December 2011
8 posts
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When you tweet this New Year's Eve, use the...
It’s the holidays. Some people are going to be idiots and drive drunk. Since 1977, police across Ontario have been trying to stop them by running spot checks as part of the Reduce Impaired Driving Everywhere, or RIDE, program—which aims to not only catch drunk drivers, but deter them altogether. The police don’t make the locations of those spot checks public, for obvious reasons: doing...
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This week: hexes, murals, and menches
In The Grid:
The Grid’s year-end cover story is the fifty people who made Toronto better in 2011, but it’s you—you!—whose vote will decide the winner. (Ensuring you have your say in this defining moment of civic engagement is my department.) *
Is the former home of Igor Kenk’s Bicycle Clinic—927 Queen West—cursed? No. But now that it’s just been sold again, maybe it...
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This week: the Cameron House, my 'hood, and...
In The Grid:
The Cameron House has finally got its two new murals up, and they look great. I wrote about how the Queen West tavern started the tradition of painting new murals every few years—and how the new pieces on its east and south sides harken back to the beginning.*
…speaking of which, I’m looking for photos of the Cameron House’s façade over the years, especially throughout...
Why my neighbourhood needs something more, and why...
A few months ago, I started mapping where Toronto’s residents’ associations were. The map’s not yet complete, but if you go a little west of downtown, you’ll see there’s a chunk of land sandwiched between the Roncesvalles-Macdonell Residents’ Association, the Parkdale Residents Association, the Queen-Beaconsfield Residents’ Association, the Brockton...
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The last two weeks: Playboy, strip clubs, and bike...
Now that I’ve landed a gig, these weekly things are going to have to be a little simpler. The best way to stay up on what I’m up to is still following me on Twitter.
In The Grid:
After Jenna Morrison was killed by a truck while riding her bike at Dundas West and Sterling, a ghost bike was chained to the stop sign beside where she died. Last Tuesday, that ghost bike was taken...
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That time Sue-Ann Levy and I argued about Playboy
I wrote something for The Grid today, about how the Toronto Sun and Sun columnist Sue-Ann Levy are in the wrong for criticizing the Toronto Public Library for having exactly one microfilm subscription to Playboy. One of the reasons: that taxpayers pay $278 a year for the single subscription to the men’s magazine, but more than $21,000 a year for 78 Sun subscriptions—scantily clad...
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What Toronto used to look like really, really...
Throughout 2009, Google sent its fleet of horrifying panopticon machines sedans all around this city to assemble the imagery that’d make up Google Street View. Two years later, though, some of what was shot has already changed dramatically.
Here’s The Big Bop at Queen and Bathurst, before scaffolding scarfed it up:
Here’s Queen West and Dufferin, before the Dufferin...
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Here’s a good thing! I’m The Grid’s newest associate editor. I’ll be writing lots, as well as working with both the print and digital sides of the weekly city magazine to make cool stuff that people will like a lot, I hope. I am very, very happy about this.