Cancer faker Kirilow arrested again

Burlington cancer faker Ashley Kirilow is back behind bars.

The 24-year-old woman, who received 10 months of house arrest in April 2010 after pleading guilty to fraud over and under $5,000 by pocketing funds in a bogus cancer charity scheme, has been charged a second time for breaching her conditional sentence.

Defence counsel Kirstie Bloomfield said Kirilow was arrested Monday after apparently leaving the dwelling where she is confined to house arrest.

Kirilow appeared briefly Wednesday before justice of the peace Barbara Waugh, where she was remanded in custody ahead of her next court appearance Friday. The bespectacled woman with shoulder length brown hair wore a purple sweatshirt and grey slacks. She whispered briefly with Bloomfield but otherwise did not address the court.

Hamilton man charged with two vicious murders and three random stabbings

Hamilton police have charged a 25 year old with two counts of first degree murder and three of attempted murder.

Loujack Nougues Cafe, 25, of no fixed address was arrested yesterday in the Main and Sherman area and will appear in court today.

Staff Sergeant Steve Hrab would not comment on how Café allegedly chose his victims or whether he knew his victim.

Laura Young was found stabbed to death and dumped at the rear of 116 Cathcart St on Feb 6, 2011. George Washington Burnett, was found with a knife in his neck in his bed at 55 Stirton Avenue on Sept 6, 2011. And three people were attacked on the streets of downtown Hamilton between November 7 and November 12, in what were labeled “random attacks” at the time.

CANNABIS & BRAINWAVE STUDY - Kijiji Job Posting @ St.Joes

http://hamilton.kijiji.ca/c-jobs-other-CANNABIS-BRAINWAVE-STUDY-W0QQAdIdZ349224836

We are looking for healthy volunteers to participate in a research study. This study is part of research that will help us understand the relationship between cannabis use, brain activity and thinking.

 

To be eligible for this study, you must:

·        be 18-30 years old;

·        be a native English speaker, and not have learned other languages before age 5;

·        never have had a psychiatric or neurological disorder;

·        be right-handed;

·        not have used any street drugs in the past year 

OR

·        not have used other street drugs in the past year, but use cannabis occasionally 

OR

·        not have used other street drugs in the past year, but use cannabis at least once a week

 

You would be asked to read and remember words presented on a computer screen, and to answer questions about them by pressing a button. We will record your brainwaves during this task.

 

You will also be asked to complete some interviews and questionnaires about medical and psychiatric symptoms and substance use, and some paper tests of language, memory and personality.

 

You will receive $11/hour for participation. This study will last approximately 4 hours.

 

Signs at Hamilton restaurant heat up rights debate

The owner of a hillbilly-themed restaurant on the Mountain says he was only clarifying his cuisine by posting signs saying he doesn’t sell Middle Eastern and Asian foods and serves customers in English.

But Evelyn Myrie, executive director of Hamilton’s Centre for Civic Inclusion, says the signs at Hillbilly Heaven on Upper James Street are “very offensive and against the principles of diversity and inclusion.”

The restaurant has a big sign by the cash register that says halal, rice, kabob, shawarma, fries, wings, ¼ chicken, Mexican and burgers are “things we don’t have and never will.”

On the door it says “to better serve you, our staff speaks ENGLISH” and “What would make you think this was a Korean BBQ? Do you see any f’n ducks in the window?”

Myrie says the owner should take down the signs and apologize.

“Why would he go and attack the people who eat those kinds of foods? He’s ignoring a great deal of the population. It’s very stereotypical … It’s unacceptable and feeds into a stereotype … He has the right to sell his goods but doesn’t have the right to trash other foods that are culturally driven.”

But the owner of the restaurant, Cameron Bailey, says he means no offence. He says his business at Upper James and Fennell Avenue “is in a bit of an Arab neighbourhood. I got tired of people coming in here and asking me if I have halal. I put a sign up saying we don’t have halal, so stop coming in here and asking me.”

As for the sign about Korean barbecue, that was in response to a Korean customer who got angry with Bailey, he said, because his restaurant didn’t serve Korean duck.

Hamilton No.2 for potty-mouth tweeting

The city that’s trying to clean up its act has been caught using dirty words — on Twitter of all places.

Brampton the Bad has been identified as Canada’s most vulgar city for tweeting more four-letter profanities than anyone else. Those “f” and “s” words appeared in 1.41 per cent of all tweets over a one-month period, according to a survey.

