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Bob Ramsay

Born in Edmonton. Educated at Princeton and Harvard. Speechwriter. Book editor. Copywriter. Communications strategist. Presentation trainer. Marathoner. Explorer of the world's distant places. Travel writer. Op-ed page writer. Fund-raiser. Board member. Speaker series host. Arts addict. And of course, relentless enthusiast.

“Peter was always in the believing business.”

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That’s from Paul Wells’ tribute to Peter Herrndorf who died last week at 82 and whose death is felt by the literally thousands of us whom Peter lifted up, especially when we and our organizations were faint of heart. It’s no surprise that, just one week after his death, the stories of his magical healing powers are legion, tear-inducing and growing.

Here’s mine: for 45 years Peter would phone me on my birthday and sing Happy Birthday to me. I knew he did this with hundreds of other friends as well and marvelled that he had the time, energy and discipline to do it.

Then when Jean and I got married, he would call on our anniversary to congratulate us. One year, he didn’t call on our anniversary, July 23rd, but the next day. I mentioned this when he called, and he said: “I’m not calling a day late; I’m calling a day early. You were married on July 25th.”

“No, Peter, our anniversary is July 23rd.”

“No, Bob, it’s July 25th.”

So I took off my wedding ring, looked closely at the date engraved on the inside and it read “July 25th.”

“Gosh, Peter, I guess you’re right.”

I was stunned. For years, we’d been celebrating our anniversary on the wrong day.

But this coming July 25th, when we celebrate our 30th anniversary, we’ll raise a glass to the man who not only cared about his friends’ anniversaries; he cared about getting them right.

We will miss him keenly.

Meanwhile…

“Peter was always in the believing business.” Read More »

What you can’t measure, you can’t improve.

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This is one reason the alcohol lobby is fighting so hard against instituting a common definition of “a drink” on its bottles. If that happened, people would know how much alcohol is in their glass of wine or bottle of beer.

The drinks industry is reeling. In the US last year, 20% of drinking-age Americans took part in Dry January. This year, it’s 35%. No wonder Tito’s Vodka hired Martha Stewart to create off-label ways to consume vodka. The “dry” movement is also spreading: yesterday I got an email from the Canadian Cancer Society urging me to sign up for Dry February.

To foretell the liquor lobby’s fight-back tactics, check out the following playbooks from the past: tobacco, sugar, opioids, fossil fuels and long ago, seatbelts.

Meanwhile…

What you can’t measure, you can’t improve. Read More »

Little Losses

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The big losses we all know and dread. It’s the little ones that chip away at who we think we are. I read this week that the Kiwi shoe polish company is ceasing sales in Great Britain. It seems no one is shining their shoes any more. The cause is people working from home and wearing running shoes when they go outside. I, of course, took it to mean the decline of all standards of self-discipline, like making your bed.

Meanwhile…

Little Losses Read More »

Fear and loathing…and awe.

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We all knew the day would inevitably come. But so soon?

It seems artificial intelligence can now write almost as well as humans. Last week, OpenAI released their new ChatGPT chatbot for public testing, and the raves are pouring in. Try it now: it’s free. Just log in and ask it a question or assign it a task. But remember, it doesn’t search the internet; it ‘thinks’. For example, here’s what it comes back with when you ask: “What are the ethics
of creating test-tube babies?” and “Why did the chicken cross the road?”, and on a whole other level of thought: “Write a rhyming couplet poem about playing hockey in Canada.”

Given the pace of AI not just imitating language, but thinking in original ways, I’m relieved I’m an old writer and not a young one. Then again, new technologies always create jobs that didn’t exist before. But buckle up; real creativity is about to become a lot harder, as is ethics.

Meanwhile…

Fear and loathing…and awe. Read More »

There’s no such thing as bad weather. There’s only bad gear.

1 Comment / Omnium-Gatherum /

Indoors, there’s also “no such thing as information-overload, there is just filter failure.” So as we march into the most information- overloaded season of them all, let us not go unarmed.

