by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

Last time I shared the secret contents of my notebook I got a ton of e-mail. Quite impressive, considering e-mail doesn't weigh much. So here's another peek inside my crumpled and blood-splattered scribblings.

If you want to witness tubby, middle-aged Québécois guys get worked up, hit the three used-appliance stores at Papineau and Marie-Anne. Ask them about GE (pronounced Jay-Euh). Years ago that French TV news show did an unflattering report on all three of them. They still complain about it non-stop. They'll all tell you that the report actually denounced another store, not them.

The bathroom in the Ultramar at St-André and Ontario has the brightest blue lights. It makes it darn difficult to find a vein to inject.

Finding a good, affordable repairman is like getting a date with a busty barmaid these days. The good repairmen are quiet as monks. My Grenadian fix-it-all, Leslie, barely speaks. The bad ones fill the air with useless banter and criticisms. The reigning reno legend in my parts was once known as Montreal's DJ Superman, a Jamaican named Dave, father of 14. He rarely removes his yellow hardhat. Everybody waves when they see him.

Adrianna, my daughter's charming tennis instructor from ATSOM tennis camp, reeled off a depressingly long list of recently-closed local tennis facilities. I like tennis because you keep your distance from sweaty opponents.

The good thing about the end of American film shootings here is that it forces extras to find redeeming employment. Extras are too often senselessly egotistical narcissists. I imagine that they further annoy acquaintances by interrupting movies to point out their insignificant appearances in the background.

With bus ridership in decline over the last few decades, it's fitting that the Montreal Transit Corporation is known as the MTC, pronounced as "empty seat."

For years, a black community church at Addington and St-Jacques bore a ramshackle sign that read, "Youth in Asia." Who knows why? A medical supply company has now moved in, foreshadowing the nearby superhospital.

For a long year, the hot style for black male teens has been knee-length, white cotton T-shirts. It looks baby-ish.

The places I'd least want to be in Montreal: 1. The lockdown room of the Pinel Institute for the Criminally Insane. 2. Bordeaux Jail. 3. Beneath the junction of the Turcot Interchange. 4. At a scrapyard in Pointe-Aux-Trembles. 5. The food court at Complexes Desjardins.

I'm smitten with local Olympic high-roller Dick Pound. He's got style to burn. I asked him if he's a Wheaties man. Nope. Usually no time for brekky. If he has a few minutes, it's Raisin Bran, he tells me.

I can't watch old TV or films. I get too distracted speculating on whether the actors are still alive or how old they'd be now.

I've been to the Dollar Cinema about a dozen times. It's clean. It's cheap. It's good. But sit at the front. The speaker is about the size of a squirrel's paw.

Some cashiers spontaneously ask your postal code. The correct reply is, "No."

If you're a raver chick battling the bulge, that midriff-flashing thing might not be working for you. You might consider going goth. Goth chicks seem to get away with carrying a few extra pounds. You see them all over Verdun.

My friend, Westmount needletrade veteran Robin, produced a load of sporty-stylish girly clothes out of a huge supply of lycra she got a deal on. But she's got distribution issues. She refuses to sell them to retail outlets that want to resell it for $100 a pop when she says she can make a healthy profit at $20 a piece selling it direct.

It's only a slight misnomer to say that Fred Flintstone was a Montrealer. Henry Corden, who died in May at age 85, was from Montreal. But he only did Fred's voice in later years, after the original actor died.

Some predict that we'll be able to download the contents of animals' minds within the next few years. This would be good for newspapers. We'd have more subjects to report on and they couldn't sue for slander.

Comments? kgravy@openface.ca