As seen above, drunk drivers are only funny when they smash their own heads into the dry wall of a beat cop’s cubicle. The Vancouver Sun presents ICBC’s top ten drunk driving excuses. Be warned, they are a little stupid (even unlikely), but hey, driving drunk is wicked shitty. Stay safe, folks. I fear there are many tokoloshe at the wheel. Buses are awesome, and taxis need your money.

Take A Bow, You!

The Vancouver Courier has named this year’s local Newsmaker of the Year. Was it Gregor Robertson? Sam Sullivan? Trevor Linden? Nope. Spoiler alert: it was you. Really? Though they mean you as a political engine of change™ (as in you, the few who vote), this still reeks of a Class A cop-out. Didn’t Time magazine do the same thing last year? Oh wait, they did.

Grants Gone Macabre

Research money well spent! Scientists calculate the odds of every unlikely death scenario from falling off a ladder to drowning in the bath. It turns out I have a greater chance of using the word macabre again this year than I do being eaten by prawns (web extra: I seldom get to type the word macabre. It’s tricky. Just try it).

A New Republican Baby Jesus

Christendom has a new King. A big welcome to Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnston. Pa-rup-pa-pum-pum. Personally, I think naming your first kid after Linda Tripp is just weird, but then again I sort of lean to the left.

A New Vancouver Baby Jesus

Hockey mega extra super zeus Mats Sundin arrives in Vancouver and immediately pisses off his cheerleaders. Money media quote:

The 37-year-old centre arrived from Stockholm, via Frankfurt, and was whisked out a back entrance at the arrivals area of YVR and into a waiting SUV.

Duped photographers gamely tried to run down Sundin, but the media is not known for its athleticism, and sprinting is more difficult in snow boots and while carrying many thousands of dollars’ worth of equipment.

Is that genius or is it as unintentionally and inexplicably profound as zee Germans loving Tom Cruise? Either way, as a guy who grew up in Toronto watching Sundin bob, weave, hit, and shoot, I’m stoked.

Fight Club

My two favourite Vancouver bloggers go toe to toe with suburban douchebaggery. Attaboys. Take care to remember that Ghandi was wrong and Mandela was a boxer.

From Gaza With Love

A popular Beirut bar joke:

Knock Knock.

Who’s there?

The Israeli air force.

The Israeli air force who?

Boom!

Not funny, I know. The video above was released by the Israeli Defense Force tonight. It shows operational prep, I suppose – the air force readying for last night’s missions over Gaza. So efficient and clinical. What a nasty, never-ending, simmer-boil-simmer business this is. You can join Vancouver protesters who are railing against the airstrikes (the Straight provides plenty of pictures), or, if you tend to abhor protests but still want to know what’s going on in the Levant’s end game department, turn to the unflinchingly unemotional and always academic Juan Cole. His interpretation of this sadness has always ruled without much in the way of ideological clutter (think better than CNN, Haaretz, and Al Jazeera, all without the ads, Nancy Grace, and the language barriers). Matching cliché: it’s always better to sit back and read than just sit back and watch.

Journosaurus Flex

The Georgia Straight’s pithy Year In Review, magically translated: “we may sometimes read or come across as old or semi-tenured/indentured, but the truth is we’d so totally rather be interning at HuffPo or Counterpunch for free.” Giggle.

The Hunt For Red December

Russian rocket attack on Canada (almost). Man up, Harper! Whatcha gonna do? Psst, try this: Tell Putin that Quebec was responsible for Tunguska. Coalition solved. Thank me later.

Green Rambling

Science + Nature x Design = architect Michael McDonough (watch him ramble above). Extra points: Witold Rybczynski at Slate opines on green urban planning (a fantastic read).

Pop Goes The Pipe Dream

The Kitsilano housing market is totally tanking. The Globe and Mail’s upside: sanity returns. Deep thought: if the fellow who pens the Condo Hype blog had his own newspaper column or radio show, life for a lot of newly broke people would be better.

Idea No. 6

A global reduction in fishermen.

Rock Me Nostradamus

If I had to go with any a single corporate soothsayer it would have to be the BBC, and it just so happens that their top correspondents are predicting what 2009 holds for the world as we speak. And so what if the business of crystal-balling becomes a pandemic phenomenon in the journalism profession this time of year. Endure.