Despite what you might think, I do usually try and run with the leads people send me, unless it's blatant self-promotion. In which case . . . seriously, this isn't free ad space. Give me something to work with here.

Anyway, someone very generously sent me a link to images from Luka Magnotta's BadPuppy appearance, and . . . well, honestly, maybe I'm just being picky, but there's something about ritualistically murdering a person, disassembling them, and then running to Europe that just kills my boner.

I mean, if it weren't for that, I would be all over him. I don't know what it is about him: his cold, lifeless, unfeeling eyes, the face and lips that look like they were reconstructed with only the faintest knowledge of human anatomy, or maybe it's just the overall vibe of pathological opportunism, but I would flip that around like a two-minute steak.

For the past 24 hours, everyone has been tweeting about Brendan Burke, son of the general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs, who came out in an article on espn.com yesterday. Brendan's currently a student manager of the Miami University (Ohio) team (wait, there's a Miami University in Ohio?), having quit playing hockey in high school out of fear that his teammates would find out that he's gay. The elder Burke now insists that there are certainly gay players in pro hockey, and that an out gay player could advance in pro hockey "if he works for the Toronto Maple Leafs!" The story's been picked up in positive coverage in Toronto's mainstream media, and let's hope that it encourages more queer athletes to come out in pro sports.

In less great news, York Regional Police are reexaming a 29-year-old cold case involving an unidentified man who was found with "a compact mirror...and a pair of red high heels." Ignore the Post's disgustingly sensational headline. The case sounds suspiciously like a pair of other cold cases involving young gay men that were reopened last year.