Category: Toronto

The sweet, dry hereafter

Dan DickinsonLeave a comment

My wife, bored of writing about the condo only every few months, has set up a new blog with the intention of recounting more of her adventures (and TV watching habits, presumably). She’s also graduated to a real blog software: WordPress. Go say hello, ever’body.

.:.

Today, as I hurried toward Summerhill station to escape the rain, I walked by Atom Egoyan and his wife Arsinée Khanjian (at least, I assume it was her; I didn’t get a good look) who’d ducked under some cover. They are both very tiny.

[tags]nelliedee, atom egoyan, arsinee khanjian[/tags]

Even harder than globalization

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You know what’s a hard word to type? “Declaration.” Doesn’t look that tricky, but every time I type it I fumble for a second. And since the Doha declaration on the TRIPS agreement and public health is a major part of my paper I’ve been typing it every few minutes.

Speaking of the topic, it’s ironic that I’ve been far too busy the past few days to catch up on the news of what’s happening at the AIDS conference here in Toronto, where these issues have been front and centre. A few blocks away, what I’m writing about is being discussed by some of the most knowledgeable people in the world…yet here I sit, too busy with academia to notice.

[tags]doha declaration, TRIPS, Toronto AIDS conference[/tags]

4.48 Psychosis

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Damn. It’s already gone by, and I was too busy anyway, but I’d liked to’ve seen this Summerworks play: 4.48 Psychosis. I was attracted to it partly because it got a great review in Now Magazine, but also because a very cool Tindersticks song was based on the original play itself and even the song is haunting. It sounds horribly dark and disturbing; I regret not trying to see it.

[tags]4.48 psyychosis, tindersticks, summerworks[/tags]

Ode to Whitby

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The Scotsman and his fiancé made a return visit to Toronto yesterday, and I met up with them for dinner and a few drinks. I took them to Smokeless Joe’s for a bite to eat and a few pints. Around 7:45 we realized they weren’t going to make the 8:13 train to Whitby (where they were staying) especially since it would’ve meant someone chugging their Delirium Tremens so they decided to catch the next one at 9:13 and have another drink while we waited. It turns out I may have underestimated the amount of time it takes to get from Smokeless Joe’s to Union Station, ’cause we arrived a few minutes too late. Anyway, there was nothing left to do but have another drink, so we scooted around the corner to the Irish Embassy and had a quick quaff (during which I learned that The Scotsman is prone to being labelled “a hottie” by teenage girls) before hauling ass back down to the train station.

This time we made it with ten minutes to spare, and I accompanied them up to the GO platform (as I’d never seen it before). It was crowded with drunken 905ers anxious to get back to Whitby (and environs), some wearing cowboy hats & sombreros, others drinking Malibu rum straight from the bottle, and still others complimenting The Scotsman’s sporty new man bag and asking how much he’d paid for it. I feel safe in saying that any urge I might’ve once had to visit Whitby has now been quashed.

It was a fun few hours, and I can see from my IM client that they’re made it back home. Now I’m trying to figure out how we can squeeze in a visit to New York next year. Perhaps there’s a museum of occupation there that The Scotsman’s missus could take us to; I hear it’s her speciality.

.:.

Today’s been nice so far…great weather, happily snoozing cats (both the vomiting and the limping have subsided for now), some relaxation before a) Nellie gets home, and b) I have to get back to my term paper.

[tags]scotsman, whitby, go train, malibu rum, man bags[/tags]

Why can't they ever vomit on, say, the kitchen floor?

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Here I was, having a good weekend, and suddenly whammo…cat problems. Last night, around 1:00, one of the cats pukes all over my laptop bag. Seriously, it’s like he aims for personal items. Trying to clean everything out of the bag and wash it off while still half asleep was buckets of fun. Then this morning I woke up to find the other cat limping; I guess he did something to his foot/leg overnight. Probably beat the crap out of his brother a little too emphatically. I’ll watch it for a day or so and take him to the vet if it doesn’t get better.

.:.

Today’s idiots: Dr. Ted Baehr, who claims Talladega Nights makes fun of Jesus [via Yes But No But Yes], and the lady who thinks the tree in her backyard is gurgling out “God’s water”.

.:.

Another great picture from Sam at Daily Dose of Imagery. You can actually see our building under construction a few blocks to the southwest.

[tags]cats, vomit, injured paw, ted baehr, talladega nights, god’s water, daily dose of imagery, moss park[/tags]

"You call it an electrified anal prod, I say tomato."

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Today I watched Little Dieter Needs To Fly (imdb | rotten tomatoes), a Werner Herzog documentary about Dieter Dengler, a German man who moved to America because he wanted to be a pilot, eventually winding up a prisoner of war after being shot down over Vietnam. It was totally engrossing and captivating, unbelievable in parts. I highly recommend it.

In a funny little coincidence, not an hour after I finished watching the documentary I read that Werner Herzog will be showing a movie at this year’s film festival…a retelling of Dieter Dengler’s story. I’ll be doing my damndest to see that.

Which reminds me…a while back I also watched Incident At Loch Ness (imdb | rotten tomatoes), another Herzog [ahem] documentary. It’s pretty entertaining.

