A Salute to 2007

A salute to 2007 TheStar.com - Columnist - A salute to 2007
TANNIS TOOHEY/TORONTO STAR
December 31, 2007
Rosie DiManno
city columnist

It was another year of living stupidly.

Really, we get goofier at it with every passing annum, here in the centre of the universe that is Toronto.

Up at the Hall, a power-mad mayor had his knuckles rapped over inventive tax grabs but was only mildly chastened by a council that bottled it when push came to shove. And meanwhile, whilst mewling poor, pocketed a handsome pay increase for themselves.

We done murder and sexual assault and robbery but sometimes you couldn't tell the cops from the crooks because the crooks were the cops.

Lawyers got horny with clients and teachers got lusty with students. Creepy sex – including one person who allegedly used a snake for foreplay in a menagerie à trois – was a recurring theme.

The Leafs missed the playoffs (again), the Blue Jays got caught up in a steroid scandal and the soccer team – their name escapes me – couldn't buy a goal but were madly supported anyway.

Drugs poured into the city, guns poured into the city, bedbugs poured into the city: Snort, shoot and scratch.

Herewith, then, one last and not-so-fond backward glance at 2007 in T.O. and environs, as the calendar turns. Ten-nine-eight-seven-six-five-four-three-two-one: Mbwaaahhh.

Bend it like Bertuzzi: An irate soccer mom is charged with assault after provoking a screaming and shoving melee at an under-8 match for boys in Pickering.

Armed with Bazooka: Durham detectives chew over the case of a woman who's stolen at least $5,000 worth of bubble gum from various grocery stores.

Also available in Honky White and Mellow Yellow Menace: A black Brampton woman receives delivery of a couch with a packing label describing its colour as "nigger brown."

Up yours: The CN Tower loses its long-held record as the world's tallest free-standing building to a Dubai skyscraper that's 2 metres higher.

I breast my case, your honour: Const. Joseph Green is acquitted on charges of groping and pointing a gun at a stripper at For Your Eyes Only, where he'd been hanging in uniform. Green did admit to asking her if she'd had a recent boob job.

Oh, frock-off: A York University professor lectures students in his cross-dressing alter ego ensemble of fetching black skirt, matching blouse and pink watch.

They'd only ordered a pizza: Owners of a Peel home are puzzled to discover delivery of a woman's body inside a van parked in their driveway.

Hello Bolly: The appearance of Indian film stars Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai causes fan-demonium at the Toronto premiere of their movie, Guru.

No can do: Toronto residents are urged to stop flushing dental floss down the toilet because it's wreaking havoc on the city's pumping stations and treatment plants.

I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do-I-do: A Missouri mother tries desperately to stop her newly married 39-year-old daughter from joining bigamist husband Oliver Killeen – wed at least 19 times – now living in Toronto.

Tiny terrorist: A 21-year-old university student is bitten by a scorpion during a flight to Toronto.

Pedant-ophile: An acting teacher who hosted the Art of Love erotica film festivals is charged with sexually assaulting one of his students.

Raggedy H-Andy Mop: A convicted drug dealer tells court jail guards hurled him around "like a rag doll" and used him as a human mop after he refused to clean up some spilled juice.

Assault with a deadly venom: A teenager accuses the owner of a pet cobra – already convicted of mischief for letting the snake loose among tenants in the rooming house next door – of using the reptile to frighten her into submission during a sexual assault.

Seal it with a hiss: A five-month search of the evacuated rooming house finds no sign of the crawl-about snake, which is pronounced unofficially dead by experts.

Portrait of the politicians as nincompoops: Toronto city councillors almost come to blows over who will get to sit in the front row for a group photo.

If Michael Jackson can get away with it...: A young mother is accused of dangling her 3-year-old daughter from the balcony of their third-floor apartment.

Dis jockey: Tie Domi launches a $950,000 defamation lawsuit against radio personality John Derringer for falsely alleging the ex-Leaf tough guy charged fees to appear for charities.

I beg your pardon: A man found guilty in a gangland style-killing is set free – 11 years into his life sentence – after the Court of Appeal denounces the presiding judge for being "dismissive, mocking and critical of the defence and, at a personal level, (showing) discourtesy and sarcasm."

Hey, at least it wasn't under a falafel stand: A documentary by Toronto filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici provokes immense outrage and scorn for claiming to have unearthed the burial site of Jesus beneath a Jerusalem apartment building.

Remedial attraction: A pregnant Toronto high school teacher is charged with sexual exploitation following allegations that she had been romantically involved with a student for 18 months. The charge was later dropped.

Vehicular obstruction: The city announces it is owed $125 million in unpaid parking fines.

Auto-immune deficiency: An investigation is launched after allegations that City of Toronto staff have had parking tickets "fixed."

Erectile dysfunction: Condo king Harry Stinson files for bankruptcy.

Hush-a-bye-bye-baby: A 22-year-old Richmond Hill woman is sentenced to two years after leaving her 14-month-old daughter alone in a crib for three days.

Truthiness and consequences: Oshawa mayor John Gray loses a bet with the Comedy Central host and had to declare a Stephen Colbert Day.

Son-of-a-stiff: A West Hill welder is given seven years after admitting he treated his dog better than his mother, leaving the woman on her back in excrement-stained clothing, moaning in pain, for four days before she died.

