Nobody Planned This Wednesday Holiday. Now Nobody's Working

Canada Day landed on a Wednesday and somehow half the country took the whole week off. Shane and Ryan are both at their desks, mildly annoyed, and very much in the mood to talk about summer grievances. The conversation starts with how far in advance you actually need to plan a long weekend, moves …

NEW - You Almost Always Turn Left. Here's Why!

Human movement bias is more consistent than almost anyone expects, and Samantha Yammine is here to explain why the research is harder to dismiss than it looks. Studies in Spain and Japan, with children, adults, individuals, and crowds, all point to the same result: people veer left, and they can't …

SHIFTHEADS: Stories You Did Not Need. Avoiding Them Was the Right Decision

It's Canada Day weekend, give or take, and Shane and Ryan have three stories that will improve nothing about your life and yet somehow feel essential. First: the banana car. Twenty-three feet long, Ford F-150 engine, open top, eighty-five miles an hour, and a dedicated app so you always know where…

NEW - Horror With Headphones and Minions in Hollywood

Steve Stebbing, film and entertainment critic, splits this week into two rounds. First, Canadian titles built for a long weekend at home. Then, what's actually worth the theatre seat right now. Three Canadian Films Worth Your Canada Day Undertone is the one Steve keeps coming back to: a Canadian h…

Shiftheads - How Do You Measure What AI Actually Does?

AI evaluation in business sounds straightforward until you try to do it. Mohit Rajhans says most companies are realizing the math doesn't work the way they thought it would. Mohit runs http://ThinkStart.ca and tracks where technology meets business reality. This conversation starts with a simple p…

ICYMI - She Planned It for a Year. Still Blew the Budget

Vacation budgeting is something Jessica Moorhouse thinks about professionally. She still went to Italy for three weeks, blew past her carefully built spreadsheet, and came home with zero regrets and a slightly rejigged budget. Jessica is a personal finance expert and the author of Everything But M…

The Game That Saves Lives: Dungeons and Dragons

Dungeons and Dragons started in 1974 with no budget and a simple idea, and Ryan O'Donnell makes the case that it has been saving lives ever since. If you've never rolled a die, this is the episode that explains why people who have can't stop talking about it. For neurodivergent kids especially, th…

NEW - Borrowing Against Your Investments: Good Idea or Trap?

Wealth Simple is expanding fast and Vincent Gregoire, Canada Research Chair in Finance and Technology at HEC Montreal, is paying close attention. Lower fees and less friction are good for investors. The new ability to borrow against your portfolio, including potentially your registered retirement s…

SHIFTHEADS: 1974: Trudeau, Nixon, and 79-Cent Ground Beef

Canada Day 1974 means a federal election, a sitting prime minister fighting for his majority, and a American president about to become the first to resign the office. The past has a way of arriving right on time. This Throwback Thursday lands on the Canada Day long weekend and goes back fifty year…

NEW - Secrecy Creep: What Governments Hope You Don't File For

Canadian politics commentator Rob Breakenridge joins the Canada Day long weekend to make a distinction most people skip: the country is not the same thing as the people running it, and one can be worth celebrating while the other deserves serious scrutiny. A piece Rob wrote a year ago on Alberta's…