Alex Carrick’s Blog

In July 2010, Alex Carrick’s The Size of the Skip received an honorable mention in the prestigious and world-wide Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition. For the second year in a row, he was short-listed in 2011 for Caboose Follies. But this is getting ahead of ourselves.

Mr. Carrick carried out his undergraduate work at the University of Western Ontario (UWO), then received an M.A. in Economics from the University of Toronto (U of T). He also completed the first year towards a Doctorate while living at U of T’s Massey College.

The pull of the job market was too strong and Mr. Carrick went to work for the Canadian Institute of Steel Construction (CISC) in 1972. The CISC is a trade association representing structural steel fabricators in Canada. Mr Carrick eventually became the Secretary-Treasurer as well as the Economist for the CISC.

Since 1985, Mr Carrick has held the position of Chief Economist/Editor with CanaData, a division of Reed Construction Data (RCD), where he has acquired an in-depth knowledge of the Canadian construction industry.

He is often quoted in the media, especially in the two construction newspapers, The Daily Commercial News and the Journal of Commerce. He has delivered presentations throughout North America on the Canadian, United States and world construction outlooks.

In 2008, he first ventured into blogging and then in 2009, he started making videos on economic topics for various RCD web sites. This offered an exciting challenge that has required development of a whole new skill set.

Many of his award-winning short stories have been compiled in the Scoops series of books as well as the Ten Tales series. The former is comprised of “Two Scoops” Is Just Right, “Three Scoops” Is A Blast! and “Four Scoops” Is Over The Top.

The latter has eight titles (i.e., too numerous to mention here) and all of the books are set out on the Carrick Publishing website.

Mr. Carrick is married with three children, plus a lazy dog and crazy cat that round out the household. Much of the family’s life revolves around the cottage on Georgian Bay.

His wonderful wife Donna is a well-known author in the crime and intrigue fields.

He can be reached at alexcarrick@rogers.com.

There are over 180 articles posted to this site. Mr. Carrick asks that you please be kind to some of his earlier craftings and check them out as well as the newer works. The “old stories” need hits too and they are among his favourites. He hates to think of them sitting forlorn and neglected.

Anyone is welcome to read these stories. If you enjoy them, please forward the link to other contacts.

However, Mr. Carrick does retain copyright with respect to commercial for-sale uses. As examples, the latter would include: publishing; printing and re-printing; comics and cartoons; scripts for television, movies and the stage; music lyrics; etc.

By the way, when Writer’s Digest chose Mr. Carrick’s site for its Blog of the Week (mid-May 2012), the accompanying description said, “Alex Carrick’s blog is clean, crisp and entertaining. His stories range from humorous to thought-provoking, making it a fun read.”