GETAWAY

The blogger will be happily indisposed Saturday and Sunday.

Enjoy your weekend.

Kick a tire, eat a tomato, enter a spelling bee..

Shmoscars

Like you, I will watch the Oscars out of die-hard habit.

Like you, I will fidget, get more snacks, switch channels during commercials and acceptance speeches by teams of animators for Best Documentary Short Subject Dealing with World Iniquity to Which a Rich Person with a Beverly Hills Postal Code Can Attach herself, check the email in the next room and phone cousins in Latin American countries.

My measue of a Great Movie, or even a realy good one is simple. Staying power. Do I watch it again and again year after year?

Godfather I and II. Lawrence of Arabia, The Bandwagon, Funny Girl.

This year's crop is not so great.

No Country for Old Men is dreadful, pointlessly bloody rehash of the Coen Brothers' best work, Fargo. It is not even close to a good movie.

There Will be Blood is a curiosity that will be watched by seven people over the next decade.

Atonement, which won the BAFTA - British Academy Awards - last week is half a movie - the first half.

Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth is, as always, magnificent, but the movie is one of the owrst balls-ups ever made. No idea who anybody is or what they are doing or why. We turned off the DVD after 40 minutes.

The only guarantees are Javier bardem for best supporting actor and Daniel-Day Lewis for best actor, both deserved in two second rate movies.

A Chorus Line - One Singular Sensation

The race for the mayor's chair is getting busy and full of contestants and that's a good thing.

Peter Ladner, Gregor Robertson, The Nutty One, of course, Al De Genova, Raymond Louie (who will announce in days), Daffy Duck, Brigitte Bardot, Richard Branson and Ted Danson.

Quite a line-up.

The two Big Dailies posted editorials this morning agreeing with what we have been saying here for weeks. The NPA process has been anti-democratic.

What they don't say is what we have all been saying for some time now. The Nutty One must move on.

Who did I leave out?

Roger Clemens?

Your toss.

So Far, So Good

The federal goverrnment has followed through on 2 promises.

Last year they introduced the Taxpayers' Bill of Rights, and yesterday they appointed a taxpayers' ombudsman, Paul Dube, pictured right.

Both initiatives are welcome news.

What remains to be seen is if either policy has direct results in favour of ordinary people.

kd lang sings 'Bird On A Wire'

I prefer concert versions of songs like this great one of k.d. singing a Leonard Cohen classic rather than "videos" with clever shots of who-knows-what.