Originally Bruce, Leslie and Zak's e-journal, this blog mostly houses Leslie's thoughts and musings as she struggles upstream in the spawning stream of life. Or at least that's the way I see it -B
Howdy!
The following content should have been posted on November 1 or 2, 2025, but I was sick sick sick. So here it is now, for the sake of future reference.
Number of trick-or-treaters at our door: 238
And here are the traditional images:
Tequila!
In case you're wondering, I bought more than 900 pieces of candy to give away, so we still have Halloween candy left over. But better to have leftovers than to run short, in my books.
Only ten months until Halloween 2026!
Hello, hello, and happy new year! We’ve made another successful orbit of the sun, and that’s something to celebrate. Yay us!
But you’re here for the tally of the year in music and books. Let’s get to it!
1. Kate Bush, “Running Up That Hill”
2. Tears for Fears, “Mad World”
3. Air Supply, “Sweet Dreams”
4. Supertramp, “The Logical Song”
5. Queen, “You’re My Best Friend”
6. The Who, “Magic Bus”
7. Dua Lipa, “Houdini”
8. ABBA, “Chiquitita”
9. Blue Rodeo, “After the Rain”
10. Love & Rockets, “So Alive”
11. Seals and Crofts, “Summer Breeze”
12. Doobie Brothers, “Long Train Runnin’”
13. Gowan, “Moonlight Desires”
14. ABBA, “Summer Night City”
15. Kate Bush, “Burning Bridge”
16. Deep Purple, “Hush”
17. Linda Ronstadt with Aaron Neville, “Don’t Know Much”
18. Rod Stewart, “Ain’t Love a Bitch”
19. Luba, “Every Time I See Your Picture”
20. Rockpile, “Teacher Teacher”
21. Simon and Garfunkel, “The Boxer”
22. Florence and the Machine, “Dream Girl Evil”
23. Little River Band, “Help Is on Its Way”
24. The Lovin' Spoonful, “Summer in the City”
25. Gerry Rafferty, “Night Owl”
As I have done for the last several years, I leaned into nostalgia this year, well, nostalgia and familiarity. My iTunes library now contains roughly 32,500 tracks, which is a LOT of listening. To listen to most of the library (which I did: only 9,760 tracks — less than a third of the collection — were unplayed as of last night at midnight), I had to listen more extensively and less intensively. But obviously old favourites persist.
Speaking of old favourites, now seems as good a time as any to mention that toward the end of 2026 I have a short creative nonfiction piece coming out in an anthology called Beyond the Concert Hall, which might explain some of my listening habits. Watch this space!
New music acquired:
• Hania Rain, Nonfiction: Piano Concerto in Four Movements
• Edmonton Winds, Close to Home
• Florence and the Machine, Everybody Scream
• KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack
That's not to say that I didn't also acquire a lot of older music, as obviously I did. But one certainly isn't immersed in music in one's fifties as one is in one's teens.
And then of course there's reading, and so...
My final tally of books read in 2025 was a personal low: 106. But things can only get better, right? Here are some stats:
• Books written/edited by women: 72
• Books written/edited by men: 32
• Books written/edited by nonbinary people: 2
• Volumes of poetry: 24
• Nonfiction (including memoir, creative nonfiction, and anthologies): 21
Here are some of my favourite books read this year:
• Alana Cattapan et al., eds., Feministing in Political Science
• Dawn Macdonald, Northerny
• Craig Mod, Things Become Other Things
• Premee Mohamed, The Annual Migration of Clouds
• Kenneth Oppel, Best of All Worlds
• Philip Pullman, The Rose Field
• Richard Siken, Crush
• Emily Tesh, The Incandescent
• Ira Wells, On Book Banning
Of these, Things Become Other Things and The Rose Field were the most striking, and I can see myself rereading them (although the final three books in Lyra's world are so long!). The others? Well... there's so much to read, and my "to-be-read" shelves are groaning, so I'm not confident I'll be doing a lot of rereading. But maybe?
While we’re at it...