Active avoidance of useless information means being fully aware that you’re blocking huge gobs of internet reality and doing it to save yourself. This has now grown to be a core competence for digital citizens and it’s called Critical Ignoring. It starts with the idea that “Low-quality and misleading information online can hijack people’s attention, often by evoking curiosity, outrage, or anger.” So don’t let yourself be snowed this winter.

Meanwhile here is this week’s Omnium-Gatherum…

There’s no such thing as bad weather. There’s only bad gear. Read More »

Complicit

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Victory may have a thousand hand-maidens, but so does complicity.

This podcast tells how to avoid turning your gaze when others’ bad behaviour comes into view. But while a big part of complicity is often silence – “Nothing to see here, folks” – explicit badness can never seem to shut up and sit down. See FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s “meandering” one-hour take-down of Western countries for daring to criticize World Cup host-nation Qatar; and Donald Trump’s “rambling” one-hour speech announcing his run for President in 2024.

But the best examples of this growing art form are the filmed tributes to mendacity on a national scale, like this with David Beckham as part of his £150 million sponsorship deal touting Qatar.

Meanwhile, here is this week’s Omnium-Gatherum…

Complicit Read More »

Loud Quitting

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Richard II said that, or at least his creator William Shakespeare did in 1595 when the word “doth” was used a lot before “waste”. I mention this for two reasons: the New Yorker cartoonist, George Booth, died this month at 96. As the magazine’s art director said: “if you can’t recognize a Booth cartoon, you need the magazine in Braille.”

But also because our under-rated Canadian seer, Dan Gardner, wrote about Booth’s passing on how we always misjudge time, and especially age, and most especially, other people’s age.

Booth’s cartoons were as quirky and charming as the man himself who was profiled in a 23-minute documentary on getting old and staying in the game.

Meanwhile…

Loud Quitting Read More »

“I wasted time, and now time wastes me.”

Leave a Comment / Omnium-Gatherum /

Richard II said that, or at least his creator William Shakespeare did in 1595 when the word “doth” was used a lot before “waste”. I mention this for two reasons: the New Yorker cartoonist, George Booth, died this month at 96. As the magazine’s art director said: “if you can’t recognize a Booth cartoon, you need the magazine in Braille.”

But also because our under-rated Canadian seer, Dan Gardner, wrote about Booth’s passing on how we always misjudge time, and especially age, and most especially, other people’s age.

Booth’s cartoons were as quirky and charming as the man himself who was profiled in a 23-minute documentary on getting old and staying in the game.

Meanwhile…

“I wasted time, and now time wastes me.” Read More »

“You’re the smartest in the room.”

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Diana Henriques was the New York Times reporter who broke the Bernie Madoff story, the biggest Ponzi scheme in history. She said Madoff was different from even the most sophisticated con artist who would try to convince you they were the smartest person in the room. Madoff convinced you that you were the smartest in the room.

It seems Toronto has its own Bernie Madoff. Albert Rosenberg conned wives, banks, investors and the world for years. CBC Gem has a wonderful hour-long documentary on his story, written and directed by Barry Avrich. [CBC GEM is password-accessed but free]. Very worth watching, and a reminder that not all frauds are online.

Meanwhile, beyond the watering holes of Yorkville…

“You’re the smartest in the room.” Read More »

Science progresses one funeral at a time.

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Max Planck said that. He  won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918 for creating quantum physics. That year the Spanish Flu became the deadliest disease in history, killing 50 million people. But COVID, which has killed 6.6 million people so far, may be rising again.

Science is a lot more ready for it this time around. So it’s easy to forget the dreadful early weeks of COVID when residents in Ontario’s Long-Term Care homes accounted for more than 60% of all COVID-related deaths, despite them being less than 1% of the province’s older population.

Another way to ensure we avoid that particular fate is via art, of course.

Science progresses one funeral at a time. Read More »

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