I spent last summer in Montreal trying desperately to stay focused on completing my thesis. Every day I would be confronted with some terribly tempting cultural event that would pit dedication to the work against fun in the city. (I could stay a few more hours at the library today. Orrrrr I could go see a tipsy Rachid Taha trip over his mic cord at the Jazz Fest. Hmmm. A toss up. —Not!)

Montreal as we know is a premiere summer city - festival after festival, week after week, from the Jazz Fest to Just for Laughs. Best of all, it’s mostly free and it’s mostly outdoors. It’s truly amazing anyone gets anything done from June to September.

Though I hope to make a trip back to Montreal sometime this season, I have to say that summer in Toronto is nothing to sneeze at. My mental calendar is already filling up with ideas of wonderful things to see and do in the months of sweltering heat that await. Here are some summer venues and upcoming events worth getting excited about.

MAY

• Doors Open Toronto | May 24 & 25
• Toronto the Good | May 27
• Film Jam 9 | May 30
• More than Just a Yardage Sale | May 30 & 31

JUNE

• Luminato - Toronto Festival of Arts & Creativity | June 6-15
• Toronto Small Press Book Fair | June 7
• North By Northeast Music and Film Festival & Conference | June 12-15
• Pride Week | June 20-29
• Annual Cacti and Succulent Show | June 28 & 29

JULY

• The Fringe - Toronto’s Theatre Festival | July 2-13
• Beaches Jazz Fest | July 18-27
• Romeo & Juliet (Driftwood Theatre Group) | July 29-31

AUGUST

• Irie Music Festival | August 1-4
• Caribana Parade | August 2
• Taste of the Danforth | August 8-11
• The Ex | August 15-September 1

SUMMERLONG

• Canada’s Wonderland | May 4-September 1
• PS Kensington | last Sunday of the month May through October, begins May 25
• Dream in High Park | June 24-August 31
• Harbourfront World Routes Festival | Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from June-September, begins June 27
• Toronto Islands

There are many more of course - feel free to add!

Our new recycling bin was delivered today. It’s a large (for the three households/units of our house). What a monster! Dragging the thing up the stairs when it’s empty is hard enough. Nevermind when it’s full of newspapers and glass bottles. Looks like our old bins will still have their use: as intermediaries allowing us to carry recycling down the stairs in decent non-back breaking bundles before transferring everything to the behemoth. Bleh.

Nifty wheels, though.

• Information on the New Garbage and Blue Bin program

All of this lovely sun over the past week or so has duped many a bud in the city into blossoming a fortnight early. Since our “garden” consists of an itty bitty pile of soil tossed in a corner and our household consists of one far-from-green thumb and one indoor plant enthusiast, here spring has sprung in a different way.

Late last week, we gained five new leafy, trunky, bulbous, or petal-bearing pals, bringing our total to 15 or thereabouts.

The current inventory of domestic flora is as follows:

• Tropical Monstrosity (referred to as such for excellent reasons - however surely lovely for a pretend day at the beach, piña coladas not included)
• Actually rather endearing Umbrella Tree
• Cute Little Fat House Plant in Funky Vase
• Bathroom tulips (still shy and tucked away) in sleek silver holder
• Kitchen tulips
• Vines/hanging plants (x2)
• Single white orchid (tall and lovely, behind kitchen sink)
• Three fuzzy aloe type things
• Small red and yellow leafy potted plant
• Other leafy green house plant
• Thin-leaved excited potted plant
• Mini rubber plant
• Mini wannabe Christmas tree (out-of-doors)

*Note: May not be actual scientific names.

With all the sun and all this green (minus the thumbs), it might not be May yet, but it sure feels like it.

• Scenario #1: You suspect that your partner doesn’t love dogs like he says he does. You need a subtle way to broach the issue. Randomly asking, “Would $50,000 be enough money to induce you to take a loyal, healthy pet to the vet to be put to sleep?” won’t do.
• Scenario #2: You forgot to study for your anatomy test - a dissection on a small mammal. You need a last-minute cram session.
• Scenario #3: You left home without this essential item.
• Scenario #4: You’re bored, and you crave poutine.

The above situations are common. We’ve all been there. And we’ve all been searching for ways to overcome.

The answer is board games. At a pub.

Below, brief reviews of several joints well-equipped to come to the rescue, and a list of their excellent game offerings—from Scruples, to Operation, to Backgammon and everything in between.

The Bishop and the Belcher | corner of Church Street & Hayden (175 Bloor Street East)

The Bishop and the Belcher is a popular spot located on Church Street just steps south of Bloor. Come 6 p.m. on a weekday, it’s bustling with businessfolk winding down in gregarious groups of three or more. It’s a large venue too, the kind of place that a party of 10 could go relatively unnoticed.

