‘A blue-collar artist for a blue-collar town’: A century of Leo Mol

‘A blue-collar artist for a blue-collar town’: A century of Leo Mol

Renowned sculptor Leo Mol, who died in 2009, would have turned 100 this week. His work is found all over Winnipeg.

Towing company hands stolen car back, but not to owner

A Manitoba man says he is dumbfounded after his car was stolen, impounded by a Winnipeg towing company and given back — to someone that wasn’t him.

Cody Lamb lives in the western Manitoba community of Douglas, about 18 kilometres east of Brandon, but spends weeks away from home working on oil rigs in Alberta.

The 24-year-old says on Sept. 11, while away for work, he heard from his girlfriend who told him his car wasn’t in their driveway. Lamb reported the car stolen to Brandon RCMP the same day.

After filing the report, he heard from Steinbach RCMP on Oct. 1 that his car was recovered that day in the community of Mitchell, roughly five km west of Steinbach.

Jets’ game flies south against Ducks

The Winnipeg Jets sure looked like a team that was running on fumes Friday night.

Playing for the fifth time in eight days, the club suffered its first regulation loss of the young season — a lacklustre 5-1 showing against the Anaheim Ducks at Canada Life Centre.

While we won’t question the effort, the execution was a different story. Sloppy plays, missed passes, porous defensive-zone coverage and iffy goaltending made this a tough watch for the 13,693 fans in attendance.

“Just some mental things that happened. Obviously some physical things as well,” said head coach Scott Arniel.

Nature doesn’t waste its time

Sixteen months in and the black burn from a forest fire somehow transitions from the foreground to the background. I’m not sure if it actually softens, if it really changes, or if is just that your eyes, now used to the background, start seeing less of it.

One thing’s for certain: nature doesn’t waste any time taking its opportunities. In the sheltered ground behind where the shed over our Newfoundland root cellar used to be, a forest of sorrel has arisen, its dark-green leaves with their distinctive double horns at their base crowding in tight amongst each other.

It’s no surprise: sorrel is new beginnings, often the first plant I see recultivating abandoned gardens or disturbed ground and I’m happy to have it around always. Its distinctive lemony bite is a fine addition to salads, though we’re not likely to choose it from that particular root cellar patch. Not with the way the asphalt roof shingles burned right around there. I shovelled up the heavy pats of congealed black tar last spring, right after the fire, bringing them up from inside the cellar in big plastic buckets to send to safe disposal. But there’s probably plenty of tar still in the ground and out of sight — hardly an appetizing thought.

From other areas, maybe we will eventually sample sorrel: it depends on how close they were to the house or shed or anything else that burned. And so very much burned. The province has said gardens are safe from contamination by fire-retardant chemicals as nothing has shown up in tests. But we know what way the wind was blowing — what burned, and where, is always part of the equation. It’s a strange calculation to make: I’m just glad our house wasn’t heated with fuel oil, was too old to contain asbestos, and didn’t have indoor plumbing for decades.

A Life's Story: Writer built bridges with genuine curiosity, compassion for diversity of religious practices

Brenda Suderman knew how to make people feel comfortable. For a journalist, that character trait is a real strength, and it made people trust and appreciate her.

Whether covering musicals, worship spaces, the effects of pandemic shutdowns, death rituals and practices of different traditions, the discovery of the burial of 2,284 infants in unmarked graves, or any other of the countless topics she wrote about in her four- decade career, Suderman did it with genuine interest and care.

Born and raised in Winkler, Suderman grew up on a farm. Much of her childhood was spent in gardens and sugar beet fields.

Baptized at 16, she became a member of the Winkler Bergthaler Mennonite Church. The restrictions against women at the time contributed to planting the seeds of Suderman’s feminist perspective.