The South Bayview Bulldog

After 27 years on air, Bell Media has confirmed that production has been suspended on Fashion Television. Host Jeanne Beker tweeted the news today: “So surreal. This dream is over: After 27 glorious years, FT production ceased today. So sad to see some of my closest colleagues move on.” The weekly half-hour series roved the globe to collect a mix of news and feature pieces touching on the worlds of fashion, photography, architecture and design. Through the show, Beker has interviewed virtually every top designer over the years including Stella McCartney, Marc Jacobs, Tommy Hilfiger and the late Alexander McQueen. Bell Media has confirmed that Beker is staying on with the company, something the fashion pioneer seems very excited about. “Looking forward to working with Bellmedia + evolving the FT brand,” she tweeted. “Bell Media remains committed to the fashion genre and will continue to grow FashionTelevisionChannel to deliver a broader appeal for viewers, advertisers, and distributors,” Scott Henderson, vice president of communications at Bell Media, said in a statement.

The city’s “gotcha” parking enforcement has long generated mistrust and contempt from its citizens. The ticketing process is born out of the sheer desperation of a government that spends and will not economize. If income or sales taxes were applied in the same unreasonable, unpredictable way, there would be a revolt.  Today on South Bayview, the inevitable abuse of the authority to tax played out again.  A shopper, nearly in tears,  ran to her car as the enforcement officer slapped a ticket on it. She was five minutes late. Well, you may say, the law is the law.    In fact, there is no other tax legislation that requires a citizen to guess whether he is going to be taxed because he misjudged the time of day. Or because he was routinely delayed a couple of minutes. And if parking enforcement were done merely to police the availability of parking, enforcement officers would behave reasonably.  There was, for example, abundant parking on Bayview Ave. as the ticket man taxed that shopper $30. In Toronto, parking fines have nothing to do with parking. It’s a disgrace that the City pretends to be keeping order when it is really out to fleece as many drivers as it can.  

Silly us. Missed the one from Peugot that it sneakily put out a few days ago. An observer who saw the “Car that changes colour” gambit from the French auto maker said that if he hadn’t seen it on April 1st  it would have been easily believable that Peugeot had actually developed this car. This is the thing about technology now. You’re prepared to believe almost anything.  Cars are a good source of material for these tricks. Remember the Volt convertible last year?  Our thanks to the reader who told us about the colour prank.   

It’s surprising it doesn’t happen more often in busy, re-constructing Leaside. But yesterday the north wall of a bungalow at 133 Randolph Rd collapsed inward all by itself during a day off for workers. The wall had been left standing obviously without support as is often the case in such re-builds. No one was hurt and firefighters say the well-fenced site is safe. 

Jeweller Linda Penwarden, and her shop at 631 Mt Pleasant Rd., has been profiled by Post Media News and the article may be read here linked from the Ottawa Citizen. Ms Penwarden is apparently an example of hard work and persistence being rewarded with a successful practice in  jewellery making.  As reported by David Kates, she has worked in the jewellery business for nearly two decades. He says she has learned the valuable lesson of doing your homework. For sure.

Wendy’s President and CEO Emil Brolick earned total compensation valued at $4.6 million in 2011 after taking the helm of the hamburger chain in September, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Friday. Wendy’s outgoing CEO Roland Smith, who retired rather than relocate to Ohio from Atlanta after Wendy’s sold most of Arby’s, took home about $16.5 million in total compensation last year, including $11.4 million in severance pay. That pay package was up more than three-fold from the $4.9 million in total compensation that Smith earned in 2010. Brolick’s 2011 compensation included $338,462 in base salary for time served in the role; his base salary for the full year is $1.1 million. Brolick also received a $500,000 signing bonus, $3.2 million in stock and option awards and $533,000 in non-equity incentive plan compensation. Brolick, a former chief operating officer at Yum Brands, joined Wendy’s on Sept. 12. Fox

Tremblettt’s Valu Mart and realtor Patrick Rocca teamed up to get the Easter Bunny (inset) out on  South Bayview Saturday.  Many kids had the thrill of a picture with the normally flop-eared rabbit, who had fairly upright ears on this occasion.  Easter Sunday is set to be a warm one, with temperatures predicted to climb to 16°C and a minimal chance of rain. The chance of rain is about 30 per cent, said Kuhn, though it will be scattered throughout the city. Warm temperatures Sunday will drop slightly Monday then drop further Tuesday as an arctic air current moves in. Sunday’s temperatures are above average but still far from the record-setting heat felt in 2001 when the mercury hit 25.2°C.