Thinking Allowed

It's a bit over 40 years since Gil Scott-Heron penned the piece that would earn him monikers like ''the godfather of rap'' and ''founder of the spoken word movement'' for the rest of his days.

There are lots of contenders for the saddest lines ever written.

I was brought up on traditional Christmas stories, the sort that saw me going to midnight Mass and arranging holy plaster figures in a home-made wooden crib.

The news that our terrorism alert levels have gone from very low to low in the past few weeks has brought to mind those swingometer rural fire warning rainbow charts.

When I lived in Japan for a year, I saw many marvellous things. A photo booth in Osaka that could merge two faces to show you what your offspring might look like.A vending machine selling hot coffee on the top of Mt Fuji. Shops that sold sock glue. Students that wore thick white ruched socks held halfway up their legs with sock glue.

After a week at home with the flu (the real sort, the doctor said), we'd tried most things.

Sometimes the numbers don't add up to much of anything, Liz Breslin writes.

Let's face it. There's a lot wrong with the world these days. But two things make me really mad. Stainless steel pineapple slicers and planned obsolescence. Let me explain.

Here is a millstone to grow up with: big boys don't cry.

Last week a friend opined that if there was a pill you could take three times daily to give you all the food nutrition you need, she'd never cook another meal.

It would be much easier to adopt a poker face if we were in control.

A little procrastination can go a long way. Even when it's not on your to-do list.

In 1990, Andre Agassi starred in commercials for a camera brand.

Some people notice shoes, right? Walk down the street and that's what they'll look at.

A new year is as good a time as any to usher in the new and reap the harvest.

Help me out here. How does an otherwise mostly intelligent woman end up watching a YouTube video in which a North American teen voice croons a folk tune about zombies eating his brain to a video background of Minecraft graphics? And this before breakfast.

It is easy to forget that some things were never memories.