As I mentioned in an earlier post, I tried to participate in many cultural activities this year, and hope to continue doing so in the year ahead. Here are some highlights:
• Sarah Millican, Late Bloomer
• Laser Pink Floyd The Wall
• Edmonton City as Museum Project (ECAMP), Ukrainian Ties
• Provincial Archives Open House
• Samantha Williams-Chapelsky at the FAB Gallery
• Sarah Slean at Festival Place
Once again, I wish you bright, happy days as we move through the universe once again.
Hello!
It's the end of 2025, a remarkably challenging year. I'm hoping that the year ahead will be kinder and brighter.
But before we leave this one behind, here is a visual retrospective — from me, of all people, the least visually oriented person you know! — of the year that was.
Obviously the big news at the beginning of 2025 was the arrival of Ms P, or Penelope, who technically arrived at the end of December. But we're so glad she's here.
Because I was teaching a course in arts management, I made an extra effort to participate in arts and cultural events. This "At the half" image is from a Pro Coro Canada concert at McDougall United Church downtown, on a very cold Sunday.
This image is from an ESO concert featuring Brahms and trumpet music. It was fabulous! And while I know true orchestral aficionados wouldn't care for seats so close to the stage, for me they are a perfect balance of sound and activity.
Bonus images: Friday night painting activity in support of my dance group. Bruce was skeptical about the whole enterprise.
Do you sense a theme emerging? At the ESO again, this time for orchestra and organ.
Since we weren't on the coast, we went to one more Pro Coro Canada event, this one at the Arts Barns.
A sunny July Saturday afternoon on the Ukrainian Ties walking tour with Nicole. I enjoyed the tour enough to sign up for another one in August, when the weather was decidedly less pleasant.
This opportunistic image was caught on a walk in Coronation park. These are two of the remaining mosaics adjacent to the planetarium; the new velodrome is in the background. We were in the area because we were going to a laser show at Space Science Centre (which was wonderful for my brain).
Best thing I saw while cycling! There's a porcupine in this picture. What a surprise in the neighbourhood!
I had a front-row seat, sitting next to the book's editor, at the launch for Revolution Songs by Carissa Halton. A fabulous event! And we sang revolutionary songs, of course.
Bonus image: This is from the Edmonton launch event for Songs from This and That Country, by the wondrous Gail Sidonie Sobat, at Audreys.
This image was taken a moment or two before we began our two minutes of silence on November 11. Looking out over the RCAF lake. A surprisingly mild day for November, but the weather soon cooled, as the next image (November 29) demonstrates.
View from the fifth floor of Rutherford North. I haven't been here for years, and while much has changed on the ground floor and second floor, this floor is largely as I left it decades ago. Old home week!
Does this post make up for a year of not writing? Probably not, but here we are.
Wishing you and yours the best for what's ahead.
Happy 2025! A new year, a new beginning ... I wish everyone the very best for the year ahead. May all your efforts come to fruition.
But of course, you’re not here for kind wishes: you’re here for stats. And so stats I will give you.
Books
My final tally for 2024 was 122 books. A surprising showing, in fact. By the middle of November I was doubtful I would get past 100.
Of those titles, 73 were written by women or female-identified authors, 43 were written by men or male-identified authors, and 6 were co-written or written by authors whose gender was not specified.
My favourite books of the year were Fire Weather by John Vaillant and Gay Girl Prayers by Emily Austin, for entirely contrasting reasons. Fire Weather is an hour-by-hour analysis of 2016’s fire in Fort McMurray. If you want to understand why some people believe fossil fuels will lead to the end of the world as we know it, this is the book to read. Gay Girls Prayers, on the other hand, is a celebration of Queer life, told as an re-envisioning of Catholic prayers. It’s very, very funny and intelligent.
I discovered, then devoured, the novels of Sam Wiebe — hardcore West Coast detective fiction. Very, very violent. I also devoured The Lightning Circle, a YA verse novel by Vikki Van Sickle that centres girls’ friendships positively and affirmingly — not unlike her picture book Into the Goblin Market, a retelling of Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market” that reframes sisterhood.