A variety of new and vintage editions of classic board games are available for the picking. How long has it been since you’ve played Jenga (’Jumbling Towers’)? Connect 4? Trouble? Things could get pretty silly. (Or if you think you’re too mature for those, every table has its own deck of Trivial Pursuit cards.)

On offer:

• Backgammon
• Battleship
• Boggle
• Clue
• Connect 4
• Identity Crisis?
• Jumbling Tower
• Mastermind
• Monopoly
• Operation
• Scrabble
• Scruples
• Trivial Pursuit Genus IV
• Trouble
• UNO
• Yahtzee

Clinton’s | 693 Bloor Street West

The first sight you see upon walking into Clinton’s (right after the row of regulars at the bar) is a bookshelf holding two dozen board games. Among them are the classics (Scrabble, Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit) as well as the retro favourites like the Game of Life and Mastermind, their original 1960s and 1970s boxes showing some healthy wear and tear. Then there’s the random games that have been all but forgotten. Parker Bros.’ Probe (1964) is hailed not immodestly in the instruction booklet as “the most provocative game of words since the invention of the modern alphabet.” (Makes you wonder why it’s not Probulous making waves on Facebook.)

Just add friends and a couple of pints.

On offer:

• All the Answers
• Flinch
• In Pursuit
• Life
• Mastermind
• Monopoly
• Probe
• Rummy-O
• Scrabble
• Scruples
• Sorry!
• Super Quiz
• Therapy - The Game
• Trivia Challenge
• Trivial Pursuit
• Trivial Pursuit - The Vintage Years
• Trivial Pursuit - Genus III
• Trivial Pursuit - Genus V (Canadian Edition)
• Twenty Questions
• Urban Myth
• Whatzit? The Game of Fractured Phrase
• Wheel of Fortune
• Win, Lose or Draw

The Old Nick | 123 Danforth Avenue

The Old Nick has a very solid collection of games, with as many new ones (Sex and the City Trivia Game, Cranium) as older ones (Monopoly, Risk). It’s also the only pub I know of where you can get a “Greek Chicken Burger”– your classic burger, garnished with tzatiki, feta, and roasted red pepper.

Highly recommended. The cozy alcove in the back of the bar, right underneath the dartboard, is where they keep the goods.

On offer:

• All in the Family Game
• Baffles: Intriguing Game of Words
• Balderdash
• The Beatles Trivia Deck
• Careers
• Checkers
• Cranium
• Cribbage
• Divor¢e
• Dominos
• Kensington
• Mille Bornes
• Moneywise
• Monopoly
• Outburst
• Pick-up Sticks
• Pictionary
• Ratrace: Madcap Game of Social Climbing
• Risk
• Scrabble
• Sex and the City Trivia Game
• Trivial Pursuit
• Trivial Pursuit DVD Pop Culture 2
• Trivial Pursuit Genus III
• Yahtzee

C’est What | 67 Front Street

Slimmer pickings than elsewhere — but hey, there’s always pool.

On offer:

• Chess
• Cribbage
• Scrabble
• Trivial Pursuit

Drake Hotel | 1150 Queen Street West

And what if none of your friends are as enthusiastic about board games as you are? Room 101 Games was started a couple of years ago to bring together strangers in Sunday evening board game and Charades gatherings. Drake Hotel played host.

The Room 101 Website describes how this all went down. I’m not sure if this is still ongoing. I joined the mailing list a few weeks back, but so far no news.

• Balade à Toronto (Jean Leloup)

• Crabbuckit (k-os)

• This Lamb Sells Condos (Final Fantasy)

• Old Apartment (Barenaked Ladies)

• Spadina Bus (Shuffle Demons)

• Welcome to Toronto (Kardinall Offishall)

The February 21 front page of the Toronto Star had some arresting images of the fire that all but razed a full quarter of the 600 block of Queen West between Bathurst and Spadina this past Wednesday. I think what got me even more though, was the language in a sidebar describing the damage sustained by each affected business: from “water damage,” to “gutted,” to “collapsed”. There’s something about the word “gutted” that’s especially heartwrenching.

Made a point of passing by the scene of the fire yesterday afternoon. Four and a half days after it broke out, the flames have been extinguished and demolition has begun. The area remains blocked to traffic and yellow “Fire Line — Do Not Cross” tape still sections off a vast portion of the street. My curiosity and need to see these ruins in person turned out to be far from unique: dozens of people and their cameras took a moment this weekend to gape at what remains of the strip of Queen West framed by Pizzaiolio and Organized by Design.

Gutted really is the right word for the state of many of these structures. What’s left of them is just a shell, if that. The former buildings’ insides and outsides are spewed on the sidewalk and street in chunks and shards.

