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August 14, 2025August 27, 2025

Why I added my name to the long ballot in Pierre Poilievre’s by-election

By Barry Rueger
Published: Globe and Mail
August 14, 2025
858 words

Barry Rueger is an author and is running as a candidate in the Battle River-Crowfoot by-election in Alberta.

In April of this year, I worked for Elections Canada. I was a service agent in the weeks leading up to the federal election, helping early voters to complete their ballots.

I have two distinct memories.

There was a young couple from Syria who brought in their Canadian citizenship certificates, barely two weeks old, and showed them to me proudly as they prepared to vote here for the first time. They took the process incredibly seriously, and had obviously done their homework.

Another group of voters that stood out were older, Canadian-born, didn’t know who the candidates were, and, in some cases, didn’t even know which riding they were voting in. These were people who voted for one party election after election, with no questions asked.

Such people are the reason why Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre is now running in the riding of Battle River-Crowfoot, in Southern Alberta. On April 28, more than 82 per cent of the riding’s voting constituents (or 53,684 of 64,807 eligible ballots) elected Damien Kurek, the Conservative candidate. They voted for a local boy who was a “fifth-generation farmer” and who had been a worker in the oil-and-gas industry. It was the third time in a row they had elected him, but just a few days later, he indicated he would be willing to resign his seat. The reason? Mr. Poilievre had been defeated in his Ottawa-area riding of Carleton, and needed a presumably safe seat to return to Parliament.

Like that young immigrant couple, I care a lot about my vote. I take the time to look at candidates and parties, and try to choose the person who I think will represent me and the people who live in my town. I don’t just vote for a party; I vote for an individual.

If I were one of the 53,684 people in Battle River-Crowfoot who voted for Mr. Kurek, I would be angry right now. I would be wondering why someone who had received my vote in three elections would suddenly abandon his position as a member of Parliament for a job as a lobbyist. And I’d be wondering how a candidate who had just been defeated in his own riding in Ontario was supposed to understand my needs, and fill the role of a rural Alberta MP.

Mr. Kurek’s decision to step down is why I joined 200 other Canadians in registering with the Longest Ballot Committee. Our names will all be on the ballot with Mr. Poilievre, not because any of us expect to win, but because we’re saying that there is something very broken in Canadian politics.

I’m running in this by-election because I believe it’s time for Canada to find a new way of choosing the people that we send to Ottawa. I’m running because I’m one of the people who felt hopeful when Justin Trudeau promised a new and better electoral system, only to back out when he realized the old system worked better for him. I’m also running to make the point that the rules determining how MPs are selected, and how governments are formed, should be crafted and implemented by a non-partisan body of independent citizens, the genuine working people who are most affected by government actions – or inaction – and not the politicians themselves.

I’m the grandson of homesteaders who broke barren ground in Saskatchewan and lived in a sod hut. I was born in Calgary, and went to school there. My relatives are all Albertans; people who work on farms, or in oil and gas, who hunt and fish, and volunteer for the local fire department.

When I look at Mr. Poilievre, I see someone who has never worked a real job in his life – who has never got his hands dirty picking fruits or vegetables (like I have), or done factory work (like I have), or carried sheets of plywood across an icy construction site.

With Mr. Kurek, the voters in Battle River-Crowfoot had a candidate who truly represented their community: someone who had done the same sort of work as his constituents. Now, instead, they’re being handed a life-long professional politician.

Since his defeat in the Carleton riding, and his appearance on the Battle River-Crowfoot ballot, Mr. Poilievre has called the Longest Ballot Committee’s actions “a scam” and wants our form of protest to be banned. Some social-media pundits have posited that running for office should require a $1,000 deposit (which was rendered illegal by a Court of Queen’s Bench of Alberta ruling in 2017)

Since John A. Macdonald in 1867, every single one of Canada’s 24 prime ministers has been either a Conservative or a Liberal. When voters’ choices are limited to the two “natural” governing parties, it’s inevitable that politicians will grow lazy, or even corrupt, and will wind up offering no real choice to the electorate.

I am running in Battle River-Crowfoot because I agree with my fellow Longest Ballot nominees that our electoral system needs reform, and that those reforms will only come to pass as a result of pressure from ordinary Canadians. Other countries have managed this, and it’s time for Canada to do the same.

August 1, 2025August 8, 2025

It’s Only Earwax — Should You Worry?

By Barry Rueger
Published: Next Avenue
August 1, 2025
1318 words
Read on-line.

Earwax is one of those things that everyone encounters, but nobody discusses. If you’re like me though, it blocks up your ears time after time, and you go looking for answers. The good news is that earwax — technically known as cerumen — is really not a significant health risk. The bad news is that because it’s a minor problem, you’ll find all manner of folktales and remedies, many of which are nonsense.

Many doctors recommend starting with over-the-counter ear drops.

An excess of wax in the ear canal is seen in around 10% of children, 5% of adults and increases to around 60% in older populations. Wax obstruction is more common in men than in women. Wax problems may be commonplace, but unless that yellow or brown stuff actually blocks your ear, you tend to ignore it, or maybe get annoyed when you find a little blob of it on your pillow in the morning.

I spoke to Desmond A. Nunez, M.D., a specialist in ear, nose and throat surgery (or otolaryngology) at the University of British Columbia.

“Earwax” is not really wax, like you find in a candle. Earwax is a combination of the cells of the skin of the outer ear, which are always being shed, and oils from sebum glands and other skin glands that produce substances for perspiration and temperature control purposes. All of that is incorporated into the earwax that we produce. The specific composition of earwax varies from one person to the next.

Earwax does have a purpose. Nunez explains, “It’s partly protective, so the presence of the wax in the ear canal will prevent things from getting into the ear, and also the amount of lubrication from sebum secreting glands gives you an oil base, a protection against water ingress.” Your earwax keeps your ears from getting infected while swimming.

