From the moment I stepped on the College Street car, I knew something was abuzz.

"I smell something burning," one woman told her travelling companion, a sentiment echoed a split-second later by someone else.

The driver walked to the back, looked, sniffed, and returned to his seat.

Over the P.A. system, he gruffly told us: "Whoever tried to light the joint, don't do it again. If you do it again, everyone's goin' off and the police are comin' on."

Much low muttering amongst the passengers.

As we approached Dovercourt Street (I was going to the West End Y to try and undo some Christmas overeating damage), a young man in an olive bomber jacket and navy blue fisherman's cap asked the driver, "What was problem?"

The young man spoke with a Russian accent.

"Some guy tried to light a joint," the driver replied, slowing down for Dovercourt.

"What is 'joint'?" the young man asked.

Major eye-rolling and forced expulsion of air through the nostrils by the driver.

"Look, forget it," he told the guy, shaking his head in exasperation. "If you don't know, you don't know."

At Dovercourt, as I was leaving, I told the driver with a commiseratory grin, "Have a good night."

He laughed and said: "It's gonna be a long one!"

While in Edmonton last week, I got reacquainted with one of the great radio stations of our time -- CKUA. It has an audio stream if you feel like checking it out.

Anyway, in the course of driving around and listening to the station, I heard several Christmas songs from a Nettwerk Records compilation CD that were fantastic.

This set me off on a mad, implusive hunt for said CD. Too late. Sold out everywhere.

But at a downtown HMV, I did come across a William (She Bangs! He blows) Hung Christmas disc for only $10. However, I figured by waiting one more year, I could get it for $2. :)

(From when to when was he famous?)

This NYT story looks at the people who cover crimes on the streets of New York City.

The Globe and Mail's Andre Picard on some weaknesses identified in medical reporting and about a new service called mediadoctor.ca.

Novelist Orhan Pamuk, who is facing charges for having the temerity to talk about the Armenian genocide,  will now only go to trial on one charge.

Yang Bin -- editor of the Beijing News, described as one of China's most daring and popular newspapers -- has been turfed by the government, along with two other top editors.

A government-funded art project in Austria has generated outrage by producing posters depicting Queen Elizabeth II and France's President Jacques Chirac having sex.