Welcome back!
Wow, what a week. Terrorism in Boston, the death of a Nova Scotia icon, Victoria Hall memorabilia on the auction block and the rollout of The Chronicle Herald’s new Weekend Edition.
While I’m still digesting the raft of changes publisher Sarah Dennis & Co. have made to Canada’s only independently owned daily – everything from font changes to section overhauls – I must admit that it’s Liane Heller’s new “On the Buses” column that has me most intrigued. Not so much for its folksy, Sesame Street-esque “people in your neighbourhood” narrative, but rather the sheer ballsy-ness required by its author to travel each and every one of Metro Transit’s 64 routes, “while visiting the neighbourhoods and getting to know the people along the way.”
Presumably that includes hopping aboard the No. 72, made infamous earlier this year following some early-afternoon gunplay along Dartmouth’s Pinecrest Drive, and chewing the fat with folks at the new Dartmouth BridgeTerminal, a favourite haunt of knife-wielders and mace sprayers.
If that isn’t enough to convince you that Liane’s “journalism to go” exercise isn’t worthy of supplemental danger pay, consider the fact that since last July six – yes six! – Metro Transit buses have spontaneously burst into flames.
Given the extent of Liane’s itinerary, how long could it possibly be before she finds her fanny, quite literally, sitting in the hot seat?
Herald daredevil Liane Heller
WHEN DISH-ASTER STRIKES:
Poor Glenn Martin. I’m told Halifax’s reigning king of giftware was practically inconsolable after $600 worth of Fiesta dinnerware wound up under the wheels of a stranger’s car in the parking lot of his Comfort & Joy location in Woodlawn.
I’m told Glen, who also operates Comfort & Joy’s Lunenburg, Park Lane and Sunnyside Mall locations, had just received a long-awaited shipment of the popular dishware line and was busy making deliveries to meet client demand. According to my source, he was neatly stacking the boxes beside his car when he saw an older lady get into the car next to him, and proceeded to begin talking with her co-piloting pooch.
According to my source, she then proceeded to cut her wheels so close to where Glenn and his precious cargo were located that she ran over the boxes! “Shards of pasta bowls were flying through the air and (he) was yelling STOOOOOOOOOOOOP!!! … She was still driving with a box jammed under her car and dragging a Scarlet Red Pie Baker,” while Glenn pursued her, begging her to stop.
When she finally did, I’m told she stepped from the car, saying little more than, “Where did that come from? I certainly didn’t see it!”
I gather little, if anything, came out of the exchange, given that the woman was soon seen driving off while Glenn (who with his Emera-toiling partner Derrick MacDonald also owns Maitland’s famous Frieze and Roy General Store), tried to, er, um, pick up the pieces and carry on.
SIGN OF THE TIMES:
The sign on the door says “temporarily closed,” but Upper Tantallon residents are losing faith that the Jumbo Video store at 5288 St. Margaret’s Bay Road will ever reopen. Comments on the store’s Facebook page make mention of the closure as far back as March 30, with no signs of life witnessed for two weeks at least.
BAY WATCH:
Speaking of Upper Tantallon, belated congratulations to British expat Denis Dineen who last week was named President of the St. Margaret’s Bay Chamber of Commerce. Denis and his wife Linda own and operate Delish Fine Foods – located just across the parking lot from the aforementioned Jumbo Video – which The Daily Telegraph named the best British shop outside the British Isles in 2011.
Joining Denis on the newly selected executive are 1st VP Guy Arsenault (baySource.ca); 2nd VP Doug Poulton (Enter Realty); Treasurer Cailin MacLennan (Bluenose Accounting & Tax Services); and Secretary Ellen Helmke (Otis & Clementine’s Books & Coffee), also the chamber’s past president.
Making up the list of directors are: Keith Ayling (Keith R. Ayling Lease Consulting Services); John Glover (Redmond’s Home Hardware); Jim Jewer (Scotiabank); Shari Johnson (Tradewinds Realty); Ivan Nickerson (Shining Waters Marine Limited); Janice Naugler (Royal LePage Atlantic); David Hills (Freedom 55 Financial); Tracey Kennedy (Kennedy Schofield & Associates); and Padraic “Paddy” Hynes (RBC).
