A few special touches can conjure connection

Advertisement

Advertise with us

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: You may think I’m crazy, but I’m going to a Halloween party as a glamorous witch to run into this special guy and put my spell on him.

Read this article for free:

or

Already have an account? Log in here »

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Subscribe and receive a limited-edition Free Press branded hat or tote.

Digital Subscription

One year of digital access for only $205*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles

*First annual payment billed as $205.00 + GST for one year. This annual subscription will automatically renew at $233.00 + GST every 52 weeks (10% off the regular annual price of $259.35). Offer available to new and qualified returning subscribers only. Cancel any time.

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Add Free Press access to your Brandon Sun subscription for only an additional

$1 for the first 4 weeks*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles
Start now

*Your next Brandon Sun subscription payment will increase by $1.00 and you will be charged $17.95 plus GST for four weeks. After four weeks, your payment will increase to $24.95 plus GST every four weeks.

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 30/10/2025 (274 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: You may think I’m crazy, but I’m going to a Halloween party as a glamorous witch to run into this special guy and put my spell on him.

He’s co-hosting it with his housemate and it’s a big bash. You can’t get into this party unless you’re wearing a full-on costume. I don’t want to wear a complete Halloween mask, though, because I want him to recognize me and be attracted.

Can you give me any magical ideas?

— Need to Bewitch Him, West End

Dear Need to Bewitch: Forget the mask. A striking witch get-up with big hat, elaborate makeup and clever accessories beats any mask for this special caper. You need to show off your decorated face and be instantly recognized by this guy.

Costume stores might even have witchy costumes on sale last-minute. Add decorations to yours such as dangling a spider off the brim of your hat and be sure to carry a special wand to cast a spell on this guy.

Decorate your broom as a humorous conversation starter with a goofy rubber toad glued onto it. Also, make up a few crazy spells and memorize them so you can pretend to cast them on people, including a special one for this man you fancy.

Toward the middle of the party, ask to pose with this guy you like to take a picture, and offer to send the photo to him — for a little connection the day after. Good luck.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I recently watched with fascination as this group of huge hunky guys pulled up in two trucks and unloaded some big furniture I recognized. They took it into the apartment block beside mine.

Then I spotted him — the furniture owner — and his big football buddies struggling with the largest bed you ever saw. This was definitely the guy I was so hot for two years ago. We had a terrible misunderstanding and broke up.

Finally, he and all his moving gang took off, no doubt to the bar for drinks and food. I watched them drive away.

Why would he move in so close to me? I know it’s been a while, but I could never forget him. Now he’s going to be sleeping (and whatever else) right next door to me.

Maybe we still have a chance. Do you think he knows I still live here? I would love to get him back. What’s my next move?

— Misunderstood Ex, St. Boniface

Dear Misunderstood Ex: First, find out if he’s attached to a new woman and if it’s serious. You just saw part of his old gang helping him with the move, so one of them or one of their girlfriends will be in the know.

Also review the reasons you two broke up. If they were serious, forget it. He probably just moved in there not caring that you live nearby and he won’t be friendly.

But if it was a stupid misunderstanding between you guys, maybe he’s still interested and you two can work it out, now that time has passed. Good luck.

Please send your questions and comments to lovecoach@hotmail.com or Miss Lonelyhearts c/o the Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6.

Maureen Scurfield

Maureen Scurfield
Advice columnist

Maureen Scurfield writes the Miss Lonelyhearts advice column.

Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.

Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.

Report Error Submit a Tip

More Stories

Local brother act cut their teeth working with the late Jerry Lewis

Bill Redekop  6 minute read Preview

Local brother act cut their teeth working with the late Jerry Lewis

Bill Redekop  6 minute read Monday, Aug. 21, 2017

One of the toughest tasks for the Steiner Brothers, a former kid tap dancing act from Winnipeg, was performing with Jerry Lewis at hospitals for sick kids.

“Oh my, you’d be trying not to cry,” recalled Rob Steiner, 72.

And Lewis, who would go on to help raise over US$2 billion for muscular dystrophy over his career with his annual telethons, would admonish the boys.

“He’d say, ‘What are you crying for? You’re making them happy. Why are you crying?’”

Read
Monday, Aug. 21, 2017

BRANDON — A father has admitted in court that he purposely violated his probation order so he could be sent to the Brandon jail to support his son, who’s serving time there.