The most incongruous thing in all this mess is the presence of a small rack of relatively undisturbed clothing in what used to be the back of preloved. About ten ‘nouveau vintage’ sweaters are just hanging there in a tidy row. Lightly sprinkled with ash, perhaps; maybe a few frozen threads, but essentially fine— probably still with the price tags on. There’s something ostentatious about the intactness of the stuff. If those sweaters were people, they’d be naive, oblivious, blissfully unaware of everything that has crumbled around them.

But there’s beauty here too (well captured by the Star and countless citizen photographers). Elegant icicles hang from charred bits of structure; what used to be walls or doors and are now pieces of brick, wood and glass fall into interesting arrangements… the odd office chair is visible under the rubble, turned on its side. The scene, moved indoors, could be an installation at the Power Plant. Only it’s a lost slice of T dot (not to mention a few homes and livelihoods). It will be interesting to see what pops up in the next couple of years in this spot, and to follow the displaced businesses to their new homes.

(Image: preloved.ca)

• Duke’s Cycle
• Suspect Video
• CBC.ca story on the fires
• CBC.ca photo gallery
• Toronto Star coverage
• Some Flickr images

Cheek’s
1205 Queen Street West, c. 1990

At the corner of Queen & Dufferin, where the Dufferin bus stops after passing under the CN Railway bridge en route to the Exhibition, there’s a small commercial plaza. Its tenants are a motley crew that includes QD Computer, Queen St. Pharmacy and Comesee New & Used Restaurant Equipment.

I hate to be negative, but these guys may not want to hold their breath. Over the years, turnover at the plaza has been unusually high, as one off-beat assemblage of businesses and organizations has given way, property by property, to another. Some corners seem cursed that way.

As a kid, my school bus used to drop me off at my mom’s work, which has moved twice in the past decade and a half, but has always been located within walking distance of the plaza. At its easternmost end, now the site of a beauty salon called Jane’s Hair, there used to be the most amazing fast food joint, Cheek’s.

Cheek’s had an incredible BLT, the likes of which I have never tasted in the 15+ years since the burger joint graced one side of the plaza. If my memory serves me well, it was served on a hamburger bun, with generous mayonnaise and Canadian bacon, and they would wrap it up in foil to go.

A Google search reveals there’s a Cheek’s Homemade Burgers & Good Eats in Bolton, Ontario. Could it be the legendary BLT lives on north of the 401?

Dark City
307 Danforth Avenue, c. 1995

If Cheek’s BLTs bring me back to when I was 8 or 9, Dark City, an east-end café no longer in business, reminds me of the beginning of my high school years. Around this time, the Toronto Star was proclaiming coffee houses “the nightclubs of the ’90s.” Key difference: these nightclubs didn’t ID.

Located on the Danforth, steps from Chester subway station and walking distance from one of my best friends’ home at the time, Dark City quickly became a regular hangout. Our first ventures there came out of tagging along with her older brother who was 17 or 18 to our 13-14. But it soon became the spot we’d go just us two to discuss ’serious’ matters and plot summer travels (some plans actually materialized in later years!). I don’t think I ever ordered coffee here, as this was some time before I drank the stuff—we favoured Italian sodas and maybe the odd hot chocolate, although we did get hooked on the chocolate-covered espresso beans.

Looks like Dark City is still roasting coffee, but to my knowledge, it has been a while since the company has been in the business of serving it directly to customers. At the site of the former Dark City one now finds 7 Numbers, an Italian restaurant. My old friend tells me they serve a lovely Valentine’s Day special at a very decent price.

Ted’s Wrecking Yard
549 College Street, c. 2000

Midway through high school, I started volunteering at North By Northeast (NXNE). I couldn’t work at the clubs yet, but I helped out on the conference side of the annual indie music festival. It was through NXNE that I became acquainted with a few bands on the Toronto circuit. My favourite of these was zoebliss.

zoebliss (since reconfigured as madviolet) played at numerous clubs around town like Lee’s Palace, C’est What, The Rivoli, The Reverb and Ted’s Wrecking Yard, and I made it out to as many shows as I could. I wasn’t of age, and could never get into Lee’s. They had a stringent ID-checking policy born of an incident during which the bar was closed down for several days for serving minors. But a few other venues, including Ted’s, seemed more or less immune to such concerns. I normally had no problem getting in. I’d pay cover, order my Coke or Shirley Temple and no one asked any questions. Memorable performances I saw at Ted’s over the years include shows by Martina Sorbara (now of Dragonette), Lindy and Australians The Waifs. Fittingly, Ted’s is where I celebrated my 19th birthday. At midnight, I ordered my first round ever of B52s.

