“LOOK who I ran into?” says reader Donna McMillan, who was more than a little surprised to find LMFAO’s Redfoo – in his trademark bright garb – at the Kingston shops on the walk to her car from work.

She wasn’t sure why the afro-loving shuffler was in town, but as the Miami-based frontman is currently in Sydney while judging The X-Factor, we’re pleased to see he made a pit-stop to the capital.

Shedding a big tier

THE town’s once proud daily newspaper, “The Canberra Times”, wracked by falling circulation and advertising volumes, has now ignominiously been stripped of its metropolitan status and relegated to a community paper as its Sydney-based owner Fairfax continues to rearrange its corporate deckchairs.

What does it matter? Apart from a different divisional boss and the promise of another “most effective operating structure”, not much beyond the editorial humiliation of being grouped corporately with titles such as the “Illawarra Mercury”, “Newcastle Herald”, “Ballarat Courier” and “Launceston Examiner”.

Oh, and this bit of blather: “This move will bring a range of benefits to ‘The Canberra Times’ including the opportunity to put an even greater focus on the local Canberra market.” That would be, like “The Chronicle”?

Arboretum strikes again

AWARD-award winning photographer Hillary Wardhaugh has had to cancel her community Photowalk, this weekend, another victim of the rapacious gnomes running the National Arboretum.

“I am seriously pissed off!” she says (and she’s not alone) at the publicly owned Arboretum’s “ludicrous demands”.

Hilary had the innocent idea of taking her Photowalk group, a “free community event just for the joy of creating photos”, for a gambol through the Arboretum. Sure, said the gnomes: that will be $200, thank you, for a permit.

“They agree that Photowalk is not a commercial enterprise, but still maintain that they need to charge $200 for a permit,” she says.

But it gets better: “They also asked if we were we willing to have our images used by them to promote the National Arboretum… for free!

“So they want free access to any images we capture and they want to charge us $200 for the privilege, so I am sorry to say, Photowalk Canberra  will never be held at the National Arboretum.”

Golf gets to hit and run

GOLFER Virginia Deigan apologised for the quality of the photo, but the blurring is perfectly reasonable when you realise Ginny, a member of Capital Public Golf Course, is a “speedgolfer” and of such skill that she’s the first Australian female to play at the Speedgolf World Championship at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, Oregon, on Sunday.

Speedgolf may sound the death knell for caddies because its all about hitting the ball and running.

“Yes, it may ruffle some of the traditional golfers who like to take their time around the course!” she told CC.

“One of the issues with golf at the moment is that people are taking way too long to play and the sport is losing participants as a result.

“What speedgolf shows is that spending less time over a shot, playing more instinctively and not thinking about it so much can actually be good for your game – or at least won’t make it any worse.

“After playing speedgolf, playing traditional golf seems a lot easier, a lot less pressure.”

The format of Speedgolf is simple: total strokes plus the total minutes and seconds it takes the player to complete his or her round. The Speedgolf world record for a single round is 109.06 (65 in 44:06).

Deigan, who plays off a handicap of 13 and 5km run time of 23 minutes, is aiming to beat her personal best speedgolf score of 84 strokes in 61 minutes, 10 seconds

Dunne and dusted

ALL of tremble over the gay marriage debate in the Assembly, the canberratimes.com.au live blog managed to twice describe Labor stalwart Mary Porter as a Liberal MLA in the text and a picture caption, and Labor Minister Joy Burch was captioned as “Liberal MLA Vicki Dunne”. They sorted it as the blog went on.

Sally strikes again

CANBERRA pianist Sally Whitwell has much to smile about having won her second ARIA, this time for her ABC Classics album, “All Imperfect Things: solo piano music of Michael Nyman”, which won Best Classical Album.

As well, the album’s producer, Virginia Read, won Best Engineer in the Artisan category, the first woman to have done do.

In 2011 Whitwell  also won an ARIA for her album “Mad Rush: Piano Music of Philip Glass.”

That Righteous feelin’

WE are to be assailed by “the unmistakable voice of a generation”  in March when the appropriately named former Righteous Brother Bill Medley performs at Canberra Theatre.

Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the duo’s enormous, most enduring hit “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’”, apparently still the most played song in the history of American radio.

The other half of the “blue-eyed soul” Brothers was Bobby Hatfield. They  recorded from 1963 through 1975, and continued to perform until Hatfield’s death in 2003.

Bill’s baritone also featured on the duo’s hits such as “(You’re My) Soul and Inspiration” and “(I’ve had) The Time of My Life”.

Bywong gal takes fashion prize

WELL done Viviana Parish, from nearby Bywong, who won the Caulfield Cup fashion on the field in Melbourne. Viviana, a recidivist who won the Black Opal fashion on the field in March, is poised to enter Derby Day on November 2, also in Melbourne.

“I love fashion and enjoy mixing colour and fashion trends to create eye-catching creations,” she says.

“My hats are handmade by my mum, who also has a flair for creative design.”