But this was a particularly big week for one of our favorite natives of Edmonton, Alberta, whose long-fought, personal battle in support of stem-cell research took a huge turn for the better as U.S. President Barack Obama signed an executive order lifting the ban on such research.

“Today is a new day,” Fox said in a statement posted on the Michael J. Fox Foundation’s Web site after the order was signed. “I could not be more thrilled to see President Obama live up to his commitment to get politics out of science. We have seen, for the past eight years, how much damage the opposite approach has done to science and patients. Now that the President has taken this critical action, I am excited by the prospect of American scientists carrying human embryonic stem cell research forward toward better treatments and cures that will affect countless millions of lives.

“I commend the President for recognizing the inherent value of scientific freedom, and for helping to create an environment in which it can flourish.”

We, of course, fell in love with Fox after meeting him as Alex P. Keaton in NBC’s classic family comedy, “Family Ties.” Later roles in the “Back to the Future” movies and on ABC’s “Spin City” further solidified his place in our hearts. Although he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 1991, he didn’t disclose his condition until 1998 and not long after, he put his acting career on the back burner.

He has since made rare but eagerly anticipated guest appearances on shows like “Boston Legal,” “Scrubs” and “Rescue Me.” But Fox’s cause — finding a cure for Parkinson’s in our lifetime — is always at the forefront.

On Thursday, Fox’s foundation also announced that it was getting involved with personal genetics company 23andMe, and The Parkinson’s Institute and Clinical Center in an effort to recruit 10,000 people with Parkinson’s disease to join a new online research community. The idea is that people with PD can help support the research for a cure “in real time, potentially helping to speed early-stage scientific discoveries toward practical therapeutic relevance in treating Parkinson’s disease.”

One more bit of good news came with the announcement this week that Fox will host a one-hour ABC special, “Michael J. Fox: Adventures of an Incurable Optimist,” exploring the nature of optimism. It will air on May 7.

Weber’s father confirmed the news in the Calgary Herald, but didn’t elaborate. Reports include mention of a $125,000 engagement ring.

Vaughn has been quiet about his relationships, especially since his short-term tryst with Jennifer Aniston became tabloid fodder last year.

Vaughn’s mother was born in Canada and was a real estate agent there, as well.

One of our faves from Christopher Guest’s mockumentaries, including “Waiting for Guffman,” “Best in Show” and “A Mighty Wind,” O’Hara got her start at Second City in Toronto in 1974 before becoming a series regular on “SCTV.”

A tremendous character actress, she’s also brought her touch to memorable roles in “Beetlejuice,” “Home Alone” and  ”The Nightmare Before Christmas.”

She was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame last year.

Few people knew Evangeline Lilly — at least, if they didn’t stay up watching party-line commercials late at night (check out the video below) — before she landed her role on “Lost” five years ago. During five seasons, she’s amazed us as Kate Austen on “Lost,” a federal fugitive who’s as impressive with her ass-kicking abilities as she is rolling around on the beach with the likes of Jack and Sawyer.

She’s done her job well for five seasons and gets the “Canadian of the Week” honor for, well, continuing to do her job.

It was reported this week by Zap2It.com that Lilly was leaving “Lost” early and auditioning for roles in TV pilots that would air this fall, for the 2009-10 season. “Lost” is in the middle of its fifth season and already has a deal set with ABC to end after the sixth, so there were concerns that the mystery of the island might be solved with Lilly around.

The report was quickly and roundly denied by ABC and Lilly’s rep, who told E! Online it “absolutely false.”

So, here’s to Evangeline Lilly, eh!  The show would definitely be lost without her.

Canadian Troy Ross won this season of the boxing reality show, “The Contender,” with a fourth-round technical knockout of Nigerian Enhinomen (Hino) Ehikamenor on Wednesday night. If you’re asking, “Is that show still on?” The answer is, obviously, yes. But it’s not easy to find. In its fourth season, “The Contender” has been bobbing and weaving all over the channel lineup after getting its start on NBC and airing Seasons 2 and 3 on ESPN. The fourth season was shown on Versus, somewhere between hockey and rodeo.

While the inclusion of Alanis Morissette is sure to cause some tense debate and, perhaps, threaten international relations, it’s only right to pass along the link.

Check it out here, then come back and let us know what you think.

Some of these Maple Leaf ladies threaten to melt the glaciated peaks of the Arctic Cordillera, while others, well, you decide if you’d send them back through customs.

Who should be added to the list? Who should be removed?

(Photo credit: Frazier Harrison/Getty Images, via Comcast.net)

Picture this: America, November 2004. Half the country, riled up over election results, threatens to move to Canada.

At the same time, Canadians were casting their votes. For what? To decide who is “The Greatest Canadian.” Were they just showing off? Trying to show us how awesome they were as we realized how lame we are?

Perhaps, but Canadians don’t need to prove to us how awesome they are. They know it and so do we.

Without Canadians, we wouldn’t have “Saturday Night Live,” Jack Bauer or more than one hockey franchise west of the Rockies.

While the jury’s still out on “loonies” and “toonies,” our relationship with Canada, on a popular cultural scale, is pretty much the opposite of the currency exchange. Every Canadian unit of cache is worth just a little more than ours.

But as I examined the results of the CBC’s landmark vote to decide upon “The Greatest Canadian,” I realized they’re really on to something up there.

Even beyond Bryan Adams, Seth Rogen and George Stroumboulopoulos, there have been some really tremendous Canadians. See the full list here.

The winner of the coveted title was Tommy Douglas, Canada’s “father of Medicare.” (Doesn’t that say something about Canadians, too? My guess would have been Wayne Gretzky, and he came in 10th!).

Take Terry Fox. Here, he was a one-off feature on a short-lived NBC show called “Real People,” but in Canada he was a national hero and second on the CBC’s list of Greatest Canadians. After a cancer scare that resulted in having his leg amputated, he ran across half of Canada to raise money for cancer research on a prosthetic leg.

He started his “Marathon of Hope” in April 1980 and made it just past halfway across the country (5,376 kilometers — which is, like, 9,000 miles!) in four and a half months.

His health took a bad turn and Fox died from cancer complications and he had to abandon his effort to run across the country, but he inspired a nation and reached his goal of raising $1 for every Canadian resident — reaching $24.17 million when the country’s population was at 24.1 million in February 1981. He died June 28, 1981, but his legacy lives on with races that are held in his honor every year in 60 countries.

Here’s the CBC’s complete Top 10, with links to their profiles on every one of them.

1. Tommy Douglas

2. Terry Fox

3. Pierre Elliott Trudeau

4. Sir Frederick Banting

5. David Suzuki

6. Lester B. Pearson

7. Don Cherry

8. Sir John A. Macdonald

9. Alexander Graham Bell

10. Wayne Gretzky

We can’t have a Tommy Douglas or Terry Fox every week, but we’ll be looking to take note of a worthy Canadian each week and have a little fun in the process.

(Photo credit: CBC)