Dominic Dowan, 46, pleaded guilty to breaching a probation order from November 2024 that prohibits him from owning, possessing, carrying or converting anything into a weapon.

Crown attorney Caroline Lacey called Dowan’s reasoning for wanting to go to jail “bizarre.”

“That’s just ridiculous and honestly a waste of police time to be having to deal with someone trying to go into jail to support someone else,” Lacey said in Brandon provincial court on Thursday.

Government wants public input on use of AI

Carol Sanders 5 minute read 2:00 AM CDT

The province says it’s taking the lead when it comes to cybersecurity and artificial intelligence, but is it moving in the right direction?

Starting Aug. 10 in Brandon, Manitobans will get a chance to have their say on how the government should proceed when it comes to personal data security, the need to protect children from digital threats and the growing risks posed by AI.

“We want to hear from everyone because we want to make sure we’re getting this right,” Innovation and New Technology Minister Mike Moroz said Thursday. A second “public listening session” is set for Aug. 12 in Winnipeg.

Manitoba took the lead among Canadian provinces this spring when Premier Wab Kinew announced a plan to ban social media for youth under the age of 16. At the start of the 2024 school year, it banned cellphones in the classroom.

Middle Eastern wars: wait for September

Gwynne Dyer 5 minute read Preview

Middle Eastern wars: wait for September

Gwynne Dyer 5 minute read Friday, Jun. 12, 2026

Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump told journalists that the United States and Iran are “in the final throes of what will be a very, very good deal.”

On Wednesday, after an American helicopter gunship crashed in the Strait of Hormuz, presumably downed by Iranians, he declared angrily that “They’ve taken too long to negotiate a deal that would have been great for them, now they will have to pay the price!!!”

Later on the same day, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqai took on the role of ‘only grown-up in the room’, saying that the United States is “damaging the diplomatic process through the contradictory messages it sends, its repeated shifts in positions and demands, and, worst of all, through repeated violations of the ceasefire.”

The pattern is pretty clear by now. Trump oscillates between wild optimism and frustrated fury, while the Iranian negotiators keep their voices down, never shift their positions, and display performative patience. That enrages Trump even more, and I suspect the Iranians secretly enjoy it.

Read
Friday, Jun. 12, 2026

Plus ça change … VLTs and online sports gambling

Peter McKenna 5 minute read Preview

Plus ça change … VLTs and online sports gambling

Peter McKenna 5 minute read 2:00 AM CDT

The province of Ontario was the first jurisdiction in Canada to offer a private online gambling (sorry, gaming) market in April 2022. Alberta has now followed suit and officially launched its own regulated, online sports betting market. Will Manitoba be next?

There is certainly money to be made. Ontario added roughly $469 million in online gambling profits to its governmental coffers for the 2023-24 period. And you can bet Alberta has its eyes firmly fixed on the potential for proportionate dollar amounts flowing into its provincial treasury.

What strikes me are the obvious similarities between video lottery terminals (VLTs) and online sports betting. The same governments (and not the Mafia) trying to separate people from their money, and the attendant damaging outcomes — but with different technology. Even the political calculations and implications are a carbon copy of the politics of VLTs.

I vividly recall a government official from the then-Nova Scotia Alcohol and Gaming Authority telling me that VLTs — the crack cocaine of gambling ­­— were operating on old technology that would eventually be overtaken. Little did I know that the new technology would enable people to gamble on ubiquitous online platforms.

Read
2:00 AM CDT

COVID picture remains bleak in Manitoba with record cases, three more deaths

Danielle Da Silva 6 minute read Preview

COVID picture remains bleak in Manitoba with record cases, three more deaths

Danielle Da Silva 6 minute read Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2020

A day after the province's top doctor admonished Manitobans for their cavalier approach to COVID-19, a starker picture emerged Tuesday, as a record 184 new cases and three more deaths were announced, including two patients at St. Boniface Hospital.

A man and a woman, both from Winnipeg and in their 80s, were patients at the province’s second largest hospital when they were diagnosed with COVID-19. A female in her 60s linked to the outbreak at Parkview Place care home also died.

Manitoba's death toll stands at 58. 

St. Boniface Hospital is managing an outbreak of the virus which has spread to include three units (B5, E5 and E6) and has infected 23 patients and 10 staff members.

Read
Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2020