.:.

TOist takes on the ugly yellow obelisk at the corner of Yonge & Bloor. I would have suggested that abandoned storefront on Bloor between Spadina and Bathurst next, but it seems to have found someone to love it again.

.:.

The US Government is moving to protect their interrogators from prosecution even if they’re found guilty of “humiliating or degrading wartime prisoners.” This isn’t surprising, given the kind of things I read about in this Esquire article or how you see Alberto Gonzales act in this Daily Show clip.

.:.

If this is true — or even close to true — then people are even dumber than I thought: 30 percent of them can’t remember what year the September 11 terrorist attacks took place.

[tags]little dieter needs to fly, werner herzog, rescue dawn, hudson bay obelisk, interrogation, prisoner abuse[/tags]

Creepy … crawly … creepy … crawly … creepycreepycrawlycrawly …

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Last night we decided to head (further) downtown for some shoppin’ and some eatin’ and a movie. We picked up a new backpack for me at MEC, had dinner and some new beer (both very good) at Smokeless Joe’s, and went to see The Descent (imdb | rotten tomatoes) at the Paramount theatre. Nellie and I were attracted to it by the good reviews it’s gotten to date, and by the reputation it’s garnered for being scary. We weren’t disappointed.

There were three parts: standard setup, claustrophobic tension and violent mayhem. It didn’t lapse into any silly horror movie clichés, nor into any female horror movie stereotypes (there were no major males characters). They used a few standard horror movie devices (e.g., panning shots as a person backs up toward a dark corner), but sparingly. All in all, I’d recommend it…if you’re ok with scary movies. Oh, and enclosed spaces; I don’t consider myself claustrophobic, but some of the scenes where they’re crawling through tiny passages made my freaking skin crawl.

Oh, and one final note: if you’re just going to talk with your two friends at cocktail-party volume throughout the entire film — as the trio of chattering assholes behind us did — do the rest of society a favour: wait for the DVD and watch it at home.

.:.

Then we came home and watched a schmaltzy, sappy, dorky movie…a Christmas movie, in fact: Noel (imdb | rotten tomatoes). I have no idea why, nor am I even sure why it was on our Zip list. Nellie thinks it was a film festival movie. In any case, avoid this one if you can.

[tags]descent movie, noel movie[/tags]

An evening of disappointments

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Disappointment #1: Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (imdb | rotten tomatoes). In retrospect I don’t even know why I wanted to see this. I think I was sucked in by the preview, with the shot of the Kraken tentacles enveloping a ship, but even those special effects — which were very good, as was Davey Jones’ head — couldn’t save this movie. It was scattered and nearly plotless, it was only funny once or twice and it dragged on forever. That was three hours of my life that I could’ve spent watching squirrels waterski or something.

Disappointment #2: again…I don’t know what I was thinking. We decided to go to 7 West after the movie, even though I swore I’d never go there again. It’s just so convenient, and the food’s ok…but the service is just unbelievably bad. It’s like they train their staff to be inattentive. Granted, the guy we had last night was new to the job, but I don’t know why they’d leave a newbie to cover a whole floor. Things were ok at first — we got a bottle of wine and split a plate of pasta — but it took him half an hour to bring us the bill and then return for it, both times only doing so because one of us signalled wildly from across the room. Then, when he finally returned, he’d forgotten to bring a pen.

Normally I’d give the guy a break; everyone has service like this once in a while. But this has happened nearly every time we’ve gone. We seem to keep forgetting, I guess. Must write note to self on back of hand: avoid 7 West.

Fortunuately we’d had a much better dining experience earlier in the day when T-Bone treated Nellie and I to lunch at Fieramosca. Not only is their food a cut above anything at 7 West, they treat you like old friends.

.:.

Great article by Robert Ouellette in Reading Toronto this morning titled The Real Cost Of Suburbia. They expand on an op/ed piece in the Globe about the consequences of low-density housing growth:

“I fume when the water bill for our downtown home comes in when I know the amount of water used is a tenth of the billed amount. Where does the rest of that money go? Well, let’s just say it costs a lot to water those suburban lawns and keep their backyard pools filled and run the storm sewers all the way down to the lake where their waste closes once pristine beaches. For once I’d like suburban dwellers to subsidize me.”

Ouellette raises a the related issue of gas prices, one I plan to touch on in the next few days (when studying down-time presents itself):

“Ironically, it might be gas prices that finally force the end to the disaster known as suburbs. $3 per litre gas anyone?”

[tags]pirates of the caribbean, 7 west, fieramosca, reading toronto, robert ouellette, suburbs[/tags]

UPDATED: ………Aaaaaaaaaaaand we're back

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So, that happened. Our power came back on around 4:30. Needless to say that was not the best night of sleep I’ve ever had.

Apparently it was just our street. More specifically, it was just our side of the street, in this particular block. Lucky us.

Anyway, no harm done. It stayed remarkably cool in the apartment, and we had little trouble sleeping. To the HydroOne guys who worked through the night in that insane heat: thankyouthankyouthankyou.

[tags]blackout (but not really)[/tags]