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The Moscow Mule isn’t Russian, but the myth behind its name is what gives the cocktail an added layer of flavour.

The drink is New York-inspired and appeared in the early 1940s. The story goes that three gentlemen from the bar industry – a distributor, a ginger beer-maker and a vodka distiller – dreamed up the cocktail together while at the bar in The Chatham Hotel in Manhattan. The guys combined a couple of jiggers of vodka with some ginger beer and gave it a good squeeze of lime. It’s really a pretty simple creation. And its a great thirst-quencher.

As for the name, vodka has for a very long time been associated with Russia, and some early imbibers of the drink, as they were testing it, thought that the spicy, snappy ginger beer gave the beverage a bit of a kick.

And the Moscow Mule was born.  

Here’s a recipe:

Moscow Mule
Ingredients
½ oz. lime juice
2 oz. vodka
6 oz. ginger beer

Method
Squeeze lime juice into a Moscow Mule mug. Drop in squeezed lime for good measure. Add 2 or 3 ice cubes. Pour in the vodka and fill with cold ginger beer. Serve with a stir stick.

Variation: The Kentucky Mule
An excellent substitution: use 2 oz. bourbon instead of vodka and garnish with a sprig of mint.

[Image/ Nan Palermo, via Wikimedia Commons]

Check out my latest post The (so-called) Moscow Mule from AndrewCoppolino.com.

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(This photo is a frame taken from footage shot by Richard Glaze back around 1962 -- I think; if anybody could help me identify the actual year, I'd be grateful. It's of a steam train excursion taken up north. Hopefully, I'll post the video at some point soon.)

For your reading pleasure, I thought I'd offer up another story that I published in my Tales From the Silence anthology. As you may know, Tales From the Silence is a companion anthology to The Sun Runners, set in the same universe where the Earth pushed the consequences of climate change back far enough that they had precarious colonies set up across the inner solar system before things caught up and the Earth collapsed. The anthology invites several authors to share tales about life on those colonies between the years the Earth went silent, and when, in The Sun Runners, it awakes and attempts to recapture its earlier influence.

A number of stories within the anthology also focus on Earth, as it recovers from the catastrophe and starts to rebuild over the intervening fifty years. After the Apocalypse in Moosonee takes place in the town of Moosonee on the shores of James Bay -- the end link of the Ontario Northland railroad connecting the community to the rest of Ontario, and its only ground link to civilization. The year is 2177, twenty-six years after the fall of the Manhattan Sea Wall that heralded the Earth's collapse and the start of its silence. The community has suffered, but it has pulled through. What happens when, after twenty-six years, something comes down the tracks?

I was honoured to have this story included in Volume 3 of Stephen Kotowych's Year's Best Canadian Fantasy and Science Fiction, published in 2025. Read on:

Rebeka had been hunting grolar bear when the government train came to town.

Blackflies beat against her face shield and caught in the netting of her kaffiyah. The brown-white bear stood in her sights. Birds chittered. A light breeze rattled the branches.

"Hold still, you."

She sighted down the barrel of her air rifle and blinked. Her ocular implant zoomed in. The brown-white bear doubled in size, then doubled again. It turned its head, and she focused in on its eye.

"Let's see what you've got."

The groler bear glowed green. Information popped out around it: Grizzly-polar hybrid; female; 150 kilograms.

Rebeka held her focus. The halo flickered. She clenched her jaw. "Come on . . ."

Female . . . 150 kilograms . . . Elderly.

"Yes!"

Past cub-rearing age.

"That's what I needed to see." Enough meat to last the winter. More Vitamin A from its liver than they'd ever know what to do with, though Doctor King had been good at convincing the Kalaallit traders to accept his pills. The kids could have new coats before the snows hit.

Now, to calculate the shot.

The halo flashed. New information flowed out: distance, trajectory--

Suddenly, the halo flashed brilliantly. "Ow!"

Rebeka reared back, banging the side of her head like a blackfly had found its way through the netting. "Ow! Ow! Stop it!"

Very like a blackfly.

She clenched her eyes shut. "Come on! Don't give up on me now!"

The flashes stopped. She opened her unaltered eye, looked around, then closed it and opened her implant. She blinked and rubbed her temple. "Okay. Okay, back to work." She settled into the brush and sighted down the barrel again. "Where were we?"

She held her breath. The grolar bear lowered its head into the implant's crosshairs. She rested her finger on the trigger and blinked the safety off. "Go to sleep, old mother," she whispered. "I'll make sure the townkids thank you for their coats." She tightened her finger.

A howl rose through the muskeg and echoed off the hills. The grolar bear jerked up just as Rebeka's gun chuffed. Seconds later, a hole blasted into the trunk of the tree behind where the bear had been.

"Damn it!" Rebeka shoved herself onto her knees, then froze. The howl was still going. What is that noise? Her first thought had been a wolf, but they couldn't hold a note this long, and there was too much power behind it. Then, as suddenly as it started, it stopped, leaving only echoes in its wake.

Then it started again.

Rebeka clambered to her feet as the second howl lasted as long as the first. It was followed by a third, much shorter howl before a fourth, long one rose. When it ended, Rebeka stood in a forest startled into silence.

Wait.

She started forward, slinging her rifle over her shoulder.

Two long howls, one short, then one long. Only one thing makes that sound . . .

Pausing to geotag where her bullet had struck the tree, Rebeka ran for the rail crossing.

As she ran through the bush, she heard echoes rise from the distant hills: a rhythmic clank of metal, a rumble of engines, the scrape and squeal of wheel against rail. She came out onto an old logging road in time to see a gleam of metal a hundred metres ahead as something crossed the gap in the trees. She heard another howl, almost deafening this time, and a prolonged squeal of brakes, then a thump.

Rebeka skidded down the lumber trail. The rumble of engines continued, this time accompanied by snatches of shouts. She slowed as she reached the level crossing. Planting herself in the shrubbery beside the rails, she peered out.

The train was made up of three self-propelled passenger cars, their sides sun-bleached, dented, and scratched. Most of the windows were covered with corrugated metal. Enough scrap to patch the whole town! At the front of the train stood a dozen people wearing long, loose, camo-coloured cloaks over overalls. They'd wrapped their heads against the blackflies with keffiyehs of netting, too, but stared out at the world through goggles. They wore wide-brimmed khaki hats, and they all had rifles, some held at the ready.

Rebeka ventured out from the shrubs and ducked behind the rear of the train beside the coupler. Everybody's attention was focused at the front. One man climbed down from the cab. He had no rifle. The others flanked him as he crept forward. Rebeka blinked and zoomed in for a closer look.

She winced. The grolar bear lay splayed and messy against the front of the train. Poor thing!

The lead man straightened up, shaking his head. He gestured at the bear, and the others slung their rifles over their shoulders and stepped forward. Voices rose as they cleared the carcass away.

Rebeka geotagged this site, too.

In her zoomed vision, the lead man turned, then paused. He stared across the distance of the train at her position. At her. He tilted his head and started forward.

Rebeka ducked back under cover. As voices approached, she turned and ran for the logging road, diving back into the bush the first chance she got. She raced for home.

#

Rebeka couldn't imagine Moosonee without the sea at its doorstep. The story of James Bay ending twenty kilometres downstream on a river before the waters rose and flooded Moose Factory had been just that: a story. Instead, the smell of salt and the scream of gulls rising over the rush of the pines always called her home.

She crashed out of the bush and followed the old powerline cut until she got to Quarry Road. She kept running. She followed the rutted track as it curved and descended, pulling up beside the rail line as it approached her town. She passed a battered, faded sign that read MOOSONEE, POPULA--.

Patched-up houses and pre-fab stores stretched out ahead of her along dusty roads. The tracks skirted the edge of the town opposite the estuary to the old train station--now the Meeting Hall--beside the Community Centre. People were already gathering on First Street, staring up the line toward the forest and beyond.

Rebeka waved her hands as she drew close. "Hey! Hey!" She pulled off her face shield and unwound her kaffiyah. "Hey! Train!"

"We heard!" Mrs. Freisberg smiled as Rebeka approached. The silver-haired woman squinted at the tree line through cracked glasses. "I haven't heard that sound in over twenty-five years!"

"I saw!" Rebeka waved back the way she'd come, then leaned on her knees, gasping. "They--" She took a deep breath, gulped, then continued. "They ran into a grolar bear at the logging road crossing."

"Whoa! Really?" Kile and his friends leaped up from the stoop of the old Thrift Store. "How long is it?"

"Those things could stretch kilometres!" Liz added. "Long chains of cars, carrying ore, grain, wood! Did you count them?"

"Just three, I'm afraid." Rebeka ruffled Liz's hair to the girl's annoyance. She turned to the others. "Three self-propelled passenger cars, bringing people." To Doctor Elijah King, standing in the doorway to his pharmacy, she added, "Dad, they got rifles."

In the distance, the train whistled twice. The rush of motors and clank of wheels started up again.

King stepped onto the street, as did Brody from the door of the hardware store and Karen from her coffee shop. She hadn't served coffee since the Manhattan Sea Wall failed, but she did serve a legendary bone broth. Karen handed Rebeka a steaming mug.

King glared up the line. "Southerners," he growled.

Brody chuckled softly and patted King's shoulder. "Of course, they're Southerners. Who else could they be? Californians would also be southerners to us."

"And the guns are not a surprise," Karen added. "You'd be an idiot to step into the wilderness without them."

"Still," King grumbled.

"Do you think they'll have news?" Ahead of them, Mrs. Freisberg stared at the train line. Her voice was eager, upbeat, but her hands twisted the strap of her purse. "Do you think they'll know about John?"

Brody, King, and Karen glanced at each other. The townsfolk stayed silent. Rebeka bit her lip.

"Maybe," said Karen at last.

King coughed. "I'm sure they have a few stories to tell."

"No harm in asking," Brody added. He glanced at Karen, who nodded and gestured at Kile. Kile nodded and ran into the coffee shop. He came out a moment later with a tray of steaming mugs and handed one to Mrs. Freisberg. She accepted it, not taking her eyes off the line.

The street filled up, more people hurrying in from the outskirts. Some carried whatever they'd been holding when they'd heard the train horn, mugs most often, but sometimes tools or a battered book. The younger kids joined up with Liz, chattering, while Kile hurried back into the coffee shop to deliver more bone broth. Some of the kids started playing train, running around in conga lines, while the bigger kids leaned on walls and pretended to be unimpressed. Old people frowned while parents leaned together and whispered.

Rebeka slung off her rifle, handing it to Brody. He checked the magazine. "You fired a shot?"

"A miss," she replied.

"You geotagged the spot?"

She rolled her eyes. "Of course, Other Dad."

"Hey," King chided. "Be kind."

"I am being kind, Dad," said Rebeka. "How long has it been since I lost a shell? Years? You two won't let me forget about that."

"Well, 'Beka," King began. "Bullets--"

"Bullets don't grow on trees." Rebeka rolled her eyes again. "If I had a shell casing for every time I heard that, we wouldn't have to worry about recycling our supply."

"How did you miss?" Brody cut in.

Rebeka shrugged. "The train horn disturbed the grolar bear."

"The same bear that got hit by that train?"

She nodded. "Geotagged that as well. Should still be a lot of usable flesh left."

"Good job." Brody gave Rebeka a smile and a wink. "You think the liver's okay?"

King sighed. "Don't you start, you two."

Rebeka grinned. "Yeah. Should be plenty of Vitamin A there! Don't want to run out of that." She looked up at King. "Right, Dad?"

He rolled his eyes.

