Living

Passions: The annual fundraising gala in support of the Dr. Peter AIDS Foundation takes place Sunday, Sept. 11, 6-9 p.m. at the Dr Peter Centre, 1110 Comox St., Vancouver.

The Ambleside Orchestra rehearses Wednesdays, 3: 30-5: 30 p.m. at Highlands United Church, 3255 Edgemont Blvd., North Vancouver under the direction of Nicolas Krusek. There are opportunities for string players.

IT was quite a day for North Vancouver mortgage broker Alan Brown. On July 13 at the annual Macdonald Realty Summer Classic, Brown won $10,000 by getting a hole in one. It happened on the par-3 17th hole of Green Acres Golf Club in Richmond.

THE United Way of the Lower Mainland has committed to helping out after-school programs on the North Shore over the next three years.

A Capella Chorus: Choirs for children ages eight-12 and youth 13-18 are looking for new members. Learn songs from Africa, raise money for Education Without Borders, perform outreach concerts for the elderly and make recordings.

EVERY year around this time you start to see scratched and disheveled souls, margarine tubs in hand, clawing their way through the brambly thickets along roadsides throughout the Lower Mainland.

WHILE the TV show Portlandia is a satire - skewering the bike-riding, coffeeslurping, granolaloving urbanites six hours south of us - it also strikes a chord of familiarity here in hippie Vancouver.

THERE'S a new look at one of the Lower Mainland's most venerable golf courses.

Espiritu Vocal Ensemble, a high-profile community choir that performs a wide variety of music, is looking for motivated singers for the upcoming fall season. Singers should have basic music reading skills. Rehearsals take place Mondays, 7-9 p.m.