TBK Creative, a social media agency, looked at more than 1 million tweets across Canada’s largest cities to rank them based on the most frequent use of bad words.

Hamilton and London placed second and third with 0.9 and 0.7 per cent respectively. Toronto the Good ranked fourth with 0.62 per cent, followed by Laval and Montreal. Ottawa had the cleanest tweets to place 10th.

To be fair, not every tweet was tapped by someone in Brampton; the text just included the bad word in the same cyberbreath as the city name.

Wrote Torontosoul: “If I had to live in Brampton, I’d swear a lot too.”

thespec.com limits their page views to 35 per month.

The Hamilton Spectator is now asking readers to subscribe to their online product thespec.com. As of now you can read up to 35 pages for free but after that they ask you to pay for a subscription of $6.95 per month or $2.95 for print subscribers.

Does this effect you? Will this change your habits from reading thespec.com?

Hamilton Ryan Gosling - http://hamiltonryangosling.tumblr.com/

http://hamiltonryangosling.tumblr.com/

As many as 1,900 jobs coming to Hamilton

Hamilton companies have landed the major contracts in a $1.5-billion offshore wind energy project.

It’s expected the majority of 1,900 jobs to build Windstream Energy’s 300-megawatt Wolfe Island Shoals project near Kingston will land in the city as four local firms will fabricate the steel, assemble the components and transport the giant towers across Lake Ontario.

Walters Group will fabricate the structural steel, Hamilton Port Authority will provide the facilities to assemble the parts, McKeil Marine will use its tugs and barges to transport and erect the components and Bermingham Foundation Solutions will secure the massive wind towers to the lake bed.

An official announcement is coming Wednesday morning. No dollar figure for the value of the local contracts is being released.

“Windstream is looking forward to bringing this level of investment, revitalization and job growth to the Hamilton area,” said Ian Baines, the Burlington-based company’s president, in a news release obtained exclusively by The Spectator.

“We are responding directly to Finance Minister Dwight Duncan’s challenge this week to invest and create jobs in Ontario. We are here. We are stepping up to the table. We are ready to invest, the jobs are immediate and real.”

All the companies are part of a manufacturing consortium called the Lake Ontario Offshore Network, formed to lobby governments about the benefits and economic value of wind energy.

But the project doesn’t have a timeline since the Ontario government imposed a moratorium on new projects almost a year ago, saying more scientific study of the impacts of wind energy is needed.

Too cold for homelessness awareness

McMaster University students were going to spend Friday night in the cold to raise funds and awareness for homelessness. But organizers say it’s now too cold.

The Hearts for Homes event had been scheduled to run from 8 p.m. to 7 a.m. at the Salvation Army Meadowlands Church, 187 Stone Church Rd. on the south Mountain.

But with Environment Canada calling for flurries through the day and night and a low Friday night of -9 C, the Salvation Army has rescheduled.

New Hamilton pet rules: chickens no - tarantulas, snakes yes

Hamilton councillors have taken a stand against urban chickens.

At this morning’s planning committee meeting, councilors – who had previously voted to look into the benefits and downfalls of allowing hens within Hamilton’s urban areas – decided against any further study.

Councillor Lloyd Ferguson, who spearheaded the move, said city staff shouldn’t devote their time investigating something councillors would ultimately veto.

“I’m sensing that the majority of the committee at the end of the day (won’t) support this. So why are we running around like chickens with its head cut off?,” he said. “At the end of the day we’re just going to shut it down anyway. There are health risks, there are rodent risks, there are odour issues.”

However, the city’s public heath staff also told councillors that the department had changed its mind about the health risks of urban chickens. Previously, staff had raised red flags about the risks of diseases like salmonella and H1N1. Now, they say chickens pose no more health risks than dogs or cats.

Councillor Jason Farr, who proposed the probe into urban chickens, argued it’s worth investigating the issue due to the growing amount of support for chickens in urban areas.

“It’s not the end of he world to have a couple of birds in the backyard and we shouldn’t present it as such,” he said.

Burlington band Walk off the Earth video goes viral - Youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9NF2edxy-M

Leaving Hamilton to help raise orphans in Haiti

Judy Mackenzie always wanted a big family.

This year, the 50-year-old will see her dream come true in a really big way as she becomes Mom to 25 children in Haiti at the end of January.