The train horn sounded, closer this time. The town kids joined in, making whistle sounds in response. Conversations buzzed. Brody and King drew closer with the crowd, Rebeka a step behind.

"How could they be here?" asked Brody.

"They must have figured out a way around Otter Rapids," King replied.

Brody let out a chuff of disbelief. "They'd need to build a new bridge for that, past the ruined dam and overtop the old town. How could they have done that without us noticing?"

Karen paused between handing out mugs. "Well, it is a hundred and forty kilometres away."

Brody turned to her. "I saw the rail end this past spring. It's a dead drop into the canyon, and there's nothing there but rocks and trees and water. They'd have to have moved in supplies and built a bridge in less than six months. We should have noticed something."

"Could they have used the New Government Road?" asked Rebeka.

"It's in even worse shape," Brody replied. "It's washed out pretty much everywhere north of Iroquois Falls."

"Well, however they did it, they did it," said King, as headlights broke out from the treeline. He raised his voice over the shouts and cheers of the other townsfolk. "And now we're going to meet them." He nodded at the former station. "Appropriately, at the Meeting Hall."

#

As they walked toward the train station/Meeting Hall, Rebeka's vision flared. She staggered, then stepped to one side, leaning against a wall. She kept her implant eye closed as she massaged her temple.

Shadows fell over her. King and Brody looked down. They didn't say anything. They didn't need to.

"It's okay," she said through gritted teeth. She turned away, forced her eye open, then blinked rapidly. "Just a glitch."

Brody's voice pitched up. "Clearly, it's not."

"Other Dad--"

"Bex!" He waved his arms. "These are coming almost daily now! You can't keep living like this. We need to take you up the coast."

She glared at him. "Did the hospital in Attawapiskat take delivery of a new batch of implants?" She gestured at her implant. "Because otherwise, they're just going to remove this."

Brody started to shout, caught himself, and then lowered his voice. "Better that than pain."

"Easy for you to say," she snapped. "You're not looking at blindness."

"Brody?" King's voice was calm, quiet. "Go on to the Meeting Hall. Save us a spot."

Brody drew in his breath, looked at King, frowned at Rebeka, and then stalked off, shaking his head.

Rebeka pulled a necklace of metal beads from her pocket. She ran the rosary through her fingers and breathed deep against the memory of pain.

King pulled a match from his pocket. It flared to life as he crouched low to get a good look at her eye. Rebeka huffed but opened her eye wide. "The thing's still working, Dad! I would have had the bear if the train hadn't startled it."

"It's not about that, and you know it." King waved the match out and stuffed it back in his pocket. "Brody doesn't like to see you in pain. Neither do I. I'm not seeing any physical damage yet, but if this gets any worse, you're going to the hospital in Attawapiskat."

Rebeka looked away. The rosary beads clicked between her fingers. "Dad, I can't put food on the table with just one eye, and a normal one at that."

King gave her a tight smile. "You'll adjust. And it doesn't have to be just you who puts food on the table, you know."

"I'm the best shot in town thanks to this implant," she snapped. "If I don't put food on the table, what good am I?"

"You're my daughter; that's what good you are." He gripped her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "And that's plenty good enough."

She pushed his hand away. "I don't want to talk about this right now." She pocketed her rosary and shoved past him. "Come on. We don't want to miss this meeting."

#

The brakes squealed as the train descended the line into town. Its horn blared, and kids who'd stepped too close clamped their hands over their ears. The train slowed as it reached the platform, which was now full of people.

Finally, the engines cut out and, brakes squealing, the train eased to a stop. Metal shutters pulled away from the windows, revealing soldiers in camo gear, faces obscured by netting and goggles. Rifles were slung over their shoulders. They stared out at the people on the platform and the people stared back. The kids and some of the older folks started to edge away.

At the head of the train, the cab door opened, and a man stepped to the edge. Rebeka recognized his long coat, netting, and hat from the logging road crossing. He looked out at the audience, then pulled off his hat and goggles, unwinding his kaffiyah netting, revealing the face of a clean-shaven man with short, brown-blond hair and dark eyes. "Hello!" His smile showed brilliant white teeth.

He raised his hat high, and his voice. "Hello, Moosonee! I'm so glad to see you all here! How long has it been? Twenty-six years? But you're still here! Wonderful! Wonderful!" He clapped, loud and hard, and the soldiers at the train windows started clapping as well.

At the back of the crowd, Rebeka watched the townsfolk look around, many confused. But as the applause continued, some straightened their shoulders, looking proud. She found herself nodding, thinking, Damn straight. We're still here.

The man continued, "My name is Drew McMurtry, and I work for the Toronto District Government."

He tossed his hat, goggles, and kaffiyah inside the cab, clambered down onto the platform, then gestured to the soldiers on the train. "Take the nets off, all of you! The blackflies aren't bad around here. Let everybody see your faces!" He turned back to the crowd. "Let everybody see everybody. This is . . ." He stopped, sighed, and, when he looked up, seemed almost in tears. "This is a great reunion after all this time. We're so glad to see you all there."

He clapped again as the soldiers removed their nets and goggles, revealing men and women. Some men had beards, some not. Some soldiers had close-cropped hair; others wore their hair longer. Without the keffiyehs and goggles, all looked . . . young. Nervous. Shy. They smiled and applauded, and, this time, the townsfolk clapped with them.

As the applause ebbed, McMurtry raised his hands. "I'd like to speak to your council. We have a lot of catching up to do." He gestured as two soldiers pulled open a loading door in the middle of the first car. Each held a cardboard box in their hands. "First things first, though: to the people of Moosonee, we're from Toronto, and we bring . . . chocolate!"

Two soldiers jumped onto the platform, opening the boxes to reveal rows of foil-wrapped bars. Everyone stared. Then the kids rushed forward en masse before being held back, barely, by their parents. After brief chaos, the crowd organized the children into lines. Each kid received one bar and thanked the soldier handing them out before going immediately to the back of the line for a second offering.

Rebeka looked at the boxes in the soldiers' hands and noted similar ones in the train car behind them. There's probably enough in there to give every child quite a sugar high.

King glanced at Rebeka. He and Brody shared a look. Then he nudged Karen, who nodded. She stepped forward to McMurtry and stuck out her hand. "Mr. McMurtry, welcome to Moosonee." Smiling, he shook her hand. "My name is Karen Quachegan," she continued. "I'm the . . . mayor of this town." She gestured at the station behind her. "Why don't we go into the Meeting Hall? We have bone broth."

Rebecca watched as Karen, Brody, and King led McMurtry into the station. Two soldiers followed close behind. On the train, four soldiers wrestled a waist-high crate to the edge of the train's loading doors and called for help. Townsfolk rushed forward to assist. As everyone worked, Rebecca counted the soldiers in her head.

Two dozen, she thought. And all of them with guns.

#

After the soldiers and townsfolk volunteers loaded the large crate onto a cart, Rebeka followed them as the soldiers guided the cart into the Meeting Hall. McMurtry, flanked by his two soldiers, sat at one side of the head table while Karen sat at the other, Brody and King beside her. Everybody clasped steaming mugs of bone broth. Townsfolk pulled up seats around them.

McMurtry gestured to the crate as it entered. "More gifts from the Toronto District Government. Chocolate is a nice treat, but probably not all that you need, am I right?"

"That's very generous, Mr. McMurtry." Karen smiled, looking almost embarrassed by all these gifts. "We have been doing all right here since things stabilized. Some of the older ways helped, including hunting, but new supplies are always appreciated. We have to geotag our bullets so we can rescue and recycle them before they go extinct. The component parts of our rifles can be fixed up only so many times."

"That's why we're here," said McMurtry. "I think this will help provide all of the supplies you need."

King coughed. "We appreciate all of these gifts from the south, Mr. McMurtry, but we are all wondering how you came to be here."

McMurtry tilted his head. "Well . . . what was the last thing you heard from . . . us?"

"We heard the Manhattan Sea Wall failed," said Brody. "We heard there were riots. Then the electricity cut out and we lost the Internet. We had to rely on ham radios to get any sort of news after that. The last thing we heard from the south was the warning from Otter Rapids that the dam at the Abitibi Generating Station had collapsed and that we had to get to higher ground, fast. Since then, all our news has come from the north."

McMurtry nodded solemnly. "That . . . that must have been really hard." He smiled, still solemn. "There were hard years for us, too, but we managed to restore order in the city and save the farms around it. We kept Holland Marsh from flooding, and that stabilized our food supply. We moved City Hall into Queen's Park, and since then, we've been bringing the surrounding settlements under our protection as we can manage it. Hamilton. Waterloo. Belleville. Ottawa's a big mess. And as for the Dominion of Montreal . . ." His lip curled a moment. "Well, we've banged heads with them, but I think we've come to an understanding. The peace has held."

He leaned back. "Since then, we've been reaching out, seeing who we can help, making things safe for everybody, bringing things back to some level of normalcy. There are jobs to be done--paying jobs--and we need people to fill them. We're trading with Michigan, the Boston Free State, the Montrealers, even. The world is starting to come back together, and we want to help that process along. And that's why we're here, with supplies and . . . more." He gestured to the soldier on his right.

The soldier, a woman, stood up. She had close-cropped blonde hair and wore a white armband on her sleeve emblazoned with a red cross. "Hello, everybody. My name is Sergeant Mireille Baker, and I'm a medic. With your permission, I'd like to talk to all of you and hear about any medical issues you might have. We've brought medicines, and we have access to more back south. Does anybody have any issues they'd like to go over with with me?"

Silence settled on the room as, without making it obvious, the townsfolk focused on King. He leaned back in his seat and gave a barely perceptible nod to Karen. She gave that nod back and shifted in her seat. "I'm sure many of us wouldn't mind being seen to by a southern medic."

The townsfolk relaxed. Hands rose. If McMurtry or any soldiers noticed the silence and communication, they didn't indicate it. Conversations swelled, people talking to Baker, people talking to each other. Karen turned to McMurtry and beckoned others toward them to talk business. Rebeka stepped closer.

"Things are happening in the Arctic," said McMurtry. "Nations are trading all the way to Siberia. There's mineral exploration. There's a lot of opportunity up there. You could be a part of that, and we could help." He smiled and nodded as though expecting thanks. "We can offer protection; stop those Greenlander pirates if they ever show their faces--"

The door opened, and soldiers and townsfolk entered, carrying boxes and heading for the storeroom. They jostled past Rebeka, who stepped back to let them pass, only to hear Kile shout.

"They're not pirates!" he blurted. People turned to see the boy standing to one side, holding an empty tray. McMurtry frowned, but Kile didn't stop. "And they're not called Greenlanders. Their nation is Kalaallit Nunaat! They show up every spring, trading seal meat and fruits from Europe for medicines and lumber!"

Kile's mother hurried forward and whispered to him. He glared at her. "Well, they're not!" he grumbled as she led him away.

McMurtry coughed. "Well, I'm glad to hear you've had good dealings with the people of the Arctic. Things can be different in different parts of the world. I know the Newfoundlanders aren't too happy with them." He laughed. "Anyway--"

"Excuse me?" Sergeant Baker was suddenly at Rebeka's side, staring at her. "Are you using an ocular implant?"

Rebeka blinked, then nodded. Baker took out what looked to Rebeka like a metal wand with an eyepiece on it. A light flashed on inside it. "May I?" Baker asked.

Rebeka nodded again, and Baker stepped her back, leaned close, and gently pressed Rebeka's eye open wider. She shone the light into Rebeka's pupil. Rebeka grunted as her implant flashed and flared.