Finally, I reread Mary Robinette Kowal’s Lady Astronaut novels (specifically, The Calculating Stars, The Fated Sky, and The Relentless Moon, not the shorts) and am delighted that a new book in the series is scheduled to arrive later this year. Something to look forward to, along with another Richard Osman novel, a new John Scalzi, and a bushel of new poetry.
Music: Top 29 Plays
It’s difficult to talk about music this year. My listening has been exceptionally nostalgic, and merely thinking about some of the songs listed below makes me weepy.
• Kate Bush, “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)”
• Air Supply, “Sweet Dreams”
• Taylor Swift, “Karma”
• Kate Bush, “Burning Bridge”
• Simple Minds, “Don’t You (Forget About Me)”
• Dua Lipa, “Houdini”
• LP, “One Last Time”
• Muse, “Madness”
• Janelle Monáe, “Dance Apocalyptic”
• Tina Turner, “The Best”
• Blue Rodeo, “After the Rain”
• ABBA, “Chiquitita”
• Jim Croce, “I Got a Name”
• Dua Lipa, “Love Again”
• Gowan, “Moonlight Desires”
• Kate Bush, “Nocturn”
• The Lovin’ Spoonful, “Summer in the City”
• Rod Stewart, “Young Turks”
• Shakira, “Whenever, Wherever”
• Simon & Garfunkel, “The Boxer”
• Steppenwolf, “Magic Carpet Ride”
• Billie Eilish, “everything i wanted”
• Electric Light Orchestra featuring Olivia Newton-John, “Xanadu”
• George Michael and Aretha Franklin, “I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)
• Prince and the Revolution, “I Wonder U”
• The Doobie Brothers, “Long Train Runnin'”
• Lionel Richie, “Say You, Say Me”
• Luba, “Every Time I See Your Picture”
• Max Richter, “Summer 3 (2012)”
My library
as of this morning contains 31,122 tracks. Of those, 8,848 were unplayed
as of last night and 170 had been played at least 10 times.
I haven’t been acquiring much actually new music — although my first play of the year was Brat by Charli xcx (technically, I listened to Brat and it’s the same but there’s three more songs so it’s not) — but have been actively backfilling some catalogues, including, of course, my ridiculous collection of holiday music.
A point of
discussion in print culture studies has to do with extensive versus intensive
reading and whether scarcity or abundance is more damaging to literary culture.
A similar theme is emerging in music. When we can listen to so much music so easily, how
much is music really worth to us?
And with that thought I look forward to another year of indulging in culture — and, fortuitously, teaching others to do so as well. Cheers!
Good morning. The sun will rise today at 8:49 a.m. and set at 4:16 p.m. and then the days will begin to lengthen and the light will return. That's a sufficient event for me to celebrate.
And so I bring you ... another deranged erasure poem.
i. as.
You — merry.
He — light.
(trouble)
You — little.
He — tied.
(trouble)
We are old.
Happy // old //
Faith, friends dear ...
near us, once
We — together
flow ———
As high?
Ha! Merry you.
Best wishes of the season to you and yours: Happy Solstice!
Wheeeee, how the last few months have zoomed by! Now it's November — roughly seven weeks from the solstice and the winter holidays. Hold on tight!
But first there is the business of Hallowe'en. In a fit of anxiety, I bought extra extra candy, meaning we had a lot of candy leftover. Oops.
Our final tally was 269 trick-or-treaters. Down from last year, but still pretty impressive. Other people have told me they had fewer than 20 kids at their doors. Sigh.
Anyway. Here are our jack-o-lanterns. Cheers!
Happy Canada Day to those who celebrate! It's the second long weekend of the Canadian summer, and I'm hopeful for the time between now and Labour Day.
In the meanwhile, here is a stat about my iTunes library. As of this morning, the library itself contains 29,271 items, of which 17,726 are unplayed. Or to put it another way, I've played roughly 40 percent of the tracks in the library to date.
So begins the second part of the year, the part in which I'm anticipating considerable change. Fingers crossed for the next six months.