The Catholic Children’s Aid Society case manager is giving up her north-end apartment, uprooting herself from her native Hamilton and moving to the coastal town of Montrouis, where she will be the house mother and administrator at the Bon Samaritan’s Dare to Dream Children’s Home.

“I’ve always wished that I could have a big family with lots of kids because I feel very maternal and very nurturing, but I also feel I’ve got a lot to offer and teach. And circumstances didn’t work out that way,” said Mackenzie, who has a 27-year-old daughter.

Mackenzie was looking for a career change when she learned about the need at the Haitian orphanage, where the children have long been without someone to consistently care for them and are looking after each other. She decided to fly to Haiti at the end of August and visit the children, ages two through 18.

That two-week trip showed her how many things people in Canada take for granted, and she was touched by the way the orphans were so grateful despite their difficult circumstances.

“So in a way I feel like I’m being a little bit selfish because I’m going to feel very gratified being down there,” she said. “The conditions are horrible … but (with) the benefits down there, I’ll feel like I’m a millionaire — being fulfilled while at the same time helping them become self-sufficient and self-reliant.”

The Hamiltonian flies out Jan. 31 to live with the children in a temporary location. The original Dare to Dream Children’s Home is by a river and was flooded last May.

Mackenzie’s position is unpaid. Her friend and coworker, Joanne Cuff, is heading up the fundraising initiative in Hamilton to cover the children’s food and school supplies as well as electricity, basic repairs and fencing at the damaged orphanage.

Cuff, 57, accompanied Mackenzie on her trip to Montrouis and plans to visit Haiti a couple of times a year.

“I think once we met the kids, I’m thinking: If Judy doesn’t do it, I’m either going to have to do or find somebody to do it because we looked at each other and thought, OK, we’re toast,” Cuff said. “We can’t just leave here and not do something.”

Condo projects showing promise in the core

Hamilton’s core is on the cusp of a condo boom.

Two developers are working on new projects that are expected to add more than 20 storeys of condominiums to the downtown and Stinson neighbourhoods.

One is a proposal for a $20-million condo development at the site of the Hamilton Cab headquarters on Charlton Avenue East, at the foot of the escarpment. Ron Van Kleef, the president of Hamilton Cab, aims to create 160 units in three, six-storey buildings.

The other is developer Harry Stinson’s Hamilton Grand building on the corner of John and Main streets. The project, which had been stalled due to financing issues, is moving ahead as a six-storey structure incorporating a mix of commercial and retail, office space, hotel rooms and condos.

Combined with Stinson’s redevelopment of the former Stinson Street School, the projects should give a much-needed boost to central Hamilton, said Councillor Jason Farr.

“Look out, southern Ontario — the next big neighbourhood is right next door to Corktown,” he said.

Van Kleef says he’s been working on his condo project for more than three years. He has had formal consultation with city staff, Farr, and Mayor Bob Bratina and is in the process of finishing the environmental and traffic studies required before construction.

“It’s a site that the city really is supporting,” Van Kleef said.

Van Kleef’s planner, Ed Fothergill, estimates construction will begin in a year and a half.

The site — the former home of a bowling alley — had been vacant for several years before Van Kleef bought it in 1997. The property had fallen into disrepair and Van Kleef said he invested a significant amount into its remediation.

Clean The Randle Reef by Matt Jelly - Vimeo Video

From his blog http://mattjelly.wordpress.com/2012/01/01/the-lions-share/

The Lion's Share from Matt Jelly on Vimeo.

Are jousting knights the new UFC?

The battle for control of the jousting market is getting personal.

On one side: Shane Adams, of Halton Hills, Ont., slated to hostFull Metal Jousting, airing in 2012 on the History Channel and produced by the same people behind the hit UFC series Ultimate Fighter.

On the other side: Charlie Andrews, whose six-show series,Knights of Mayhem, has been running on National Geographic since November.

Andrews, a native of Utah who sports many tattoos — “patriot” is inked on one pectoral muscle and a profile of a black warhorse on the other — describes jousting as a “kill sport.”

He launched his reality TV show before Adams, his teacher and (former) best friend, aired his own.

“I can’t wait till these (stands) are full of people and I come riding out on my badass warhorse, Jagermeister,” he says in one episode of his show.

The duelling knights are credited for introducing full-contact jousting — the emphasis is less on theatre than violently knocking an opponent off his horse — and freeing the equestrian sport from medieval history geeks.

But their friendship abruptly ended last year over the television series.