"Sorry," Baker breathed. "How long have you had this?"

"I got it when I was four," Rebeka replied. "About a year before the Sea Wall fell."

"Huh." Baker shut off the light and leaned back. "Well, that explains it. Those things are not designed to last more than twenty years without regular maintenance, and you've made it last more than twenty-five!"

"Tell me about it," Rebeka grumbled. "My dads want me to go to the hospital in Attawapiskat, but what can they do about it?"

"Probably nothing except remove it," Baker replied. "But we can replace it in Toronto."

"What?" Rebeka stared at Baker. "You're telling me these things aren't extinct? Some of them survived the EMPs?"

Baker shrugged. "Not a lot of the old technology did, but some. We've stockpiled what we've found to use as spare parts." She looked Rebeka in her implanted eye. "Spare parts to fix exactly your problem."

For a moment, Rebeka stood speechless. Then, she whispered, "Wh-what would I have to do? Where would I have to go?"

Baker pulled a card from her pocket. "Take this. It's the address of Toronto General Hospital. Come to the city and make an appointment. We could see you within the day. It's as easy as that." She patted Rebeka's arm.

Then she moved on to her next patient, leaving Rebeka staring after her.

#

McMurtry and his soldiers stayed in town for two hours. Karen and others led groups down to the estuary, where the Torontonians stared at the docks where rowboats floated and gulls cried above them. Finally, McMurtry thanked everyone, announced that he had to return south, and gave a speech about reconnection and hope. The townsfolk cheered as, with two loud whistles, the government train departed.

The townsfolk watched it go, then turned to the crate McMurtry's people had delivered.

In the Meeting Hall, Brody brought a hammer and a crowbar. Soon, they had the lid off and were tossing aside paper packing fluff. People crowded in until Rebeka waved her arms. "Hey! Give us room!" The people backed up.

"Everything we needed to help with your lives here, they said," King muttered. "If they'd given us some notice, I'd have given them a list."

"I'm sure there's plenty of things we can use," said Brody.

"I didn't like what they said about the Kalaallit," Kile grumbled. "It's the Scandinavians who are pirates; them and that European Federation they're forming. The Kalaalit Nunaat have to deal with them all the time."

"It's politics, Kile," said his Mom.

"Politics can kill, Mom!"

Brody pulled aside a sheet. "Here we are!"

Townsfolk surged forward again before backing up from Rebeka's baleful glare.

However, everyone liked what they saw. Murmurs of appreciation rose at the metal cans, glass jars, and packages wrapped in wax paper. Brody sniffed the paper packages. "Beef jerky."

"Beef!" Liz exclaimed.

Karen gathered some of the packages into her arms. "That's going on the menu tonight. It will make a nice change from moose."

Brody sniffed another package. "Coffee!"

Karen dropped the jerky. "Back, everybody! Back!" She grabbed the packages. "I'll serve this up tomorrow morning. Bottomless cups all around, but only if you don't stampede!" This brought a cheer and some laughter from the townsfolk.

King looked deeper. "I'm seeing cabbages, zucchini, fruit preserves." Around him, people buzzed. Winter did not seem so cold now.

Rebeka pointed. "Dad, look at those jars. Are those medicines?"

King peered closer. "Yes! Antibiotics. Minerals. Multivitamins, and . . ." He pushed some jars aside, stopped, and then started laughing.

"What?" said Brody, as did others in the crowd.

"Elijah, what?" asked Karen.

"Dad?" said Rebeka.

He pulled something from the box and struggled to get his laughter under control. He held up a bottle. "They gave us Vitamin A!"

He started laughing again. This time, everyone joined in.

Karen and Brody passed packages to townsfolk, who hurried to the storeroom while King and Rebeka sorted through the rest of the crate. King removed the last item and swept his hand along the bottom of the crate. "That's all of it."

"Meat, vegetables, medicines, even candy and linens," said Brody. "Not a bad haul."

King looked up. "True. Not a bad haul." But he frowned.

Brody peered at him. "What's wrong?"

King said nothing. But for Rebeka, it clicked. "Everything we need to help us with our lives here," she echoed. "Any air canisters?"

King shook his head.

"Any rifle parts?" she asked.

"No," said King.

Karen halted. Brody raised his chin, realization dawning. "Any bullets?"

King looked grim. "No."

Silence descended on the Meeting Hall.

#

Rebeka crested a hill and hit a blessed downslope as the rail line eased into the canyon of the Abitibi River. The dynamos of her railbike whined as the regenerative braking kicked in. Blackflies smacked against her visor and snagged in the netting of her kaffiyah. She looked ahead at the bend that would reveal the old community of Otter Rapids and the ruins of the generating station there.

Ahead, she heard the whistle of the government train blowing around a distant curve.

#

"Everything we needed, they said," Brody said. "Didn't they know we're hunters?"

"Who isn't this far north?" Rebeka muttered in reply. She ran her rosary beads over her fingers.

King sucked his teeth. "No. Not everything we needed. Everything they thought we needed. Everything they thought it was safe to give us. So we would welcome them the next time. The chocolate and candy were a nice touch. I'm surprised they didn't offer roses."

#

On her railbike, Rebeca rounded a bend, and the ruins of Otter Rapids spread out before her, denuded hillsides, old foundations and broken dam abutments showing where the community had been. She pulled to a stop where the rails used to end and stared ahead.

More trees had been stripped from the hills above the high water line to build a long, winding, makeshift trestle snaking along the canyon wall, skirting the townsite. It was at least a kilometre long--one point two kilometres, her implant told her--before it passed the remains of the generating station, and the rails gripped the ground again.

At the other end of the long trestle, the government train slowed to a stop.

#

Mrs. Freisburg had leaned back against the crate. "Why wouldn't they give us any bullets?" The townsfolk didn't answer. She didn't blink; the answer was obvious. So she moved on. "What would they want that they're worried we'd say 'no' to?"

Karen stared at the ceiling. Brody fretted. King stared into the crate. Others shifted on their feet, nervous or disconsolate.

Rebeka's fingers stopped clicking. She looked up. "They want the Arctic." Everybody looked at her. "You heard them: there's resources up there. They'll need a port to access that, and we're the closest one they can get."

"How big a port?" Brody asked.

They stared out the station window at the battered, patched-up town, their homes, and the docks on the estuary a few blocks away.

"They'll need something that can handle a lot of goods," said King. "Something they can defend. You heard their cracks about 'Greenlanders.' They're not expecting the other players up north to play nice."

"They're not going to ask us for permission, are they?" said Brody.

"They may ask," said King. "But I don't think they're going to take 'no' for an answer."

#

Rebeka hopped off her railbike. Keeping low, she crept along the railbed to the start of the trestle and zoomed in on the government train.

Her implant flickered. She grunted, frustrated, and tapped her temple. Then she focused closer.

#

Kile yelled as, at the station, he pumped the pedals of the railbike. "Come on and help, Liz! It's been a half hour, and the battery's just at fifty percent!"

Liz hurried over to help.

Rebeka set down her box on the trailer behind the railbike. Behind her, King continued. "Follow them as far as you can. Don't let them see you. Your implant should allow you to spy on them from far enough back. Find out what they're not telling us. You need to see how they act when their guard is down."

She nodded, then, after a brief hesitation, gripped King's hand and Brody's and pulled them closer. "Dad? Other Dad? The medic, Sergeant Baker . . . She said they could fix my implant in Toronto."

Silence fell between them. Brody looked at King. "Elijah, if there's a chance--"

King looked at Rebeka. "Do you think there's a chance?"

Rebeka sucked in her breath. "I don't know. If they could fix it, I'd get it fixed, but . . . What if they want to hurt us--"

King straightened up. "You have to make the call." He looked grim. "I'm sorry, but you have to decide whether we can work with them or . . ." He looked at Brody.

"Or?" Rebeka prompted.

"Or . . ." Brody sighed. "If we need more time to prepare for them."

Rebeka bit her lip and looked at King, then at Brody. She took a deep breath. "All right."

#

Around the government train, soldiers fanned into the bushes, stamping around, some taking bathroom breaks. Others gathered around--what were those things? Mounds? Mounds on pallets, covered in tarps.

They'd cleared the land and stashed these items before going into town, she realized. As she watched, soldiers pulled aside one of the tarpaulins, and Rebeka tuned her zoom higher.

"That . . . is a big gun," she whispered.

Her implant pulled up information from before the fall of the Manhattan Sea Wall. Identification: Gomm Cogne 47, crowd-control configuration. Capable of sixty rounds per second, rubber buckshot.

The soldiers moved it toward the train, looking north as they did so.

She returned to the railbike, unhooked it from its trailer, and pulled it from the tracks. She set it in the ditch, then faced the trailer.

#

At the station, Rebeka grunted as she, King, and six other townsfolk hauled the trailer onto the tracks and hooked it to the railbike. "Does this have to be so heavy? It'll be agony getting this to Otter Rapids."

Mrs. Friesburg and Liz rolled up with a cart. "This is the last bit of blasting material we salvaged from Victor Mine."

"If they've rebuilt the line the way I think they have," said Brody, "We need to direct the force of the blast down at the tracks. This thing has to be as heavy as possible so it doesn't become an upward projectile."

"It will still become an upward projectile," said King. "Just not a good one. Either way, make sure you're not nearby when it goes."

Rebeka nodded. She and Karen and other townsfolk began moving the explosives onto the trailer.

Mrs. Freisburg faced south, took off her cracked glasses, and closed her eyes. "John."

#

At trackside, Rebeka pulled the trigger over to prime it, only to have it flash and spark in her hands. She yanked it free lest it set off the explosives beside her. "God dammit!" She looked at the connection, but the box got hot and started smoking in her hands. She tossed it into the ditch. She took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and looked at where the trigger used to connect with the fuse.

"Percussion fuse," she muttered. "I can work with that."

She braced her hands against the trailer, braced her feet against the ties, and pushed. The trailer moved, slowly at first. She took one step, then another. The trailer picked up speed on the incline. She pushed harder, stepped faster, then stumbled and fell face-first onto the ties.

The trailer kept rolling, rounding the curve, accelerating down the incline onto the long trestle.

Rebeka staggered to her feet, legs bleeding. She unslung her rifle and sighted down the barrel at the fuse. Her implant calculated distance, windspeed, trajectory.

She glanced at the soldiers and the government train. She saw McMurtry shaking his head at the crowd-control weapon.

"Sorry, government man," she muttered. "You may have offered us the carrot, but you still brought the stick." She counted down the seconds to her shot.

Then, her implant flashed white.

She yelled and clenched her eyes shut against the pain. It was worse than staring into the sun. She tried opening her unaltered eye, but it was no good. She couldn't focus.

She smacked her temple twice, then once more, and her implant switched off, leaving only darkness in her right eye, but thankfully, no more pain.

Growling, she switched her grip on her gun and sighted down the barrel with her left eye. The fuse blurred in her vision. Focus, she thought. Focus! She counted down.

At the other end of the trestle, someone shouted. She pulled the trigger.

The gun chuffed and shoved against her shoulder. A blink later, the trailer exploded. The blast pitched Rebeka onto the ballast.

For a moment, she stared at the sky with half her vision, listening as wood crackled and debris fell. Gradually, the buzz of blackflies and the chitter of birds returned, along with the rustle of pines.

She sat up.

The trestle, with its wood piled on wood, stood shaken and out of alignment, a huge chunk missing from its centre. Pieces burned. As she watched, piles broke away, knocking into other supports. Finally, with a groan and a rumble, the bridge came apart, tree trunks snapping like twigs as they avalanched into the canyon below.

