Author: ‘Game of Thrones’ finale was ending, also beginning

Reviewing the good, the bad and the bizarre of 2021

There will never be another year like 2021 in Manitoba, with a bevy of ups and downs that made it a head-spinning 12 months.

There were plenty of big storylines from January to now — some good, some bad, and some just plain weird. Now that 2022 has arrived, we’ll take a look at some of each.

THE GOOD•••

First vaccines go to the most vulnerableLess than one year after work on vaccines to combat COVID-19 began, the first doses were delivered to Manitobans.

Winnipeg musicians respond to pandemic in different ways through music

By now, everybody knows what the pandemic looks like: masks, on faces or on the sidewalk; kitchen tables transmogrifying into co-working spaces; hands cracked and red from sanitizer.

But what does the pandemic look like when musicians start putting pen to paper? And what will it sound like once those words and music are recorded? The Free Press reached out to Manitoba musicians to find out, and discovered some are leaning into the new state of the world for inspiration, while others are avoiding it altogether.

Ava Wray finds humour in pandemic lifeAva Wray had good reason to feel pessimistic. She lost her job. Her relationship ended. It seemed she was spending more time with cats than with people (though, admittedly, she sort of liked that). When it came to writing songs, it was hard to focus on anything but the implosion of her world and the world around her.

“So often, lyrics come from the events in our lives, but suddenly, nothing was happening,” says the singer and guitarist, a member of local duo Bicycle Face and other projects. “So I had to look around and write about what was happening — right then.”

Each of city's historic bridges has unique story

They span the muddy waters from which Winnipeg derives its name. They connect neighbourhood to neighbourhood. They’re a fundamental feature of our city.

Winnipeg has a reputation as a “River City,” but many don’t know the stories behind the bridges they use every day.

While a bridge may seem to be a boring piece of basic infrastructure, many of Winnipeg’s have fascinating histories that go back more than 100 years.

Granite housing project passes final council hurdle after appeal rejected

Critics of the proposed 12-storey housing project set for the parking lot of the Granite Curling Club were shut down at a city meeting Thursday as councillors allowed the development to proceed.

The 110-unit building at 30 Granite Way originally meant the loss of 45 of the 80 parking spots, which the long-running club said would ruin its financial viability.

In June, the city produced a plan to add parking spots around the club by removing a boulevard and adjusting spots at another parking lot, but the club’s management called the plan inadequate.

City council’s property and development committee discussed a number of proposed variances to the building plan Thursday, including allowing the building height to reach 126 feet even though regulations stipulate a maximum 100 feet, and shifts in the width of some parking spots allotted to the residential building and the curling club. Appeals against those changes, including those by management at the Granite Curling Club, were unanimously denied by the committee.

Middle Eastern wars: wait for September

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.