17 5 / 2013
There’s even one of those crazy Taiwanese news re-enactments. I guess they didn’t have a sufficiently heavy-set preprogrammed character. Also unclear why there is projectile crying and shaking a child, and why his crack den looks like a library, but there are Mounties and this is awesome.
Crack smoking Toronto mayor Rob Ford caught on tape! (by NMAWorldEdition)
17 5 / 2013
Rob Ford, newsmaker - a timeline
As our senior editor Edward Keenan wrote after Rob Ford’s famed 911 call incident in October 2011: “Incivility and unbecoming behaviour are his whole brand.”
In light of the news you might have heard about Toronto’s mayor this morning, we’d just like to present for you again a few memorable incidents in the bizarre, troubled history of the ongoing Rob Ford clown show.
1999: Rob Ford is arrested for failing to take a breathalyzer test after being pulled over, and also charged with possession of marijuana.
2002: Ford refers to Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti as “gino boy.”
2005: Ford calls Councillor Gloria Lindsay Luby a “waste of skin.”
2005: Ford says the following: “No. 1, I don’t understand a transgender, I don’t understand, is it a guy dressed up like a girl or a girl dressed up like a guy? And we’re funding this for, I don’t know, what does it say here?”
2006: Ford says, “If you are not doing needles and you are not gay, you wouldn’t get AIDS probably, that’s bottom line.”
2006: After being thrown out of a hockey game in which Ford berated those sitting nearby, he apologized, claiming he had been drinking and was under a lot of stress.
2008: That time he said “orientals” who “work like dogs” were “taking over.”
2008: Ford is charged with assault and uttering a death threat after a domestic dispute with his wife Renata. Weeks later, the charges were withdrawn.
2010: That time he offered to score a stranger drugs on tape.
2010: Ford endorses anti-gay-marriage pastor Wendell Brereton.
2011: A mother claims Rob Ford gave the finger to her and her six-year-old daughter after they scolded him for talking on his mobile phone while driving. Ford claimed this was “not accurate,”and responded to a television reporter’s question about it with a fit of sustained laughter, ending the interview. Later he clarified that he had been on his mobile phone, but denied making a rude hand gesture.
2011: Ford goes to the cottage instead of the Pride Parade.
2011: The unforgettable 911 call controversy.
2011: The Star reports that the Youth and Family Violence Unit was investigating two domestic disputes at the mayor’s house in two months, including one after his in-laws phoned the police.
2011: Ford draws a complaint from a women’s group after suggesting into a live microphone that he could think of a word that starts with “B” to call a woman speaking before his Executive Committee.
2012: Ford charges at a Star reporter on a parcel of property behind his house.
2012: Ford skips the Pride Parade again.
2012: Rob Ford, “party animal.”
2012: That whole conflict-of-interest thing.
2013: The Star reports Ford was “asked to leave a gala event celebrating the Canadian armed forces last month, because organizers were concerned he was impaired.”
2013: Sarah Thomson alleges Ford grabbed her ass at a party. The night before International Women’s Day.
2013: Ford goes on a “magnet blitz” in a parking lot.
Have we forgotten any of Rob Ford’s many unbecoming incidents? Please let us know in the comments section below.
16 5 / 2013
‘He thought I was nuts’: Guidance counselor snaps photos of wild squirrels interacting with miniature props
Wednesday was Nancy Rose’s day off. For most of the afternoon, the high school guidance counselor from Bedford, N.S., was crouched on her porch, her camera fixed on a miniature bathtub that was carefully staged on a railing. Ms. Rose was waiting for a squirrel to approach the tub and reach for the peanuts inside. National Post reporter Jake Edmiston interrupted Wednesday’s photo shoot to speak to the photographer, whose whimsical depictions of the woodland creatures are garnering international attention.
Q: So how did this all start?
A: I was taking pictures of the squirrels in my backyard. After taking the same shot over and over again, I decided that maybe I could add something to make it more interesting. One of the first things I noticed was a squirrel standing on a pumpkin, holding a stem. He looked like a ship captain.
Q: How many hours does it take you to get one of these shots?
A: Sometimes I could spend the whole weekend and nothing happens. The squirrel was actually hungry today, so he came back quite a few times. But it might take 30 pictures to get a good shot. He moves so fast.
Q: Hold on, it sounds like you’ve got a dog in the background there? What does he think of all this?
A: Oh? No. Must have been the wind. But I do have a cat. Unfortunately some days she decides to go out and sit on the deck just when I’m ready to get a good shot. She hasn’t gone after them yet, but the squirrels are cautious of her. She’s kind of big, fat and lazy.
Q: How many usual suspects are there?
A: Well there’s one big squirrel I call Mr. Peanuts. I can even go out on the porch and yell “Peanuts” and he’ll come over, and so will the blue jays. I also have two new young ones. They’re just getting warmed up to me. But squirrels are pretty territorial, so if a new one comes the other will try to chase him away. So they have to take turns.
Q: Have you always been this interested in squirrels?
A: No, I probably didn’t know they existed until a couple of years ago. But the people who order my calendars are total squirrel fanatics. They’ve got squirrel collections.
Q: Would you consider yourself a squirrel fanatic?
A: Not to that extent. I’ve got enough squirrel props, I don’t need anything else in my house. My whole dining room is filled with this stuff.
Q: You live with your husband, right? What’s he thinking about all this?
A: He thought I was nuts, until I started to make some money from it.
Q: As of late you’ve been interviewed by media in Canada, Germany and the U.K. You’ve got publishing contracts for your squirrel-themed calendar. But before all the buzz, were people starting to think that Mrs. Rose is starting to lose it?
