfermor.org. 
   The title, Along the Enchanted Way is from a poem by Patrick Kavanagh:

On Raglan Road on an autumn day I met her first and knew
That her dark hair would weave a snare that I might one day rue;
I saw the danger, yet I walked along the enchanted way,
And I said, let grief be a fallen leaf at the dawning of the day.

  If you would prefer an account by a woman, written about the same time see, Transylvania and Beyond by Dervla Murphy. I also have a copy of that book and wrote about it in a piece titled, oddly enough, On Barfing. She died in 2022 and details are provided in this post: Dervla is Dead.