Apparently the sixth foot was a messed-up hoax.

“The coroners service, a forensic pathologist and an anthropologist have all examined the shoe and remains, and determined a skeletonized animal paw was inserted into the shoe with a sock and packed with dried seaweed,” the coroners service said in a statement released Thursday.

There are some strange people out there.

A severed foot washed up on the shore of a beach in Campbell River today. That’s the sixth foot found on the coast since last August, and the origins are still unknown.

I’ve been strangely fascinated with this. It’s like something straight out of a cheesy horror movie from the eighties, and certainly one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever heard.

The whole thing is still shrouded in mystery. The origins are unknown, and there really isn’t anything to match the feet with missing person reports, as you’d need a DNA sample from the missing individual. All they have to go off of right now are the sneakers, but they’ve only released details about one of the shoes to the public, and it was a size ten Nike that thousands of people around the world own. Another news report I read interviewed an oceanographer who said the feet could have come from anywhere within 1000 miles of the coastline.

I find this incredibly interesting, almost entertaining, because it doesn’t really seem real without names or identities or grieving families on the television. Since it’s just the feet, it’s easy to forget that there’s a real tragedy behind this - a shipwreck or foul play.

Hopefully they eventually find out what’s happening.

The end of a long weekend is always a sad event. This weekend was Victoria Day in Canada, in which we honour ex-Queen Victoria, and the current Monarch, with Marching bands, fireworks, and sleeping in.

This was my fourth time in Victoria during this event, and I’d never made it down to the parade, so I figured I’d drop by this year. I decided to take some photos, but in traditional parade fashion, my camera died within the first ten minutes. This has happened at the last three parades I’ve attended.

Soon after arriving at the parade, standing in the chill air, shoulder to shoulder with strangers, I suddenly realized why I’ve missed the last three; I don’t like parades. Standing in a giant lineup, that never moves, while people slowly drive by, laughing and waving at me, is what I imagine hell would be like if there was such a thing.

Putting my cynicism aside for a moment, it was fairly good. A lot of schools and organizations got involved and seemed to put in a lot of effort.

One of the groups involved was Homes for the Homeless, or something like that, which was basically a group of homeless people scaring children and screaming that we need to make legislature listen. The cause is certainly valid, as anyone who spends any time in our downtown core will know, but it just seemed out of place in a parade or at least improperly executed. The funny bit (maybe funny isn’t the right word) was after they finished their march, they came back up the opposite way asking the crowds for change.

After my coffee sunk into my system, it was a pleasant way to spend the morning. I think next year the five minute television coverage from the local news will probably suffice, though.

I’ve listened to some really great presentations today at the conference, but the most shocking thing I’ve found is how cheap a jug of American beer is when the Canadian dollar is even!

That is all.

For when the stress is just too much.