Doh!
February 28, 2010
People, not deer threaten bog – report
By JONATHAN SHER, THE LONDON FREE PRESS
For most of the past century, it’s been people, not deer, who’ve posed a threat to the bog environmentalists say is an ecological treasure and rarity in southern Ontario.
People drained the bog, flooded it, stripped its peat, cut its black spruce for Christmas trees, surrounded it with development and gravel pits and planted an invasive plant that’s likely its biggest threat, buckthorn.
Clever beasts on the right track
February 27, 2010
Smart coyote at Western to hunt rabbits, squirrels or garbage
Monday night London endorsed a funding plan for a recycling centre approved last year before stimulus money fell through. Meantime, a coyote has been spotted along the river trails at the grounds of the University of Western Ontario.
Ilderton and London team up
February 23, 2010
Ilderton's Scott Moir, London's Tessa Virtue: 2010 Ice Dance Gold Medalists
London. Flat. Fast.
February 19, 2010
Christine Nesbitt goes real fast
20 Landscapes II
February 14, 2010
This is a set of 20 collage landscape images made from bits of previous paintings. Acrylic on paper with bits of painted paper and canvas. All roughly 7 by 10 inches on watercolour paper.
See 20 Landscapes.
Waking up heartbroken
January 28, 2010
I had the great delight of waking up to Meaghan Smith a few days ago, to a delightful little song called called Heartbroken. I love the Swing beat and the old time cartoony feeling in the instrumentation and her warm clear voice. I could see her singing with Bob Wills and The Texas Playboys. At this point I’m ready to buy the album.
Then the CBC announcer says the voice and the girl is from London Ontario. Whoa! That is worth looking up:
I grew up in London, Ontario, Canada. We couldn’t afford cable, so to avoid doing homework, I occupied myself with other activities, like drawing and singing. And with three (mostly fuzzy) TV channels to choose from, I ended up watching a lot of animated movies and old musicals.
And with her parents deeply into music of all sorts, that just goes to show that London, the creative city is once again a most fertile middle-class backwater where things are safe to bloom. But to blossom, yes, we need to go elsewhere:
I opted to go to school for animation in pursuit of my drawing,… I graduated from college and moved to Halifax, Nova Scotia, for a job in animation. I also decided to tackle my fear of the stage, and began to play shows locally.
Well, that certainly warrants a post at cartoon life :-) Here is a page of vids at Youtube and her MySpace page with more songs and another interview at LAist and a video with her own animations.
London’s No Prorogue Rally
January 20, 2010
Date: Saturday, January 23
Time: 12:00 – 1:00 pm
Location: Victoria Park – Richmond and Central Entrance
Rebecca Solnit, The Current, Elite Panic
January 19, 2010
Excellent interview on The CBC’s The Current this morning with Rebecca Solnit. It answered some questions. Here’s a Google link on Elite Panic.
Update; 01-21-09
Link to the interview on the podcast page:http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/podcast.html19/01/10: Pt 3 – Disaster Writer Rebecca Solnit on why terrible disasters can generate remarkable communities.
click to listen 19/01/10: Pt 3 – Disaster [mp3 file: runs 27:45]
20 landscapes
January 13, 2010
See also 20 Landscapes II
Annie Leonard’s ‘The Story of Cap & Trade’
January 8, 2010
Third time’s the charm
January 4, 2010
Stephen Harper's Reformatory Graduation Photo
Snowbird
January 2, 2010
Thou dust in us command!
March 4, 2010
John Geddes writes in Thou dost jest, dostn’t thou? at Macleans, that:
My first thought is that conservatives, of whatever stripe or label think there was some dear time in the past when everything was just correct. Aaaah! The wonderful glorious sunset-lit past was so much better than now. Let us all worship the year zero where we can start again fresh and steer the country towards a glorious and correct future.
Pol Pot wanted to drive Cambodia back to the year zero, where he could start again.
"Thou dust in us command!"
But Stephen Harper proposes the change as gender neutral – a step forward for women – and at the same time turn the clock back to the glorious past – tradition. How can you be opposed to that?
It’s a tactic. He’s just picking a fight. The position is this: Anyone opposed to the change is anti-feminist and at the same time a reactionary radical.
Women got the vote in Canada in 1916 in Manitoba through to 1925. Yea, let’s turn back the national anthem to a non-gender specific, archaic turn of phrase when women weren’t equal – or even citizens.
Update 05-mar-2010: There has been for some time, a grassroots correction to this “all thy sons command” line. People have been using “in all of us command.” I have been singing that line. I thought it was the ‘official’ correction. I always wondered why when I was singing that line that everyone else was singing something different.
Another ad hoc ‘correction’ is to change “our home and native land” to “our home on native land.”
Update 05.mar-2010: National anthem won’t change: PMO
Very clever chess move, yes sir, very clever. Now, what was in that Throne Speech again?
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