Paul Couvrette, a local photographer and friend of Gene Simmons and Shannon Tweed, says the city of Ottawa “needs an enema”.  Simmons and KISS are performing on the main stage at Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest on Wednesday, July 15th, and acting mayor Doug Thompson declared the day to be “Shannon Tweed Day” in Ottawa, in part because she lived here for four years and was named “Miss Ottawa Valley” in 1977. 

Now Simmons, through Couvrette, is voicing his outrage at the city’s decision to withdraw the proclamation.  Simmons says that he is embarrassed for his longtime companion Tweed, and that he wants her to have a “great time in Ottawa”.  Couvrette has lined up Daniel Richer, the official Ottawa town crier, to make the proclamation anyway, and says “it’s basically a case where we are literally going to show the city ‘OK fine, you can keep your damn proclamation, we can proclaim it ourselves.’”  The CHEZ nation believes this is the right idea, as we have declared next Wednesday to be Shannon Tweed Day in the CHEZ nation and in Ottawa.  Rock on, CHEZ nation!

In other Ottawa proclamation news, July 14th has been proclaimed Yousuf Karsh Day in honour of the Turkish-born photographer.  Says Couvrette, “if Karsh was alive, he’d laugh at all this and quite frankly, he’d love to photograph Shannon.  He loved photographing beautiful women.”

Shannon Tweed Day kicks off first thing in the morning on Wednesday here on CHEZ 106.