Tributes continue to pour in for Dave Watson, the Straight's beloved Dot Comment columnist who recently died of cancer. His final days were marked by courage and grace, and this brilliant and humble man will never be forgotten.

Life lived between takeoffs and landings

Finding the university's centre proves elusive

When news broke this month that former B.C. Finance Ministry senior aide Dave Basi is alleged to have taken $50,000 from two Vancouver Island developers to help them remove property from the Agricultural Land Reserve, many wondered if the integrity of the reserve had been compromised.

The DB NachtZug leaves Berlin at 10:25 p.m. In the bar car, it's hard to tell what time period the train is travelling through. The waiter is Fred Astaire. A would-be Gertrude Stein scribbles poetry furiously into her journal, then crosses it out, scribbles and crosses, scribbles and crosses. Beside us there's a pipe smoker in tweed with a waxed moustache. And in the corner are Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda, circa Easy Rider, ordering drinks six at a time.

You enter through the doors of a dressed-up old Cadillac dealership, into a lounge that is comfortingly familiar, yet subtly strange. The 1910 Belgian "jewel box" spiegeltent sits inconspicuously to one side of the building. When you breach the portal between them, you are like Alice going down the rabbit hole-into a wonderfully idiosyncratic parallel universe called Teatro ZinZanni, where you are a character as well as a member of the audience.

Now A Global Monolith, The Vancouver-Born Activist Group Still Has Lessons For Would-Be Peaceniks And Revolutionaries

Starring Sheila McCarthy and R.H. Thompson. Rated mature.

Starring Sheila McCarthy and R.H. Thompson. Rated mature.

Starring Sheila McCarthy and R.H. Thompson. Rated mature.

Starring Sheila McCarthy and R.H. Thompson. Rated mature.

Starring Andy Garcia and Uma Thurman. Rated 14 years.Written and directed by Englishman Bruce Robinson, who penned the The Killing Fields screenplay and wrote and directed Withnail and I and How to Get Ahead in Advertising, it's the story of world-weary Los Angeles detective John Berlin, whose devotion to his job has wrecked his marriage.

Starring Andy Garcia and Uma Thurman. Rated 14 years.Written and directed by Englishman Bruce Robinson, who penned the The Killing Fields screenplay and wrote and directed Withnail and I and How to Get Ahead in Advertising, it's the story of world-weary Los Angeles detective John Berlin, whose devotion to his job has wrecked his marriage.

Starring Val Kilmer, Graham Greene, and Sam Shepard.Directed by Michael Apted.

Starring Val Kilmer, Graham Greene, and Sam Shepard.Directed by Michael Apted.

Starring Peter Coyote and Jurgen Prochnow. Rated mature.

Starring Peter Coyote and Jurgen Prochnow. Rated mature.

Starring Richard Harris andJohn Hurt. Rated mature.

Starring Richard Harris andJohn Hurt. Rated mature.

Starring Dennis Quaid.Writtenand directed by Alan Parker.

Starring Dennis Quaid.Writtenand directed by Alan Parker.

Starring Matthew Modine and Harry Connick, Jr. Produced by David Puttnam and Catherine Wyler. Rated mature.

Starring Matthew Modine and Harry Connick, Jr. Produced by David Puttnam and Catherine Wyler. Rated mature.