Through the smoke and flames, Rebeka saw the government train on the other side of the gap. She saw McMurtry standing at the cab door. His shoulders sagged. Behind him, the train let out a long, mournful whistle that echoed off the hills.

And, across the hills, other whistles answered.

They weren't echoes. They varied in pitch. Rebeka counted them under her breath. "Three . . . four . . ." Some were faint with distance. "Seven . . . eight . . ." Others . . . others were close. "Eleven . . . twelve . . . "

Only then did the whistles stop, their howls fading to echoes, then silence.

McMurtry turned away. The soldiers climbed aboard. Slowly at first, then picking up speed, the government train vanished into the woods.

Follow Drew McMurtry's story with the short tale, Big Fish, Little Fish.

 By the east side I mean literally everything east of the Canagagigue Creek as well as east of the Lanxess/Stroh property line. By greater than the public knew I mean that Uniroyal Chemical and corporate successors have intentionally misrepresented the state of groundwater aquifers both on and off their property. The purpose is obvious. Not only have they fought to ignore and minimize my revelations in 2014 concerning the natural surface flow of their liquid contamination from their east side pits over onto the Stroh property but by falsely pretending that the bulk of the Stroh property sits upon low permeability aquitards (UAT, MAT, LAT) they have pretended that once again there is no means, conduit or flow path from the east either back into the Municipal Aquifers (MU, ML) under Elmira or into the Bedrock Aquifer (BR) beneath Elmira. Their misrepresentation has also grossly reduced over the last thirty-six or thirty-seven years the probability that their is a direct hydraulic connection between those three aquifers under the Stroh property permitting ready vertical contamination of the Bedrock Aquifers under Elmira with DNAPLS, Dioxins, DDT, PAHs and much more. This exacerbates the already known worst case scenario of the Uniroyal Chemical site and may very well be the final straw that broke the camel's back (i.e. remediation to drinking water standards).

This new information comes from a "Schematic Of Hydrogeologic Units " dated January 2024, Figure 1.2  It is also marked Onterris Proprietary & Confidential and was handed out to TRAC at their last public meeting on September 17, 2026. It may also have been handed out to them sooner by GHD but I am confident that there has not been any public announcement of the major significance of the subsurface changes of what was known for decades as the Conceptual Site Model (CSM). Of course it is confidential because afterall we citizens and residents have no rights other than simply being the guinea pigs eventually going to be drinking again from these still amazingly contaminated aquifers.    

Since 2014 I have been fairly confident that Woolwich Township were doing Uniroyal/Lanxess a solid by moving the Elmira By-Pass to the east side of town and hence burying under roads and commercial development much of Uniroyal Chemical's off-site eastward contaminant flow. This is similar to the desperation moves of Varnicolor Chemical in the early 1990s by suddenly putting concrete over a large part of their grossly contaminated 62 Union St. site. Isn't it sad that dirty polluters and their political friends couldn't spend their money actually cleaning up rather than covering up? 

♦

I took the above photograph earlier this month while visiting the Underground City (Toronto's disappointingly named PATH network). It's a table at the Pigeon Cafe where I got some free wifi, some power, and a chance to do some writing.

Hey, do you remember the heyday of blogging? Do you remember blogging memes? Looking through my old pages of this online journal of mine, I came upon this post from January 10, 2008 (eighteen years ago!). I titled it Top Ten Signs You're Reading Something from James Bow.

At the time, I was responding to a meme post by R.J Anderson (who is now mostly on Instagram, here) talking about the tropes of her writing. I did the same. At the time, I'd published two books of my Unwritten Books trilogy, with a third one due to come out later that year. The Unwritten Girl, Fathom Five, and The Young City, were upper middle-grade, young YA urban fantasy novels. Since then, I have two YA science fiction novels, a new adult urban fantasy, and I've self-published another YA urban fantasy, and edited and released a science-fiction anthology (see them all here).

How has my writing changed in the eighteen years since that meme? After reading what I wrote, I thought it might be good to revisit my points and see. So, without further ado:

Top Ten Signs You're Reading Something by James Bow

1. No Real Villains. While at the time I had created a fairly irredeemable villain in the form of Aldous Magnait (The Young City), I still preferred to keep my villains in shades of grey. The antagonists of The Unwritten Girl and Fathom Five both had strong and pretty reasonable motivations to act as they did, and they either resolved their differences with the hero, or accepted a tragic end.
   
   This definitely holds true for The Night Girl, The Dream King's Daughter and The Sun Runners. Such antagonists are just more interesting, in my opinion, as they bathe the hero in their shades of grey. However, while Nathaniel Tal (Icarus Down) may have been motivated by guilt and shame, he's definitely darker than my other villains, and the main antagonists for The Cloud Riders has motivations which do not excuse the actions they take. I think what's changed is that the real world has shown me some proper villains closer to home, acting through malice or incompetence or both. I can't understand these people, but they've given me permission to add them to my stories, and they've given me a bit of a template to draw upon.
   
   
2. God Exists? Let's Check the Machine. This statement was inspired by Rebecca's second point in her post, which states, "God exists. Deal." I thought our attitudes are similar, and I still think that, in terms of morality and ethics, our attitudes are still similar, though I find myself less interested in the question of whether God exists. I hope he does, but I have my doubts. It doesn't change the necessity for me to act with empathy -- something some White Christian Nationalist Heretics is trying to rebrand as a sin.
   
   But in terms of my characters? Rosemary was raised Presbyterian and still attends during Christmas and Easter. Peter shrugs his shoulders agnostically and tags along. But Perpetua is not a believer -- or so she tells herself. Only when she's experiencing a moment of terror does she pray "for the first time in seven years".
   
   But in my novels set in the future, I think my characters retain some spirituality, particularly Simon as he follows his strong moral code towards revealing the truth and calling out genocide. And in the Silent Earth sequence, Earthlings and Martians refer to God (singular). while Venusians and Mercurians refer to gods (plural), though they mostly express such sentiments while swearing. As Terry Pratchett says, atheism is well and good but, when you smash your thumb with a ball-peen hammer, you really could use the ability to blaspheme.
   
   
3. Such a Romantic. I still find it hard not to include a love interest in my stories, and add a bit of romance. That sort of thing just captures my interest, even in Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time. I was inspired to write the Unwritten Books because I wanted to follow the entire Meg-Calvin style relationship between Peter and Rosemary without skipping the part where they officially admit their love for each other, as Madeleine did jumping from A Wind in the Door to A Swiftly Tilting Planet.
   
   But I have tried to branch off from this. Frieda in The Sun Runners isn't interested in that sort of intimate relationship, and threatens a constitutional crisis at the thought of having to marry someone. Samantha in The Cloud Riders backs away from an intimate relationship in order to help a dear friend. Who knows what the future will bring?
   
   
4. Characters Blowing Through Teeth, Quirking up Mouths, (Putting) Hands through (Their) Hair: Teeth continue to embed themselves in walls when I strive to show a character's frustration, though I am trying to quell these writing tropes. Add to this the raising of the eyebrows, and other pointless steps that I find myself including mostly to provide beats within the dialogue to indicate how the conversation is landing. On my current draft of The Cloud Riders, I've found that I've managed to cut a few thousand words from the manuscript by clearing out these things, and I fully expect my editor to tell me to clear out more.
   
   
5. Location? Following the YA urban fantasies set on the Bruce Peninsula and Toronto (albeit Toronto in 1884), I returned to Toronto and its PATH network and made the city almost its own character within The Night Girl. I then went to rural Saskatchewan for The Dream King's Daughter, and most of my tales within Tales from the Silence stayed on a rebuilding Earth. Some of it comes from the adage of "write what you know". Some of it comes from the desire to feature more Canadian settings in science fiction and fantasy.
   
   But I've been to Jupiter. I've been to Mercury, Venus and Mars, and halfway across the galaxy to Icarus Down. Striking out to parts unknown, while trying to remain within the realism of science fiction (as compared to the magical realism of fantasy) has proven an exhilarating challenge.
   
   One thing I haven't done, however (outside of my short stories), is set a science fiction story on relatively contemporary Earth. That might change if I finish The Curator of Forgotten Things, set in Halifax.
   
   
6. I'm Ready for my Close-Up: I continue to stick closely to the protagonists' point-of-view in my tales, as part of the "show, don't tell" adage that's been drilled into my head throughout my years as a writer. Back in 2008, I (mildly, I hope) critiqued author Jenny Nimmo and her book Milo's Wolves for witholding a critical piece of information from the reader that the protagonist received in order to keep a key element of the plot a mystery. I ended up doing exactly that in The Sun Runners. I guess there are times when you need to pull the camera back, though I didn't keep the readers in suspense for too long (I hope).
   
   I'd written nothing but third-person close-POV back in 2008, but I branched off to first person past tense with Icarus Down, and I'm returning to that with The Cloud Riders. The challenge with those books is finding the voice for the narrator that is distinctive from my voice.
   
   
7. Style Isn't Everything: At the time, Rebecca called my writing style "lucid". Others have said I keep things tight (aside from the writing tropes I've described above). I do find that's achieved through multiple drafts, including drafts where I go in to cut as much frippery as I can. In my raw writing, I find I still add a lot of placeholder words in order to measure out my beats, or waffle on what I intend to say (using later drafts to try and hone in). This may be why my manuscripts take a while to get to the publication stage (Ten years for The Sun Runners!).
   
   But Erin has said that when it comes to my third-person stories, my style is to try and get out of the way as much as possible. Keep descriptions brief and suggestive, stay close to a single character's point of view (including giving the reader a window on their thoughts), show rather than tell, and try to let the readers themselves cast judgement on the protagonist's actions and reasons for them.
   
   This is not something I follow a manual on. I don't have a template to do this. It just feels right to write as though I'm a silent cameraperson perched on the protagonist's shoulder. I vanish even further when I give the protagonist the narration duties with my first-person stories.
   
   
8. And the Girl Shall Lead Them: Back in 2008, my scorecard for my five novels (three published, one finished, one in progress) was four female protagonist to one male (Peter in Fathom Five). To that, I added one more male protagonist (Simon in Icarus Down) and another four female (five if you count Eliza, the co-star of Icarus Down). I didn't have any idea why this should be back then, and I still don't. It just interests me more; I can't explain why.
   
   
9. And a Cast of... Seven: In my early days of writing, especially my fan fiction, I tended to keep the number of supporting characters down because I didn't want too many complications to the plot. My cast included a protagonist (the Doctor, Rosemary, Perpetua), secondary protagonist/love interest (Peter, Fergus, Polk), primary antagonist (Marjorie, Magnait, the Dream King), protagonist support character #1 (Puck, Faith, Earthenhouse), protagonist support character 2 (Arial, Edmund, Howard), and a couple of incidental characters to help things along.
   
   My cast of characters have now grown. I have double protagonists for Icarus Down and The Sun Runners, and I've been less afraid to spend time developing minor support characters.
   
   Possibly one effect of this has been an increase in my word count, from an average of around 50,000 for The Unwritten Books to something closer to 100,000 for Icarus Down and those that followed. I'm currently working on trying to pull The Cloud Riders back from a word count of 120,000.
   
   
10. Your Vision is as Good as Mine: At the time, I commented that I refrained from describing my characters, especially my main characters in detail, and I sure as heck avoided planting a character in front of a mirror at the start of a story to get such a description. (I have, however, done this trick in both The Dream King's Daughter and The Cloud Riders, but later in the story as the characters use this to assess either what's wrong with them, or how they've changed. Like rules you're not supposed to break, you can use tropes you're supposed to avoid, if you use them judiciously and well).
    
