CANUCKS GO FISHING TO AID AUTISTIC KIDS
Participants in the Canucks Autism Network’s 13th annual Fishing For Kids tournament gathered in a different locale this year. Not for the actual fishing, which was at Langara Island’s West Coast Fishing Club again. That’s the facility Ontarians Brian Legge and Rick Grange began assembling in 1992 after Grange landed a 62.5-pound fish on six-pound-test line there. Before tournament contestants, who paid $13,500 each to enter, flew north this year, they and guests partied on the brand-new 7,000-squarefoot covered deck at Paul Cheung ’s Pacific Gateway Hotel. A fitting location, too, given the presence of Fraser River fish, albeit not 60 pounders, on three sides. The event’s western theme saw many wear cowboy gear. They included black-hatted foundation co-founder and Vancouver Canucks co-owner Paolo Aquilini and white-hatted team forwards Sven Baertschi and Jake Virtanen. The upshot: $1 million reportedly raised.
SPEAKING DRUMS: Brenda Crabtree, Gaye Fowler, Kajola Morewood and Michelle Sound will show works in the Craft Council of B.C.’s Cultural Fabric exhibition until Oct. 4. All are of Indigenous birth or ancestry. From the Spuzzum First Nation, Emily Carr University professor Crabtree showed one 20-inch and three 24-inch red-dyed deer-hide drums. Two contain simulated skeletal fish to represent the perils that B.C. salmon face. The inscription “what becomes of the broken hearted” on another emblemises residential school tragedies. Not academic ones either, as Crabtree said her father had two siblings die at such schools, “and we are still looking for one who vanished.”
TO A T: Ronald Tremblay’s Ford Model T roadster was 14 years old in 1928 when grandfather Alfred (Chief ) Tremblay founded the still-family-owned auto repair and sales firm. In 1984, Ron’s father Fred put the jalopy on the roof of his The Garage operation at 24th and Macdonald. Relenting two years later, he spiffed it up and returned it to running condition. Ronald drove the shiny convertible through rain to 41st and Dunbar for a recent show-off afternoon with other locally owned vehicles. It was his way of publicly thanking Gryphon Development CEO Jason Hsu for expediting The Garage’s move to Burnaby, thereby freeing the site for a three-floor mixed-use complex. Ron’s sons Kevin, Graeme and Jeffrey — too many to fit in the Model T — own and operate the fourth-generation business today.
MAPPING ZAPPA: Seventeen years is a long time to write a book, even when it’s an exhaustive account of late musician Frank Zappa’s recordings. But university linguistics teacher Charles Ulrich took that time to finish his 800-page The Big Note, which New Star publisher Rolf Maurer released at LanaLou’s rock restaurant recently. Three months late, actually, as a second printing of 3,000 (the first was 2,500) was already on sale. Palo Alto, Calif.-born Ulrich never met Zappa, who preceded him as a DJ at Pomona College’s KSPCFM station. Oddly, the book’s inventive mother was Russian, not American. An expert on Zappa’s lyrics, Vladimir Sovetov collaborated with Maurer, who wanted to create “liner notes that the albums should have but don’t.” Drawn in, Ulrich emphasized music over lyrics, and was supercharged by Brett Clement’s 2009 University of Cincinnati doctoral dissertation on it. Maurer reined in the project at Zappa’s 100th album, leaving Ulrich with material “for two more books.” That should occupy him to age 95.
MALT PARTY: The firm William Grant, founded in 1820, launched its Experimental Series of malt whiskies here recently. Mostly in their 20s, attendees sampled the still-family-owned distillery’s IPA Experiment, Project XX and Winter Storm bottlings. There were no fancy names a generation ago when Grant’s descendant, late managing director Charles Grant Gordon, filled two glasses in the Hyatt Regency Hotel. Raising one, he recited an ancient verse: “God gi’e guid grace to all the Grants / Likewise eternal bliss. / For they should sit among the saints / Who mak’ a dram like this.” That sentiment is endorsed today by Dave Mason, the West Coast Whisky Society founder-president (wcws.ca), who said its 200 members’ average age is 55. They’ll need to go some to down the million barrels (250 bottles in each) that PMA Canada agent Dave MacIntosh says are maturing in Glenfiddich’s Speyside warehouses.
RE-ENTRY: UBC astronomy Prof. Jaymie Matthews has sent Canadian research satellites into orbit while guiding students’ minds into deep space. Now, following a stroke, he is in the G.F. Strong Rehabilitation Centre and working to regain his speech. Participation in the NEOSAT (Near Earth Orbit Surveillance Satellite) had Matthews theorize that close-passing asteroids might be mined for the gold, platinum and titanium on their surfaces. Regarding one that landed in the Gulf of Mexico and doomed the dinosaurs, he said cheerily: “Of course, that enabled us to emerge.” Here’s hoping that he emerges from rehab, voice restored, and soon.
DOWN PARRYSCOPE: RIP Sen. John McCain who, unlike some who creatively dodged military service, simply believed that his country was great and didn’t need to be made so again.