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Newsstand: July 27, 2011
Here’s your Wednesday, would you like some news with that? Very well, then: The library board defers closing branches until September, health officials urge the City to maintain public health programs, and a Toronto Whole Foods employee’s resignation letter becomes the newest viral thingamabob.
The annoying thing about the Ford brothers is that their idiocy often comes so fast and strong you don’t have time to deal with it properly. So let’s all put Rob Ford’s middle-finger misunderstanding behind us (for now, at least) and focus on his brother Doug (Ward 2, Etobicoke North), who was busy flipping a bird of his own at celebrated author Margaret Atwood and the pro-library brigade yesterday. The Dougler said he would close libraries in his own ward “in a heartbeat,” specifically singling out the Northern Elms branch. Well, bad news, Dougie boy. The library board has voted to defer closing libraries until September, and to get a heartbeat that slow you’d really need to start working out more often. Also, it appears some of Ford’s constituents aren’t exactly thrilled at the idea of having their free books taken away from them.
Surprise, surprise, the Toronto board of health wants the City to continue funding dental programs, breakfasts for children, and HIV prevention programs. That’s so them. What are they going to come to the defence of next, clean air and vaccinations?
Whole Foods is having what PR people refer to as a “Fuck it, I’m calling in sick” day as a vitriolic (and long) resignation letter from a former Toronto employee is circulating the web and getting widespread media coverage after being posted on Gawker. A spokesperson for the grocer says the company doesn’t agree with any of the author’s statements, not even the part about Whole Foods being a “faux hippy Walmart.” “It’s enough to make you throw up into your $11 quinoa salad,” says the representative.
Holy shit, the mumps are back in the developed world, seemingly localized in one Japanese restaurant in downtown Toronto. But don’t worry, because according to Toronto Public Health, the restaurant is perfectly safe and a mumps outbreak could happen anywhere, which should be reassuring to just about nobody. People, no matter how scared you are of needles, go get vaccinated if you haven’t already. It beats the big chin.
