Here in the Toronto area, an unpublished study has been all over the news, suggesting that those who received the seasonal flu shot last year are at significantly higher risk of getting the swine flu this year. I've never had a flu shot. Does that make me more or less at risk?
Regardless of whether or not this study is valid, what hits home is that there is so much we don't know.
For those not from around here, Site 41 refers to a proposed dump up in Simcoe county, an hour or so north of Toronto, above what protesters call the world's most pristine water. It looked like the dump was going to be pushed through regardless of any environmental risk and regardless of the protests. However dogged grassroots protest has led to a one-year moratorium on construction, and according to the Globe and Mail, after that vote, "even the die-hard supporters of the dump were changing their tune. It's time to move on and forget about Site 41 entirely, Warden Guergis said."
$11 Million has already been spent on the ill-fated dump. The plan was to use a gigantic rubber barrier to stop toxins from leaching into the aquifer. The proposed dump has some history. It was initially rejected as environmentally unsound, then reassessed. County council approved the dump in 2007 by a narrow margin.
No Water to Waste
Next Council's Problem
Cops Raid Site 41
Protest Against Dump Site 41
It goes to show that organized protest can be successful, sometimes even when the deal seems done. One question remains unanswered....if they need a dump, and it isn't going here, where will it go?
Thanks to East Texas Red for sending me this article about turbines to be built in the Sound of Islay to provide power for the island, including the distilleries that make those oh so tasty Islay scotches. Now I'll be a green scotch drinker when next I pick up a bottle of Lagavulin.
Apparently, Bob Dylan is recording a Christmas Album.
I hope he does Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer!
Check out this story in Spacing Toronto about a woman who got her bike back!
This article from the Toronto Star caught my attention.
The garden-lover's version of Lavalife was launched in Toronto this week by a group of diehard food-growers. The site, SharingBackyards.com, posts ads from green thumbs looking for sunny spots to dig in and "brown thumbs" who have the land, but not the time or gift for growing food. In exchange for their soil and water, they get half the bounty.
The idea is to match unused space in the city with people who want to grow food on it.
Great idea!
Tuffy P mentioned to me yesterday morning that the Mandarin restaurants were giving away free dinners to Canadians yesterday in celebration of Canada Day. We saw one of their restaurants from the highway around lunchtime and there were lineups for blocks for free dinners. When I saw this, I thought it was a generous gesture. I also thought, I'm really fortunate I don't need to line up for hours to get a free dinner. I didn't think any more about it.
This morning, I heard on the radio news there were a lot of people unhappy with the gesture, saying it was discriminatory because it was exclusively to Canadian citizens and excluded visitors, landed immigrants and so on. I suppose the restaurant chain could just as easily celebrated the diversity of Canada on Canada Day by giving free food to anyone who wanted it, not just Canadian citizens. I don't think their intent was nasty, but a good point was raised.
What's your view?
Madoff called his $65 BILLION investment fraud an error of judgement. If there is an award for understatement, Bernard Madoff wins hands down.
On my way out the door, I heard a radio announcer saying, "We'll be right back with more on the Michael Jackson situation." I thought he died - what more could there be? The investigation, that's it. Now we're in for a week or two of "developments", conflicting stories, celebrity interviews and so on. The media circus around celebrity deaths intensifies the more eccentric the celebrity. Over the past day or two, we've heard revelations and concerns from other celebrities that Mr. Jackson's behaviour had become strange. Good thing they told us that. Otherwise, how would we have known? There have been suggestions in the media that Mr. Jackson had been taking prescription narcotics. Hard to imagine a celebrity taking drugs, isn't it?
I'm sure we'll here lots more, like it or not.
It was announced yesterday that the Grammy Awards were dropping the polka category.
In a statement, the academy said polka was scrapped to "ensure the awards process remains representative of the current musical landscape."
Regular readers of this blog know that I'm not big on awards shows. I typically don't watch any of the televised shows like the Grammy's or Oscars or what-have-you. Still, I can't help but feel sad that they have eliminated a traditional music category. I suppose the Cajun/Zydeco category will be next.
Polka has had a good run. It first appeared in the 1830s and spread across Europe. There was a time not so very long ago when North American polka music enjoyed tremendous popularity in the cities of America's industrial heartland. Things change.
There are still isolated pockets of polka popularity. When we were down in San Antonio for the International Accordion Festival in 2007, we saw people of all ages polka dancing to Santiago Jimenez Jr. and Los Texmaniacs.
In my car this morning, I heard a local radio host talk about this. I think he really thought polka was funny because he made a point of saying he wasn't making fun of it. Then he qualified his remarks by saying that polka has to be heard live. Nobody would ever play a polka CD in their car driving down the highway. I pressed the CD button on the car stereo, replacing the radio host with "Texas Polka Party".
We've had 18 murders in the city this year, and four of the slayings were in and around the same west-end neighbourhoods. Yesterday the body of a 14 year old boy was dumped in a West Toronto field.
