Britain’s Royal Mail celebrates Monty Python with stamps featuring iconic sketches and characters

Free fix is in: repair café aims to keep items out of landfills

Stephen Kirk wants to give people a chance to fix items they’re not ready to let go of.

The Spence Neighbourhood Association staffer took notice when repair cafés started popping up around the world, and he decided to bring the idea to Winnipeg.

The café invites people to bring broken items like bikes, clothes and small kitchen appliances to the association’s headquarters to get free repairs by a team of skilled volunteers.

“Certainly in our neighbourhood, a lot of people’s motivation is economic, they would rather fix it than have to buy a new one,” said Kirk, the environmental and open spaces coordinator for the Spence Neighbourhood Association.

Take advantage of hydroelectric potential

Manitoba Hydro tells us that we are going to need significant new electricity generation over the coming decades.

Paralyzed foster girl has system under a microscope

An internal investigation by Manitoba’s Families Department is nearly complete in the case of a six-year-old girl who is paralyzed after being assaulted by her foster mother in Winnipeg.

The review by child-welfare officials is intended to prevent similar incidents, but it’s unlikely the public will learn the findings or recommendations.

“We’re working closely with the (child and family services) authority to make sure that every recommendation is taken seriously and implemented,” Families Minister Nahanni Fontaine said Monday.

“They’re important (investigations) because they help us identify what went wrong so we can make those changes to ensure something like this tragedy never happens again.”

Officer who shot dog dead after it bit him won’t face charges

A Manitoba First Nations police officer will not face charges for fatally shooting a dog last year, despite the Crown describing the officer’s conduct as “concerning.”

The Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba announced it would not recommend charges Monday, more than a year after the incident was reported to the police watchdog.

A Manitoba First Nations Police Service officer went to a home in Swan Lake First Nation to make an arrest in June 2025, the IIU said. No arrest was made as the person police were looking for was not there. As the officer was leaving, a dog chained outside bit him.

The officer later returned with a carbine rifle and shot and killed the dog.

TV that waxes poetic, vacations hard, reminisces

The summer TV drawer is nearly empty, but here is a varied platter of viewing suggestions to amuse through to September, including: travelling with an epic poem, a group vacation, an anniversary reflection on the Tragically Hip (sob), a missing-child crime thriller and the return of a fictional talk-show host.

● Richard E. Grant’s Very Modern Odyssey

Documentary series streaming on CBC Gem

Sidestepping the argumentative hubbub about a new translation of Homer’s epic poem vs. old, and whose biceps Matt Damon wears in Christopher Nolan’s big-screen The Odyssey, consider this luscious travelogue, hosted by Richard E. Grant (Withnail and I). Beauty is beauty.

Britain’s Royal Mail celebrates Monty Python with stamps featuring iconic sketches and characters

LONDON (AP) — And now for something completely different: Britain’s Royal Mail has issued stamps celebrating the absurdist comedy of Monty Python.

The 10-stamp series announced on Thursday celebrates some of the troupe’s most iconic characters and catchphrases, from “Nudge, nudge” to “The Lumberjack Song.”

Six stamps depict scenes from the sketch-comedy TV series “Monty Python’s Flying Circus,” including “The Spanish Inquisition,” ”The Ministry of Silly Walks," “Dead Parrot” and “The Nude Organist.”

Another four mark the 50th anniversary of the cult classic 1975 film “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” including one showing the limb-losing Black Knight insisting, “’Tis but a scratch.”