Well. So that was the first three months of the year. Wheeeeeee! Time sure flies.
The last three months have been up and down — delightful lunches with friends, but also the loss of friends. Some amazing celebratory days, but also days filled with sad news. Here's hoping the next three months will be somewhat duller and more mundane
But anon. Here's the data for which you're surely waiting breathlessly:
• Library total: 28,500 (approx)
• Played to date: 6,580 (approx)
• Tracks with at least 5 plays: 15
So. Belated Happy Easter to those who celebrate, and look out for happy April fools today.
Hello! It's 2024 — how did that happen? Seems like just a few days ago I was posting about all the hits of 2022. Well ... something something something time moving faster ... something something something getting older ... you get the idea ...
And so, without further ado ...
Unless your 2023 was very, very different from mine, you'll likely understand why there are so many old familiar tracks on this list. I continue to commute to work primarily by bus and use music for dopamine management. Is that strategy working? Well ...
Here are a few runners-up ...
And I should note two honorary mentions:
There are now almost 27,700 items in my Music library (27,689, although that number may include some non-song files). Of these, 5,616 remained unplayed at the end of the day on December 31, 2023, roughly 20 percent.
For the record, this may be the last year I can provide a data-based breakdown of my listening habits. Today or tomorrow we are migrating my music storage to a new system. Fingers crossed!
Here's the number you're all here for. My reading tally for 2023 was 120 books, not counting picture books or short Orca nonfiction.
I read several books by each of Ben Aaronovitch (magic-based mysteries), Nghi Vo (Asian fantasy), and Iona Whishaw (historical mysteries set near Nelson, BC). Some of my standout reading experiences this year include Babel by R.F. Kuang, Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus (the Netflix adaptation, less so), and In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts by Gabor Maté. Hoping for more from several of these authors in 2024.
I edited four books published in 2023: two contemporary novels, one historical novel, and one volume of poetry. I'm currently working on two more projects that will be published in 2024, and another that will be published (fingers crossed) in 2025.
My brain is very very tired, so that's all I can think of right now. I'll probably add more updates tomorrow or later in the week.
Here's to a kinder, gentler year ahead — at last!
Since I barely have the concentration to read lately, much of what I do read is fairly accessible — mysteries, bestselling fiction, middle-grade and YA, etc.
I'm not surprised to find the following passage in a middle-grade novel; just surprised by its acute relevance more than a decade after its original publication.
"They were afraid of the riots and the turmoil, the messiness of democracy. ... Democracy, my young friend, will always be at the mercy of those who say things run much easier and smoother without it! Just let us do our jobs, they say, without all this turmoil."
— Carol Matas, Behind Enemy Lines, page 67
A fine idea to remember in these increasingly authoritarian days.
G'day, and welcome to December! It's not exactly a brown month anymore, thanks to some snowfall last week, but we now inhabit a land of icy peril. Drive with care.
Last night, we went out, driving with care, of course, to a play. Last week we had seen MacEwan University's Legally Blonde: The Musical, which was frothy and fun. Yesterday we saw Indecent at Studio Theatre. Wow, what a play.
The set design was excellent. The acting was excellent, The script was excellent and powerful — moving, thought-provoking, timely (although the play is set in the early twentieth century). It was hands down the best play I've seen in years.
Last night was the closing night of its run, and if you missed it that's a shame. Bravo to Studio Theatre for this fine piece of work.
Hello!
So, it's November. In the last two months I have travelled to Kentucky and Regina, and in a couple of days I'll be in Vancouver. That's my reason for not writing for ... months ... y'know.
Anyway.
We counted 291 people at our door on Hallowe'en. And there was tequila. Here's a picture (of the door, not the tequila):
Next thing on the order papers is solstice. Wondering whether I can get myself organized for that, at least.
Cheers!
I had such plans for this summer. And now it's almost over!
Anyway.
In case you're wondering, as of today, I have exactly 26,600 tracks in my iTunes audio library. Of these, about 11,430 are currently unplayed. So there's that.