Ted’s was above Barcode, another bar dear to Torontonians. In late 2001, Chart magazine was among those to report that both bars would likely be closing down—the doors were padlocked and some shows slated to occur there had been cancelled.

For several years there was talk of the creation of a resto-lounge/boutique hotel concept at this site, to be called The Inn on College. Originally set to be opened in the fall of 2003, it’s my understanding that as of 2005, the project had still not come to fruition. If it ever materialized it didn’t last long. I passed by 549 College earlier today; a large “For Lease” sign appears in the downstairs window.

Uptown Theatre
764 Yonge Street, c. 2000

I was out of the country in 2003 when I first heard that the Uptown Theatre had collapsed, killing one person and injuring several others. It didn’t seem possible that a fixture of the downtown could have become embroiled in such a tragedy. Already the fact that it was being demolished seemed odd.

The Uptown was not just a public landmark, but a personal one I remember from the earliest age; it was located around the corner from the first building I lived in when I was born. I remember the main theatre in particular. It sat 1,000 people. Seeing a movie there felt like an event. Along with the Backstage Theatre on Balmuto Street and the Plaza Theatre in the Hudson’s Bay Centre (both of which closed in 2001), I must have watched dozens of films there over the years.

In 2001, Famous Players (which owned the Uptown) confronted legislation requiring that the historic facility be made wheelchair accessible. Sadly, the company opted to have the theatre teared down rather than invest the estimated $700,000 in renovations that would have been needed. To put the decision into perspective, this all happened at the height of mega multiplex fever; it must have seemed a lot of cash to spend on the three-theatre Uptown.

Of course, ultimately, a lot more than $700,000 is being spent in connection with the new project which has arisen on the site of the demolished theatre: luxury condominiums still under construction. What was once the entrance to the Uptown now houses a Sales & Presentation Centre for the condos.

• Brief History of the Uptown Theatre
• Some pictures of the Uptown’s final moments
• The Uptown Residences

The streets of my neighbourhood are dotted with Christmas trees tonight—tomorrow morning is the last day the City picks up those final green remnants of holiday cheer. It’s one way to mark the end of the season.

The holidays were short, but lovely. A few highlights, expressed in weblinks:

• A “Christmas Basket Party” in support of the Parkdale Parents Primary Prevention Project
• Playing “Thieving Santa” at the office Christmas party. Got a fabulous and festive CD (100% CanCon!): The Gospel Christmas Project
• The Festival of Lights in Kensington Market
• Montreal comes to visit: Cameron House, Ronnie’s, La Hacienda, Fresh on Spadina
• Mini high school reunion at Victory Café
• Dirty Dancing at the Royal Alexandra Theatre
  
• Enchanted
• Midnight Mass
• Mom’s favourite: Almond Roca.
• 32nd Annual Christmas Treats Walk at the Toronto Zoo. (Narrowly escaping death?)
• Celebrating New Year’s at a ’smelly condo’: in the absence of Cranium, making our own mad-libs inspired game out of red and green construction paper; watching the 100th anniversary of the ball dropping in Times Square
• Afternoon tea at the Royal York Hotel

The end of 2007 has me in the midst of an off-season “Spring Clean”. Thus far the archaeological dig of six years worth of stuff has uncovered: To-Do lists, receipts, foreign currency, programs, pamphlets, bits of hardware from a long-lost lamp, class notes and handouts, coursepacks and postcards.

In the spirit of revisiting the archives, I thought I would take advantage of my new scanner and share a few shots taken over the past six years. I don’t know yet if I’ll do another installment of thematically grouped photos, but this one at least, brings together pictures of permanent marker scrawls—words of protest for the most part—taken in T.O. and in a few other North American cities.

(And while we’re on the subject, Montreal-based Urbanphoto.net has an amazing collection of photographs of signage, graffiti and much more from cities around the world.)

“Shoot film, not heroin”– Vancouver, B.C., August 2003.

“Feminism is the radical notion that womyn are people”–TTC, Toronto, c. 2001.

“Osez vivre sans…” (Dare to live without…)–Montreal, QC, c. 2001.

“Resist, resist, with your bodies & your fist/Gender rules are not defined/Don’t let this ad pollute your mind”– College & Bathurst, Toronto, c. 2001.

“Don’t let an ad tell you what your body should look like/ This woman’s body is beautiful”– Queen’s Quay & Bathurst, Toronto, c. 2001.

“Defend America: Eat Bush”–Ann Arbor, MI, August 2006. This is the odd one out– it’s not a permanent marker scrawl, and the original message is extended rather than admonished. Still, it’s so great that it could hardly be excluded on those grounds alone…