We renewed our membership at the AGO this year. I’m not sure J. was entirely convinced, but I kind of like the idea of supporting at least one local museum and you never know what interesting thing may show up to justify a visit to McCaul and Dundas. We paid a visit to the AGOcontinue reading
Toronto Archives
Real estate geography
Where would you guess this is: Beautiful Semi-Detached 4 Bedroom Brick Home In Annex, Corner Lot, Det Brick Garage, Private Drive. To be generous, Seaton Village? Past Christie Pits? But no: Steps To Public/ Seperate Schools, Dovercourt Park And Tennis Courts, Dovercourt Boys & Girls Club (Full Daycare/Children s Programs). Minutes To Dufferin Grove Park…continue reading
Blame the victim (again and again)
Even when the circumstances in pedestrian deaths clearly point to driver error, Toronto police don’t hesitate to point the finger at the person who wasn’t behind the wheel of the vehicle: Sgt. Tim Burrows said the victim was crossing slightly west of the crosswalk at the intersection. “It’s difficult to determine who is at fault,”continue reading
Preposition watch
They’re endangered. From a BlogTO review of Te Aro: This newish Leslieville cafe may not have a ton of tables to plunk a laptop, but the beauty of the space more than makes up for it. What is so hard about turning it into English by adding “on which” before “plunk”, or even just “onto”continue reading
One-way battle in the spin wars
The Star lovingly recreates Bryant’s last night as a man not under suspicion, while in the meantime, Partisan Hobo notes: …there’s no PR firm to save the deceased man’s image. I don’t even know him, but I know he came from a broken home, that he is a visible minority, that he has a historycontinue reading
Blood on Bloor
Everything about the recent cyclist death on Bloor is upsetting and horrific. Take first the location: Bloor St. outside Sephora, between Bay and Queen’s Park Circle, a pair of blocks everyone has walked along at some point and that were, at quarter to ten on a summer night, far from empty. Take the absolute insanitycontinue reading
We < heart > our libraries
From the Fans of Toronto Public Library’s blog post on the renovated Bloor-Gladstone branch: Realization I have finally been able to put my finger on a thought that has half-occurred to me on my now-numerous visits to renovated libraries. Here’s a slogan to get you started: “Your tax dollars at work!” TPL keeps getting awardedcontinue reading
Hell is other people (in Toronto)
I’m not sure how or when it happened, but at some point Toronto residents became the unhappiest and least pleasant people on the planet. What’s behind the transformation? Is it the sudden growth in population through the last two decades that has made the city so miserable, or the proliferation of Tim Horton’s (Toronto wascontinue reading
jailparty.com
I’m probably showing my age, but I’m relieved that the grownups have intervened and cancelled a planned rave in the old Don Jail. The new owner’s site had the wrong tone, and something like this was probably inevitable. More here and here.
The old jail could be used as a performance art venue, but in all decency it has to be in a context that works with themes around suffering and despair, both experienced by the inmates and by their victims, and by the people who worked in the building before it was a Doors Open curiosity.
The place has a dark history – not playfully Gothic dark, but really seriously dark, and I don’t think that’s registered with the people offering ‘ghost tours’. More below the fold.
Boy takes bus, story at 11
Whose nephew is little Gabriel Blake, the four-year-old who is the focus of an inexplicable top-of-page article in the Saturday Globe? There must be some reason so many words are dedicated to the story of a little boy who went missing for a total of — count ’em — two hours. Not to ruin thecontinue reading