As I recently remarked on Twitter: Today I think all those eccentric professors in popular culture must have got that way after a turn or two at university administration. This week I feel this acutely.
And that is all.
Wishing you peace and ease ...
Last week was April 1, and I owed you, or at least myself, some stats. But I didn't make time to post them, although I wrote them down on a piece of paper. So here, belatedly, are my stale stats.
As of midnight on Friday, March 31, there are approximately 26,400 tracks in my iTunes. Of those, approximately 17,100 were unplayed — or, if you prefer, roughly 9,300 had been played at least once. Only 5 tracks had had more than 10 plays, and the most played album at that point was Dance Fever by Florence and the Machine.
Hey, and in case you're interested, a book I edited last year was officially published on April 1. Two books I edited last fall and during winter 2023 will be published this fall, and one I just finished editing will be published as an ebook in the next month or so. I am currently editing two other books, both of which will be published in 2024.
Words, words, words. And music.
Howdy howdy!
Welcome to February! January certainly sped by — unless you're one of those people who felt January crawled by. Your mileage may vary, I guess. Either way, here we are in the second month of the year, and what do we have to show for it?
I have stats!
From January 1 to 31, iTunes played at least 3,710 tracks, roughly 16 percent of the library.
And I read 11 books.
So. Onward!
Hello, 2023! Welcome. So glad you're here. Let's get to the stats, stat.
Top 30 Plays in 2022
Plus one: Regina Spektor, “Loveology,” which didn’t actually make the cut but almost certainly would have done if I’d bought the album when it first came out.
Once again this year, I listened overall to complete albums more than to random tracks. My most-played album was Florence and the Machine's Dance Fever, which is brilliant! It's the next thing I'll play today. Other top plays include LP's Churches and Prince's HITnRUN Phase One, which is currently my go-to album for difficult days. At present I'm listening extensively to Regina Spektor's new one, Home, before and after, and various albums by Max Richter. Looking to fill some gaps in my collection with gift certificates I received in the last couple of weeks, too!
According to last year's post, one year ago today I had approximately 22,450 tracks in my iTunes library. Today that figure is approximately 26,200. So, a substantial change — and I was able to listen to most of those tracks (roughly 83%) despite many problems with iTunes.
What were you listening to this year? If there's something great that I missed, let me know!
Reading in 2022
Well, unsurprisingly, like many people, I found that my attention did not bounce back in 2022 — particularly after the nasty surprise of shifting back to online teaching in Winter 2022 — so my reading stats look somewhat dismal. I'm genuinely surprised that I finished 100 books. Most of what I read was genre and gentle, but there were a few standouts:
My year-end total was 115 books. Of these, 83 were by female-identified authors, 27 were by male-identified authors (bizarrely, a substantial chunk of them in December), and 5 were by nonbinary authors or multiple authors. I plan to continue to read the work of Ben Aaronovitch, Iona Wishaw, and Guy Gavriel Kay in the new year — and will hope for another volume in the Thursday Murder Club series.
What tickled your fancy this year? Let me know!
In other textual news...
For us, the pandemic was not over in 2022, so we did very little of what we might have done in the Before Time. We did see one play at the beginning of December, and went to one small live-music event at the end of November; we also went to a book launch in Victoria in May, and I attended a few others early in the fall. We saw no movies in theatres but did watch a few on streaming services, including Knives Out and Glass Onion. We continue to consume mostly comedy — it's about all my brain is prepared for these days.
So once again, here's to the new year. Not to pressure anyone or anything, but I'm hoping it's better than the last few...
This is all I'm prepared to say until tomorrow:
1. Afternoon of September 3
and
2. Morning of December 22
Make of this what you will.
Welcome to November! We had beautiful Hallowe'en weather — and fittingly, as we turned the lights out at ten o'clock, snow began to sift down.
But in more important news, we had 283 trick-or-treaters at the door. Wow!
Here are our pumpkins!
That's all for now, folks.