I've heard speculation that there is a drug war or a gang war of some sort going on.
There are a lot of kids with guns out there...
The Street View cameras have apparently been driving around Toronto streets recently filming our world. Google is amazing, but apparently not magical. They actually have to have people with cameras to produce their magic. There are, however, some privacy concerns.
Do we need this? Do we even want it? Is it OK for Google to film whatever and whoever they like and show it to the world?
I hate hearing news like this. Why would somebody deliberately try to poison dogs?
Last year, several dogs were poisoned in High Park. Was it the year before that dogs were poisoned in Withrow Park?
Sick.
An ad network that lets users profit from Twitter is making it harder to distinguish between autobiography and advertising on the social networking site.
I'll be the first to admit that the success of Twitter is totally baffling to me. Perhaps it's betraying my age or my generation or just that I'm reaching premature crusty old fart-hood. I'm not so very surprised though that some enterprising folks have come up with a way to inject advertising into the mix. Users are getting paid to have ads sent from their accounts to their so-called followers.
Now is that a nice thing to do to your friends?
In the news this week, it was revealed that Toronto has no way of collecting parking tickets given to cars with plates from outside Ontario.
Because the city has been unable to access data held by jurisdictions outside Ontario, it can't find out the name or address of a vehicle's owner to try to collect the outstanding fine.
The city is apparently considering polite windshield notices asking offenders to be good while in the city. Har!
Now does this mean when I visit cities outside of Ontario I can park with impunity there?
Somali pirates seize 3 more ships
It looks like there is no security for ships attempting to sail through the area occupied by these pirates. I expected they would "lie low" after three of their number were killed by snipers the other day.
You can't make this stuff up.
In my little brain, I think of pirate stories as something from a distant past, something that disappeared along with scurvy.... but these pirates are real and nasty. The ending of this adventure is right out of Hollywood though, involving snipers with night vision scopes dropping three armed pirates in their tracks.
Apparently it doesn't end here, as Somali pirates vow retaliation.
Every country will be treated the way it treats us. In the future, America will be the one mourning and crying.
Residents and farmers in an area near Shelburne are concerned about the future of land east and west of 124, north of Shelburne. My brother, who lives not so far away from there, tells me that there is speculation that numbered companies might be buying up huge chunks of area land for gravel pits. This is a concern because the land drains into the headwaters of rivers like the Grand and Pine.
Some residents have formed the North Dufferin Agricultural and Community Taskforce Their mission is to preserve and protect the unique resources in the area, including the agricultural lands, character and lifestyle that have been at the heart of the community. It looks like they are trying to have the lands they are particularly concerned about designated as special agricultural lands in an upcoming official plan.
Singer Charlie Pride refunds fan in person
I don't know much about country singer Charlie Pride. I don't know if I could even tell you what songs he popularized - although I think I would recognize his voice. I do know that he is one class act.
A Charlie Pride fan from Leduc Alberta, south of Edmonton, Jackie Sharp, recently bought a pair of tickets for an upcoming Edmonton show from a reseller's website, paying many times the actual value of the tickets - over $1200 for the pair. When Ms. Sharp's son learned his mom had purchased tickets for that much money, he apparently tried contacting the ticket broker, then emailed Mr. Pride's fan website.
After hearing about the situation, Mr. Pride flew to Leduc Alberta, surprised Ms. Sharp with a pair of floor seats for his June 20 Edmonton show, and personally refunded her money for the tickets. He also reportedly plans to dedicate a song to her at his show.
This anchovy is impressed.
A Toronto art dealer says he's "totally prepared" to give up the trademark rights his company and his wife hold for the names "Painters Eleven" and "Painters 11" following a week of what he termed "mass hysteria.".
For those who aren't much aware of Canadian Art, Painters Eleven is the name associated with a group of Toronto area abstract painters during the 1950s. They were Jack Bush, Oscar Cahén, Hortense Gordon, Tom Hodgson, Alexandra Luke, Jock Macdonald, Ray Mead, Kazuo Nakamura, William Ronald, Harold Town and Walter Yarwood. They're all gone now, but to me they were painting heros.
Last year, he (John Shearer) and his wife Lynda were granted trademark rights by the Canadian Intellectual Property Office for the names "Painters Eleven" and "Painters 11"
Hey wait a minute...how can an individual own the rights to a piece of our cultural history?
I don't know what the Canadian Intellectual Property Office thinks they're doing giving away a piece of our cultural history, and I think the individuals who went after the rights had a hell of a lot of nerve. It looks like now the couple have decided to give the rights back, under pressure of what Mr. Shearer apparently termed "mass hysteria".
*********************************************************
This ugly piece of business reminds me of something painter Ron Bloore used to say to us back in my university days. Bloore had organized an exhibition called Five Painters from Regina in 1961. After it was picked up by the National Gallery, they became generally known as The Regina Five. Bloore would say, "Canadians paint by numbers", referring to the Group of Seven, The Regina Five and the Painters 11.
