Hybrid of essays, short fiction classic Coupland

MMF walks away from bid to buy Fort Garry Hotel

The Manitoba Métis Federation won’t buy the historic Fort Garry Hotel, President David Chartrand said Monday.

Food literacy curriculum on the menu

Manitoba has a new recipe for health class and “food literacy” is a key ingredient.

The in-class portion of phys-ed has historically involved lessons about puberty, the risks of consuming drugs and dissecting Canada’s food guide.

A new pilot program asks teachers to expand their nutrition units and include in-depth discussions about how everything from diet culture to food insecurity affects eating habits.

“This is really moving beyond a conception of food as only fuel, where you just boil down food to its calories, its vitamins,” said Sarah Elvins, a food historian at the University of Manitoba who researches popular culture and marketing.

Hybrid of essays, short fiction classic Coupland

A hybrid of Andy Warhol and Marshall McLuhan, Douglas Coupland sometimes works as a visual artist, other times as a writer. With 13 novels under his belt along with two collections of short stories and seven non-fiction books, he has created a great library of Canadian work.

In spite of his preoccupation with all things digital, this latest compilation has the feel of a mix tape — a self-consciously retro object (a book on paper, for Pete’s sake), put together lovingly with new stuff and some old faves. Among the 70 items within Bit Rot are social commentaries, personal recollections and Coupland’s characteristic brand of fiction, which at its best amuses and breaks your heart a little at the same time.

The short stories in Bit Rot are outnumbered by essays, but when we do stumble upon the little tales of unlikely folks such as Kimberly Kellog and Coffinshark the Unpleasant, they are like little treasures. It’s hard to get too emotionally invested in them, though, especially when these stories wrap up in four pages or so. As a fiction writer, Coupland is at his best in novels, where he can really let a character develop instead of setting up a clever way to make a point.

One endearing constant is that whether he’s writing fiction or non-fiction, Coupland peppers his writing with memorable factoids. For instance, he shares with us in the piece Smells that the artificial aroma of cinnamon candy works as the anti-smell of human death. “You learn something new every day, and this is what you learned today,” the author says, punctuating his trivium in that adorable way he has.

Defenceman Morrissey focused on season ahead

Josh Morrissey insists that a trade request from the franchise goalie doesn’t change his desire to be a lifelong Winnipeg Jet.

The top-pairing defenceman and alternate captain reinforced that view on Monday morning when speaking to a group of reporters prior to the Winnipeg Jets Golf Classic at St. Charles Country Club.

“At the end of the day, I love being here and I love being a Jet. That’s how I’ve always felt,” said Morrissey, who spoke for just over nine minutes on a variety of topics. “That doesn’t change because of somebody else’s decision. Nothing is finalized, so who knows, he could be back. My position doesn’t change.”

Morrissey has two years left on a contract that pays him US$6.25 million and he’s only eligible to sign an extension on July 1, but the future of the franchise pillar will be a topic of discussion as the Jets work to sort through the situation with franchise goaltender Connor Hellebuyck, which remains unresolved.

Seven years sought for serial harasser

Alexander Beaton finished serving a two-year jail sentence for criminally harassing six women and didn’t last two days in the community before he was back at it, sending unwanted obscene messages and videos to a dozen women.

Now prosecutors are seeking a seven-year prison sentence for the 30-year-old Winnipeg man, whose latest string of victims includes a police officer who investigated his earlier crimes.

“He essentially continued (offending) unabated,” Crown attorney Brett Rach told provincial court Judge Malcolm McDonald at a sentencing hearing Friday. “It caused more than a nuisance to these victims — it caused them to fear for their safety.”

Beaton pleaded guilty to 14 charges of criminal harassment, sending indecent communications and breaching court orders for a campaign of harassment waged between 2015 and 2025.