Statutory holiday gaps between New Year's and Easter used to span four brutal months. You're living in Lloydminster in 2005. Your neighbor across the street has Family Day off because they're on the Alberta side. You're working because you're on the Saskatchewan side. Same town, different province, seventeen years of watching half the town celebrate while you clock in. Which side of the boundary line you live on determined whether you got a break or kept working.

Alberta created Family Day in 1990 under Premier Don Getty. Allegations suggest it was a political play to show family values when his kid was arrested, but who cares, we got the holiday. Seventeen years passed before anyone else adopted it. Saskatchewan finally joined in 2007. Ontario waited until 2008. BC adopted it in 2013 but chose a different week to be different, then in 2018 said fine, we'll do it on your stupid day. Without Family Day, if Easter falls late April, you'd face January through April with zero statutory breaks. That's a brutal stretch.

The holiday you assume is Canadian tradition is actually a 28-year provincial experiment that half the country resisted. Next time you check the calendar, ask which holidays only exist in your province and why everyone else took decades to follow. That four-month gap from New Year's to Easter still exists. Family Day just patches it temporarily in February, and some provinces didn't want the patch for almost three decades.

Topics: statutory holiday gaps, Family Day history, provincial holidays, Alberta Don Getty, holiday adoption timeline

RUNDOWN: Shane Hewitt and Ryan O'Donnell track Family Day's 28-year journey from Alberta's 1990 creation under Don Getty through provincial resistance, including Lloydminster's 17-year split where half the border town worked while half celebrated, ending with BC's 2018 alignment after initially choosing a different week to be different.

Harm reduction programs sound responsible until you check the evidence. You're walking past the playground near your house and there's broken glass on the ground. Could be a beer bottle. Could be a crack pipe. Your tax dollars paid for both possibilities: the distribution and the cleanup. Between 2021 and 2025, Toronto procured 2.3 million meth pipes and 3.5 million crack pipes. When pressed for the evidence base, the city provided four studies. One study interviewed four hospital receptionists about their impressions. That's not science.

Of the three remaining studies, only one suggested free pipes might reduce sharing. The evidence? Thirty-one drug users in Victoria said in 2010 that free pipes might make them share less. Sixteen years ago. Thirty-one people. Millions of pipes. But here's the contradiction nobody talks about: a 2011 Vancouver study with similar sample size found users saying the opposite, that sharing pipes is essential to the social experience of smoking crack. The city calls this evidence-based while ignoring the evidence that contradicts them.

Next time you see drug debris near a library or school, remember: you paid to distribute it, and you'll pay again to clean it up. The program isn't based on science. It's based on what active addicts said they wanted sixteen years ago.

Topics: harm reduction programs, crack pipe distribution, evidence-based policy, taxpayer funding, drug paraphernalia cleanup

GUEST: Adam Zivo | adamzivo.com

RUNDOWN: Investigative journalist Adam Zivo exposes Toronto's procurement of 5.8 million crack and meth pipes justified by a single 2010 study interviewing 31 drug users, revealing how harm reduction programs ignore contradictory evidence while flooding communities with publicly-funded paraphernalia.

Sushi safety risks start before you sit down. You're at the sushi bar. The chef slides salmon nigiri across the counter. Behind him, the rice pile looks like it's been sitting there since yesterday morning. You notice but you don't ask. Do you trust the restaurant followed freezing protocols, or do you assume they cut corners?

Why won't a microbiologist eat sushi after decades studying food safety? Warriner's answer: "Knowledge is power and I don't touch it." The Montreal sushi bar kept adding fresh rice to the pile all weekend. Four days old at the bottom by Monday. Bacillus cereus bacteria. Cereulide toxin that can kill you. The Anisakis parasite takes residency in your stomach. Doctors think you have ulcers or appendicitis. They're wrong. One sushi chef preparing fish got a cut. Vibrio bacteria caused flesh-eating infection. Amputation followed. Fish fraud: that expensive tuna might be cheap escolar with oils that wreck your digestive system for hours.

Freezing kills the parasite. Proper acidification stops the bacteria. The expert who knows this refuses to eat it anyway. That refusal is the answer.

Topics: sushi safety risks, raw fish parasites, Anisakis, food poisoning, sushi bacteria

GUEST: Keith Warriner

RUNDOWN: Microbiologist Keith Warriner explains why he refuses to eat sushi, covering Anisakis parasites in raw fish, Bacillus cereus in improperly held rice, widespread fish fraud, and the Montreal case where four-day-old rice made customers sick.