A: Most of them really didn’t know what I was doing. I made my first calendar for Christmas and I gave it to my family and friends. They were all quite impressed. One sister who I thought was the least impressed was the first to ask for a calendar the next year.
Q: What about the kids at the high school where you work as a guidance counselor? Have they caught wind of your hobby?
A: They think the squirrels are pretty cool. One boy brought me a little toilet. So I’ve got one shot of the squirrel who looks like he’s had a hard Friday night, with some beer bottles around.
Q: You’ve got a little photo studio set up on the railing of your back deck. How’d you manage that?
A: That’s when my husband knew I was serious — when I glued screwed a piece of plywood onto the railing. I kind of rigged up a wire, so I can put a sheet up as a backdrop. I’ll paint it to look like sky or something else. I try to use Photoshop as little as possible.
Q: This sounds like you take this pretty seriously.
A: Well, it’s a lot cheaper than buying clothes. I’ve got enough of those, I’m ready to retire.
National Post
from National Post - Top Stories http://bit.ly/YLRsgA
15 5 / 2013
Business: What's the shrewdest, smartest maneuver you've ever seen in business? - Quora
Puma paying Pele to tie his shoes in the middle of the field seconds before the kickoff of the World Cup final in Mexico (1970)… The camera made a close up and the whole world realized that the best player back then was wearing Puma shoes
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In the late 80s or early 90s, AT&T had a long-distance service, and a corresponding marketing campaign, called 1-800-OPERATOR. The ads were on TV every day… You’d call that number to get access to better-than-average long-distance calling rates.
Someone at MCI (AT&T’s biggest competitor, back in the day) realized that many people can’t spell “operator” properly. So MCI registered 1-800-OPERATER.
MCI made a fair amount of money while AT&T continued to pay for the marketing campaign.
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Oakley sent a pair of shades to the Chilean miners who were stuck in the mine.
They sent them to protect their eyes from the sun after not having been exposed to it for a very extended period of time.
When the miners emerged from the dark mine, the extremely extensive media coverage filmed and talked about how each one of them was wearing a pair of Oakley sunglasses.
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“Today I interviewed a trader, who’d forecast earnings for a food company by ordering a weekly muffin in order to count the invoice number.”
15 5 / 2013
How to skip lines at Disney: Hire a disabled ‘escort’ on the black market — only $1,040 a day
In a culture that outsources everything, it was inevitable some well-heeled Americans would find a way of skipping the tedium of lining up to get into a Disney attraction — especially during the recent Spring Break.
Wealthy mothers from Manhattan are hiring disabled people, who pose as family members, to get onto rides and other attractions at Disney World, the New York Daily News reports.
The hired helpers — given the fancy name of “tour concierge” — are obtained through Dream Tours, a company that helps organize vacations for people with special needs.
The Celebration, Fla.-based firm offers “quality-based, memorable and affordable 24-hour supervised vacation services … to people with special needs,” according to its website.
You can’t go to Disney without a tour concierge
The company allegedly takes advantage of a Disney rule that allows guests who need a wheelchair or motorized scooter to bring up to six more people to a “more convenient entrance,” the Post says.
Dream Tours reportedly provides a disabled “escort,” who accompanies the family around the park and to the front of the line at busy rides.
“You can’t go to Disney without a tour concierge,” said one mother who used its services to zip to the front of the line with her children.
“This is how the 1% does Disney.”
The woman said she hired a Dream Tours guide to escort her, her husband and their one-year-old son and five-year-old daughter through the park in a motorized scooter with a “handicapped” sign on it.
The group was sent straight to an auxiliary entrance at the front of each attraction.
“My daughter waited one minute to get on ‘It’s a Small World’ — the other kids had to wait 2 1/2 hours,” she added.
The “black-market” guides run $130 for an hour, and $1,040 for an eight-hour day, the Post reports.
Not only is the Dream Tours’ service more efficient than Disney World’s VIP Tours, it’s cheaper.
Disney Tours offers a VIP guide and fast passes for $310 to $380 per hour.
The company’s phone number was in hot demand over Spring Break. The service asks who referred you before they even take your call, the newspaper said.
The New York mother indicated Jacie Christiano, who works at Dream Tours and is the girlfriend of the tour company owner, Ryan Clement, was the family’s guide. Mr. Clement told the Post Ms. Christiano doesn’t use her disability to bypass lines and says she has an auto-immune disorder.
from National Post - Top Stories http://bit.ly/11EtQ1d
12 5 / 2013
102 hours in pursuit of Marathon bombing suspects
I wasn’t going to read this because I didn’t need to rehash the news I followed so closely, especially as a runner and being in Boston during the lockdown. But it sucked me in.
The governor reflected later on his first reaction, when his daughter called him in his car to ask about the bombings. Instinctively, Patrick had offered reassurance, telling her, “I’m sure it’s OK.”
“Because you want to believe it, right?” he said. “That it’s OK.”
But Patrick knew now that things were far from OK.
11 5 / 2013
Al Gore Dear Diary: ‘Choke on a beaver tail, Canada’
What’s that? The Canadian Minister of Natural Resources has a problem with me accusing their oil sands of using the atmosphere as an open sewer? Oooh, if I don’t watch my step, I guess I’ll be getting polite-but-firm letters from their Department of Losing Hockey Teams. Choke on a beaver tail, Canada. Any dumbass could sit on a mountain of oil and trees and pretend to know how to run an economy.
11 5 / 2013
Unruly woman, belts out Whitney Houston songs, kicked off plane
Amazing. This plane made an unscheduled stop so they could remove this woman who was belting out “I will always love you”