No harm, no fowl: Brampton hires a 2-year-old English springer spaniel to harass geese that foul its parks.

Oral vex: World champion wheelchair racing star Jeff Adams, of Brampton, claims his positive dope test was caused by an unknown woman stuffing cocaine into his mouth as he sat beside her on a sofa in a Toronto goth bar.

Architectural comb-over: Donald Trump lops 13 floors off his planned downtown Toronto luxury hotel tower.

Not to be confused with his cameo appearance on the score sheet this year: Darcy Tucker makes a cameo appearance on CBC hit comedy Little Mosque on the Prairie.

Political correctness right on target: U of T announces it will shut down its 88-year-old shooting range even though no one has complained about it.

Stalking snuffer: A British tabloid reports that Victoria Beckham has brought in extra bodyguards after a sexy groupie made it to her husband's Toronto hotel room.

Laddie Bountiful: Colin Farrell, in town for the film festival, takes a homeless man on a shopping spree and reportedly pays his rent for a year in advance, after finding the guy in his regular spot outside a Yorkville bar.

Zero tolerance zone: After a record-shattering 824-minute, nine-game goalless drought, Toronto FC finally scores, but loses anyway.

Cents and insensibility: The Royal Canadian Mint demands that Toronto pay $47,680 for using a picture of the "tails side" of the Canadian penny in its campaign to get one cent of every six collected under the GST.

The Nutcracker (Rap) Sheet: For the second time in three months, teenage students at the prestigious National Ballet School of Canada are charged with sex crimes.

Calling the kettle Black: At her husband's trial, Barbara Amiel suddenly veers off-script, calling reporters "sluts" and "vermin."

Rama-Rama ding-dong: Fifteen people, including several employees of Casino Rama near Orillia, are arrested in a scam that netted more than $2 million from cheating at baccarat.

Jama Jama ding-dong: A Toronto police officer is led away from court in handcuffs after a judge upholds his conviction for the unprovoked assault on Somali immigrant Said Jama Jama – an incident captured on citizen videotape.

Did Jihad to do it? After a firestorm of protest, Toronto council reverses course and allows decals supporting troops in Afghanistan to remain on fire trucks and ambulances.

Legal briefs encounter: The former head of the governing body for Ontario lawyers is suspended from practicing for 60 days after admitting to a sexual affair with a client.

MLSE manages to even get seats called for travelling: A disgruntled Raptors devotee who last year paid $120,000 for front-row season's tickets files a million-dollar lawsuit against the club after it announces a new row of courtside seats in front of him.

Screw U-Hall budget: After months of bewailing its financial predicament, the City of Toronto proposes spending $6.2 million on City Hall renovations to create new committee rooms, build a media studio and consolidate the mayor's staff offices. It later scaled them back.

Current events: Environmentalists become alarmed over local Hindus making devotional offerings – plastic statues, flowers, jewellery and money – into a branch of the Credit River.

Toe rag: Ed the Sock is dumped from the Beaches Easter Parade.

Pane in the glass: Toronto Council's planning and growth management committee calls for city staff to produce a "bird-friendly rating and acknowledgment system" to rate buildings on how they stack up against bird safety guidelines.

That's ID as in ID-iots: A Woodbridge family detained at gunpoint by York Region police in an apparent case of mistaken identity sues the force for $9 million.

'Hood ornaments: Toronto Community Housing attempts a mass eviction of families they say have street gang links in a bid to clean up Jamestown.

That was Paris Hilton, actually: The Toronto Wildlife Centre calls for a volunteer to chauffeur a stowaway skunk back to Los Angeles.

You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours: Toronto is hit by a massive bedbug infestation.

The Lactating Liberation Army: Moms gather at a Scarborough YMCA for a nurse-in to promote the right to publicly breastfeed anywhere.

Demerit badges: On one day, nine Toronto cops appear in various courts on four separate cases ranging from sexual assault to perjury, extortion and corruption.

Galley slaves: Former employees file pay grievances against Susur Lee and claim the renowned chef created a real-life Hell's Kitchen at his prestigious restaurant.

Torah! Torah! Torah! A woman claiming she was coerced into a sexual relationship by a rabbi sues him and a prominent Toronto synagogue for $1.3 million.

Queer pitch: It's revealed that a King City cricket club received a $1-million grant from Mike Colle's Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration. Only $150,000 had been requested.

Red hot Chile pepper: A Chilean soccer player is zapped with a Taser during a clash with Toronto police after Chile loses to Argentina in an Under-20 World Cup semifinal match at Exhibition Place.

Swing and a Miss: With his Yankees in town, Alex Rodriguez is caught attending a strip bar with a buxom blonde who's not his wife, which for some reason is a huge story.

Cost-of-shilling increase: The same crying-poor Toronto Council that approved a new land transfer tax and vehicle registration pockets an 8.9 per cent salary raise in '07.

The Gospel according to drug mules: Bibles are used to smuggle in $850,000 worth of cocaine at Pearson airport.

Going out with a bang-bang-bang: It was a close thing down through the last week of 2007 but Toronto didn't quite match its all-time high of 89 murders. Here's looking at you, 2008.