Opinion

While species extinction, endangerment and loss of habitat stories tend to capture most of the limelight in mainstream media, it is truly astounding just how much biodiversity still exists on Earth. New species are being discovered every day.

View from the Cheap Seats is kind of an extension of the newsroom. Whenever our three regular reporters, Calvin Daniels, Thom Barker and Kelly Friesen are in the building together, it is frequently a site of heated debate. This week: Remembrance Day.

In the frosty weather we've been having the last while, there is one flower that is blooming brightly: the Remembrance Day poppy pinned to our jackets. Make a hot cup of tea and let's talk about the real-life version of the poppy.

My new passport arrived today. I slid it from the red-striped ExpressPost envelope and flipped through its ornate pages, wondering which country's stamps will one day decorate the crisp parchment. India? Africa? US? UK? God alone knows.

Normally in the sports world, as soon as I'm ready to give up on someone or something I'm proven to be wrong.

Welcome to Week LXXVII of 'Fishing Parkland Shorelines'. Like most of us I am a novice fisherman, loving to fish, but far from an expert.

Recently, one of my Toronto friends called that city's mayor, Rob Ford, a train wreck. I politely disagreed. Ford is more like a tire fire.

One might not necessarily know it from the number of new half tons one sees on rural Saskatchewan's main streets, but smaller communities aren't benefiting as much from the boom.

With Remem-brance Day just around the corner, genealogists may be researching members of their families who served in the military. For general information, an invaluable site to visit is www.greatwar.co.