I still have copies of Battling the Elements and Other Odd Habits for sale !

I’ve been thinking about humour lately, having just compiled an anthology that is full of it. There is very little between the covers of “Battling The Elements and Other Odd Habits” that is factual or educational. Hopefully, it will twig the senses of those who share what makes me giggle.

I believe the best humour needs to be laced with at least a modicum of respect for the person or object that is brought to the writer’s attention.

During the 1970s and early 80s, I penned a weekly newspaper column entitled “Sense and Nonsense. ” It included quite a lot of satire in the humour I attempted to insert . Satire was popular in those days. Writers and cartoonists made fun of politicians and their antics. But they did not lambaste them with twinges of disgust and even hate, as much as they do nowadays.

      ….The National  1977

The first snows of winter are filtering down, Dark is the colour of country and town, The green leaves of summer, the glorious fall are merely a memory, a nostalgic recall.

The laughter is over, the jokes all been told,You yawn in the darkness, outside it is cold. November is dull, a good month for sleeping, The seasons are over for sowing and reaping.

Too tired to move, you doze in your chair, You make plans for Christmas, but really don’t care, When from out of the Tube comes the News of the Land….Like an ostrich, you raise up your head from the sand.

Today on the news, Joe Clark’s phone was bugged! “He did it himself,” the Liberals shrug…”The cops in cahoots with the party in power, Are devils for bugging,” says Joe, looking dour.

“And poor Mark Lalonde,” the announcer asserts luckily managed to pass up dessert!” A cream pie was flung by a party unknown In Victoria City, at Marc, it was thrown.

A note was attached to this newsworthy pie, the gooey confection was loaded with flies! The flies were symbolic, the gooey note read of “bugging” by Mounties and ‘Twas on Marc’s head. And rumours afloat of mail tampering for years, by Mounties, were causing some Liberal tears,

In Paris, the news was of Rene Levesque, They welcomed him as the new king of Quebec! Ottawa sent out a note of protest, “When in France, treat Rene as one of the rest, He doesn’t deserve any higher tribute, than Bennett got wearing his jogging suit!”

The weather forecast is for snow in the hills, fog in the valleys and temperature chills, You don’t really mind as you rise from your chair, fhe news has removed all the chill from the air.

The National News is often distressing, but somehow tonight, it seems less depressing…No matter how boring your life has become, there are folks out in Ottawa having less fun!