    I still find that if you get the character's voice right (as narrator within first person, or by dipping into their thoughts within third person) and provide a few small hints, your readers will fill in the gaps for you, and produce a picture that is more real to them than you could easily do on their own.
    

I think a lot has changed in the eighteen years since I wrote the earlier post. I think I've developed and gained a lot more confidence as a writer. However, just as adulthood is, in many ways, an illusion (I see the world with the same sense of wonder and terror at 53 as I did at 13), as a writer, I continue to make it up as I go along. That is kind of the definition of writing, is it not? Even if we plot everything out thoroughly, or sketch our characters in our journals, the first step is still stumbling on discoveries and figuring out how to use them. And somehow we make it all work.

Be sure to check out R.J. Anderson's books here.

Canada, Iran, immigration, ICE murders, Netanyahu/Gaza, rape allegations, charges, civil liability, threats against Canada (51st state), Greenland, Venezuela, Cuba, bragging about his sexual assaults against women, Epstein files, sex trafficking, tariffs... holy crap but Americans certainly don't get fed up easily do they? Twice they elected a rude, crude, bullying, senile, litigious, lying, dishonest, cheating son of a snitch to the highest position in the land. And now they've "rebuked" him. For the love of God remove 1,000 undeserving prisoners from U.S. jails and incarcerate Donald Trump, where he belongs. 

Mr. Trump once bragged that he could commit murder in Times Square in broad daylight in front of a thousand witnesses and never get convicted. The pathetic part of that brag wasn't that he made it but that it was probably true. Hopefully it no longer is. 

I truly had given up on Democracy. Citizens are simply too busy, too apathetic, too uninformed, too overworked between jobs (or looking for them), families, homes (if they are lucky) and more complicated than ever lives to be able and willing to invest time and brain power looking and listening to speeches, news, propaganda and politics. And yet... here in Waterloo Region citizens voted against all incumbent mayors but one who has his own playbook for staying in power. That may have been good but they fell far short in re-electing all regional councillors who were not mayors. That was disappointing. There are a pack of old ones that need to go as they were part and parcel of both the Wilmot Land Grab (770 acres), the well interference travesty and the Waterloo Region Water Shortage. If you don't think the last two are related then you aren't thinking very seriously.

All shame in the U.S. also needs to go to the Republican Party for riding to the end the perverted pony known as Donald Trump. The Party should have removed him long ago but as long as he was delivering votes that was good enough for them. Destroying people's lives at home and abroad is his trademark and the Republicans supported him throughout. Watch the rats leaving the sinking ship from here on in.    

Hi ! I’m Sonali Kumari, a Computer Science student with a specialization in Data Science at NSUT.

The first stage was resume-based shortlisting. Participants were evaluated on the resumes submitted during registration.

For my resume, I followed this format: Resume template for NSUT students.

If you are applying from another college, you can use the template as a reference and adapt it to your own experience and achievements.

I used Word to create my resume during my first year, but keeping the formatting consistent was a headache. Switching to a LaTeX template made things much easier.

You can also use tools like ChatGPT to review your resume against a job description, but make sure the final version accurately reflects your skills and experience.

The next stage involved submitting a Statement of Purpose (SOP). I wrote mine around the projects I had mentioned in my resume, including Kanuni Shayak, a legal assistant designed to help users understand legal documents by summarizing lengthy contracts.

While describing my projects, I tried to look beyond the technologies I had used. I think it’s equally important to explain why you made certain design decisions, what alternatives you considered, and what trade-offs came with your approach.

For example, while discussing a project, simply listing the tools and technologies doesn’t tell the complete story. Explaining the reasoning behind your architecture and the challenges you encountered gives a much better picture of how you approach problems.

Looking back, I would encourage anyone writing an SOP to focus on the projects they genuinely understand and care about. Rather than trying to include everything on their resume, it’s more useful to explain a few experiences in depth and what those experiences taught them.

The Selection Test had two parts: 20 MCQs and 2 coding questions, to be completed in 60 minutes.

The MCQs covered basic ML concepts, probability, statistics, and linear algebra, along with some Gen AI questions.

Each question had a 1-minute time limit, so both accuracy and speed mattered. Speed also contributed to the score, based on the percentage of time remaining when you submitted your answer. There was no option to skip a question and return to it later, either.

This meant I had to make a decision within the time available for each question. I couldn’t leave a difficult question for later or spend too long debating between options.

One thing that worked for me was recognising which questions were likely to take too much time. If a question was particularly lengthy or involved numerical calculations that I knew I wouldn’t be able to solve within 60 seconds, I avoided spending the entire minute on it and moved on. This helped me use my time more efficiently rather than getting stuck on a single question.

Focus on your fundamentals and practise MCQs from the topics mentioned above. Try solving them under time constraint to improve both speed and accuracy.

There were 2 coding questions. The coding problems felt medium to hard.

For me, this highlighted the importance of logical thinking and analytical skills. Recognising a familiar pattern can help narrow down an approach, but you still need to reason through the problem and implement your solution correctly.

Regular Leetcode contests can help you get better at recognising patterns and solving problems under time pressure.

When I found out that I was selected for Amazon ML Summer School 2026, it was a really exciting moment! 🎉

This year, around 3,000 students were selected from over 1.3 lakh registrations, making the selection process highly competitive.

We were given learning modules on topics like Supervised Learning and Deep Learning. What made the experience even more exciting was the opportunity to interact with Amazon Applied Scientists and learn from their experiences. Even the examples discussed during the lectures were related to real-world applications at Amazon, which made the sessions feel practical and helped me understand how these concepts are used in the industry.

Thanks for reading ! 😊 If you found this article helpul , feel free to connect to reach out to me on Linkedin.

How I got selected for Amazon ML Summer School 2026 was originally published in Code Like A Girl on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

On the first Tuesday of every month, we’ll announce a new Fearless Female, including a video interview of them sharing their business story. Want to be featured as a Fearless Female?

Contact Memberships at memberships@greaterkwchamber.com for more details. The Fearless Female Program would not be possible without our Title Sponsor, Scotiabank.

To learn a little more about the Scotiabank Women Initiative, and why they’ve chosen to sponsor this program, see the video below.

♦

The Fearless Female we’re featuring for the month of November is Lianne J. Armstrong, Partner and Senior Construction and Commercial Litigator at Lerners LLP.

Lianne is a senior construction and commercial litigator who helps businesses resolve complex disputes involving contracts, projects, facilities and operational risk. With deep manufacturing and construction industry experience, she provides practical, strategic advice focused on protecting business interests, minimizing disruption and reaching cost-effective resolutions.

To learn more about Lianne’s journey as a Fearless Female, watch the interview below (or read the written format).

Please Introduce Yourself

My name is Leanne Armstrong. I am a partner at the law firm of Lerners, and I am a construction lawyer. As I said, I work at Lerners. We have four offices. We have Kitchener, London, Toronto, and Strathroy. It has been around since 1929, and was started by Lerner’s, and we have now grown obviously significantly since that time, and we do, we’re pretty much full service, and as I say, I head up the construction law department.

What inspired you to choose this career path?

Following the career path, I really think it was, my father probably likely saying, oh, you argue a lot. You really should be a lawyer, but that was just kind of, you know, getting me thinking about it, but then it really was an area that you could look to helping other people, solving their problems, and so that it really was a focus, and then construction, I just really like the industry. I like the people that operate within the industry. I find that they are different in the sense of, although it is litigation, it’s not very, it’s not as adversarial as other areas of the law, because the goal is to keep a construction project moving, and that means working together somewhat cooperatively within an adversarial process.

Tell us more about your professional and educational background

I went to Queens, we’re actually coming up next weekend on our 30-year reunion, so I’ve always done commercial litigations, commercial litigation, companies resolving disputes or litigating disputes, but probably about 15 years ago, I began doing it almost exclusively doing construction law, and this is a path that I’ve really enjoyed, and I’m going down, and I definitely wouldn’t change it. I love the construction law.

Largest milestone right now is that, or my favourite, is that I am currently the chair of the London and District Construction Association. I had decided some time ago that I wanted to focus on the industry as a whole, and how can we make the actual construction industry, whether it’s looking at political issues or looking at local issues, so I started on the association quite some years ago, and this is my year that I am chair.

If you could go back in time, is there anything you would have done differently?

I think it’s as a woman, I think we look at it from being a woman, a woman that’s working in the construction industry, it is going into male-dominated spaces. I think when I first started, I really saw it being, well, these are the men’s events, and these are the women’s events, and saying, well, no, let’s change that, and so just showing up and not worrying about, maybe you and the couple of women you bring are the only women there, and that’s okay, and since that time that I started showing up, I definitely think that other women look around and say, oh, it’s okay too, these aren’t male events, or female’s events, that we are welcome at all of them, and just kind of entering that space, which might not be comfortable at first.

I think as women, we’re not always as confident as we should be, and if I did it again, I definitely would just lean into that, and not be second-guessing, and going with more with instinct and self-confidence, and say, I know my stuff, I’m just going to not second-guess, and just a confident piece that I see, that I know that I struggle with, but I see much more because I see other young women struggling with it.

I also am an adjunct professor at Western, I’m doing that probably five, six, seven years. I teach civil litigation, and I still see it with the younger law students as well, and I just wish I could tell all of them, have confidence, and just go out there, and challenge yourself, and just follow whatever you set out to do.

Well, the one thing I have done that I think is differently than as other lawyers, is I’ve really, as I say, really looked at the industry. So, if I’m going to go to a conference, it’s not necessarily going to be a legal conference, I want to go and find out about the construction industry, what are people doing, what are people being challenged by, and I really think that’s been, that’s helped, not just helped me in my career, but it made me love my career, because now I have friends, I, you know, within the industry, where I have barbecues, or I go to their weddings, or birthday parties, and it’s just makes, you know, it’s wonderful having your clients also be your friends as well.

How do you define success?

Success is, I think, really enjoying your job, and just focusing on doing the best job you can, being the best at whatever it is, it can be anything. For me, it’s, I want, you know, I want to be a construction lawyer. At one point, I was just a litigator, I was resolving disputes, and then I thought, you know what, I feel like my clients, I have a unique perspective in that I could also do the drafting of contracts at the very beginning, and so I set out, and I say, okay, I’m going to do that. I take all the courses, I, you know, I learn that area of the trade, and it’s just been enjoyable, just kind of focusing on what are your clients’ needs, and, you know, pursuing that.

The main thing is being client-centered. I think that is, and I think that is learners as a whole, I mean, we really set out, all of us set out to do, be the best in whatever area we practice in, and be very client-centered, so every client knows that their problem is very unique, is I put special care into how do we resolve this for you, and also, for me at least, I always tell my clients, you know, this is no longer your problem, this is my problem, you just let it go, and they can trust that I’m going to, you know, really take care in making sure that things are done as smoothly as possible, so just being client-focused, I think, is important.

What are some of the advantages of establishing your business in Waterloo Region?

I think the advantages are, is that it’s a smaller community, you’re going to be running into people all the time, and building relationships. I think that, like I did very beginning of my career, I did practice in Toronto, and it’s very different. You’re not able to build relationships like you are here, and especially within the construction industry. I would say, when you look at litigation, often it’s because people are entering into agreements with parties that they don’t know well, they haven’t worked with before, and from the other side, the other contracting party might not be as concerned about resolving all disputes, because, well, we might not work with them again, but when you work in a region like Waterloo, whether it’s in construction or within law, you have these relationships that you want to have throughout your career, so you really put focus into building them.

