Three pieces around the theme, ‘the work of our hands.’

The first, a story from Canada. Johann Xavier, and old friend, now owns a 35 acre farm with maple trees outside of Oakville. At the time of writing he was ‘evaporating’ the maple in his sugar shack. A few days ago he and his family created a network of lines after tapping into the sugar maple trees. The story is so interesting, from a technology perspective as well as nature itself, that he agreed to be on a podcast in a few weeks. (See below my latest podcast.)

Johann is a guy of many parts. We ran track together at St. Peter’s College, he went on to be CFO of Saatchi and Saatchi Asia Pacific and greater China, and recently got his pilot’s license.

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I occasionally write for a media outlet, if not my Substack. Recently, some friends in Sri Lanka informed me about a wind farm debacle in Mannar, in the North of Sri Lanka. I wrote a strong Oped about it, and was happy to hear that the beleaguered contract had been cancelled.

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And finally a plug for my latest podcast, Wide Angle. This had been something I had recorded almost a year ago and held it back for various reasons.

Remember Keanu Reeves and Laurence Fishburne in The Matrix? There’s something similar going on today, in 2025, that feels slightly like that synthetic world. Not just social media, but now with AI. Do you sometimes feel we might be trapped inside a simulated, controlled world and not realize it? That’s what it is all about. Listen to it and please let me know your comments.