At the beach ... where we should all be in August.

TORONTO. AUGUST 22, 2017. It has been a strange-weather summer in the city this year. Right now we’re waiting for yet more rain.

(I spoke too soon. It has just come. And now the question is : when will it come again? Can we go for coffee later, across from the park?)

Meanwhile, it is another what’s-it-all-about-Alfie day here in the office. I sit at my computer, looking out the window at green-leaf trees, a fire escape, tin roofs, and the parking lot next door.

I click on the Toronto Star website, to see what is happening in the alleged great world. My own top 10 current headlines turn out to be (in alphabetical order) :

(1) Boris Spremo, former Toronto Star photographer, dies at 81 ;

(2) Cornwall councillors seek answers as hundreds of Haitian refugee claimants arrive in Ontario ;

(3) ‘Don’t look!’ yells White House staffer as Trump looks at solar eclipse without glasses ;

Looking at solar eclipse without glasses.

(4) Ford, Chinese carmaker consider joining forces for electric cars ;

(6) Incoming governor general Julie Payette drops fight to keep divorce records sealed ;

(7) Indian Muslim men can no longer instantly divorce their wives, top court rules ;

(8) Organized crime in the GTA is undergoing a power struggle, experts say ;

(9) People start hating their jobs at around age 35: survey ;

(10) Why Kathleen Wynne just won’t quit.

Then, somewhere in my internet travels, I bump into an intriguing site I am out-of-it enough not to know about already. It calls itself, in a clearly satirical mode, “the holy Islamic extremist gossip site CelebJihad.com.”

Whatever else, CelebJihad.com combines two things of great interest in the USA today (and/or  “the United States and Canada” too) :

Is this the real Kristen Stewart (or what about the rest of her supposed body, not shown here?)

(a) pornographic images of female celebrities, especially  from what CelebJihad.com calls “Zionist Hollywood” ;

(b) what some call “Islamic terrorists” and others call “jihadis” and the threats they pose to a more free and democratic (or at least peaceful) global village, or wherever else you choose to think you live.

I don’t want to go on here. And I certainly don’t want my wife and her friends thinking that I in any way endorse or recommend CelebJihad.com.

I’d just further note that : “The website started around … 2008, but it only came to the spotlight after it posted topless photos of singer Taylor Swift in 2011. Since then the site has managed to hog the attention with the help of fake photos and hoax articles.”

* * * *

Is this the real Taylor Swift?

It does not seem that the formidable Ms Swift has successfully conducted legal proceedings against CelebJihad.com, so far at any rate. (Even though it is clear enough that many of the alleged photos of her and many other drop-dead gorgeous Hollywood stars on the site have been doctored using Photoshop, and God only knows what else.)

See, eg : “Taylor Swift fights Celeb Jihad over nude pics” (October 2011) ; “Taylor Swift Caught In Nude Photo Scandal” (October 2011) ; “TAYLOR SWIFT NUDE CHANGING IN HER DRESSING ROOM” (November 2015) ; and “How notorious website Celeb Jihad reached for the stars and tried to bring them down into the dirt” (April 2017).

As a sampling of the appalling material Celeb Jihad does regularly post I’d just point to some alleged photos/videos of Emma Stone, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kristen Stewart, and Madonna!

Ceremonial raising of Haida Pole at Windy Bay in Gwaii Haanas, BC, August 2013.

As a further sample of the Celeb Jihad literary style, note : “Now that Gwyneth Paltrow is in her twilight years she should be done (Allah willing) prostituting her sinful nude female flesh for Zionist Hollywood. However, as you can see in the compilation video above of every one of her nude sex scenes and in the gallery below featuring all of her naked pictures, Gwyneth leaves behind a legacy of extreme degeneracy.”

Finally, I note some quite different earlier mainstream media and other reports that I have been saving for a while now, for just such an occasion as this – as the strange-weather summer of 2017 north of the North American Great Lakes lurches to some improbable conclusion :

. Joseph Muscat, prime minister of Malta, and Justin Trudeau, prime minister of Canada.

(1) Toronto police officer buys would-be thief the outfit he was trying to steal ;

(2) How tiny, remote Haida Gwaii taught a lesson on achieving Indigenous sovereignty ;

(3) Rise of the machines … The robots were coming in not to replace humans, and not just as a way to modernize, but also because reliable humans had become so hard to find ;

(4) Most G20 States Are Running a Deficit ;

(5) With the emergence of smartphones and streaming services such as Netflix, traditional TV is finding itself under increased pressure to retain its place as the go-to medium for entertainment, distraction and information ;

(6) Maltese PM Muscat ‘hopeful’ Brexit might not happen ;

(7) Britons should be given a second referendum on Brexit, Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat says ;

(8) Joseph Muscat tells CNN he is not the only EU leader to believe Brexit might not happen ;

Going for coffee with Zooey Deschanel. Thanks to Joe Guilfoyle.

(9) Jean-Claude Juncker dismisses talk of calling off Brexit ;

(10) Brexit will happen despite the “density of problems” says Juncker.

Meanwhile : “So long it’s been good to know you …  And I’ve got to be drifting along.” (And the editors say we’ll be back with something closer to the real world by Labour Day.)