knitnut.net: Saying goodbye

The art-making party for Elmaks was wonderful and fitting, and the service the next day was lovely.

I don’t usually say funerals are lovely, but this one was. His art decorated the room, and several pieces from the art-making party the night before were there too. (Not mine. I’m still working on mine.)

There was […]

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knitnut.net: Goodbye, Elmaks.

Maks and Oboe

Elmaks, local street artist, inventor of The Swap Box, and all-round nice guy and gentle soul, died on Thursday. I’m told that his body was found in the forest on Friday, and that he had committed suicide.

I’m shaken and saddened by this news. I didn’t even realize he was depressed.

He came […]

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knitnut.net: I got in an actual fight

Yesterday afternoon I was walking down Merivale Road, nursing a migraine, when the guy walking in front of me grabbed an election sign out of the grass and tossed it in the ditch. Moments later we were both standing at the intersection of Merivale and Baseline, and I said “You know, you’re not supposed to […]

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knitnut.net: Saying goodbye

I went to Parliament Hill yesterday, to pay my last respects to Jack Layton. It was a very long, very slow line which stretched pretty much around the whole East Block. I’m glad I went, though I didn’t stay.

There was a man near me in the line who said it would be 10 p.m. before […]

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knitnut.net: Goosebumps and tears

I’m heartbroken about Jack Layton’s death this morning.

We all knew it didn’t look good a month ago when he stepped down temporarily from his job so he could get treated for cancer. He looked so thin. ‘Gaunt’ was the word everybody used. And the alarming thing was he had become so gaunt so quickly […]

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knitnut.net: Good boy, Logan, good bye.

Logan the Dog died yesterday afternoon. We’d known for the last six months that this day was coming – the writing was on the wall – but it still seemed to come too soon, too abruptly. That whole thing about one human year is the equivalent of seven dog years, it means that dogs age […]

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knitnut.net: Fire the thugs

Even I, who have a bit of a jaundiced eye when it comes to the behaviour of Ottawa’s police force as a whole, am surprised by how much police brutality has come to light since the Stacy Bonds incident. I can’t even keep up with it all here on the blog. I skipped the last […]

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knitnut.net: More police brutality in Ottawa

I find this story quite disturbing. Bad enough that the police are beating up on women and drunks and people in custody, but kids too?

The 15-year-old kid, on the evening in question, was getting into a little trouble with some friends – throwing paintballs, lighting a newspaper on fire in a schoolyard. When a plainclothes […]

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knitnut.net: Goodbye Rita

I read the papers and the obituaries almost every day. I don’t know how anybody can die in this city without me finding out about it, especially if it makes the news, and especially if they’re a friend of mine. But Rita did.

I ran into my friend John last week and he mentioned in […]

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