Causes of Excess Earwax

For most people, the accumulation of earwax is self-regulating. But what about people like me who routinely find our ears plugged and hearing impaired? What is the cause of this excess earwax?

In health forums and on Facebook you’ll find many theories from people with earwax buildup, and you’ll be offered many possible causes. One favorite with people in the live music business is that loud sound levels cause wax to become impacted. The claim is that “If you are in a noisy environment, the body creates wax to protect the ears.” Other people say that regular use of over-the-ear headphones somehow causes more wax to be created. Some posters claim that “non-smelly underarm sweat” can indicate that you’ll have more wax problems, or that different allergies can cause wax buildup.

Another factor that impacts people over 50 is the use of hearing aids. Because they block the ear canal, they also tend to impair the ear’s ability to self-clear wax buildups.

Another claim is that people with Asian heritage more commonly suffer earwax problems. Nunez explains that while some genetic factors can influence what happens in your ears, it’s likely that it’s more a matter of luck. “I have a very diverse patient population base, but even within individuals of one particular demographic, there’s a huge amount of variation.”

“Other things you have to be aware of is that if you have skin disorders like psoriasis or eczema affecting your ears, that reduces the efficacy of self-clearing mechanisms. If one examines those people’s ears, you will see more wax. But I don’t think it’s because they’re producing more wax. I think it’s because the clearance mechanisms are broken down,” Nunez says.

Another factor that impacts people over 50 is the use of hearing aids. Because they block the ear canal, they also tend to impair the ear’s ability to self-clear wax buildups. (Ordinary ear buds can have the same effect.) And the wax itself will sometimes plug up the holes in the hearing aid, making them less effective at assisting hearing.

Beyond simple hearing loss, if wax is in contact with the tympanic membrane (the ear drum) it can cause discomfort and occasionally vertigo.

Removal Tips

Regardless of how your earwax might have been created, if it’s blocking your ear you’ll need to remove some of it. Once again the internet will offer a near endless array of suggestions, as well as videos, disgusting photos and people bragging about how plugged up their ears were and about the sheer volume of earwax they removed.

A much better choice for advice is your family doctor.

If you see your doctor and he or she sees excess earwax, they will likely start by telling you to use over-the-counter ear drops. The drops you’ll be looking for will be specifically for earwax removal. Other drops target infections, or swimmer’s ear. Some doctors will suggest using ordinary olive oil, almond oil or similar substances to soften impacted wax, but commercial earwax drops (which can be oil based, water based or non-water based) will include active ingredients that may include hydrogen peroxide, glycerin, sodium bicarbonate or carbamide peroxide (a combination of hydrogen peroxide and urea that’s also used in teeth-whitening products). There are also homeopathic ear drops with different herbal ingredients.

The usual advice is to administer your drops for four or five days.

Any of these options aim to soften or loosen impacted wax to make removal easier, either naturally on its own or by the doctor using a syringe. Separating facts from internet opinions on earwax removal choices can be difficult, but this is one area where there has been actual research. A 2018 review out of the NIH in the United Kingdom concluded that “using ear drops when you have a partially or completely blocked ear canal may help to remove the earwax in your ear. It is not clear whether one type of drop is any better than another, or whether drops containing active ingredients are any better than plain or salty water.” But in 2020, another study in the Journal of Clinical Otolaryngology found that drops containing glycerol, hydrogen peroxide and urea do make a difference.

The usual advice is to administer your drops for four or five days. Lie down with your head tipped to one side, carefully drop a few drops into your ear canal, then sit for a few minutes to let them work. When you sit back up you can rinse your ear with warm water and wipe away the excess.

Your doctor may also offer to syringe your ears, shooting in warm water to loosen and remove wax buildup. There is some suggestion that too much water pressure may actually damage your ears. And some places, notably Britain, have largely stopped the syringe method.

Removal Risks

Once when traveling in China, I found my ears totally blocked with wax. Our host directed me to a fellow with a market stall. With a bike-headlamp attached to his forehead he carefully scraped the wax out of my ears using a bamboo stick. It worked, and no harm was done, but my North American doctors all have been horrified by the idea.

If you remove all of the earwax or if your tool causes a break to the skin of the inner ear — the eardrum — your ear can easily become infected. Most minor ear injuries will heal themselves, but they can be painful and may need antibiotics. The other concern is that your ear wax protects against swimmer’s ear, a bacterial infection that can have serious consequences.

Vendors will sell you cheap kits with a tiny bluetooth camera, and various kinds of scrapers and tweezers for cleaning out your earwax. Despite the many videos on YouTube showing how to use them, experts all agree that you should never be sticking anything — even a Q-tip — inside your ears.

Your ears are delicate and essential. The risk of injury is just too great to go poking around in them. Instead, see your doctor.

June 19, 2025June 24, 2025

I want a home, not an investment

By Barry Rueger
Published: Globe and Mail
June 19, 2025
1055 words

After two years of living in France, it was time for my wife and me to come home. She went first, to Nova Scotia, to look at houses for sale. After a week Susan phoned me, excited, and said, “This is it!”

My inbox was soon filled with videos, property descriptions, and photos of a 140-year-old farmhouse at Western Head, just outside Liverpool.

It was an old, charming and quirky home, with grey cedar shingles, a bay window, and a septic tank that needed to be replaced. It has a barn where I eventually hope to add a writing studio, and it has enough land for a serious garden to grow our own fruit and vegetables.

Built sometime around 1880, it was old enough that we knew it would have hidden problems, and even before we made an offer we could see that the roof needed to be replaced. The money-guzzling oil-burning furnace would also need to go, replaced by heat pumps, or, if our budget allowed, geothermal heating.

In Nova Scotia terms, we’re outsiders. Because we’re coming from “away,” we probably paid more than a local person would have, but the house is perfect for us, with room for books and records, an office and a grand piano. We can look out the windows and see the Atlantic Ocean and the lobster boats, and we can hear the foghorn at the Western Head lighthouse down the road.

