[PHOTO] Rainy day in Dovercourt Village, Toronto

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly talks about the need for freelance writers to constantly engage.


• Centauri Dreams notes the imaging in infrared of Jupiter-like 2M1207b.


• The Dragon's Gaze notes a new imaging technique that might help detect dim exoplanets.


• The Dragon's Tales updates us with news from Ukraine.
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• Joe. My. God. notes lifetime risks for contracting HIV in the United States, particularly high in the south and among blacks.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money considers the awkward position of the Baltic States in NATO.


• The LRB Blog thinks poorly of the quality of Euroskeptics in the United Kingdom on the eve of the Brexit referendum.


• The NYRB Daily wonders how Russians will react to collapsing living standards.


• Steve Munro and Transit Toronto react to the drop in Union-Pearson Express fares, Munro wondering how it could have taken so long.


• The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer reveals his disillusionment with Marco Rubio has much to do with the man's opposition to a viable solution for Puerto Rico, and notes Ecuador's oil policies are not so bad.

[VIDEO] Between Castle Frank and Broadview and back again

I amused myself this afternoon with a very short trip between Castle Frank to Broadview station and back again, over the Don and under the Prince Edward Viaduct. I wanted video of the Don Valley as evening fell, and got it.

The first video is the trip east, to Broadview; the second is the return trip west.

"Going east across the Don, Castle Frank to Broadview" (Watch on YouTube)

"Going west across the Don, Broadview to Castle Frank" (Watch on YouTube)

[OBSCURA] On a historic same-sex military couple's kiss in Victoria

This kiss got picked up widely, by Towleroad and Joe. My. God. and the CBC. The Victoria Buzz has a nice report.

HMCS Winnipeg returned to Esquimalt today after an a eight-and-a-half month deployment in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific.

The first kiss following a long deployment at sea is a time-honored tradition at Navy homecomings and for the first time in history, that kiss took place between two men.

With cheers erupting from a crowd at CFB Esquimalt’s dockyard on Tuesday, Master Seaman Francis Legare was finally able to embrace his partner Corey Vautour, after more than eight months at sea and they shared the first-ever kiss between two men.

The Huffington Post goes into greater detail about this custom.

Sailors buy raffle tickets — one for $2 or $5 for three — for a chance to be chosen as the first to walk off the ship and share a kiss with their spouse or partner. The money collected through the raffle is used for family-related events.

The HMCS Winnipeg's crew of 250 had been in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific for eight months.

Legare’s previous deployments have taken him to the Arabian Sea for maritime security and counter-terrorism operations. This latest voyage separated him from Vautour for exactly 255 days — he kept count.

“Now I’m back. I’m here. It’s just unreal, it feels great. I’m just speechless right now,” Legare told reporters on Tuesday.