THE SIMPSONS:
Positive thoughts go out to news 95.7 talk show host Scott Simpson and his social worker wife Amanda this week as they prepare to deal with the challenging realities of Amanda’s recent cancer diagnosis.
As reported in this very column on April 5, the couple welcomed the birth of an eight-pound son, Gordon William Simpson, on April 2.
Since then, via his BigAssSuperstar blog and subsequently during Saturday’s Maritime Morning broadcast, Scott revealed that doctors had in fact discovered Amanda’s stage 3C “ovarian-type” cancer diagnosis in the immediate wake of her C-section with Gordon. She will require, among other things, nine weeks of chemotherapy.
SPOTTED: “Wonder Woman” nametag, being worn by a young female Irving/Circle K employee, Tantallon location, April 17.
“Pigeons ate my family. Need $$$ for BB gun” sign, being held by a panhandler, at the corner of Spring Garden Road and South Park Street, April 17.
Sarah Dennis, Chronicle Herald Publisher, discussing her paper’s new Weekend Edition with customers, at the Quinpool Road McDonald’s, April 20.
Rosalind Penfound, Deputy Minister of Agriculture, at the Hydrostone Starbucks, April 20.
Flea Market King Bill Mont, NSGEU guy Don Goss and Shelburne County schoolteacher Terry Bower, at Crowther & Brayley’s Victoria Hall auction, April 20. Beverley Ware, The Chronicle Herald’s South Shore Bureau Chief, on Spring Garden Road, April 20.
PASSINGS:
WALSH, Martin Hugh, 66, former NSCC teacher, on April 11.
OBRITSCH, John George, 90, co-founder of the Airlane Golf Club on the Old Guysborough Road, on April 13.
FLYNN, Stanley Joseph, 79, founder, Stanley J. Flynn Trucking Ltd; President of Wallace Quarries Ltd., on April 14.
MARTELL, Heather, 60, former French teacher at Bedford Junior High, on April 14.
McCORMICK, Dr. William “Bill,” 84, Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at Dalhousie University, former Medical/Clinical director at the Nova Scotia Hospital and past president of the Canadian Psychiatric Association, on April 15.
THOMPSON, A. Keith, 64, founder of employment-placement business Thompson Associates, on April 15.
WOOD, Marilyn Lorraine, 71, co-owner/manager of Signs Now in Dartmouth, on April 15.
BONE, Richard Melbourne “Dick,” 82, former math and science teacher at Dartmouth Vocational School, on April 16.
MacNeil, Rita, 68, Canadian music icon, on April 16. Speaking with the CBC last week, “happily retired” Springhill songstress Anne Murray, who in the late 80s recorded her own version of Rita’s famed “Flying on Your Own,” described her as an inherently talented songwriter who overcame myriad obstacles to achieve well-deserved success.
According to the Globe & Mail, the two women didn’t meet until the mid 1990s while filming the television special “Anne Murray in Nova Scotia” with The Rankin Family.
Oddly enough, Rita’s death came just hours after the marathon tragedy in Boston, the city in which she held her first U.S. concert (she nearly sold out the Berklee Performance Centre and received three standing ovations) in 1989.
STEPHENSON, Sister Mary (Ethel Marie), 93, educator and former Mother House (Mount St. Vincent) denizen, on April 16.
McCREA, Armour Mayes (Ben), 73, well-known developer and Armour Group founder , on April 16.
COLLINS, Richard, former Halifax School Board member and actor best known for his role as The Trailer Park Boys’ Philadelphia “Phil” Collins, on April 15. Richard, who years ago portrayed “Markdown Marvin” in ads for the now-defunct clothing liquidation outlet AMN Liquidation Sales, also played a Mont Blanc engineer in the 2003 Halifax Explosion flick, Shattered City.