And so the MB blogging stick has been passed on to me. Another short one until it's passed back to the experts.

Bummer for Mr. Bumstead on Denman. His son was bloodied up, on his b-day, gasp! Perhaps the shirtless Mantique shopper was having a fit of 'roid rage?

Hope those roving cops ATVs don't become taser trigger happy, or human BBQs on Kits Beach may become a common occurrence. Now here's a choice quote: "The Taser has become a tool of convenience...'Drop the beer!' No? Zap!"

Gas prices this, gas prices that. I'm personally pro-carbon tax, but of course, my opinion is affected by the commuting options available to me in the area where I've chosen to live. Put me in the middle of the 'burbs, and my opinion may change. Or better yet, put me in an opposition party. But why drive, when I can get my dose of endorphins while being a happy cyclist. With the blood flowing, perhaps some ideas will flow on how to spend the cool hundy that's in the mail.

Speaking of money in da bank, how much do I need before I'll think about dropping my jay-oh-bee? News1130 with a special investigative report on why a lotto 6/49 jackpot won't do shit for you in this city. How much does a person need?"Probably like $5-million, then it would give you time to travel and you could go back to school and upgrade your skills and that and not be stressed about your financial situation. For a million dollars you could barely buy a condo in Vancouver." Wow. How messed up are our views on money. Better get started and study the lottery guide.

Everyone's favourite predecessor to Triumph The Insult Comic Dog, Ed the Sock, has been tossed in the washer. So I guess Simi Sara finally filed a harassment suit. Hope she's using Larry "the Sledge" Rosen.

"'[Vancouver] seems like a beautiful city but it has an ugly heart,' said one friend. 'It has mountains and shiny sky scrapers, but doesn't take care of its own people. It's about looking good not being good.'" How about looking scary? A strange closing line on a Tyee article about the scariest place on Earth.

Photo by Duran Cheung.

Anna here. This one's going to be short and sweet.

Baby high heels latest fashion accessory. Babies in high heels on the front page? Really, Province, really? "It looks like it's trying to make a six-month-old look like a 20-year-old." Next thing you know, R. Kelly will be using these to prove that he is innocent.

Monet painting fetches $80-million at London auction. See, aren't you glad that Vancouver has The Cheaper Show? $200 don't seem so bad in comparison.

If your watering hole of choice is anywhere outside the Granville Street brouhaha, you might want to speak up about Vancouver's archaic drinking laws. Do something without actually doing anything and join the Facebook group.

If you're not going to be away, on the beach, at a barbecue, or sleeping in this Saturday, you may want to check out some of the excellent papers being presented at UBC's Graduate Student Symposium.

The one with a new job around here is chef Rob Feenie. You've probably seen the new Cactus Club over at Burrard and Dunsmuir. It looks impressive, but we'll just have to wait for a taste test to see if it's as crappy and uninspired as all the other locations.

On the flipside, you may have heard that just about everyone has left Yahoo. Some dude created this fantastic DIY resignation letter.

Ooh la la. I didn't notice this in the Georgia Strait! Vancouver's own dating guide. Amidst a flurry of clichés ("the key is to be open to people"), dog walking and flea markets are also suggested.

Image courtesy of mordechai dangerfield in the BR Flickr Pool.

Sorry about the lack of a Monday brew... I won't actually believe Sean has a computer now 'till he full out beats me at a round of Scrabulous. And this'll likely be my first and last of the week, as I'm off to Calgary for Sled Island, but my cohorts should step in to keep the morning news flowing.

So a little bit of catch-up is in order, first of all. The sun was shining for at least a portion of the weekend, and there were two great excuses to soak it up: The Dragon Boat Festival, and Greek Days. Did anyone spot some tofulaki? I teach ESL and just went to Greece. I found some grass and a book.

There was also a machete-ing, and commentators at the CBC site are sick of Surrey slander:

Another classic CBC's, "lets bash Surrey so that Vancouver looks better". Have you gone to Hasting and Main? I drive by there every day and it stinks.

If you haven't already noticed, the comment section over at the CBC is always busy and always hilarious/hysterical/depressing. But don't cry discrimination yet you beaver-murdering, axe-swinging baby-killers; Richmond has drugs and explosives, and you got the 'Surrey Sizzle'. Though I couldn't find a CBC article on him...

Holy shit! The Snoop Dog concert was cloaked in a haze of marijuana smoke! Meh, I guess it confirms we're at least cooler than Lethbridge. But cmon', even the upcoming Backstreet Boys concert will be cloaked in a haze of marijuana smoke.

How do you judge the quality of your Tequila? Well, when it leads to half of BC believing you might be the latest victim of a foot fetished Serial Killer, I'd say it's good enough. Nice to see you home, but get your own place before you take off without leaving a note. We get paranoid.

