Earlier this week, in the town where I live, there was a little incident on the main street. A car jumped the curb and ended up sideways in front of a few shops. I noticed it because the police were there. I ventured closer and saw a woman, I think the owner of the car, sitting on a storefront step. What intrigued me was that everybody gathering around had the same first reaction.
“Are you OK?” everybody asked the woman.
She appeared shaken, but otherwise all right.
A couple of weeks ago, I had a conversation with some of my journalism students about the annual parade of awards shows – the Grammys, the People’s Choice Awards, the Oscars and the rest. The subject of this year’s Canadian music awards, coming up in April, eventually cropped up. They had all heard of the Junos, sure. But then I asked if anyone knew the origin of the Junos.
“Oh, it’s the name of the Canadian beach on D-Day,” one said.
“Yes, you’re right on the D-Day reference,” I said. “But not the musical one.”
“I know,” said one of my more erudite students. “Juno is the Roman goddess of marriage and queen of the gods.”
“Right again,” I said. “But she’s got nothing to do with the Juno Music Awards in Canada.”
You probably missed it. You can be forgiven because I missed it too. But last Monday the Internet was all a twitter (yes, pun intended) about a birthday event. It’s one that your teeny-bopper kids (or grandkids) probably noticed. It appears that music heart-throb Justin Bieber celebrated his 16th birthday by visiting the Son of a Gun Tattoo and Barbershop in Toronto. There he had a tattoo of a seagull inked onto his left hip.
“That’s a bad area,” the tattoo artist told MTV News. “Justin was nervous, but then he got into it and it was done. It’s very tiny.”