Despite all of the shortcomings, we knew we had found our home. And somehow we never once asked ourselves: “But is it a good investment?”

The newspapers are full of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s plans for helping Canadians, especially young Canadians, to buy homes. The stumbling block always seems to be a concern that if governments support building more homes, the resale prices of existing houses will go down – that homeowners will lose equity.

What Mr. Carney is missing is that for most ordinary people, a house, or even a rented apartment, isn’t an investment opportunity – it’s a home. Nearly everyone that I have known has moved into their home with every intention of living there permanently. They repaint the living room and hallway because they like the new colour, and they spend weeks and years building the flower gardens because they love to look at them. They add decks, bird feeders, and lights at Christmas.

They aren’t doing this because they’re aiming to add to potential resale value; they’re making an ordinary house into their home.

Because our farmhouse in Nova Scotia is our home, we don’t really care about its market value. We didn’t buy our farm house to resell it; we bought it to live there, to watch the birds at our feeder, the occasional deer or raccoon, and to watch the family of snow hares that nests under our deck change their coats from brown to white as winter approaches.

We bought that house, and love that house, because the Atlantic sunrises are beyond beautiful, and the stars at night are breathtaking, and because when storms arrive they are like nothing we’ve ever experienced.

And when we get home after a trip, or shopping, or work, we walk in the back door and say, “Oh, it’s so good to be home.”

My parents bought their first house in 1966 in Kelowna, B.C., on Morrison Avenue. That was my home for six years, from grade three to high school. In 1972 we moved into a newly built house a few blocks away on Charolais Road. I lived there, in a bedroom with orange shag carpeting, until I left for university. My mom stayed in that house until after my father died in 1994. She then moved into a sweet little bungalow on Ziprick Road that was her home until she died in 2021 during the pandemic.

Three houses over 55 years. That wasn’t about making investments; it was about making a home.

We moved to Nova Scotia for one reason: Susan’s son Haruki, his wife Sofia, and our three grandchildren lived in another old wooden farmhouse, about an hour down the road, just outside of Shelburne. We really wanted to be close to our grandchildren, but also wanted our separate lives, so the distance between us was just right. Susan cooked holiday dinners, and I built a swing-set and slide in the yard.

Early one morning, just a few months after we finally had all of our furniture, books and sheet music unpacked, we received a distressing phone call. Haruki and Sofia’s house had caught fire during the night, and by morning had burned to the ground. The family escaped with little more than their laptops and the clothes they were wearing. Nearby neighbours brought food and bags of used clothing, and kept the children out of harm’s way.

Susan and I drove the children home to our house in Liverpool, while Haruki and Sofia, likely still in shock, watched the last of the firefighting. While we cared for the kids, their parents took the time to come to terms with what happened, and to try to plan for the coming days.

Our Liverpool farmhouse was suddenly home for seven people, not two. For our children our home was a place of refuge. Days were spent exchanging e-mails and phone calls with insurance companies, and making plans for … well, for starting over from scratch. We shared our home with their family until they decided to settle in Montreal for the summer while insurance rebuilt their house.

A home, a real home, isn’t an investment: It’s the place for family, the place that you know you can return to when your world falls apart. A home is where you hang your hat, and keep your family photos, and raise your children. It’s where kittens and puppies move in, live their lives under foot, and then pass away. It’s where your future and your past are preserved all around you, and where every room holds a memory.

I don’t believe that anyone buys a home thinking only of resale value, or the return on investment. You buy your home – or rent it, as is the case for a third of Canadians – because it’s the place where you feel safe, and where you expect to spend years, or decades, making it part of a wonderful life.

April 4, 2025April 24, 2025

Is Your Dog’s Poop Bag Really Eco-friendly?

By Barry Rueger
Published: Asparagus Magazine
April 4, 2025
1483 words
Read on-line.

The story of compostable dog-poop bags is complicated—as is the story of dog-poop disposal in general.

According to some accounts, the idea of a small bag that could be used to pick up dog poop dates back to 1986, when Californian businessman Chris Crosson created the first dog-poop bag. Another claim dates it to the early 20th century, when Teddy Roosevelt got tired of cleaning up his dog’s droppings and instead would carry a pocket-sized bag for that purpose.

Regardless of who had the idea first, over the past 100 years it has been almost universally accepted that every dog owner should collect their pet’s waste. More controversial is the question of how that waste should be disposed of.

Dog waste carries diseases, so you want to keep it away from food, gardens, and waterways. Disease experts such as the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that dog feces can spread pathogens ranging from Campylobacter, Giardia, and E. coli, to hookworm and roundworm.

Even setting aside the disease problems, piles of dog poop on sidewalks and lawns are unpleasant, smell bad, and ick up your shoes when, inevitably, you step in them. Grabbing poop with a little plastic bag and tying the top shut seems like a simple solution—unless you’re trying to do it sustainably.
What’s your bag?

What’s your bag?

If you walk into any pet store, you’ll see shelves full of poop bags of different brands and colours—most of them manufactured in China, but some in the US or Canada. Many of them will claim to be “compostable.” The problem is how you define that term.

The group that certifies most products as “compostable” in North America is the Biodegradable Products Institute (BPI). They have tested thousands of products and allow manufacturers to use the BPI certification mark to demonstrate that what they’re selling can, in fact, be composted.

The problem for Canadian dog owners is that Canadian and American rules are different. BPI explained to Asparagus in an email that “Pet Waste Bags aren’t currently accepted by most commercial composters in the United States, so BPI Certification for Pet Waste Bags is limited to Canada, where those types of products are commonly accepted by curbside composting programs.” This means that dozens of brands of poop bags that wouldn’t be approved in the US can be labelled as “compostable” in Canada.

