Author: Bill

First thing to do: sign the petition to stop the Highland Mega-Quarry. OK, done. Soupstock is a big, fun event to be held tomorrow in Woodbine Park. Its purpose is to raise opposition to a monster quarry that some U.S. hedge fund wants to dig into 2300 acres of prime Ontario countryside and farmland.
Soupstock should help bury the quarry for good. Hope the weather is fair.

Stop in if you’re near Greenwood and Gerrard. Danica and I did the other day and today I went back with my friend George for coffee and bannock.
What a nice surprise in every way! Surprising location… there’s nothing like it anywhere close by. Surprising value… a BIG ceramic mug of good, fresh coffee and a generous slice of bannock cut in two, with butter – two dollars! The bannock is delicious and comes in two kinds… traditional (made with lard) and vegetarian (made with oil and some raisins sprinkled in). BTW, the bannock is a kind of fresh bread, made with baking powder rather than yeast. I love the stuff and ordered extra on both visits. I like the vegetarian version best.
As you see in the photo, there’s excellent wi-fi for customers. The place is simple inside, but warm and inviting, made even more so by the people who work there. Danica and I plan is to go back for dinner. I’ll bet the baked trout is as good as the bannock. There’s an Indian taco I want to try too, and corn soup.
I guess I’d better have some tea one of these days, since it’s part of the diner’s name. I was glad to be able to get coffee, though. (Fair Trade coffee, incidentally)There’s a write-up in the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star features the video I am embedding here.

I always enjoy looking at those “then & now” photos they run in local newspapers, so I did one myself today. I had a reason.
Woodbine has just been freshly paved… you can see the pylons still there because the lines haven’t been painted yet. I wanted a record of the date because I’m curious about how long it will be before city crews tear holes into it and patch it with bumps and pits. What’s your guess? A matter of weeks? Months?
BTW.

Upbeat bystanders rooted for runners enthusiastically and marathoners dug deep into their reserves of courage and determination, but the strongest passions were in other lanes.

Yesterday we noticed that the decorative painting of buildings along Gerrard East is ongoing. The colours are beginning to get more shape and definition. It takes time… one artist on a cherry picker, working with aerosol cans, from what I could see.
I’m glad that what I saw earlier was not the finished job.

A bag lady in fashionable sunglasses poses on townhouse grounds where a lumberyard once stood. The fence screens off railway tracks. Carlaw is just on the other side.
We went looking for the base of two large smoke stacks that are prominent on the skyline around Carlaw and Gerrard Street East. When we lived in Riverdale a couple of decades ago, there were plenty of factories and industrial businesses in the area. Surely the smoke stacks belonged to one of them.

Today’s experiment with two shopping mall wi-fi hotspots gave close results. Home Depot slightly better, but good for both of you. Your wi-fi offerings say you want to make your stores pleasant, convenient places to shop.

How was Thanksgiving weekend at Colleen Cottage bed and breakfast, overlooking the Black Creek River in Prince Edward County? My guess is just lovely. Thanks for sharing photos, Kathleen. I picked the classic to show first but I love your Monet, too.

I think there are enough of these to warrant a post, don’t you?

• “Are you quite sure you want to eat that?”
• “Don’t worry, something will happen.”
• “I accept this gift in the true spirit of receiving.”

Tim Hortons has wi-fi and that’s a good thing. I measured the basic speed at 0.67 Mbps.
A few doors away, the public library’s wi-fi speed was a lot faster… 4.21 Mbps.
I know I won’t get a Nobel Prize for this, but I’ll keep working on it.