R.I.P. John Pinette

Another beloved talent left us before we could find a cure for mortality, yesterday. John Pinette was a very funny overweight man, who was a regular at the Just For Laughs festival, and he died at age 50 of ''natural causes''... he had long-standing liver and heart problems.

His two stand-up specials remain with us (Show Me the Buffet, I'm Starvin'! and Still Hungry), as does his role in the Seinfeld finale, though most fans of that series would prefer to have it wiped out of their memory.

Here's a sample joke:

Skinny people decide what they want at McDonald's... Now skinny people, I love you, we're all God's children. But the food situation, you piss me off. You browse, you pick... get out of the line! Get out, go over there, and think! Skinny people decide what they want when they get to the front of the line; what were you doing in line, your tax returns? I knew what I wanted before I parked the car.

I Told Jeffrey Ross Where To Drink

Last Friday, as I was getting out from the most boring XXXtreme Humour Show of the last 5 editions of Just For Laughs, putting on my earphones and gearing up for a walk home, Jeffrey Ross was walking up the hill with his crew/hangers-on and pointed at... me.

He then asked me where he and his buddies should get their drinks on, saying he'd been told to go on St-Laurent street but he couldn't find any decent bars.

I responded by saying he'd probably been told to come on St-Laurent because all the bars there were really expensive, with high cover charges and $20 drinks and nothing but gold diggers to talk to - a plot to get him to spend his not-quite-hard-earned American money on our most expensive strip. I told him he'd have at least as much fun on St-Denis, but that the folks there might be a tad smelly, and instead strongly recommended two places - Fouf's (where I actually ended up with the Former Lady Of The House later) where the music is fun and the terrace is comfortable and where his semi-fame wouldn't get in the way of his having a good time, and Madhatter's, on Crescent, basically the same ambiance but in English, and if he'd feel the need to get his legs moving, all the bars surrounding the Hatter's were dance bars.

He seemed to like my honest manner, and, really, I just told him where I'd go if I were me or him.

Now I just hope he doesn't call his next stand-up show Don't Listen To Strangers, featuring a skit called Why I Hate Montrealers...