Generally speaking, “compostable” plastics such as poop bags are made mainly of polybutylene adipate terephthalate, or PBAT. This polymer is synthesized from fossil fuels, though research suggests it could be derived from biomass in future. It is combined with plastic-alternative materials such as polylactic acid (PLA)—typically made from fermented plant starch obtained from plants like corn, cassava, sugarcane, or potato—to toughen them up while retaining the promised biodegradability.

The issue is, although PLA is considered to be compostable in precisely controlled industrial conditions, it is not compostable in home composts or landfills. One 2012 study suggests that in a landfill setting, it could take 100-plus years for PLA to complete the chemical process needed to just start biodegrading.

That problem seems to exist for most “compostable” plastics. Although they will usually degrade, sometimes in only a few years, the degradation relies on the plastic being disposed of under just the right conditions. The moisture of the compost environment, the temperature, and even the size of chopped-up particles that the bags have been reduced to all affect the composting process.

There are currently no international standards or guidelines for home-composting conditions, but companies from many countries—including some from Canada—use the Austrian “OK compost HOME” certification, which defines polymers as home-compostable if at least 90% are degraded within 12 months at ambient temperatures of 20–30°C.

Another issue is the release of microplastics from “compostable” plastics. While research is still being carried out on this, one 2021 study of PBAT in an aquatic environment found that PBAT released “a much larger quantity of plastic fragments/particles” than did LDPE, the plastic commonly used for food wraps, grocery bags, and industrial packaging.

All of this may explain why, as of 2023, BC has stopped allowing items labelled “compostable plastic” to be put in any compost. The Government of BC webpage on the issue states, “[T]hese plastics are regularly removed from composting and recycling facilities and are sent to landfills.”

Disposal dilemma

So you’ve picked up poop in a bag that is more-or-less compostable. Now what do you do with it? As is often the case with waste disposal, the challenge is that you’re trying to dispose of two different materials that need different handling. And you’re trying to do that within the specific rules and procedures put in place by your local municipality.

The starting point with dog waste is your local municipality’s recommendations. A 2019 City of Vancouver Engineering Services memorandum examining its dedicated dog-waste disposal regime (namely, the red bins located in dog parks) cites a report saying that the city has between 32,000 and 56,000 dogs. At the US Environmental Protection Agency’s estimated average of ⅓ kg of waste per dog per day, that comes to between approximately 4,000 and 7,000 metric tonnes of poop heading to local landfills every year.

Although few Vancouver dog-owners know it, the City of Vancouver launched a pilot program in 2016 mentioning the option of emptying your dog poop into your toilet, so that it can be handled by the local waste-treatment system. Your empty poop bags can then go into your household trash can.

The reason for flushing is simple, according to Dr. Love-Ese Chile, a bioplastics researcher: when dog feces go to landfill, they don’t properly compost.

“Dog waste often contains a lot of moisture,” Chile explains. “In the non-oxygen environments in many landfills, it will degrade in an anaerobic way to form methane and water.” That methane ends up being released as a greenhouse gas, which adds to climate problems.

Every plastic poop bag has to be opened and emptied out by hand to separate the bag from the waste.

However, confusingly for dog-owners, the signs at most Vancouver dog parks only remind owners that they are responsible for picking up after their dogs, and even the parks participating in the pilot project make no mention of flushing dog waste.

A 2019 memo to Vancouver City Council regarding the City’s red bins for dog waste raised some significant issues, not the least of which is that every plastic poop bag has to be opened and emptied out by hand to separate the bag from the waste. After some processing, the waste goes to the local sewage-treatment plant, and the bags—compostable or not—to the landfill. Perhaps unsurprisingly, a 2023 follow-up memo on this process notes that the City’s call for companies interested in carrying out the poop-bag-emptying process “received no feasible responses…from anybody willing or capable of dealing with this volume of waste.”

Municipalities are still working on creating good systems for handling dog feces, with little consistency from one place to another. As a dog owner, you might do better to check the resources at the Enviro Pet Waste Network. Their aim is to provide easy-to-understand, science-based information for pet owners.

The scoop on the poop

So as a dog owner, what should I be doing? If I flush the dog poop down the toilet, I’m reducing landfill waste as much as possible. If the bags are “compostable,” even better. Aside from microplastics, the “compostable” plastic bags are still greener than plastic bags made entirely from petroleum products.

What I can’t do, though, is mix my dog waste, or my compostable poop bags, with my regular compost pile. Anything containing animal waste should be kept separate from our food gardens, and that includes compost.

One option that the City of Vancouver suggests is that you create a separate compost pit just for dog feces. Detailed instructions can be found at cityfarmer.org—but before you dig a 3-foot-deep hole in the back of your garden plot, take the time to read through dog-owners’ experiences on Reddit or in gardening forums. For everyone who loves their handy dog-waste compost pit, there’s also someone who finds it unwieldy, smelly, or just not effective as a way to compost poop.

Although it’s possible to successfully compost poop, the reality is that it’s not the same as tossing your potato peels in the compost bucket. You’ll need grass cuttings or other plant material—and probably septic-tank starter—to get things working, and your success will depend on the specifics of your soil, climate conditions, and your dog’s breed, size, and diet.

Regardless of how you dispose of the actual dog poop, every dog-owner has to judge for themselves whether a little plastic bag is as green as they want to be. If not, maybe a wooden spoon and an old yogurt container is a better choice.

June 29, 2024July 15, 2024

Without a strong NFB, Canadians will lose sight of who we are

By Barry Rueger
Published: Globe and Mail
June 29, 2024
1148 words

Bill Mason camera helmet When I finally bought myself a lovely, red canoe in 1997, it was because I spent my youth, 30 years earlier, watching the many canoeing films by the National Film Board’s legendary Bill Mason.

I recently rewatched Paddle to the Sea, the Mason classic that virtually every child in Canada saw in the 1960s in elementary school. The 1966 film tells the story of a carved, wooden toy canoe containing an “Indian” paddler. The canoe was set free in a river in Northern Ontario, and eventually was carried down through the Great Lakes and out into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. On its journey, the little canoe was aided by many people – and one dog – who picked it up, rescued it and set it once again on its course to the ocean.

