Infamous subway-riding 9-year-old’s mother Lenore Skenazy details her questionable viewing habits: We got the DVD set of Sesame Street from the early years. It shows kids just having fun in groups, playing on a vacant lot, playing on the playground and playing follow the leader. Before any of this is shown to you, there’s acontinue reading
Eight years on
This is how I felt that day: like something might come swooping down out of the sky at any time, that no place was safe, not the streets I walked along in my new high heels (heading out of the financial district: the streetcars were jammed, traffic at a standstill). When I walked along Bloorcontinue reading
Bruce gets his rocket launcher
This amuses me greatly: KANDAHAR, Afghanistan – Bruce Cockburn got his rocket launcher – briefly, in Afghanistan. The singer-songwriter was among a group of entertainers visiting Canadian troops serving in the war-torn country. He drew wild applause when he sang one of his hits, “If I Had a Rocket Launcher,” which prompted the commander ofcontinue 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
Preposition watch
Keep an eye on them — they’re disappearing: National Post, August 31: Top sites to meet a mate
I’ll have what they’re having
You might think that, in a GDP report that revised the first quarter contraction to 6.1% from the already amazing 5.4%, a growth figure of 0.1% for June is not a conclusive sign that a recovery has taken hold. This is, apparently, because you are not Canadian business journalist, or economist employed by the Bigcontinue reading
The elusive bear
Ontario forests are full of bears, but many hikers and campers never see the elusive animals at all. These days, financial bears are just as hard to find. I know I’m not the only one puzzled by the buoyant mood among economists and financial writers in Canada — ex-Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg and thecontinue 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