On Saturday night, I was heading to Smokeless Joe to catch up with my friends Liz and Keith when I saw the coolest upright bass ever. It belonged to the bassist of The Matadors, who performed at The Black Bull later that evening. I aksed if I could photograph his bass, and not only did he oblige, he even posed.
Alas, I’d already made arrangements to catch White Cowbell Oklahoma with Meryle at the same time The Matadors were playing, but I’ll have to catch these guys at some point.
Duuuuuuuude.
Sebastien “Seb’s Open Research” Paquet, one of Canada’s bright lights on the social software and blogging front, made his first visit to Accordion City (he even called it “Accordion City” in his email!) on Sunday, and invited a few local bloggers to come out for lunch on Monday. The attendees were:
We met for lunch at Cafe Diplomatico, in the heart of the Little Italy that occupies College Street West (we have a couple of Little Italies). Discussed in addition to blogging (which was to be expected) were the supposed rigor of academics, the upcoming election, censorship, Iran, search engines, the University of Waterloo and the glassy-eyed expressions of most of the other folks in the restaurant as they watched Italy playing the World Cup.
It was also the first time I’d met this group of bloggers, and I had great fun. Thanks for organizing this get-togerher, Seb! As for you locals — Hoder, Michael, Kaveh, Melanie — I’ll be sure to let you guys know about any upcoming GTABlogger gatherings.
I am just one of the buskers on Queen Street West,
a lovely stretch of trendy boutiques, electronics shops, off-beat
stores, bars and restautants, the CityTV/MuchMusic/Bravo/Space
television headquarters and street vendors. Another busker is Mysterion the Mind Reader, who performs feats of magic and mentalism for passers-by on the weekends. I occasionally provide backup music for his act (Meryle’s written about it).
He likes trying on my accordion, and I got took some photos. You can check them out the photo album or the slideshow.
Doesn’t he look like Jon Stewart’s evil younger brother?
If you’re in Accordion City this coming week, be advised that there are
not one, not two, but three Kickass Karaokes taking place!
The dates and locations are:
Gideon Strauss recently attended a concert held at a friend’s house. He writes:
I wrote in the comments that if I could get whomever it was who
borrowed my book on loft culture to return it to me, I’d be happy to
lend it to Summer. I also mentioned that I’d taken a number of pictures inside lofts and that I’d post a few.
It turns out that I can’t even remember who borrowed the book. I get
the sinking feeling that it’s in the clutches of my second-most-evil
ex-girlfriend, who now lives on the other side of the San Andreas
Fault. If this is the case, getting it back is a very unlikely
proposition. I’ll phone around and make sure; it might be in someone
else’s possession, in which case I can get it back.
In the meantime, I’ll post some photos that I’ve taken over the years at various parties that took place in people’s home-lofts.
This first series was taken at Etric Lyons’ place back in December 1999
when he threw a wine and cheese party to exhibit some photos he’d taken
that summer. This loft is a little more posh than most, but it should
still show off enough architectural and sociocultural characteristics
of the “typical” loft.
So here you go, Summer, the first series of loft photos. You can view either the photo album or the slideshow.
If you live in Accordion City (that’s Toronto, folks) and are a Crazy Go Nuts University
(that’s Queen’s University, folks) almnus (that’s a male graduate,
folks) or alumna (that’s a female graduate, folks), you might be
interested in an alumni (that’s plural for alumnus/alumna, folks)
social at the Lava Lounge
this Thursday. It starts at 9:00 p.m. and runs through the night. Be
sure to arrive reasonably early since Lava, being one of the more
popular destinations on a street that is itself a popular destination, tends to fill early.
I’ll be the guy with the accordion, the beer and the Queen’s Applied Science ’91 jacket.
Update: I mistakenly reported the party as being on Friday, but Jeff Kahl points out that June 10th is a Thursday. I just assumed that one throws street parties on Friday.
The neighbourhood in which Tucows is located [PDF
link] is called Liberty Village, named after the east-west Liberty
Street, which runs right through it. It is an industrial area that’s
largely been turned into an office area for the high-tech, design and
entertainment industries, some offbeat places to go (The Academy of Spherical Arts, Joe Rockhead’s, Liberty Cafe, and home to a number of Toronto’s quirkier citizens (including Cory Doctorow,
who used to live in a large
Disney-meets-tiki-lounge-meets-bookworm-themed warehouse
space near the bottom of Fraser Street).
This Thursday, the L:iberty Village BIA (Business Improvement
Association) is hosting a street party called Give Me Liberty. There
are posters for this event all over the neighbourhood promising three
of the things I like most: “Cold Beer. Hot Food. Cool Music.” The fun
starts at 3:00 p.m. and runs until 9:00.
Here’s what the poster looks like — click it to see their site:
I’ll see if I can’t find out more — I’ll bet that Matt and Brenda from down the street know something about this.