I saw that film during an era when there was no bigger thrill than entering a classroom and seeing a big 16-millimetre film projector and a collapsible white screen. Watching the film again, I noticed some things I hadn’t seen the first time. I was struck by the stereotyped First Nations paddler, but also by the powerful environmental message: The Great Lakes were being polluted by humans, with sewage and industrial waste dumped into the waters. I realized that when I saw the film for the first time, at age 8 or 9, it was the moment I first became an environmentalist, as did a great number of children in my generation.

In an age before the internet, and even cable TV, NFB releases shaped the way generations of Canadian children saw their country, saw the broader world, and saw themselves. Now, it seems as if our country has lost a collective sense of who we are. Sadly, the decline of the NFB has contributed to Canadians losing sight of who we are as a nation and what makes us unique.

As a young person, I learned about the Maritimes through films such as Rising Tide and The Sea Got in Your Blood, saw Saskatchewan grain harvested in Wheat Country, and learned about nickel mining in Sudbury in Miner. Sitting in a classroom in Kelowna, B.C., we experienced dog sleds and igloos in the Northwest Territories (At The Winter Sea Ice Camp), and saw famous singers like Paul Anka and Leonard Cohen – famous Canadian singers in an era when virtually all popular music came from the United States.

Like many of my generation, I allowed NFB films to shape me politically and socially. As I grew older, I explored the experimental and creative reaches of the NFB. The animation of Norman McLaren led me to more political films, such as his 1952 anti-war film Neighbours, and later in my mid-20s, in a church basement in Vancouver, to the controversial and influential anti-porn film Not a Love Story: A Film About Pornography. And as late as 1993, Alanis Obomsawin’s documentary Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance, led me to a strong understanding of First Nations issues, and especially the standoff in Oka.

This was an era when the NFB still had a global reputation. It was well-funded, had production centres all across Canada, and most importantly, was widely known to Canadians and was a source of national pride. It was the very model of a national media organization, a model that filmmakers in other places envied.

In Britain, every person knows or has visited the British Museum. Paris has the Louvre, and Washington has the Smithsonian. Each of these institutions is a cornerstone of how those nations see themselves. Even in these divided times, Americans will look at the Smithsonian and agree: “This is our history.”

Canada lacks a national institution that teaches us who we are. Part of that reflects our relative youth as a single nation, with Newfoundland only joining Canada in 1949, and Nunavut being created 50 years after that. And part of that reflects a population spread out sparsely across our vast, far-flung country, where you can drive for a day or more between populated centres. Those distances mean that the majority of Canadians have never visited the Museum of Civilization or the National Gallery. Instead, for many decades, the National Film Board was the glue that held us together.

In May, The Walrus wrote about staffing cuts at the NFB. According to the NFB’s union, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, 80 out 380 full-time NFB positions were eliminated this year. Regional studios in Edmonton, Halifax and Winnipeg, as well as “interactive studios” in Vancouver and Montreal, have been closed. The union says the recent cuts followed several decades of underfunding. Even though both the NFB brass and the Liberal government claim that the organization is being modernized, or reinvented, the sad truth is that these are insupportable blows and that the film board was already a mere shadow of what it was when I was young. Without production centres in different regions of Canada, and without employees with the time and expertise to create and commission new works, the NFB will cease to be a force that binds our country together.

Despite the boundless reaches of YouTube and TikTok, and despite a Canadian commercial film industry churning out police dramas and Hollywood blockbusters, there is still a desperate need for Canada to have a strong Canadian media production organization that will support the filmmakers and films that Disney or Lionsgate or Netflix won’t touch.

When I was young, the government of Canada was genuinely proud of the National Film Board, and understood that it played a critical role in helping Canadians love and cherish their country. Along with the CBC, the NFB told Canadian stories to Canadians. Even though the CBC is finally seeing some funding to replace the drastic cuts of the 1980s and 90s, the production of popular TV and radio programs is different from the thought-provoking films created at the NFB.

The NFB can still be the place where films are produced that are about us, and where filmmakers of any age can go to learn their craft and produce uniquely Canadian movies and documentaries. The National Film Board can rediscover its role as a cinematic hothouse; a place where non-commercial and experimental forms can thrive, and where the kind of filmmaking happens that will once again influence filmmakers globally.

Just as it was in the past, this is still a time when Canadians – especially young Canadians – need a place where they can see themselves portrayed as genuine Canadians, not as thinly disguised Americans. For that to happen, the government needs to step away from bottom-line concerns, and embrace the value of film as art and film as an instrument for social change. That will require secure and generous long-term funding commitments, and the restoration of production offices in every corner of Canada. The National Film Board is the soul of our country, and it needs to be preserved.

November 17, 2023April 10, 2025

In Nova Scotia, drag racing is a family affair

By Barry Rueger
Photographs by Susan Evans
Published: Globe and Mail
November 17, 2023
1526 words
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In the 1970s, back home in Kelowna, B.C., I had fantasies of becoming a race car driver. My cherry red ‘69 Dodge Charger was too fast for my own good, and speeding tickets were a regular expense. I drove fast, and I loved cars that went fast.

On the Greenfield Dragway near Liverpool, N.S., I’ve rediscovered that love of fast cars, of roaring big V8 engines, and have found one of the last places where global warming and fuel economy just aren’t on the table for discussion. It’s not that people aren’t aware of these things, or don’t care, it’s just that when you’re driving a car at 320 kilometres an hour, they really don’t enter your mind.

I’ve also found one of the few remaining places where virtually everything on wheels has a North American nameplate. In an age when the car business is global, and when electric cars are becoming more and more common, drag racing is still the domain of big-block Chrysler and Chevrolet engines, with a smattering of Fords. Even the token Volkswagen Beetle and the two Honda Civics manage to squeeze in loud and powerful Detroit engines.

