Je pensè il ya des la bellefleur

Sad news today as local Trois-Rivierès cultural icon Jean-Pierre Bellefleur has been reported as missing in today's edition of local newspaper Le Nouvelliste.

Mr. Bellefleur was last seen heading east up the St. Lawrence seaway in his antique cedar-strip canoe, singing Voyageur tunes, shirtless and wearing his trademark denim shorts and red bandana, using a case of Laurentide as ballast for the front of the canoe.  He was reported as being "extremely agitate, him" by local sources who witnessed Mr. Bellefleur walking down Boulevard Sainte Madeleine smoking, drinking, cursing, yelling and looking for a fight with anyone English-speaking.  His ex-girlfriend of five years, Huguette Lafreniere-Willis, was approached for her reaction Thursday but the notoriously publicity-shy Lafreniere appeared to be rather intent upon finishing her jumbo poutine while simultaneously smoking and drinking three different kinds of beer to offer any intelligible comment.


Mr. Bellefleur was apparently upset over his recent decline as the city's unofficial mascot and good-luck charm after staging a graphic and widely publicized protest against "repressiveness and old-world values" in 2006 that earned him nationwide attention and legions of internet fans.  He had been upstaged lately by Puanter (Stinky) - a smoking, hard-drinking, one-eyed poker-playing bear with a penchant for dropping loose change on the floor near pretty girls.  Bellefleur, who had not been seen in public wearing a shirt since his story went viral, had recently spent his life savings to purchase a large quantity of stock in RIM, convinced it was going to, as he put it, "frickin' shoot to da moon".

There will be a candlelight vigil held this evening near the site of Mr. Bellefleur's disappearance.  There is plenty of free parking - jus' go at the Bière Store lot, you.