I’m at the Science 2.0 conference today, the conference for scientists and what they need to know about how software and the web is changing the way they work. In honour of the conference, here’s a comic about one of the problems of space travel:
Category: Toronto (a.k.a. Accordion City)
…which means that if it’s ratified on Wednesday, the strike will well and truly be over. If that happens, garbage collection and other services provided by the people represented by CUPE Locals 416 and 79 could theoretically be back by Thursday. For reasons unknown and unfathomable to me, it has been said that services could take days or weeks to resume.
Are you looking for “Juan de la Cruz”? Let us help you!
“Juan de la Cruz” is a symbolic name used to refer to the Filipino in general. The closest North American equivalents are names like “John Doe”, “John Q. Public”, “Joe Schmoe” or “Joe Blow”. According to Wikipedia, the term was coined by Robert McCulloch Dick, a Scottish-born journalist working for the Manila Times in the early 1900s after discovering that it was the most common name in blotters. “Juan de la Cruz” is often used as a term to refer to the collective Filipino psyche.
The Filipino Centre Toronto is hosting a series of Heritage Workshops starting in September. They’re doing this in response to the growing need among Filipino youth in their search for cultural identity. It’s an expansion of the Tagalog and Homework club classes that the Centre has been offering over the past few years.
This fall, the Centre will be holding eight Saturday workshops on various aspects of Filipino culture for young adults between the ages of 18 and 25. They’re aiming to reach college and university students, who have told them that they wanted to learn more about their culture. Through these workshops, they hope to help young Filipino adults in their search for their Filipino identity and what it means within the context of the Canadian society and environment.
The workshops will cover a number of topics, including:
- Filipinos in Canada
- Our cultural roots
- Social and family values
- The arts: visual, performing, literary and culinary
- Filipino cinema and popular culture
Other related topics will be covered based on participant interest.
If you’d like to participate in this program, please contact the Filipino Centre Toronto by September 1st. You can register by calling the Centre at (416) 928-9335 or by emailing the program coordinators:
An Annex institution is no more. Mel’s Montreal Delicatessen, a late night spot on Bloor both loved and reviled by residents of this city, has closed its doors. Or rather, had its doors locked by the landlord after reportedly failing to pay rent that was months in arrears.
It started so full of promise and slid into a miasma of laziness, rudeness, incompetence and debt (rather like my deadbeat ex-housemate, now that I think of it). When it opened ten years ago in Pizzadelic’s old location, the food and service were decent; over the years, it became the Amy Winehouse of restaurants: looking bad for its age, barely functioning, somehow clinging to life after all the self-inflicted harm and willing to let just about anyone work in it.
Out of respect for the city of Montreal, that “Taste of Montreal” sign should be taken down as quickly as possible. Montreal doesn’t taste like failure.
I gave up on Mel’s after a streak of incredibly bad service ending with a visit where Wendy, Dave and I sat in their empty restaurant for ten minutes, in full view of the staff, without even being approached. They were lost in their own world, and as I wrote in a blog entry back in 2006, “I’ve seen bathroom mould with more ambition.”
I wonder what will open in its place.
Whether you’re part of the local tech community or a visitor from out of town who’s come in for the FutureRuby conference, you’re invited to the Developer Lunch taking place today at noon at Sky Dragon restaurant in Dragon City Mall.
This is going to be the 14th developer lunch organized by local developer and video-chronicler of local geekdom, Kristan “Krispy” Uccello. They’re not formal at all – there’s no agenda, set discussion topic or presentations – it’s just people who like writing software or who aspire to write software getting together to enjoy a nice dim sum lunch.
The lunch takes place at Sky Dragon restaurant, which is at the top floor of Dragon City shopping mall, which in turn is at the southwest corner of Dundas and Spadina. If you’re a FutureRuby attendee from out of town, that’s a five-minute walk from the conference hotel.
For those of you not familiar with Chinatown, here’s what Dragon City Mall looks like:
Use the elevator or stairs in the circular tower part of the building to go to the mall’s top floor, which is where the restaurant is located. We expect that we’ll be a big crowd, so they might put us in one of the private rooms in the back – if you don’t see a bunch of geeks in the restaurant, ask the waitstaff for the large group of computer programmers and they’ll lead you to us.
It’s dim sum, which means the food will be tasty, cheap and plentiful. Everybody pitches in equally towards the final bill and it’s typically $12/person including tip.
See you at noon!
Last year, for RubyFringe – the offbeat conference for Ruby programmers hosted by the local Ruby heroes at Unspace – I wrote a series of articles about Toronto for people who were coming to the conference from out of town. In the series, I pointed out places of interest near the conference hotel (the Metropolitan downtown) and little tidbits of information that might be useful to an out-of-towner.
This year, Unspace is holding another conference for Ruby programmers. This time, it’s going by the name FutureRuby and once again, I’m posting a series of articles that collectively will make a quick little Baedeker about Toronto for the non-locals attending the conference. My hope is that even people who’ve live in this city all their lives will find it useful and entertaining.