What advice would you give to other aspiring women entrepreneurs and professionals?

I have been doing this for a long time, and I have seen women come and go, fantastic lawyers who had difficulty, whether it’s fitting in or balancing work and home life. My goal is to pave a path for other women behind me. I do have two children, my children are now university aged, and I want people to say, look at me, and say, look at, she did it, I can do it as well, and I can enjoy doing it. I just think that it is a difficult career, but I want to show women that it is definitely doable and enjoyable at the same time.

I would say the most important thing is find a mentor. Women are always wanting to help other women, and they have to recognize that. Just reach out, look at somebody who has a career like you want, reach out and say, hey, can we grab a coffee, get together with that person. I have had women that do that, and I continue throughout the path of their career, always, they know, they can call me at any time, ask for any advice, if they’re having any issues, I’m going to be there, and I know that other women are the same way. Just don’t be shy about it, look for a mentor.

I think it’s just a different time in my career. My children are now off, both of them are in university, so I am looking to put more time into more charitable work, and looking at how I can give back more. It’s very, you go through a time when you do, before your children, you’re so involved in everything, and then when your children are younger, you feel you’re being pulled in so many different directions that you really do focus on the family and the career. But now, I’m entering a whole new phase, so I’m excited about it, and seeing where it takes me.

Where can listeners learn more about you and contact you directly?

Check out our website, it’s lerners.ca, and if anyone just ever wants to reach out to me and chat about things, please do. I’m always looking to meet other women, and find out what they’re up to, and how they’re succeeding in whatever careers they’re having, so I welcome to have a chat with anybody.

The post Scotiabank November Fearless Female – Lianne J. Armstrong appeared first on Greater KW Chamber of Commerce.

♦

Organization: Family and Children’s Services of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo Foundation operating as FACS Foundation

Position: Volunteer Board Member (HR, Real Estate, Manufacturing, Construction and Associated Industries, Consulting, Investment or Technology experience)

Job Description: As a Board Director for FACS Foundation, you will provide the strategic vision to scale innovative prevention programs and transform how our community meets growing needs and empowers children, youth, and their families to thrive. Since 1991, FACS Foundation has raised funds for programs that prevent child abuse and neglect and keep children with their families in their communities. The Foundation helps to address the root causes of harm, which have profound effects on family welfare and our community. The Foundation funds programs and services delivered by Family & Children’s Services of the Waterloo Region, grassroots organizations, and other community partners focused on early intervention and prevention for the safety and well-being of children, youth, and families.

The Foundation Board is recruiting several new members with HR, Real Estate, Manufacturing, Construction and Associated Industries, Consulting, Investment or Technology experience. Applicants should have a minimum five years of Board experience along with ideally one year of Board leadership experience (e.g. Chair of Board, Vice-Chair of Board, Treasurer or Chair of Committee). We are seeking a Board composition that reflects the diversity of our community and represents the populations served by FACS.

We are committed to anti-racism, equity, and inclusion, and we encourage individuals of diverse age, gender, sexual orientation or are from the First Nation, Inuit, Metis or Black community to self-identify and apply. In addition to diverse lived experiences, we are looking for differing perspectives and skills to govern that support an ever-changing environment focused on creating innovation and excellence. Change-makers with an entrepreneurial mindset who can help transform our vision to purposeful action are welcome to apply.

The Board of Directors provides governance oversight and leadership to the operations and performance of the Foundation, based on its charitable purposes. This is a voluntary position with on average one Board meeting and one Committee meeting per month. Time commitment of approximately 4 – 6 hours per month. Directors serve a three-year term, renewable twice for up to nine years. Board members discharge a fiduciary duty related to the position of trust and obligation to act in good faith to uphold the best interests of FACS Foundation as a Board.

FACS Foundation Board members play an important advocacy role on behalf of our region and are called upon to raise funds and support decisions that serve the best interests of our community.

If you are interested in being helping children, youth and families thrive in Waterloo Region, please send your resume and cover letter to Jaya.James@facsfoundation.org by December 1, 2026.

*We appreciate all interest, however, only applicants chosen for an interview will be contacted*

The post Family and Children’s Services Foundation appeared first on Capacity Canada.

♦It's been noted elsewhere that the flip of the clocks from saving to standard time and back has become a lot easier these days. Our computers, our phones, and our watches make the switch automatically in the middle of the night. In my house, only four clocks need to be manually changed, and three of them are in my kitchen (my stove and microwave, pictured above, and a battery-operated wall clock behind me). For a brief moment on Sunday morning, my kitchen enters into its own timezone, like Arizona. My car also needs a switch, but that just requires a few taps on the screen into the settings to turn off (or turn on) the Daylight Saving switch).

Which, I guess makes it strange that the switch between Daylight Saving (Summer) Time and Standard (Winter) Time is becoming increasingly unpopular.

Because it is. Over the past twenty years, I've heard the complaints increase. I've heard news reports talk about the rise in car accidents following time changes. I've heard people complain about the sudden loss of light in November. Politicians have been promising an end to the time changes for a while and, recently, have kept their word in many jurisdictions. Today, all of Canada west of the 90th meridian (including northwestern Ontario, but not including Nunavut) has officially backed out of the change, with BC, Alberta, Manitoba, and northwestern Ontario choosing permanent Daylight Saving Time.

And I support this. I've been finding the time change increasingly annoying and unnecessary as the years go on. I am living for the moment when the Ontario government flips the switch on the change that it's already passed into law: to stop the time change once Quebec and New York State agree to stop the time change as well. But I'm uncertain why I support this so strongly, other than to complain about the annoyance of adjusting my (four) clocks, and the sudden onset of early sunsets and dark evenings.

But proponents of stopping the spring-forward/fall-back ritual are split between those who want to settle on Daylight Saving Time (me) and those who want Standard Time. Standard time has become increasingly beleaguered, as the change-over dates have been pushed back later in fall and earlier in spring. There is some institutional pressure for keeping to Daylight Saving Time, but Standard Time still has its proponents, citing their fears of sending their kids to school in darkness.

Well, I did offer a possible compromise: instead of flipping our clocks an hour forward or back, flip it just a half-hour instead, and live with that time change as the new standard time for the whole year. Winter evenings don't begin quite so late, and it isn't quite so dark when the kids go to school in the morning. And, for once, our easternmost province would get its revenge, starting all their shows at noon, instead of, as the CBC radio announcer would long intone, "12:30 in Newfoundland".

But that appears to be off the table.

I don't know why we feel so strongly about this, but we do, and I think it's right that we should proceed to end the seasonal time change throughout Canada. I hope the United States does it as well. I would prefer we stick to Daylight Saving Time because the sudden evening sunsets come November always throw me for a loop. It's just awful seeing the dark of midnight at 6 p.m.

Yes, this may mean that we're sending our kids to school in darkness, but this brings up another question: why the heck are we sending our kids to school so bloody early? Studies have shown that teenagers are hard-wired to sleep in, and starting school later in the day improves academic performance among high school students. Anecdotally, the worst time for non-violent property crimes (vandalism, etc) comes between 3 p.m. and 5 p.m., when we have a large group of students sitting around unsupervised. If we end school times closer to 5 p.m., this window vanishes, and we know most teenagers won't get up early to commit minor misdemeanours.

For the Lord's sake, some high schools in the U.S. have start times of 7:00 a.m.! What in the heck are they thinking?

Maybe if we didn't live our lives so beholden to our clocks; if we had a bit more flexibility on when the day starts, we wouldn't be so flummoxed each time the clocks change, and we wouldn't feel so bad about late winter sunrises or early winter sunsets. In my opinion, the first step is to stop the silly spring-forward/fall-back merry-go-round, but the second step is to be a bit more flexible about when our days actually start.

 Jeff Merriman,  Dwighte Este, Steve Martindale, Wilf Ruland, Steve Quigley,  Allan Deal, plus a whole bunch of General Managers of Uniroyal Chemical such as David Ash and successor companies. Now here's the rub; the fact is that I really would be hard pressed to confront any of them and initiate the verbal beatdown that most of them deserve. That said O.K. if they started up with their old bullcrap and lies for whatever reason yes I would respond strongly and harshly. Otherwise no and that may be simply a function of age. I'm now 77 years old and frankly just because I have a better understanding and knowledge of the corporate mindset behind blatant lying and deception perhaps I also have a better understanding of the people involved. They are not all unredeemable pieces of excrement. Probably some of them might actually be good family men. Others I am told have done serious and significant volunteer work. For them their personal lives are entirely separate from their business/corporate lives. Most especially if they are employees whose every public word had better be pro company or else; they have little choice if they wish to keep putting a roof over their family's heads and or pay for their university educations.

All that said there are a few that I have nothing but contempt for based upon their unrepentant and damaging lies to the public interest and to the people of Elmira, not to mention the environment. The vast majority of lying has been to further the interests and the assets of corporate polluters whether or not direct health harm resulted to nearby residents. There are also some for whom I might actually have some liking and respect for. That would include Steve Martindale of the Ontario Min. of Environment (M.O.E.). Yes it is possible that that is based more upon his personality and general friendliness versus anything he may have done in the public interest. Wilf Ruland is one whom I have trouble fathoming. He inserted himself into an internal CPAC squabble initiated by Susan B. and Pat McLean towards me that I did not even see coming back in 2007. He spoke to CPAC while I was still a formal member, behind my back, and gave CPAC an ultimatum namely him or me. Now I thought that I had zero argument or disagreement with Wilf at that time but clearly Susan and Pat had put him up to that ultimatum that I didn't even know about. That readers is how much damage a couple of sneaky, manipulative back stabbers can do to any group of people. Dwighte Este (Uniroyal) always behaved in a professional manner but clearly he was never prepared to speak either out of turn or honestly if it hindered his employer's interests. My biggest surprise was when he showed up at Susan Bryant's house to help fix her lawnmower. Yes you heard that right. She had phoned him first and then me when he couldn't make it right away, maybe around 2003 (??). Take that any way you want but it shocked me.

Steve Quigley and Allan Deal both of Conestoga Rovers (CRA) were unrepentant client driven #*+%heads in my opinion. I know that sounds harsh but you never sat across the table from them for a period of decades. Steve was the brains of the two hence he was in charge of CRA's pro corporate, anti environment efforts for the first many years with Allan Deal disappearing for years, licking his wounds perhaps. Allan Deal is back and misdirecting and misleading TRAC on a number of fronts including Varnicolor Chemical's alleged lack of chlorobenzene contribution to the Elmira Aquifers. While categorically denying Varnicolor's chlorobenzene contributions several years after Dr. Neil Thompson (U. of Waterloo) stated unequivocally that approximately 1,900 kg. of chlorobenzene was deposited into Elmira's Aquifers in excess of Uniroyal's contributions; Mr. Deal offered zero comment on who has done so.  Then less than a year later Jesse Wright of Arcadis on behalf of Lanxess Canada showed up and casually announced the news and showed a map of four or five unnamed business locations along First St. who had handled chlorobenzene, extraordinarily close to Varnicolor's former Union & First St. toxic waste site. 

Once again can you really blame me for being blunt and rude at times in describing the behaviour of these corporate butts? 

If it's a mark of character based upon one's enemies, opponents or just general ill wishers then I guess I must be a character. I can name a few well known twits who stupidly have thrown stones my way, disparaged me and or lied about me. That would include Bill Strauss, Todd Cowan, Sandy Shantz, Severin Argenton, Mark Bauman, several M.O.E. officers and other assorted figures of ill repute. Ill repute not based upon electoral results - hey Donald Trump has been elected twice- three times if you believe him- but based upon my measuring stick. 

