Your morning news roundup for Wednesday, December 6, 2006:

The post-election City Council convened yesterday. Mayor Miller announced his picks for the new city executive committee. Howard "Love Him or Hate Him" Moscoe is out as TTC chair but made the ranks as licensing and standards chair.

Toronto police had an encounter with a suspect yielding a homemade gun. A little larger than a pen, a "zip gun" can fire a 22-calibre bullet. Luckily the suspect was tazed and apprehended before a shot was fired.

The Ontario Auditor General reported yesterday on widespread mispending of tax-payers money by various provincial employees. Leather jackets, and candy are not priorities, folks. And spending our money to have flowers delivered to yourself on your birthday is as saddening as it is irritating.

Although it looks like we won't be getting the 3cm of snow reported last night, we will have some mixed snow and rain over the next few days. Drivers: please don't embarrass us or hurt yourselves or others. We're Canadian, and despite our annual snowy season the initial snowy days of winter are often accident-prone. Please be smart and safe on the roads.

In case you missed it, NASA plans to set up shop on the moon by 2024. The base would put us a measly 384,399 km closer to Mars, our next potential colony site which lies at minimum 57,936,384 km away from Earth.

Filed under strange: an American commercial airliner was forced to make an emergency landing after a passenger lit a match in an attempt to to cover up flatulence. We're not sure how she made it to Dallas, but we do know she wasn't allowed back on the plane.

A tip of the hat to Sameer who posted his last Morning Brew yesterday. Best of luck in the UK, and be sure to drop by and say hi now and then!

(photo: blogTO Flickr pooler gardinergirl)