Great profile of Maurice Sendak (left) in Sunday's New York Times ..

That Mr. Sendak fears that his work is inadequate, that he is racked with insecurity and anxiety, is no surprise. For more than 50 years that has been the hallmark of his art. The extermination of most of his relatives and millions of other Jews by the Nazis; the intrusive, unemployed immigrants who survived and crowded his parents’ small apartment; his sickly childhood; his mother’s dark moods; his own ever-present depression — all lurk below the surface of his work, frequently breaking through in meticulously drawn, fantastical ways.    more »

I've been remiss not to mention that Canwest's Chris Lackner is co-ordinating a new election blog at our site. It's called The Trough.

I just got a call this afternoon at home from one of the pollsters mentioned below and here's what I was asked (I'm paraphrasing the questions) and in the order I was asked: - What's the number one issue facing Canada today?... So here's the latest polls: Ipsos Reid, which provides polls exclusively to Canwest News Service has: CONS 38 / LIBS 29 / NDP 13 / GRE 11, BQ 8 "Stephen Harper's Tories have a commanding lead over Stéphane Dion's Liberals nationally, but the Conservatives' failure to secure first place in the key electoral battlegrounds of Ontario and Quebec could stop them from winning a majority government.."

News to me, bound as I was to my desk in our Ottawa newsroom this week, was that Liberal MP Don Bell, running for re-election in North Vancouver, suffered a mild heart attack at the beginning of the campaign... 10 RACES TO CARE ABOUTThe Vancouver Sun13 Sep 2008A dozen or so battleground ridings in Metro Vancouver could determine whether Stephen Harper’s Conservatives form a majority government.

Jeff, Paul, Chris -- don't take this the wrong way cuz you guys are fabulous journalists with a long track record of outstanding work and, on top of that, you're all a bunch of swell guys.... Your promise (I think) is that you'll take a critical look at what we're doing over here in the MSM so far as covering the election.