At the Greenfield Dragway, which leases the little-used South Shore Regional Airport runway for several weekends each year, Noel Peach is repacking the drag chute that slowed his car at the end of his first run.

Driver Noel Peach packs his parachute. A chute is required for any car that goes faster than 150 miles anhour. Drag racing still uses imperial measurements.
SUSAN EVANS/THE GLOBE AND MAIL — Driver Noel Peach packs his parachute. A chute is required for any car that goes faster than 150 miles an hour. Drag racing still uses imperial measurements.
SUSAN EVANS/THE GLOBE AND MAIL

It’s a tricky business, and one that benefits from a second set of hands. On this sunny October weekend, he was helped by his wife Lindsay.

Peach’s dad was a racer, too. After Noel and Lindsay met, it was natural that Lindsay became part of the race team – or more accurately, exactly one-half of the team.

Nova Scotia drag racing is still dominated – although not exclusively – by male drivers, but partners are integral members of most teams. Whether providing bookkeeping and planning skills, or hands-on maintenance and support, a lot of drivers rely heavily on their partners. (It’s a good thing Noel and Lindsay are a team in other ways, too: The couple’s home in Upper Tantallon, near Halifax, burned in the wildfires just a few months before, when they were here for another race.)

Drag racing still uses imperial measurements – a quarter-mile track is about 402 metres. Cars are measured in inches and feet, and an explanation on the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) website explains that a Top Fuel dragster “can burn up to 15 gallons of nitromethane fuel during a single run,” reaching more than 330 miles an hour. That’s more than 50 litres during a 3.7-second run at more than 530 km/h.

Peach drives a 1988 Trans Am, a car that hit 164 miles an hour on this day. He explains that even though drag racers are fierce rivals on the strip, they’re a strong community back in the pits. If you need a hand, or a part, someone will step up to sort you out.

Working together is what Peach and Lorne Buchanan of Bedford, N.S., did when it came time to upgrade their cars. Peach wanted to buy his current car from another racer, but didn’t want the engine that came with it. Buchanan’s dragster was fine but needed a new engine. Buchanan and Peach bought the white Trans Am together, and each took what they needed.

Today the two cars are parked side by side in the pits. Buchanan’s partner, Brenda Rafuse, guides the dragster into the pit, and helps him to pull off the hood covering the electronics. If you look for it, you’ll see Rafuse’s name is also painted on the side of the car.

Author Barry Rueger sitting in LorneBuchanan’s dragster.
SUSAN EVANS/THE GLOBE AND MAIL — Author Barry Rueger sitting in Lorne
Buchanan’s dragster.
SUSAN EVANS/THE GLOBE AND MAIL

If you only have cursory knowledge of drag racing – fat tires and loud engines – you may be overwhelmed by the many classes of cars and races. The NHRA points out that there are 10 classes that feature a straightforward, heads-up race between similarly classed cars.
Two cars line up beside each other at the “Christmas tree,” watching as a sequence of
three yellow lights flashes, one after the other. When the bottom light turns green, they both take off.

At the Greenfield Dragway, things get more complicated. Cars range from full-length dragsters, to various levels of pro and super-pro cars, to what seem to be factory stock sedans. Each is assigned a handicap based on the number of seconds the weight and configuration says it should run a quarter-mile. And each car can choose to run in more than one class.

In practical terms, you usually see two cars lined up side by side, with the slower one getting the green light first.

Greenfield is still a small-town race, and spectators aren’t kept in the grandstands. You can walk up and down the pits, talk to the drivers and their teams, and take the time to marvel at the cars and the obvious pride of the people who maintain these vehicles.

Beyond the (usually) shiny paint jobs and sponsor logos, serious cars need to meet a plethora of NHRA safety rules intended to protect the drivers, crew members and spectators. In all but the slowest cars, a roll cage is required, made to specific dimensions. Safety belts are replaced every two years, and helmets and neck collars are mandatory. Faster vehicles need to add a drive shaft loop and axle retention devices, and cars that can hit 150 miles an hour must have a parachute at the back of the car.

All of this costs a lot of money, and as Fred Thibeault from Middleton, N.S., describes it, it has been many years since the winnings at a Nova Scotia race paid enough to cover what it cost to build the car. At this point, everyone is doing it for the love of fast cars and the thrill of racing.

Thibeault’s 1969 Chevrolet Camaro SS is a shiny red thing of beauty. He has been racing this car for 34 years, and it’s obviously his pride and joy. The car is, in some ways, still stock – the same car that came off the dealer’s lot when it was purchased – but over the years it has been slowly upgraded in nearly every way allowed by the NHRA rules.

Under the hood, the car is cleaner than most kitchens. The stock 375-cubic-inch engine has been bored out, and has seen the pistons, rings and camshaft replaced or upgraded to boost performance. A dry-sump oil tank makes sure that everything stays lubricated under extreme conditions. And the transmission – well, the outside is stock Chevy, but what’s inside is another thing altogether.

Another of Thibeault’s cars is the 1989 Camaro parked right next door at the track. It’s driven this weekend by Thibeault’s son Scott. He has three sons who drive, and two are here on this cool October weekend.

The race track family goes beyond the children and spouses who are part of the teams. The 160 drivers and hundreds of family members and spectators all seem to know each other, and spend as much time socializing as they do prepping their cars for the next run.

Drag racing today is high-tech. The Christmas tree tower at the start and the photosensors at the finish line time each run and generate the printed slips that each driver picks up on the way back to the pits. Inside the cars, many of today’s dragsters rely on an electronic box to time each shift to perfection. All you need to do is steer the car for a few seconds – the computer will make sure that each shift happens at the perfect moment.

Not everyone wants such a high-tech racing experience. The head of the Greenfield Dragway Association is David Joudrey. He explains that when he’s racing his 1979 Chevrolet Nova, he’ll do so in the “non-box” class, racing against people who still shift their own gears instead of letting the “box” do it.