Upon arriving in Toronto, you may notice a certain funk hanging in the air. The strength of said funk will vary from block to block and will come from one of two probable sources.
Probable Source Number One: Gene Simmons’ Man-Musk
The first probable source of the smell lingering around town is Gene Simmons. Yes, that Gene Simmons. Gene has bedded many women:
- His current long-term partner, Playboy Playmate Shannon Tweed
- The woman with whom he cheated on Shannon in that video that popped up on the internet last year
- Former live-in partners Cher and Diana Ross
- “Over a thousand women”, if his interview on NPR is to be believed
While his Rock God status helped him land the ladies, I believe that what really draws them in his the musky aroma he exudes.
Gene will be in town on the FutureRuby weekend in his capacity as Grand Marshall for the Honda Indy, which will take place around the Canadian National Exhibition, a short drive west of the conference hotel. An event featuring fast-moving, big, throbbing machines needs a grand marshall to match, and who could fill the role better than he?
The Honda Indy will run from Friday, July 10th through Sunday July 12th, and it might affect you in the following ways:
- You may be exposed to Gene Simmons’ man-musk.
- It may take longer than usual for you to get downtown if you’re flying in from Toronto’s main airport, Pearson International Airport, on Friday. Lakeshore Boulevard, one of the major roads leading into town from the west, will be used as part of the Indy track and will be closed.
- You will hear the echoes of race car engines all weekend. It’ll be a constant hum in the background during the day – not too annoying, but I thought you might want to know what that sound was.
Probable Source Number Two: The Garbage Strike!
The even more probable source of the smell is the garbage. As of today, Friday, July 3rd, the strike by Toronto’s municipal workers is in its 11th day. It affects a number of services, including Parks and Recreation, services at City Hall and garbage collection. There little to no smell downtown, but as you go to neighbourhoods where food makes the lion’s share of the trash, such as Kensington Market (where Sunday’s post-FutureRuby party is taking place), it sometimes gets a little ripe.
If the strike goes on for another week and into FutureRuby:
- Consider yourself warned about some potential stink.
- If you’re from out of town, walking around the city and have some trash, please don’t litter or stuff it into our Saran-wrapped garbage cans; hang onto it and dispose of it at your hotel.
How Will I Get to FailCamp if the Ferries aren’t Running?
FailCamp, one of the events associated with FutureRuby, takes place on the Toronto Islands (Queen City Yacht Club on Algonquin Island, to be precise). The problem is that the island ferries are run by the striking city workers and are out of commission.
Worry not – Queen City Yacht Club has provided the use of the Algonquin II, a launch that can shuttle almost 50 people back and forth between Toronto Harbour and FailCamp.
If you were at last year’s FailCamp, you might remember the best story of FAIL of the evening, which involved warming up some “body lube” in the microwave oven for a little too long, after which hilarity ensued.
Here’s how Amy Hoy and Thomas Fuchs, the originators of FailCamp, describe their vision of the event:
We believe that it’s time to give our personal fail some tough love and talk it out over beer!
Join us for a brief, rousing introduction followed by camaraderie, beer, and show-and-tell. We’ll present a little about failure through the ages, mining your personal suck, maybe some science, pithy quotes from people you may or may not respect, and share some failure stories of our own.
Then it’ll be your turn. If all goes to plan, you may even win in our friendly “race to the bottom” for the most public, most expensive, or most ridiculous Story of Fail.
FailCamp returns next Thursday, July 9th and once again, it’s the warm-up act for Unspace’s Ruby programmer conference (going by the name “FutureRuby” this year), which takes place on the weekend of July 10th through 12th. Just like last year, FailCamp will once again provide a forum for you to share your greatest and most pathetic stories of FAIL, and hopefully how that failure taught you some important lessons and made you a better, wiser, more-careful-with-the-lube person.
Me, presenting at last year’s FailCamp.
Once again, I will be hosting FailCamp. I’ll start the evening with a couple of stories of failure, including a couple of Keyboard Cat-worthy ones of my own, after which I’ll open up the floor to you, the audience, to share your own stories of FAIL. Once we’re all thoroughly embarrassed, DJ Barbi will spin the wheels of steel and we’ll dance our shame away.
There are some tickets left as of this writing:
- For FutureRuby attendees, there are 4 free tickets to FailCamp remaining.
- For those of you who are not attending FutureRuby but would like to catch FailCamp, there are 19 “Pay What You Can” tickets left.
If you want ‘em, go to the FailCamp registration page and get them before they disappear!
My one-slide summary of how things went terribly wrong in the movie Deliverance
(The link leads to the “Squeal like a pig” scene from the movie – you might not want to watch at work).
FailCamp will take place at the Queen City Yacht Club on the Toronto Islands (Algonquin Island, to be precise). Your printed ticket stub is good for a free ferry ride from the Toronto docks to the Yacht Club, where we’ll have some finger food, the Yacht club’s kitchen and cash bar will be open, and the evening should be full of surprises.
What better way to close an article about FailCamp than the Keyboard Cat video starring “Pinky, Pet of the Week”?