Journal: News & Comment

Math, Bills, Crazy Eric, and Campbells

Permalinks to this entry: individual page or in monthly context. For more material from my journal, visit my home page or the archive.

• My wife is a math teacher, so I know teaching is hard. It doesn't need to be made harder by things like this: "[A]n academic review has found the statistics chapter [in a new math textbook for schools in Atlantic Canada] is so inaccurate that it is unusable. [...] It took three math professors 43 pages to list all the errors they spotted in the textbook."

• Bill Wyman or Bill Wyman? Tough choice.

• I'll never feel silly again for carrying keys, wallet, Leatherman tool, cell phone, and PalmPilot all at once.

• Check the time.

• In Saturday's Vancouver civic election, former provincial chief coroner Larry Campbell is expected to win the race for mayor. If he does, he will be the third Mayor Campbell of the city in my lifetime. His predecessors were notorious hippie-hater Tom Campbell, at the turn of the '70s, and current B.C. premier Gordon Campbell, in the '80s and early '90s.

It goes further. Former prime minister Kim Campbell once sat on the Vancouver School Board. Vern Campbell is currently running for Vancouver city council, and has been endorsed by nightclub owner Vance Campbell, who was rumoured months ago to be thinking of running for mayor himself.

Finally, the lead character in the excellent Vancouver-filmed CBC drama Da Vinci's Inquest, city coroner Dominic Da Vinci, is based on Larry Campbell -- who served as a consultant on the show. Da Vinci is played by...Nicholas Campbell.

 |