chasing nakedness

Sunday afternoon, 1:30pm, English Bay Beach directly in front of the inukshuk or whatever the pile of stones is called.

A man is on the beach naked. He is swimming and when he emerges from the water he holds his clothes in front of his ugly little manhood.

Someone freaks.

TWO COP CARS arrive.

This is what the police need to do? The town is broiling with criminality. This is what the ploice need to do?

The Pidgeons are Gone! The Pidgeons are Gone!

Feeding pigeons is forbidden all over Venice, not just in the St. Mark's area. To accommodate the nineteen vendors who sold corn as bird feed, the municipality will now allow them to sell souvenirs, instead, but not in St.Mark's Square. Next Thursday, all the involved parties (vendors, Comune, Art Superintendance) will hold what should be the final meeting to finalise the details. It will create a completely new look for St. Mark's, free of birds which damage the monuments, bring disease, and are loved only by tourists and corn sellers.

The Trouble With Headlines

Who really knows what happened in that Delta classroom?

The drama teacher for kids ages 11 and 12 has been asking her students to act out the headlines. Last week the headline was Mr. Cho.

Someone complained. Now the teacher is on the carpet and the Sensitivity Police have parachuted in in full force.

What that teacher may have dome with those students may have been really, really dreadful. It may have also have been realy, really wonderful and creative and instructive and transformational and leading to deeper understanding.

How the hell are we supposed to know?

This is bad reporting and bad publishing. If you can't tell me the whole story, be quiet and sip your soda.

F--- OF

You know what drives me crazy?

The sudden emergence of accepted new words and spellings like, "one off."

That drives me crazy.

How did "one of a kind," or, "one of," become, the hateful, widely accepted "one off."

To all the sheep who adhere to this, I bleat "F--- Of!"

Brodie is an Idiot

Malcolm Brodie is both Mayor of Richmond and the Chair of Translink. He is an idiot.

Today, the Vancouver Sun has published a detestable, specious little editorial by Mr. Brodie in which he blames the victims of crime for being assaulted.

His basic pitch is that Skytrain is very well policed and monitored, but that the areas near Skytrain stations aren't his responsibility and therefore older women with purses should be careful when and where they walk.

Has Mr. Brodie ever had to catch public transit at 6 am to go to a job to support his family??? I doubt it.

Why has the newspaper printed this self-serving trash?

The real story was told right here a few days ago.

There is no police presence at these crime hot spots. There is no police presence because City Council doesn't want to spend money on policing and because Mayor Sullivan has a personal agenda which would see the role of police deeply diminished in our communities.

Brodie is a shameless and shameful fool. "You're head has been cut off, " he informs the recently beheaded, "because you bothered to stick your head on the chopping block."

This is your government.

And, by the way, have you noticed how the Op-Ed page is taking a dangerous turn of late?

Three of 4 articles on today's page are written by government officials. Don't government officials already have public platforms from which to spew their noxious gasses? What happened to the citizen-observer?

Mrs. Palfry

"Mrs. Palfry at the Claremont" is a charming and deeply touching movie.

We expect Joan Plowright to always give us her talented best, and she does. But who ever heard of Rupert Friend? Well, kids, he's only doing 7 movies this year!

Easily the world's most handsome young man and a fantastically gifted actor, all things being equal, we can look forward to watching this fellow for ages to come.

They're both at the Park on Cambie now. Go. You'll like.

Barbra Streisand - Somewhere Over The Rainbow (One Voice)

This is probably Streisand's best video. It was filmed at a $5,000/seat private party in her "backyard" in Malibu many years ago. I was thinking of her this morning, because I noticed that "Funny Lady" is on TV tonight. "Funny Lady" is a perfect and terrifying example of how a wonderful thing - this case the perfect "Funny Girl" - can be followed by a dreadful, dead-in-the-door thing like "Funny Lady." The charming, vulnerable, irresistable star of "Funny Girl" somehow is replaced by a brittle, bitter, all-too-clever schtickster. Exorcism2 and The Godfather 3 are even more appalling examples of how "intention" is the key to everything.