“I didn’t want to make jousting a documentary soap,” said Adams, 41. “He had different views and he went off and did his own show.”

Since their prime-time feud began months ago, the two haven’t talked.

“It probably bugs Shane that Charlie has come along and gone off on a bit of a tangent,” says Thom Barnett, a 47-year-old jouster and magician from London, Ont. “His student has gone his own way and become his competitor.”

Yet that’s not how Andrews sees it.

Neighbourhood’s angel is a handyman

Patricia Stephens’ archangel is a handyman who lives next door.

Her neighbour, Fred Buch, has shovelled snow off her sidewalk for many years, mowed her lawn, helps with her gardening, cleans the sewers and even built a wooden arch bed frame for Stephens and her husband this past spring.

That’s why Stephens calls the 65-year-old retired Dofasco crane operator her family’s archangel — as well as Snow Angel, Gardening Angel and Angel in the Flesh, a name they came up with after Buch fixed their toilet, allowing it to “flush” properly.

Buch also helps other people in their neighbourhood with handyman tasks ranging from lifting heavy parcels to pool repairs.

On this day in 1973, it was the end of tolls on the Burlington Bay James N. Allan Skyway.

At about 11 p.m., the booths were shut down, and toll collectors took in their cash drawers for the final time. There was a bevy of provincial officials, curious spectators and other toll collectors on hand to see the last vehicle through, but there was a bit of a muddle. The last half dozen vehicles were waved through a few minutes before 11 p.m. and no one was sure which one was the last under the toll gate.

The Mutch family of Burlington was the first through after the toll had officially been lifted.

The 15-cent per car toll was put in place when the bridge opened in 1958 to defray the $17-million cost. 

Hamilton ranked 7th in the world among research hospitals

Two organizations have ranked Hamilton Health Sciences as one of Canada’s leading research hospitals.

The hospital scored a first place national ranking from SCImago - a European company that issues the Worldwide Ranking of Research Institutions.

It placed HHS seventh in the world.

In addition, a Calgary-based research and develop company called RE$SEARCH Infosource Inc. ranked HHS second in Canada behind Toronto’s University Health Network.

“We’re very pleased, but not at all surprised, by the high ranking of our largest academic hospital partner, Hamilton Health Sciences,” says Dr. Steve Collins McMaster University’s associate dean research in the faculty of health sciences in a statement. SCImago uses large databases to analyze indicators such as output of scientific papers, international collaboration and how often research is cited by other scientists. It ranked 3,042 institutions worldwide.

Massive renewal project under way downtown

A much anticipated multimillion-dollar development project in Hamilton’s core is under way.

The first of four new buildings that will bring as many as 600 condo units, two hotels and 20,000 square feet of retail space to the core has been rising on George Street near Caroline since the summer, bringing a swell of hope for the core with each new floor.

The brain child of developer Darko Vranich, the $125-million project has been on the drawing boards for the past decade as he slowly assembled a huge chunk of the city’s core.

“You can’t help but notice there are construction cranes on the skyline downtown now,” said Jason Farr, the city councillor for the core. “Darko has a sincere desire to get going faster than anyone realized. He didn’t want to wait any longer, he wanted to get going.”

Over the past decade, Vranich has acquired most of the land roughly bounded by King, Main, Bay and Hess streets with tiny George Street running through the centre. The plan calls for two extended-stay hotels — the 129-room Staybridge under construction at the northwest corner of George and Caroline streets and a 182-room Homewood Suites inn at the southwest corner of George and Bay streets.

The plan also includes three condo towers in two buildings reaching as high as 20 storeys.

The buildings are to be completed in five phases over the next six or seven years. The entire project is seen as a way of linking the restaurant-bar hub of Hess Village to the rest of downtown.

Two of those condo towers will rise on the site of the former federal government office building at the north-east corner of Main and Caroline streets. Vranich bought the structure in 2004 and started demolishing it in August.

The plan to demolish that building sparked a brief controversy over the fate of eight friezes surrounding the main entrance of the structure. They were created by noted local artist Elizabeth Holbrook and the chance they would be destroyed ignited protests from the local arts community. Vranich eventually agreed to have the art work detached from the building and donated to the city. Later he unveiled a plan to preserve the seven-storey west portion of the building, including the main entrance, as the base for an additional three storeys of condos. An attached east tower will be up to 15-storeys tall.

Rick Mercer's Hamilton Police bicycle unit ride along - Youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhNW_-ws8js&feature=youtu.be