When Severin died and before Bill followed suit he (Mr. Kowalchuk) had a letter published most likely in either the Woolwich Observer or the Elmira Independent extolling the virtues of Mr. Argenton. While I am hard pressed to suggest that Bill lied I was at the time somewhat surprised by his courage in doing what he did considering Mr. Argenton's rather immense fall from grace. In hindsight and based upon the facts and decisions of various individuals and authorities I feel completely safe in suggesting that Mr. Argenton, former owner of Varnicolor Chemical, was one of the truly great liars of Woolwich Township. Now the fact is that after Bill Kowalchuk's own fall from grace as Woolwich CAO, he was hired by Severin both to increase his company's market but also to serve if you will as the company's liaison with government agencies attempting to dispose of toxic goods. Perhaps astute readers might read between the lines and see just a tiny glimpse of where my attitudes towards corruption in  government come from.

Severin was a keen promoter of himself and his company as being environmental stewards of the first order. He also was not averse to throwing shade (hmm) upon anyone who criticized him or suggested that his operations were anything short of legal, pristine and environmentally sound. A local contractor he had hired for a small digging job ("Digger" Dave Holmes ) ran afoul of Mr. Argenton when Mr. Holmes stood up in a public meeting and suggested that the Varnicolor Chemical site on Union St. was badly contaminated with solvents. Mr. Holmes was on site when a hole he was digging began filling up not with groundwater but with odorous and discoloured solvents floating on the water table. He was told to refill the hole and take off. He did so but I believe also advised the Ontario Ministry of Environment (M.O.E.) of what he had seen and smelled. I was working at Varnicolor Chemical at the time and was also advised as to the discovery. Mr. Argenton's public response to Mr. Holmes words at the public meeting was that Mr. Holmes "...was full of shi*".  

I could go on and on including his initial public bragging that the only charges laid by the M.O.E. against him were paper charges and not pollution charges. This was incredibly stupid of him and refocused my and others opposition to both him and the M.O.E.'s mishandling of the case. Lo and behold after the M.O.E.'s initial coverup on his behalf and later reluctance to lay serious charges they finally did. Severin was convicted and went to jail for a few months but still got a huge break. He was never convicted or sentenced for actually contributing to the destruction of the Elmira Aquifers  as we now know that he did along with Uniroyal Chemical, Nutrite and still other miscreants.      

♦

Mountainoak’s two-year-old Farmstead cheese is similar to Parmigiano-Reggiano in terms of texture — there’s those incredibly satisfying “cheese crystals” (tyrosine, a natural phenomenon that takes place in Parms and Gouda cheeses and others).

Based in New Hamburg, Mountainoak’s Farmstead, among other of its cheeses, has won awards at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair and the British Empire Cheese Competition.

Overall, their cheeses continue to be winners.

The Mountainoak Cheese website notes that the cheese has hints of butterscotch and caramel. I’ve found that all of their cheeses — made of Holstein milk from their farm — are superlative, and are a great local option that we can take advantage of.

Especially when we want to support local food businesses.

For more information about Mountainoak Cheese, click here.

[Banner image/Mountainoak Cheese]

Check out my latest post Cheese profile: Mountainoak Farmstead from AndrewCoppolino.com.

When we talk about housing at KW Habilitation, we’re actually talking about two different, but equally important, areas of our work: Inclusive Living and affordable housing. While both are connected to having a place to call home, they serve different purposes.

♦

For people who receive Inclusive Living supports, home is about much more than having a roof overhead. It’s about choice, comfort, relationships and having support that reflects what matters to them.

KW Habilitation works alongside adults with developmental disabilities in a variety of living arrangements, providing individualized supports based on their needs, preferences and goals.

That might mean support with everyday routines, making decisions, maintaining relationships, exploring interests or participating in the community. No two people are exactly alike, and neither is the support they receive.

KW Habilitation is also involved in creating affordable housing opportunities in Waterloo Region. This work responds to a different community need: access to housing that people can afford.

While Inclusive Living focuses on individualized supports, affordable housing focuses on the availability of housing itself. The two can sometimes intersect, but they aren’t the same thing. By investing in affordable housing, KW Habilitation is helping address one of the most significant challenges facing people and families across our community.

Whether we’re working alongside someone to make their own choices at home or helping create more affordable places to live, both areas of our work reflect a shared belief: everyone deserves a place where they feel safe, valued and connected.

And that’s an important part of building a community where everyone belongs.

The post More Than A Place To Live appeared first on KW Habilitation.

This list was quickly off the top of my head. I suspect that with some quiet time and fullsome thought I could increase it dramatically. Hmm now an idea has just come to me. Maybe a once a week special here whereby I do a "Spotlight on Liars" column. You know I could expand it to include more than just polluters, bureaucrats, consultants and Ministry of Environment (M.O.E./MECP) senior staff and employees. Some dandy names from the past come to mind already just by suggesting the M.O.E. such as Ireland, Robinson, Papenhuzen, Trebilcock, Wong. Oops I've slipped off topic. I was going to suggest political figures as well. Oh man this is just way too easy. How about Strauss, Shantz, Cadeau, Seiling, Cowan, Bauman there are just so many! Hmm in one case I almost feel sorry for Mr. Cowan. True he could be the butt of the old joke "How do you know if so and so is lying?" The answer: "His lips are moving.". Why do I feel sorry for him? Because most of the liars I am calling out are for environmental lies related to the Elmira Water Crisis. Mr. Cowan mostly lied about everything with the focus on his innate and inherent superiority. To the best of my knowledge he did not lie to save Uniroyal/Chemtura money or to protect reputations of people lying to minimize the local contamination and reduce Uniroyal and successors financial liability.   

Today's focus is on Gorgeous George Karlos of the M.O.E.. In all the modesty I can muster I must admit that I added the "Gorgeous" to the front of his name. In one sense I have to admire his boldness and brashness. Most of the liars above lied about things such as the far off 2028 remediation deadline or about who is responsible for which contamination whether ammonia, benzene, toluene, PCBs, xylenes, styrene, chlorinated solvents etc. all pollutants with multiple sources. Not Gorgeous George. No Siree! He looked CPAC in the eye back in early 2014 and loudly proclaimed that in response to a question from the floor he had walked Uniroyal/Chemtura's south-east property line and nearby areas looking for a peculiar surface feature that showed up on a recent Conestoga Rovers (CRA) map. Many of us had seen that feature and wondered about it but the first person who asked was a citizen sitting in the gallery, not a CPAC member. 

Now keep in mind this was the CPAC with Dr. Dan Holt as Chair, Vivienne, Sebastian, Ron, Graham as CPAC members and Richard, Henry and I as a sub-committee of CPAC, known as SWAT (Soil, Water, Air, Team). Geez did that name (SWAT) ever piss off Chemtura! It was the first that I realized that often the biggest liars are the most thin skinned of individuals. Later public consultation after Sandy Shantz became Mayor refused to allow questions from the audience even going through the Chair. Our CPAC did and this was but one case where it paid off. The surface feature looked like a smooth curve starting on the Uniroyal property to the west and running over to the next door (east) Stroh property where it bent 90 degrees to the south . 

George Karlos of the M.O.E. categorically stated he had walked this entire area and that there absolutely was no pathway or anything else that could possibly indicate any kind of path or travel route or conduit for contaminants to leave the Uniroyal site, cross over to the Stroh property and disperse or migrate from there. Gorgeous George lied like a dog!  In May 2014 I had been requested to scout out filming locations for a Documentary by I believe the C.B.C. .  I phoned Ron Stroh the current owner of the Stroh property and farm and asked for permission both for me and the C.B.C. to access his property and do some filming. He gave me that permission with a couple of conditions.  

My visit to the site was absolutely shocking. Keep in mind by this point I had been studying reports, text and maps of the entire area for about twenty-four years (1989-2014)! What I found was a large, frikken running waterway within five to ten metres of the Uniroyal/Chemtura property line running parallel with it for at least 125 metres due south on the Stroh property where it then bent to the east briefly before turning due south again and running southwards towards the Canagagigue Creek. Holy crap but later examination showed that it jogged around the Martin family's private in ground swimming pond and indeed did discharge into the Canagagigue Creek. 

Gorgeous George to the best of my knowledge has never set foot or shown his lying face in Elmira since. Good riddance to bad, lying rubbish.

• What: NAZA, A Window into Systems of Mass Killing
• Presented by: Waterloo Region Friends of Palestine ♦
• When: 4:15pm on Sunday 1 November 2026 (doors open 3:45pm)
• Where: Princess Original Cinema (sorry, this cinema has steep stairs and is NOT accessible)
• Location: 6 Princess Street West, Waterloo Map
• Extra Showings: 1:50pm on Saturday 31 October 2026; 6:50pm on Wednesday 4 November 2026
• Tickets: princesscinemas.com/movie/naza
• Phone: +1‑519‑884‑5112 (Princess Cinema office)
• Contact: wrfriendsofpalestine@gmail.com

From Irene O’Toole:

Dear Waterloo Region Friends of Palestine,

♦24 interviews in silhouette on Tel Aviv rooftops

NAZA exposes the surveillance and AI systems enabling the mass killing of civilians in Gaza’s genocide.

NAZA is a documentary by the Israeli co-directors of the Oscar-winning No Other Land. It premiered at the Venice Film Festival in September and won the Special Jury Prize.

It is a bone-chilling indictment of Israel’s military and its use of technology to systematically commit genocide against civilians in Gaza. It is based on interviews with 24 Israeli intelligence officers, many from notorious military units. They were filmed at night on Tel Aviv rooftops with their faces and voices disguised.

“Naza”  is Israel’s military slang for collateral damage: the number of civilians expected to be killed in a tank or air strike. The military developed an AI system called “Lavender”  to identify 37,000 Palestinians as suspects belonging to Hamas, and officers were pre-approved to kill up to 20 innocent civilians, often an entire family, for a low-ranking suspect and many 100’s when the target was a senior commander.  More than 500 deaths required high-level approval.

Using Israeli technology to hack into cellphone cameras and microphones they were able to spy on everyone in Gaza with a phone, including children. One targeting strategy was called “Where’s Daddy?”  and alerted officers when a marked man entered his home, so that he could be bombed along with his family. Officers describe watching entire families going about their normal lives before striking.

The interviewees describe the work as a routine job done on screens, “like a video game” and “You understand that the objective is to destroy.”

NAZA puts the people who worked inside that system on camera. The filmmakers have been accused in Israel of treason and attacking the State of Israel. Netanyahu proposed stripping their citizenship for defaming IDF soldiers. Crowds have gathered chanting “death penalty to the traitors.”

The film’s conclusion is unmistakable: the mass killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza was not a tragic by-product of war but a premeditated and calculated crime of commission.

2026 | UK, USA | Abraham & Szor | 80 min | Hebrew, Arabic, English with subtitles

Official Trailer

The film is followed by conversation / Q&A with Robert Massoud, founder of Zatoun, fair trade olive oil from Palestine.