The Tyee on whether or not too many kids are going to University. Not really sure where I stand here, but since graduating from UBC, I've definitely been stripped of any delusions that the universities are a bastion of modern intelligence. Just another cog in the machine...

Since I brewed yesterday, and have spent all my spare time wringing the sixth (now inhuman) foot dry for inspiration to beef up my creative writing portfolio, this one might not be as in-depth as usual...

The four biggies: Foot DNA doesn't match up to that Quadra Island plane crash, the Senate approves a new anti-spanking bill, rewards are now being offered for those (other) missing men, and that guy who was put in the hospital by an RCMP officer with an oldschool 'nonlethal weapon' -- pepper spray -- has died. Spanking jokes are too easy, and missing or murdered individuals aren't things to be joked about.

Must view: shouting match in Parliament over the new consumer-spanking copyright bill (I'm sorry). While Prentice lacks both proper grammar and an argument, he does demonstrate some major skill with the acronym as he unloads this gem: "the comments about the USA, DMCA are NDP-BS". Sounds like a Wesley Willis song or something (final link NSFW).

The Atlantic tells us how the internet is destroying our brains (watch out, he quotes Nietzsche). Or, in more 'easily digestible' web-speak: You're all a bunch of lazy bastards. Are blog readers really "selfish, lazy, and ruthless?" When we spend so much time online, we obviously train our brain to read in a certain way; but that hardly means one can't stop to savor a novel or essay (with a whit of effort). I'll say that the internet is ineffably superior to television, but people still need to get into the habit of reading a helluva lot more literature, and leave it at that.

Oh, and there's ice on Mars. And the news broke on twitter. "We have ICE!!!!! Yes, ICE, *WATER ICE* on Mars! w00t!!! Best day ever!!" What ever happened to our image of the calm, collected, emotionally vacant astronaut? Ok, I'm not gonna slam the internet wholesale, but twitter is definitely killing our brains. "Daisy... Daisy..."

Alright, I wasn't planning on doing a Brew this morning, but how can I resist with the latest development in "THE CASES OF THE DISARTICULATED FEET"? Shit has gotten so weird Boing Boing is covering it. But seriously, I hope the police are just pretending that they haven't already firmly established an extensive investigation into potential foul play...

With those nicely outsourced Olympics and now the possibility of another iniquitous serial killer (and ohh, the food!), the word 'high-profile' only begins to describe our epitome of, um, 'livability'.

There'll be a major police crackdown, as Vancouver criminals are going straight to jail after... 30 convictions? I guess it's not that surprising:

Vancouver police inspector Rob Rothwell says for an addict to support a three quarter a day crack cocaine habit, they have to steal one-point -two-million dollars in property a year.

Beggars Group, Europe's largest collective of independent music labels marked 2008 as it's strongest in thirty years; "worries about online piracy are nearly non-existent." How surprising: fans of good music actually hold respect for the artists. If the majors started releasing music that mattered, I'm sure people would start paying for it.

Those recommendations on Taser use have finally been made. Solicitor John van Dongen is staying positive: "I think it's important that it also uh, confirms, uh that it is a useful tool for police."

This article about the infiltration of Russian salmon into BC only barely offers an excuse to link to these insane Ukrainian mafia tombstones... but you'll forgive me.

As West Van buys the Olympic bullet, I'm reminded that right from my first cab ride leaving the sleek, smoker-friendly (woo!) Athens airport, it was clear that the Greeks hold a lot of resentment towards the 2004 Olympic Games. The event did some major damage to the Greek economy, not to mention the forced resettlement of the Roma community.

The Athens games once again reveal that events of such magnitude are almost always accompanied by human rights violations such as the forced eviction of whole communities in host cities.

Let's not forget that the Downtown Eastside has Canada's largest urban First Nations population... A better piece, Olympics and the City shows what we can learn from Athens. While it has a focus on London's 2012 bid, it covers all the basics on why the Olympics are always escapist fun for everyone but the host. But dude, aren't our airports sweet?

Apparently, 96% of 18-24 year olds download copyrighted material, and the average teenager has 800 'illegal' songs on their iPod. According to those stats, under the new law almost every undergrad at UBC will owe the government about $400,000 (student loans not looking so bad now, eh?). I say we make that fine apply only to Dave Matthews Band, Sublime, and j-Pop tracks... that'll save the 5% of 'em who don't actually deserve it.

Greenpeace wants Canadian Supermarkets to axe upwards of 30% of the fish they're selling. Pescatarians are totally weaker than Vegans.

Is Vancouver's status as gay-marriage-tourism-capital of North America under threat?

If, like everyone else, you think the 2010 mascots are just a tad ridiculous, just be grateful they're not the 5 mascots of the apocalypse.