Stephen Weir articles, editorials and popular social media weir postings

WIDAFEST WINDSOR'S NEW AFRO/CARRIBEAN FESTIVAL IN JULY Although this will be the first year that Windsor will have an African/Caribbean outdoor downtown festival, WIDAFEST will have an experienced festival hand on the tiller. Chris Alexander, a long-time event organizer and former Chief Operating Officer of the Toronto Caribbean Carnival, is now the festival's vice-president and is assisting in getting the seven-day event off the ground. WIDAFEST is the buzzword name for the Windsor International Diaspora African Festival, which is set to make its debut in the city from July 23rd to 30th. It will showcase the rich and diverse cultures of Africa and the Caribbean diaspora  outdoors in downtown Windsor "We are excited to be launching WIDAFEST along Windsor ’ s safe people-friendly Detroit River waterfront," said Chris Alexander. "Windsor is a growing diverse city, and we plan to make this a popular annual event for the people of Windsor and Detroit. ” The festival

Karl Jirgens takes a picture of Stephen Marche STEPHEN MARCHE:  Biblioasis March 8th talk wasn’t just any old flop As usual I arrived too early. Biblioasis staff were still putting up chairs and laying out cheese and crackers. Owner Dan Wells and author Stephen Marche were sitting at the front window of the bookstore, drinking wine, and trying to make two microphones work (not a great team, but they did get them working). Said “Hi” and bought a copy of Stephen Marche’s new  On Writing & Failure: Or, On The Peculiar Perseverance Required to Endure the Life of a Writer . I thought $16 was a rather expensive price for a 73-page book. Oh well, I had an hour to kill, and I could break tradition and actually read a title before the book launch started. I left the store and shuffled down to Timmies near the train station (my home away from home), grabbed a coffee, sat at a window booth looking over a busy busy  Wyandotte  and started to speed read. I actually finished before killing my me

 A BUCK 'N' DOE OR NEW YEAR'S EVE PARTY FIVE DECADES AGO? Found Art. Pictures from the Sixties.  These pictures were inside a large box of unclaimed family snapshots, left for development, pickup and payment at a now long gone Drouillard Avenue store in Windsor, Ontario. I recovered the box while helping clean out the store. I promptly put them away in my attic office.   According to the orange Kodak envelope for this set of pictures, they were let at the store by a man who lived on Cadillac Street a few minutes from the front gates of theFord Foundry.  All the young dudes party in a beat-up basement apartment. Holes in the ceiling, third hand furniture, 60s style greaser hairdos. In 1965 the Elvis look still was a major influence on these hard drinking Windsor Hound Dogs.  Out of focus, damaged by the heat of being in my attic for 35 years, I rediscovered their pictures while cleaning out my files!  Young dudes party while the ghost of their youth linger on, on this page.