At the start line, some things haven’t changed. Once you’ve done your prerun “burn-out” to warm up your tires, and have positioned your car’s nose at the starting point, you’ll have both the brake and the throttle pushed in as the Christmas tree counts down. You want your engine revs to be as high as possible before you start moving. Your aim is to release the brake when the lights hit “1/3 yellow” – if you wait until the green light comes on, you’ve already lost.

After a day revelling in the smoke and sound of these cars, I’m sadly reminded that I hardly drive over the speed limit any longer, and that it’s been years since I even did my own oil change. My Mazda CX-5 SUV is a convenience now, not the passion that my Charger used to be.

Still, as David Joudrey reminds me, if I can borrow a helmet, and can pass the safety inspection, my Mazda and I can join them at the Greenfield Dragway next season and recapture those days of speed – though I doubt my insurance policy will allow it.

May 29, 2025

My 79-year-old wife was just accepted into Oxford.

By Barry Rueger
Published: Business Insider
May 28, 2025
594 words
PDF of article

After 25 years as a successful piano teacher, my wife, Susan, decided to go back to school for a master’s degree in music theory — at 79 years old.

When I married Susan eight years ago, I knew she was a gifted teacher, one who puts in the hours needed to do her best and who genuinely cares about every student.

But then last year, Susan started to explore ways she could learn more about music and how she wanted to return home to the UK from Canada.

Almost on a lark, she applied to the oldest university in the English-speaking world: Oxford. In March, word came back that Susan had been accepted at the university that most British students dream of attending.

We couldn’t be more excited, but her 80th birthday is fast approaching, and the road ahead is not easy.

Read this at Business Insider.

April 9, 2025August 6, 2025

Understanding the Different Types and Causes of Seizures

By Barry Rueger
Published: Next Avenue
Aoril 9, 2025
1313 words
Read on-line.

One sunny day in mid-October I realized that I was in the hospital. I didn’t know why, and I didn’t know how long I had been there, but I was definitely in the emergency ward at Vancouver General Hospital.

By the end of the day I had learned that my wife, Susan, had found me on the dining room floor in my dressing gown, that she had called the paramedics and that through the examinations and the ambulance journey, my eyes had been open and I was answering questions.

A week later, my new neurologist, Oscar Benavente, M.D., told me that I had probably suffered a seizure. The “probably” was because the event had happened days earlier, and he hadn’t been there to see it.

Please read the full article on-line at: https://www.nextavenue.org/understanding-different-types-causes-seizures/

October 3, 2024April 10, 2025

The Problem With Low Potassium

By Barry Rueger
Published: Next Avenue
October 3, 2024
1526 words
Read on-line.

It was unexpected when my family doctor announced that I had very low potassium levels, or hypokalemia. Aside from prescribing some of the largest pills that I’ve ever seen, and directing me to an endocrinologist, he had little to say to me. I quickly realized that I knew nothing about this essential element, either inside my body, or in the world around me.

Read the full article.

June 1, 2024June 1, 2024

Japanese fusion comes to Nova Scotia’s South Shore

By Barry Rueger
Published: Globe and Mail
June 1, 2024
962 words

Partners and co-owners of Main & Mersey Dining Room and Coffee Bar, Shani Beadle, left, and Andreas Arnmar, right, are photographed at their restaurant in Liverpool, Nova Scotia on December 30, 2023.Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail

Andreas Arnmar and Shani Beadle’s road to restaurant ownership was what you could call uphill, right from the concept stage.

Late last year the husband and wife opened the Dining Room at Main & Mersey, an Japanese-fusion restaurant, in Liverpool on Nova Scotia’s South Shore. With a population of 2,500, the town boasts culinary options that lean toward fish and chips and lobster rolls.

Believing locals would appreciate the dishes they were envisioning, such as Oyster Mushroom Tempura or Agedashi Tofu, was a real leap of faith, they say now. And that was just the first challenge.

The couple’s culinary journey started small: with coffee. After moving to Liverpool from the U.K. in 2017 (Beadle is from B.C., while Arnmar was born and raised in Sweden), they opened home-furnishings store Main & Mersey on the town’s Main Street. Beadle’s background in fabric design positioned her well for the endeavour.

While she ran the shop, Arnmar renovated their new home and raised their young daughter. Two years later, they launched a small coffee shop behind the store because, in the words of Arnmar, “there wasn’t any good coffee that we liked around this area.”

Main & Mersey’s menu offerings include, lobster kani salad, left, and salmon misozuke, right.Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail

The coffee bar did a lot better than they expected, and so did the bakery they added in 2022, serving up treats such as cinnamon buns, lemon-curd croissants and spinach and feta rolls. Soon, she adds, “I saw how many people we turned away asking for proper food, who didn’t just want fish and chips and chowder. There was a massive gap in the food spectrum, especially when the tourists are in town.”

To fill that gap, Beadle and Arnmar knew they wanted to do something new, namely to go higher end and introduce different flavours to the town’s dining scene. They secured a bigger location just a few feet away from the furniture shop in fall, 2022, and began construction on the space.

A brand-new restaurant kitchen, a welcoming bar and an accessible washroom are all complemented by wood-topped tables, tropical plants and cozy lighting. Much of the painting and tile work was done by Beadle, Arnmar and local volunteers. And they converted the upper floor of the building into apartments, with rent offsetting part of the cost of renovations.

The interior of Main & Mersey Dining Room and Coffee Bar.Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail

The couple decided to bring along their pastry chef from the bakery, Aimee Corbet, and hired winemaker and mixologist, Alexandra Beaulieu, as well as a Peruvian-Japanese chef. Their Japanese-fusion menu is integral to their vision, of course, but Arnmar stresses that they’re out to do more than just serve food on plates.

