HERE’S your chance to send a message to “The Canberra Times” and, at the same time, share the love with “CityNews” by having a go at 2B Advertising & Design’s meandering “Canberra Media & Brand Survey”. There’s the incentive to kiss and tell by being in the running for an iPad Mini. Be nice to us at 2b.com.au/survey

Warriors for lurve

LOOKING for love in all the wrong places? On Human Rights Day, December 10, the Dutch Embassy is hosting a free film screening at The Street Theatre of “Warriors for Love”, a new documentary in which Dutch TV personality Sipke Jan Bousema meets people from other countries, who have to fight for love every day.

He compares LGBTI rights in the Netherlands with other countries, where he visits festivals, events and demonstrations.

The screening will be followed by a foyer reception. RSVP to 6247 1223 or book online at thestreet.org.au

Studio goes begging

LOCAL music producer and audio engineer Sam King (of local bands The Ellis Collective and Burrows) is passing around the digital collection plate via crowdfunding website Pozible to help him finish knocking up a commercial recording studio in Watson he’s calling I Am Merloc Studios.

“It’s been a pretty hectic project and I’ve learnt heaps from it,” says Sam on the website, where he explains the budget ballooned and the banks weren’t impressed with his self-employed status.

He needs $5000 and when CC last looked had just cracked $100, but from the music videos for two songs he produced for local bands Fun Machine and Cracked Actor in the half-built studio, it sounds like he knows what he’s talking about.

The site has a breakdown of where the $5000 would go, photos and details of rewards he’ll give you for throwing in some coin, starting with having your name carved into the studio.

To see the videos and contribute, go to pozible.com/project/175831

All go for Joe

THE well-connected and trusted Canberra stockbroker, Joe Cardone, has forsaken, for now, treading the bourse as local manager of Patersons to set up his own – different – business.

Cardone’s huge local network and contacts will be a big loss to the distant owners of Perth-based Patersons.

A former banker and passionate broker, he was with the company for nine years. Since resigning on October 31, Joe’s been busy wrestling with technology providers and establishing a city office ahead of opening the doors in the New Year.

Dianne’s back!

ANYONE snuffling into the chardonnay at Dianne Anderson’s sentimental soiree to mark her retirement from the still-vacant convenor’s role of the Australia National Eisteddfod’s choirs division earlier this year may be startled to learn that the irrepressible one is being reincarnated as the event’s artistic director. And she’s making changes, including the appointment of three adjudicators: Julie Christiansen (Birralee Choirs), Andrew Hunter (Concordis Melbourne) and the School of Music’s Peter Tregear. “There’s no keeping her down,” our arts snout sniffs.

Cabinet solidarity

THE astonishing $1.5 million Hannah Cabinet, pictured, which has attracted a 30 per cent increase in visitors to the Bungendore Wood Works Gallery since arriving in May, is staying until the New Year.

It was destined for the Ballina Regional Gallery in northern NSW, but an extended stay in Bungendore gives more time to seek a permanent home for the cabinet in an institution or gallery in the Canberra/ACT region.

The cabinet, which stands more than 2.4 metres high and deep, is Geoff Hannah’s latest masterpiece and took six years to make using 34 different Australian and international timbers, four species of shell and 17 varieties of precious stone with extensive marquetry inlays on 18 doors and on, and in, 140 drawers.

Hmmms

• BAH, humbug. Elf Radio is back broadcasting endless jolly Christmas music of comfort and joy until Boxing Day, just like a department store, really! It’s the Australian Radio Network’s digital station dedicated to carols and classics. CC could take only 30 minutes of that much jolly.
• THIS week’s silly survey: Target has (amazingly) discovered that women are more likely to do the Christmas shopping, with 70 per cent indicating they would purchase gifts this year compared to 48 per cent of Scrooge-worthy men.
• CC’s Weston snout heard people complaining about the “Canberra Times’” claim that it is a family newspaper because of its columns of “Adult Services” in the Classifieds section.
• T-shirt slogan: “What if the hokey pokey really is what it’s all about?”
•  CC’S cinema snout was enjoying Palace Electric’s digital cinematic experience the other night, but at curtain down found herself in an analogue queue of 30 people lining up to pay the $3 to escape the car park. “Why can’t we just pay for the parking at the box office in one transaction?” she sensibly wonders.