TAKE THE A STRAIN

With the windchill at -17, I flagged down a cab the other night in Toronto's West End. The driver barged his way to the kerb and screeched to a stop. Nothing unusual so far. As I got in he was laughing his head off.
"Oh, dear," I thought, "I've got me a nutbar."
"Yonge and Wellesley, please."
"Ok, mister,"he giggled.
Was my fly undone? Nope.
"Mister, I've had the funiest passenger, right before you. This guy was singing all the way. Singing his head off. Kind of pop stuff but he told me they were all his own compositions. He said he wanted to make a CD. I've got this little recording device here so I got him to sing a few bars into it. Listen."
I couldn't hear much, apart from static from the recording device and a faint noise in the background I guessed was the new Josh Groban.
"Was he any good?" I asked the driver."
"Well to be honest, mister, he's not nearly good enough to record a CD. But you know what? He told me he had a fulltime singing job. I couldn't believe it! This guy has a fulltime gig! So I asked him where he sang."
Outside Sherbourne subway station.


HIS PANTS ARE ON FIRE?
The compilers of dictionaries must be going nuts trying to solve a new conundrum. What do you call a person who lies, changes his mind and lies again and has a curious obsession with expensive leather riding boots?I know! how about: adj or v :zachardelli, as in; He was a bigger zachardelli than Pinocchio. Or he zachardelli-ed (past form) his way into a 36-year pension after a Canadian was tortured in Syria. (Origin: from name of former head of Royal Canadian Mounted Police accused of perjury; shed tears for himself as a great and honourable man.)