Mindful eating means putting the phone down. You're scrolling through TikTok with a fork in one hand, consuming content and calories simultaneously, completely disconnected from both. Your body never signals fullness because your attention isn't on your body. The food could be delicious or terrible. You wouldn't know. This is how you end up eating too much, feeling too little, and wondering why nothing satisfies.

The world's five healthiest communities share one non-negotiable practice: they eat together. Not just sit at the same table. They cook together, source together, break bread as ritual. What does this do? Portion control happens naturally when you're engaged in conversation instead of your phone. Obesity rises when connection drops. The correlation isn't subtle. And the fix isn't complicated: stop eating alone. Stop eating distracted. Start treating meals like the intimate, communal experience they've been for centuries.

What's true for food is true for everything: when you pay attention, you consume less and connect more. When you disconnect, you overconsume and feel empty. The meal isn't the point. The presence is.

Topics: mindful eating, eating alone, phone distraction, communal meals, self-care through food

GUEST: Alyssa B | nourished.ca

RUNDOWN: What if your date night started at the grocery store instead of a restaurant? Shane and nutritionist Alyssa B explore how sourcing, preparing, and sharing food creates deeper intimacy than any reservation, and how disconnection from food mirrors disconnection from yourself.

Family Day started in 1990 when Alberta Premier Don Getty's son got arrested. You're planning your long weekend right now. Maybe skiing, maybe nothing. The stat exists because Getty wanted to show family values after the scandal, or so the press claimed. Saskatchewan took 17 years to follow in 2007. BC waited until 2018. Every province eventually copied what might have been political damage control disguised as policy.

Ed Conroy notes the press hostility toward Ontario's 2008 version. Another paid holiday we don't need, they said. But here's what changed. Families now spend time in the same room while everyone stares at different screens. The stat designed to force family connection arrived just as phones made real connection nearly impossible. That's 99% of the problem according to Ed, who's watched it play out. Some people still use the weekend to plan phone-free activities. Most don't. In 1990 Lloydminster, neighbors on opposite sides of the street had different stats because of the provincial border.

The next time you're scrolling alone on Family Day, you'll remember it was created either to help families reconnect or to help a politician's image recover. Possibly both. The irony is you probably need the break regardless of which story is true.

Topics: Family Day Alberta history, Don Getty political scandal, provincial stat adoption, family phone isolation, February holidays

GUEST: Ed Conroy | http://retrontario.com , @‌retrontario

RUNDOWN: Alberta created Family Day in 1990 after Premier Don Getty's son's arrest, sparking accusations of political theater. Ed Conroy maps how the controversial stat spread across Canada through 2018, culminating in BC's alignment, while families became more isolated despite the connection-focused holiday.

The $200 You're Spending (And Why Your Server Hates Valentines Day)
Valentine's Day restaurant chaos turns romantic plans into service nightmares nobody admits. You're spending $199.78 average per person if you're celebrating. You booked weeks ago. You're dressed up. You might be planning a proposal. You expect perfect intimate service. The restaurant wedged in extra tables because February is slow and they need to maximize this one profitable night. Your server is handling more customers under worse conditions. Crouse worked restaurants for years and identifies the pattern: Valentine's Day, New Year's Eve, Mother's Day are "truly awful to work" because people arrive with "very high expectations, higher than normal" while service capacity is strained beyond normal.

Topics: Valentine's Day restaurant stress, holiday spending statistics, service industry experience, Roman fertility festival, commercial pressure

Booze & Reviews: The Movie So Grim It Ended the Date Before Drinks
Valentine's Day movie recommendations split between romance celebration and relationship devastation. You're deciding what to watch tonight. You're among the minority actually observing the holiday, staying home instead of fighting restaurant chaos. The Big Sick adapts real love story where Emily's mysterious illness makes casual boyfriend Kumail realize his emptiness without her. When Harry Met Sally delivers 40-year-old Billy Crystal-Meg Ryan friendship-to-love story with quotable dialogue feeling absolutely timeless today. Casablanca provides Bogart-Bergman screen-melting chemistry choosing duty over personal happiness, mature selfless love bigger than romance itself.