Awards and reviews:

Jury Special Prize at 83rd Venice International Film Festival

“There are things I can’t talk about, one interviewee reluctantly notes, suggesting there are true horrors that can’t be spoken of aloud. What is said during these conversations is still enough to make you scream and weep.”  ROLLING STONE
“The spare, focused style of Naza has a grim, artful beauty, all in service of the subject matter. The results are impossible to shake.”  NEW YORK MAGAZINE
“As a work of cinema, it is exemplary. As a work of journalism, it is inarguable. As a document, it is an indictment.” TIME OUT

Review from NPR
Review from rogerebert.com
Review from Variety

Articles & Interviews:

Why ‘NAZA’ terrifies Israel’s liberal elite
‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza (from +972 magazine April 2024)
How do human beings explain taking part in genocide? NAZA provides a chilling look
‘They know the house they are bombing is full of children’

Don’t miss this important film and conversation following.  Please share with family and friends.

Also, see you at Kitchener Market for Walk with Palestine this Saturday 11am.

In solidarity and peace,
Irene

I’m on vacation this week, so I dipped into my archives to bring back a few points from past newsletters that especially resonated with the Better Allies community. Thanks to everyone who’s shared what’s been helpful. I appreciate hearing from each of you.

Let’s dive in.

In 7 Pieces of Bad Career Advice Women Should Ignore, authors Cindy Gallop and Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic list popular suggestions they believe we need to leave behind. One is to find a mentor.

They wrote,

“Women don’t need mentors. Women need what men get all the time — someone prepared to go out on a limb for them. A champion is someone who, behind closed doors, slams their fist on the boardroom table and says, ‘If there’s only room for one bonus in the budget, it’s going to Jane, not John.’ In other words, a champion is a committed sponsor who has the agency to influence people at the top and will use it to help you, someone who will be your loyal brand ambassador and push for you to get ahead — even if it means jeopardizing their reputation by disrupting the status quo.”

Now it’s your turn. Think about who you champion and sponsor. If they tend to be “like you” or remind you of your younger self, consider developing relationships with a more diverse group of coworkers. Get to know their work, strengths, and career goals. And start being their loyal brand ambassador.

Sponsor 5 Ally Actions and put your brand or business in front of 40,000 caring individuals in business, healthcare, education, and non-profits.

Or, say thanks to Karen and buy her a coffee ☕.

Let’s face it: Not all assignments are created equal. Some are high-profile and can be rocket-booster fuel for a career. Others may be necessary but go unnoticed.

In the Harvard Business Review article How to Equitably Assign High-Profile Work by Rachel M. Korn, Asma Ghani, and Joan C. Williams, I learned that limited access to high-profile work significantly drives employee attrition. (I wasn’t surprised.) The authors also highlighted a stark contrast in access, with 81–85% of white men reporting fair access to career-boosting assignments, compared to about 50% of women of color. For Black women, this figure drops even further to 43%.

The authors emphasize the importance of interrupting bias when assigning high-profile work. This is a crucial step all managers should understand and commit to. As they wrote, “After all, what’s the point of recruiting the best talent if you can’t retain it?”

The next time you need someone to stand in for you on an initiative or take on a high-profile assignment, reflect on your selection criteria. Do you tend to give high-profile work to certain people or certain types of people?

Then, consider what it would take to expand that pool. You might need to expand your network if you know only a few people with the skills you value for these plum assignments. Or figure out how more people outside your normal go-to list can learn more of those skills.

“I can’t give away my privilege. I’ve got it whether I want it or not. What I can do is use my privilege to create change.” — Debbie Irving, in Waking Up White

At its core, privilege is a set of unearned benefits given to people who fit into a specific social group. Due to our race, gender, sexual orientation and identity, financial situation, age, abilities, religion, and more, we have greater or lesser access to resources and social power.

Yet here’s the thing: Privilege is often invisible to those who have it. This means that people can get defensive when someone mentions their privilege.

Having one’s privilege pointed out might feel like the equivalent of being told that one is lazy or lucky — or that one’s life has been easy. Many people (myself included) are quick to respond that they’ve worked hard or had their fair share of difficulties in getting where they are today.

But doing so ignores that privilege is simply a system of advantages granted to all people in a given group.

I encourage you to pause and take a moment to understand your own privilege, reflecting on the benefits or obstacles you face at work. Download my free list of “50 Potential Privileges in the Workplace.” I have a one-page version and a two-page, large-print version.

As you review the list, please note any items that surprise you. Then, consider how not having those privileges might impact how someone experiences your workplace.

“Help: I am scared of saying the wrong thing!”

If that sounds like you, here’s some advice Brooklyn Norton of Mildon, an Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) consultancy shared with me a few years ago.

We are all going to get it wrong! A little secret: even the EDI ‘experts’ get it wrong, too. However, just like a muscle that we want to grow, we are going to have to practice saying:

• “I see how what I said could have been interpreted that way. I’m going to be more aware of my language going forward.”
• “Thanks for bringing that to my awareness. I am glad you’ve told me; I didn’t know, and I now know.”
• “Wow, I never thought of that. Would you mind sharing more with me about it?”

Which phrase will you use the next time you make a mistake on your journey to be a better ally?

(By the way, I hear from many of you that you appreciate when I share that subscribers disagree with me or when I’ve realized I’ve gotten something wrong. That someone who writes a newsletter on allyship is also still learning makes the topic more approachable. I promise to keep doing this!)

In 2024, I started asking all of you to send me examples of actions you’ve taken after reading my newsletter, hearing me speak, or diving into one or more of my books. Here’s the very first one I spotlighted:

“Thanks to your virtual fireside chat, and reinforced by your newsletter, I think about allyship in multiple contexts. Is there a silent voice I can invite to a conversation? Is there someone being spoken over who I can help give voice to? Is there someone’s idea who deserves credit where I can make sure they get the deserved credit? Each of these are small steps, but in totality, they make a difference.” — Todd Shechter

If you’ve taken a step towards being a better ally, please reply to this email and tell me about it. And mention if I can quote you by name or credit you anonymously in an upcoming newsletter.

That’s all for this week. I’m glad you’re on this journey with me,

Karen Catlin (she/her), Author of the Better Allies® book series

100% written by me. I use AI for researching a personal archive of my books and past newsletters, and for light editing.

Copyright © 2026 Karen Catlin. All rights reserved.

Together, we can make a difference with the Better Allies® approach.

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Be Someone’s Loyal Brand Ambassador, and Other Actions for Allies was originally published in Code Like A Girl on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The Ontario Government released their 2026 Fall Economic Statement (FES) yesterday entitled A Plan to Protect Ontario. This marks the second FES in a row and fourth straight fiscal document, including the 2025 and 2026 provincial budgets, to use this title. Tariffs and the Canada-US relationship also repeated as the Ford government’s primary focal point, with Minister of Finance Peter Bethlenfalvy calling on the need to build a more resilient and self-reliant Ontario economy for the future.

While FES 2026 divides its key initiatives under two official pillars; Fortifying Ontario’s Industrial Base and Build Ontario for Growth, an underlaying theme of Restoring Trust and Accountability can be found throughout the document. The provincial government’s plan to balance the budget has also been delayed until at least 2029-30, the same fiscal year of the next provincial election.

Key Figures:

• Ontario’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is projected to grow 0.5% in 2026 and by 1.5% in 2027.
• Ontario’s 2026 GDP growth is down from the 0.9% projection in FES 2025.
• The projected deficit for 2026-27 has risen to $16.9 billion, up $3.1 billion (22.5%) originally projected in Budget 2026 back in March.
• Ontario’s current net-debt to GDP ratio is forecast to be 37.4%, originally forecasted at 37.7% in the 2026 budget.

Protect Ontario: Fortify Ontario’s Industrial Base

Ontario has responded to the ongoing tariff and trade with the US with $30 billion in tariff relief since April 2025 and introduced measures to protect jobs, reinforce domestic supply chains, and prioritize Ontario businesses through public procurement. While new initiatives such as the Canada-Ontario action plan are expected to further support critical industries in Ontario and across the country, FES 2026 largely focuses on a continuation of programs rather than offering any net-new affordability or cost saving measures.

Specific Highlights:

• $8.7 billion for the new Canada-Ontario action plan which aims to further reinforce domestic supply-chains and capabilities in highly tariff-impacted industries such as steel, auto, and critical minerals.
• Advancing the province’s Buy Ontario agenda through the promotion of bulk purchases and priority for Ontario and Canadian suppliers for government procurements.
• Further supporting employment transition supports through Protect Ontario Workers Employment Response (POWER) Centres which has supported over 27,000 Ontarians who have lost their jobs due to tariff related impacts.
• Highlighting the $30 billion in tariff relief and support Ontario has provided workers and businesses since April 2025 through programs such as the Ontario Trade Together Fund (OTTF), the Protect Ontario Financing Program (POFP), and the Trade-Impacted Community Program (TICP).

Protect Ontario: Build Ontario for Growth

Amid ongoing trade uncertainty and heightened global competition, the provincial government continues to focus on positioning Ontario as a leading destination for investment, innovation, and job creation. These initiatives aim to enhance economic self-reliance, create new opportunities for Ontario businesses and workers, and support Ontario’s long-term economic growth and security.

Specific Highlights:

• Providing an estimated $8 billion over the next five years in income tax relief for businesses across Ontario through the Ontario Competitiveness Tax Cut.
• This follows the federal government’s announcement to allow for companies to write off 100% of certain assets such as fibre optic cables and machinery and is expected to bring Ontario’s marginal effective tax rate to 3.6%.
• Expanded eligibility for the Ontario Research and Development Tax Credit and Ontario Innovation Tax Credits which is estimated to provide and additional $50 million over the next three years to support Ontario businesses lower the cost of R&D.
• Outlining the $12.5 billion in savings Ontarian’s have realised through cutting the gas and fuel tax, lowering the cost of transit fares through the One Fare program, and removing tolls, among other initiatives.
• Supporting more housing startups and housing enabling-infrastructure by investing $8.8 billion over the next decade into the Canada-Ontario Partnership to Build.
• This investment also includes the HST rebate announced in Budget 2026 for eligible buyers of new homes as well as supporting investments that will allow municipalities to reduce development charges.
• Echoing the Ontario’s plan to build by investing over $210 billion into major infrastructure projects over the next ten years including:
  • $31 billion for new and existing highway projects.
  • $63 billion for public transit.
  • $6.4 billion to build and upgrade 58,000 long-term care beds.
  • $30 billion to build new schools and childcare spaces.
  • $5.5 billion to support critical repairs and upgrades to postsecondary institutions.
  • $64 billion to support more than 50 hospital projects.
• The promise to develop an AI Industrial Strategy focused on commercialisation, business adoption, and workforce development.
• Signaling Ontario’s intention to issue a Security and Resilience Bond to boost investment and strengthen Ontario’s defence supply chain.
• Ontario would be the first province in Canada establish a bond of this kind.

Restoring Trust & Accountability

Despite a growing deficit and overall spending, Ontario echoed its commitment to being prudent fiscal managers and continue to find ways to make government programs more efficient by removing red tape. As part of this commitment, the Ontario government plans to crack down on waste, abuse, and fraud while improving investments into public services that keep Ontarian’s safe and prosperous.

Specific Highlights:

• A commitment to review funding for priority programs and eliminate wasteful spending and fraud.
• Echoing Ontario’s investment of $32.5 million for expanded border enforcement capacity to provide police with tools to detect and deter cross-border crime.
• New upcoming measures to enhance enforcement of illegal cannabis in Ontario.
• Supporting businesses across Ontario by reviewing all 375 business-facing permits across the province.
• Streamlining eligibility for the Ontario Computer Animation and Special Effects (OCASE) Tax Credit to just include film and television producers.
• Moving forward with the development of new Digital credentials to enhance privacy and security and provide better convenience for Ontarians.

The post Key Highlights of the Ontario Fall Economic Statement appeared first on Greater KW Chamber of Commerce.