I made my way through Kensington Market this afternoon, walking eastbound on St. Andrew St..

Downtown Torontonians may know that the Bright Pearl dim sum aircraft hangar sits on the southwest corner of that street's intersection with Spadina. They may also know about the Chinese-style architecture.

The green part of the roof in the (unseasonal) photo at right works very well as a veritable launching ramp for melting snow -- which was abundant in T.O. today.

As I walked west on the north side of the street, eastbound people on the south side were getting splattered big time. They literally had to run a gauntlet of falling snow. One poor old lady took a major plop to the head. But she was a trouper and shook it off. :)

Many businesses in the market were shut down this afternoon due to a power outage -- which negated my entire reason for being there.

While the snow thing was fairly harmless, falling ice prompted police to shut down some streets in the downtown core to pedestrian traffic.

Last year, I published a post about the 10th anniversary of the massive downsizing of the Regina Leader-Post -- something orchestrated by the Hollinger of David Radler and Conrad Black. Their company had taken ownership of the newspaper two days before.

That post turned out to be the most-read story ever on this blog, with only a commentary about Elvis's death day coming close.

Anyway, if you missed Looking Back On The Great Downsizing of 1996 the first time, here it is again.

What makes this anniversary a bit more special is that Lord Black of Crossharbour will be going on trial in Chicago on March 14 for white-collar crimes committed during his tenure as CEO of Hollinger International (see below).

Last week, I had lunch with two former colleagues from those days. Our toast? "May justice prevail!" :)

Conrad Black doesn't go on trial until March 14, but the big media machine is already gearing up. More from the Toronto Star's Antonia Zerbisias.

From the BBC:

The BBC has struck a content deal with YouTube, the web's most popular video sharing website, owned by Google.

Three YouTube channels - one for news and two for entertainment - will showcase short clips of BBC content.

The BBC hopes that the deal will help it reach YouTube's monthly audience of more than 70 million users and drive extra traffic to its own website.

The corporation will also get a share of the advertising revenue generated by traffic to the new YouTube channels.

Pakistan announced the arrest of a former Taliban defence minister -- in Quetta, of all places! The arrest took place on Monday, the same day that U.S. Veep Dick Cheney urged Pakistan to do more to fight terror.

From the BBC:

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has warned that climate change poses as much of a danger to the world as war.

In his first address on the issue, Mr Ban said changes in the environment were likely to become a major driver of future war and conflicts.

He urged the US - the world's biggest producer of greenhouse gases - to take the lead in fighting global warming.

Mr Ban said he would focus on the issue in talks with leaders of the G8 group of industrialised nations in June.

The UN is also due to hold a conference on climate change in Bali in December.

If you look at Asia, Himalayan glaciers feed seven major rivers: The Ganges, Indus, Brahmaputra, Mekong, Thanlwin, Yangtze and Yellow rivers.

In 2005, the World Wildlife Fund issued a report warning that those glaciers are shrinking. In late 2006, India and China launched their own study.

Hundreds of millions of people depend on those rivers.

In China, the mighty Yangtze -- Asia's longest river, which supports about 500 million people -- is showing the strain. According to this CBC.ca story, it's drying up. One Chinese expert points the finger at global warming.

And that's aside from other issues like pollution.

The Ganges runs through Nepal, India and Bangladesh. The former latter is a poor country that's quite low-lying, so it's vulnerable to rising sea levels.

India and Bangladesh (formerly part of Pakistan) have historically experienced strained relations over the Ganges, with India accused of diverting excess amounts of water. If there's even less water in the river in the future, I don't think it's a stretch to presume things might get worse instead of better.

If survival basics like food and water become scarcer due to global warming, I would suggest there is a substantial risk of violent conflict over their control, either within a nation or between nations.