Happy new year! Welcome to 2022. As writer Steven Brust observed, hoping this year will be better than 2021 is a low bar to clear — and it’s also all too plausible that 2022 won’t make it over. But that’s all in the future. Today, while the year is shiny and fresh, I’ll be hopeful.
You’re presumably here for the revelation of my 2021 textual consumption. Well, the news isn’t great — but you were expecting that, weren’t you?
Music
I listened to comforting music like the world was ending this year — because at times it felt like the world was ending. So no surprises in this list.
2021 Top 31 lol
Kate Bush, “Burning Bridge”
Shakira, “Whenever, Wherever”
ABBA, “Take a Chance on Me”
Air Supply, “Sweet Dreams”
Janelle Monae, “Dance Apocalyptic”
Janelle Monae, “Turntables”
ABBA, “Chiquitita”
Holy Boy, “The Sun Ain’t Gonna Shine (Anymore)”
Billie Eilish, “everything i wanted”
ABBA, “Summer Night City”
Tears for Fears, “Mad World”
Andy Gibb, “An Everlasting Love”
Janelle Monae, “Coma Alive (War of the Roses)”
Rise Against, “Savior”
LP, “One Last Time”
Olivia Newton-John / Electric Light Orchestra, “Xanadu”
LP, “Someday”
Queen, “You’re My Best Friend”
Jorge Luis Chacin, “Sueltala”
Prince & the Revolution, “I Wonder U”
ABBA, “Fernando”
Haiku Hands, “Not About You”
The Doobie Brothers, “Long Train Runnin’”
Meg Myers “Running Up That Hill”
Sheena Easton, “You Could Have Been with Me”
Deep Purple, “Hush”
George Michael and Aretha Franklin, “I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)”
Max Webster, “Let Go the Line”
Queen, “Killer Queen”
Teena Marie, “Lovergirl”
Knife Party, “Destroy Them with Lazers”
While I was intentionally listening to familiar music much of the time, I was also too familiar with some of the library and therefore actively seeking new sounds. I added A LOT of music to my library this year. I owned approximately 18,200 tracks on January 1, 2021. That figure is approximately 22,450 today, and only 420 of them were unplayed by December 31. More than 900 songs in my library were played at least 10 times, including 17 full albums, and 134 were played at least 20 times. My top 31 tracks were all played at least 30 times.
In summer 2021, the Prince estate released a new album, which I’m still getting to know. And in addition to the LONG-awaited new ABBA album, the fall also provided a new Brandi Carlile album and a new LP album. These were my big purchases; otherwise, most of my acquisitions were dance/EDM or backfilling holes in artist catalogues.
And with that, it’s time to reset the playcounts once again and hope that I can continue to track playcounts in 2022. Apparently the iTunes software isn’t keen on users being able to track their listening (although Apple is certainly keeping track).
Here’s to aural pleasure! What caught your ears in 2021?
Books
This was another dismal year for reading, as my concentration continues to be poor. Still, I managed to read 126 books and am grateful to have hit even that. Here are some stats:
• 96 books by women
• 25 books by men
• 5 books co-authored or co-edited
• 17 books of poetry (plus some verse novels)
• 23 nonfiction titles
• 3 graphica titles (plus several comics I didn’t count)
• 1 novel that I edited
Here are the most noteworthy titles I read:
• The Dog Who Lost His Bark by Eoin Colfer (MG fiction, illustrated)
• To Night Owl from Dogfish by Holly Goldberg Sloan and Meg Wolitzer (MG fiction)
• No Modernism Without Lesbians by Diana Souhami (nonfiction)
• South Away by Meaghan Marie Hackinen (nonfiction)
• The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue (fiction)
• Knot of Shadows by Lois McMaster Bujold (novella)
• Tell the Birds Your Body Is Not a Gun by Rayanne Haines (poetry)
Oh, hey, also I wrote an open-access grammar textbook, which will be uploaded into a OER repository later in 2022.
So, yeah. What books did you adore in 2021?
Once again, cheers! Here’s to 2022. Please be better than 2021.
(And wow, the Blogger WYSIWYG interface sucks now, doesn't it? Jeez.)
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