Pair viewing with classic cocktails. Pink Lady traces to 1913 with gin, Applejack, lemon juice, grenadine, egg white creating fruity sophisticated elegance. Clover Club pre-prohibition Philadelphia recipe uses gin, raspberry syrup, lemon, egg white for delicate pink foam, labeled "ladies drink" in 1900s bars with strict beverage gender rules. Rose from 1920s Paris combines dry vermouth, cherry brandy, raspberry syrup. French 75 most romantic option layers gin, sugar, lemon, champagne.

Topics: Valentine's movie classics, anti-romantic films, classic cocktail history, prohibition-era drinks, relationship cinema

GUEST: Richard Crouse | | Richard Crouse

SEG 1 RUNDOWN: Film critic Richard Crouse explains why restaurant workers call Valentine's Day "truly awful" despite customers spending average $199.78 per person and traces the holiday from Roman goat-blood whipping rituals to modern $29.1 billion spending spree.

SEG 2 RUNDOWN: Entertainment critic Richard Crouse recommends Valentine's viewing including War of the Roses which was so grim about relationships it ended his first date before drinks, plus shares classic cocktail recipes dating back to pre-prohibition 1900s.

Celebrity meet and greet transactions follow predictable patterns when you appear once. You're in line for your ten-second window with someone from something you genuinely love. The interaction stays surface level. Forced smile. Generic acknowledgment. Walk away deflated. Greg Sestero from The Room meets thousands at cult film screenings since the 2000s. First encounter provides exactly this experience. So does the second.

Pattern breaks somewhere between encounter four and five. Edmonton 2016: standard meet-and-greet treatment. Calgary events building slowly from generic "hey sport" to actual recognition. Fifth encounter: random sidewalk meeting outside sold out show. Greg stops, points, "I know you," offers free tickets. The conversion required thirty viewings of the worst film ever made. Multiple years of showing up. Each event adding incremental recognition until transactional treatment shifts to genuine connection. Opposite approach exists: Baltimore airport, mystery TV actor keeping head down while fan loses composure taking pictures. Rental car line allows acknowledgment of weirdness without demanding identification. Boundaries maintained, interaction stays respectful.

Recognition requires accumulated presence. Transaction stays transaction when you only show up once because celebrities meet too many people to remember single encounters. The number between deflation and connection is somewhere around five.

Topics: celebrity meet and greet expectations, fan recognition strategy, The Room cult phenomenon, repeated celebrity encounters, respectful boundaries

RUNDOWN: The team breaks down how five separate Greg Sestero encounters over multiple years converted generic treatment into genuine recognition, and why respectful boundaries matter in both repeated and one-time celebrity interactions.

Valentine's Day expectations hit different when Dr. Betsy Chung asks the question you're not ready for. You're seeing ads pour in, urgency building, pressure mounting to do something for Valentine's Day. Flowers so expensive, heart-shaped chocolates everywhere, commercialism creating panic where guy's card gets declined in flower shop line and multiple men fight over who gets to pay for him. Meanwhile Betsy gives her clients a choice: do you want a fulfilling relationship where you feel close to them, or do you kind of just want to do your own thing and you guys are just coexisting with each other? Just because a relationship lasts doesn't mean it's working. A lot of people stay in relationships for life and it ends up becoming something where they're just kind of roommates.

You're thinking until the kids grow up and then we'll fall in love again. That timeline adds more pressure without fixing roommate mode. What actually deposits into relationship isn't February 14th gesture. It's learning to appreciate your partner, not even just who they are as people, but how they contribute to your day to day and how they are being a partner to you. Example: my partner leaves work early every Thursday to go pick up the kids because on that particular day there's this meeting that I have to stay late for. Little things like that we tend to overlook in terms of types of sacrifices or accommodations two people make. As human beings we are kind of built to look for all the problems all the time.

The workbook first exercise is learning how to appreciate your partner. The Valentine's Day ad sells you flowers. The actual relationship work is noticing Thursday afternoon schedule adjustments. One costs $80 and lasts a week. The other is free and compounds.

Topics: Valentine's Day pressure, relationship roommates, partner appreciation, intimacy work, long-term relationships, daily contributions

GUEST: Dr. Betsy Chung | Dr. Betsy Chung Psychotherapy | Relationship Expert and Therapist | California, USA , author of The Couples Skills Workbook

RUNDOWN: Dr. Betsy Chung contrasts Valentine's Day commercial pressure with actual relationship deposits, asking whether couples want fulfillment or are okay coexisting as roommates while kids grow up.