Odds & ends

• Thank you for lending a sympathetic ear (eye?) to my back-to-school rant earlier this week. I always feel better after hammering out a good vent on the keyboard. ;)
• Ranting aside, I have to admit, it felt a little odd Tuesday morning, when I realized for the first time in 26 years, I was not going to be looking out the kitchen window of our house & seeing the neighbourhood kids heading off with their backpacks. (There are a few children living in our condo building, but I haven't seen any in back to school mode this morning.)  LGND (six months younger than Katie would have been) will be entering Grade 12, her last year of high school. Even though it was sometimes hard having her as a yardstick for Katie, we knew her from the day her parents brought her home from the hospital, and it seems a bit strange that we won't be there to see how it all turns out & what she does with her life as an adult.  
• I also have to admit that (as usual) it was the anticipation & buildup to the big day that was the hardest... I did get a bit weary of one back to school photo after another by the end of the day, but that's kind of par for the course, I think. Relatively speaking, I think I did OK!
• Thanks also for weighing in on the merits of waterproof mascara & your favourite brands. I picked up a tube of Maybelline Great Lash to try before the big day. Not sure how I will test the waterproof aspect -- maybe look up some sad clips on YouTube?? ;) 
• Peter Mansbridge announced earlier this week that he is stepping down as the anchor of CBC TV's nightly flagship news broadcast, "The National," after almost 30 years in the role. Those of you Stateside, think Walter Cronkite, in terms of his longevity and impact. It's hard to envision the news without him. Appropriately, he will be stepping down after hosting the Canada Day broadcast from Parliament Hill next year on July 1, 2017 -- while will celebrate our amazing country's milestone 150th anniversary.
• I met him once, in the mid-1990s, when he agreed to take part in a silly stunt thing to promote & fundraise for my journalism school's upcoming 50th anniversary (I was an alumni rep on the steering committee). Afterward, he was heading out the door & seemed almost a little surprised when we started crowding around to shake his hand and thank him for coming. The thing that surprised ME most -- something you don't see when he's sitting behind the desk on TV -- is that he is a very tall man, well over six feet, with very broad shoulders. As part of the agenda, we'd had him type out a bit of doggerel on a manual typewriter -- it was still sitting in the typewriter and I took it before I left. I wonder if I still have it somewhere??