Old man is assaulted in dispute over tree

A middle-aged man resorted to property damage and assault because he didn’t like his neighbour’s tree.

An apparent argument between neighbours over a tree ended with an elderly Toronto man in critical condition and another man in custody on Thursday.

Police say the two neighbours in Etobicoke, in the west end of Toronto, had been feuding for months. But the fighting boiled over Thursday in the dispute over the branches of a tree on the elderly man’s property that were hanging into the younger man’s yard.

Witnesses say the younger man, 48, ripped the branches down and threw them onto the property of the 74-year-old man. Then there was a confrontation between the two.

According to reports from the scene, the elderly man was assaulted, thrown into a door and gagged with leaves.

“My father came outside and the wife was yelling and the husband jumped over, took some of the leaves and started trying to shove it down my father’s throat and then threw him through the front door,” said the older man’s daughter.

She said the dispute about the tree had been going on for a long time.

The elderly man was taken to hospital with no vital signs, but was revived on the way to the hospital. He is still in critical condition.

The 48-year-old was taken away in handcuffs. Charges are pending.

Why did Blogger delete ERV’s blog?

Many science bloggers are asking why Blogger.com deleted a science blog, ERV (endogenous retrovirus). The blogger, Abbie Smith, is a graduate student in HIV research. She has shown herself quite capable of debating pesudoscience floggers such as Michael Behe, pointing out their mistakes and lies, demanding proof of their claims, and tapping her foot while they come up empty. For this Behe calls her “some woman” (not HIV researcher, not grad student, not young scientist) who’s a Mean Girl.

And then a couple of days ago her blog suddenly disappeared from Blogger. It isn’t full of links. It’s not spam. So what happened? Did some creationists complain about her? Did Blogger yank the plug without investigating? Inquiring minds want to know, but there doesn’t seem to be any place to ask that question.

ERV is back on blogger for now with no explanation offered as to the breach of service. ERV is pulling up stakes and transferring her articles to Scienceblogs.com, where there’s a committment to actually supporting science bloggers. Scienceblogs hosts the most popular science blog in the world, Pharyngula, and I expect the site to attract much more traffic for ERV.

Blogger’s treatment of ERV has made me think that I’d better accelerate the transfer of my blog to WordPress, especially since Blogger’s kludgy published procedure for backing up a blog backs up only the last 500 posts.

Is transit an essential service?

The sudden transit strike in Toronto on Saturday was quickly over but it may have been a serious tactical mistake for the union. They had must about everything they wanted. But now the Ontario government is preparing emergency legislation to declare public transit an essential service and take away their right to strike. The public certainly doesn’t like their daily lives to be held hostage. If people depend on transit and forgo buying cars, then their lives will be thrown into confusion, their jobs and childcare arrangements and appointments will suffer if they can’t use public transportation.

The union says that they don’t want to be declared essential. Once it’s illegal for them to strike they won’t be able to apply the same pressure that they do now. But I think they almost deserve it.

Back from B.C.

Here’s the cause of all the fuss: a new bride and groom in Revelstoke, BC., after their non-religious marriage service.

Surprise transit strike in Toronto

After the transit union and the city reached a tentative deal after the last minute, we thought we had a chance of avoiding a strike altogether. And there was supposed to be 24 hours’ notice. But the union rejected the deal, the union leader muttered something about threats from the public, and the transit went on strike immediately on Saturday, stranding thousands of people. Sigh. Every time they have a strike, some people stop using transit and never come back.

Hoarding and fire don’t mix

A former bookstore burned and took the life of its ower. It was crammed to the eaves with books and junk, with just a narrow corridor through it. Neighbours smelled food cooking just before the fire was noticed. The front door was partially blocked with junk and there were triple back doors. Firefighters had to break through the walls and roof to get their hoses onto the fire. The buildings on either side were damaged as well.

"We stand in awe…"

A thread over on scienceblogs reminded us of this article by Prof. PZ Myers of the University of Minnesota: We stand in awe at the heights our people have achieved.

Monday Melee for January 28

I just discovered this collection of bloggers about getting organized: Monady Melee.

The Monday Melee up til now has been answers to these five questions:

1. The Misanthtropic: Name something (about humanity) you absolutely hate.
2.  The Meretricious: Expose something or someone that’s phony, fraudulent or bogus.
3.  The Malcontent: Name something you’re unhappy with.
4.  The Meritorious: Give someone credit for something and name it if you can.
5. The Mirror: See something good about yourself and name it.
6.  The Make-Believe: Name something you wish for.

The new questions are these:

1. The Magnificent: Name someone you absolutely adore, and tell us why.
2. The Muddy: Tell us something about life you just don’t “get”.
3. The Magnetic: Name something or someone good (or bad) you’re drawn to and you just can’t help it. Tell us if you want to change this or not.
4. The Mainstay: Who or what is something you just can’t live without? Why?
5. The Masquerade: Tell us something about yourself we wouldn’t already know.
6. The Mettle: Tell us about a time you showed courage in yourself, or tell us what you wish you had the courage to do.

The new questions areGo to the original Monday Melee post for the rules and icons.

Meet a professional organizer

Sandy Wright of WrightEdge Solutions says,

“Here’s a description of my typical workday.

• During a first session, which is 2 hours, I interview the client as to the organizing goals, barriers and others who may share the space.
  
• I tour the area to understand the living style and get a feeling for what might or might not work.
  
• During that session a plan is developed and at least one element is begun. Subsequent followup is discussed and scheduled if appropriate.
  
• Followup sessions are usually 1-2 hour work sessions with my providing a session log with ‘homework’ to be done by the client and suggested products.”

(Link)

Cultural Mormanism

The author of Letters from a Broad, an expatriate ex-Mormon in Switzerland, writes about chatting with Mormon missionaries in France. She writes:

Everyone knows that apostates like me are supposed to hate the church and everything about it with a fiery passion! The crazy thing though is that even though I think the Book of Mormon is a work of fiction, for some reason I don’t hate the church or its members. Even though they may not be too thrilled about it, in some ways they’ll always be my people.

I live in France. I’ve chosen to live here, this is where I want to live, and in fact I’ve gone native to the point where I’ve practically become a French person myself. Still, when I see a pair of LDS missionaries walking down the street, I see something familiar from back home in the old country. And I know that I share a common background with them that we don’t share with anyone else walking down that same street.

The author has since moved to Switzerland.