“You can get a great cocktail, you can try a really amazing bottle of wine that you may not have had before. You get food that you may not have tried before, good service‚ and you’re in a beautiful space. It’s just kind of ticking the boxes.”

But inevitably, there were delays. Their grand opening was punted forward two months owing to a shortage of tradespeople in the region and because of government paperwork. In the meantime, they were on the hook for mortgage payments, construction costs and staff salaries.

And then, when opening weekend finally arrived last August, their chef made a sudden departure.

Beadle and Arnmar were faced with a new and almost impossible challenge: How do you run a restaurant without a trained chef? Fortunately, he had already trained the rest of the kitchen to prepare his menu. And Beadle stepped up to take on a job she never expected to fill as a member of the kitchen staff, doing prep for the evening, creating new menu items and training her staff. Meanwhile, Arnmar is up front, welcoming customers and greeting regulars by name.

The restaurant’s grand opening was punted forward two months owing to a shortage of tradespeople in the region.Meagan Hancock/The Globe and Mail

Opening the restaurant stretched the couple’s financial resources to the limit. The first big lifeline came from the FarmWorks Investment Co-operative, a Nova Scotia for-profit co-op that lends funds to food businesses in the province. The funding comes on the condition that the restaurant will buy from provincial producers, and serve Nova Scotia fish, meat and produce.

Beadle is on board. “The idea is we use 50 per cent locally sourced ingredients. That can be wine, that could be produce, that can be meat, that can be mushrooms or whatever. It could be distilled liquor that’s made in the province. Obviously, it’s easier in the summer months than in the winter, but we’re also doing things like pickles and other preserved ingredients. ”

Main & Mersey crowdfunded for the final push before opening day. Beadle posted an appeal on their website and received 85 per cent of the $50,000 they were seeking. “You can’t pull out once you’ve taken people’s money. It’s really impressive, that people in our community will step up like that.”

One of those community members is local Laurie-Anne Brown, who grew up in Liverpool in the 1980s when “it was a thriving paper mill town” with a bustling Main Street full of shops and restaurants.

She hopes new establishments like the Dining Room at Main & Mersey will restore “a thriving Main Street that I once knew.”

Beadle notes that the restaurant had donors from as far away as London and Toronto, but they’re counting on locals, like Brown, and residents of the province from further afield, too. “Build it and hopefully they’ll come. People already get in their car and drive an hour and a bit for our pastries so if the food is good … that’s the plan.”

May 30, 2024May 30, 2024

Bad news

By Barry Rueger
Published: THIS Magazine
January/February, 2024
640 words
Read PDF.

THIS Magazine Jan/Feb 2024

One writer’s desperate howl for a good old-fashioned newspaper

WHEN I WAS 11, WE WENT ON A SCHOOL FIELD TRIP TO THE KELOWNA DAILY COURIER.

I can still remember the linotype machines and drum-shaped metal plates of text and pictures that were loaded into the giant presses to print the paper’s pages.

They gave us a still-hot copy of that day’s paper. I kept it for years, and for decades I‘ve subscribed to the local daily newspaper everywhere I’ve lived. For the past year, that’s been in Liverpool, on the South Shore of Nova Scotia. Since arriving, I’ve realized that we’re in a news desert; a place where Facebook is the beginning and end of local news. That situation grew even worse when the Liberal government enacted Bill C-18, the Online News Act.

Since August, two months after Bill C-18 received royal assent, Facebook has refused to allow users to post Canadian news stories. For Facebook’s owner, Meta, leaving entire towns and regions with no local news whatsoever is a better choice than agreeing to pay the news organizations whose work Facebook users have been reporting.

Liverpool is a place where daily newspapers really don’t exist. Outside of one store in Halifax we can’t buy a Globe and Mail out here, there are no local dailies, and the tiny weeklies are hard to find. Nova Scotia’s largest paper, the Halifax Chronicle Herald, recently stopped printing on Mondays, and has cut back on its home delivery. Still, every now and then one of the big papers or the CBC would run a story about Liverpool, and someone would post a link to it on a local Facebook page. Now, even that isn’t possible, and in the meantime, the prolonged death of newspapers continues.

In September the Hamilton Spectator shut down its newsroom, and its owner Torstar is ceasing to print dozens of small local papers, moving them online instead. Similar shutdowns are happening in small-town British Columbia. It seems Southern Ontario and parts of B.C. are about to become news deserts just like southern Nova Scotia. Yes, you can still subscribe to many publications online, but there is a tangible difference between holding a printed paper and reading news on a screen. The printed page establishes the trustworthiness of the news outlet. Having trained reporters and editors and a physical printing press requires an investment that almost always leads to serious journalism. The time and money spent on reporters and editors is one reason why the New York Times and the Globe and Mail are still considered reliable. These publications have a long history as trusted news sources, and still feel a duty to maintain those standards. One may not like their editorial slants, but few seriously question the quality of their reporting.

In Liverpool, on the other hand, we just suffered through nearly two months of a boil-water advisory, and unless you followed the Facebook page for Queens County you wouldn’t have known what was—or wasn’t—happening. Because there are no local reporters, there was also no one asking questions about why an entire town had no drinkable water.

Meta’s actions are not new. For decades, the handful of publishers who control almost all of our news outlets have dramatically reduced reporting staff while shrinking newspaper page counts, and at the same time have closed or merged dozens of small local papers that they’d acquired. What Nova Scotia’s South Shore is experiencing, and what southern Ontario and B.C. are about to experience, is the harsh reality of living in a place where media ceases to be the watchdog that holds governments and corporations accountable, and where there’s no trusted source for people to sort fact from fiction.

Sometime before 2000, 30 years after my field trip, I visited the Conrad Black-era Hamilton Spectator with a friend who worked there. My vivid memory is of hundreds of square meters of blue carpet – half of the giant newsroom – sitting empty of furniture. Governments turned their heads while Black decimated newsrooms, just as they turn their heads today.

-BARRY RUEGER