Honest Ed’s is a massive discount store at the corner of Bathurst and Bloor St. This year it will celebrate it’s 58th anniversary and will most likely still be around in another 42 years. You may ask, however, why have we classified it as a gift from Toronto? Could it be because here we can find the cheapest brand, type, colour of any neccessity imaginable? Or could it be because of the free meals and giveaways organized on a regular basis by the owner, Ed Mirvish? Or better yet maybe because it serves as proof that there are still local buisnesses doing exceedingly well and contributing to the local community despite multi-national corporate giants such as Wall-Mart.

In short Honest Ed’s is a definite must see.

You might also want to check out the information sheet on Honest Ed’s over on Wikipedia.

Room 101
A games series by Misha Glouberman At the Drake Hotel

1) Games You Play Sitting Down
2) Games You Play Standing Up
3) Games that arn’t like other games

I came across this interesting games club (sorta)while surfing squiddity. Basically people can just show up on game nights and play. Never knew there was something like this in Toronto. Sounds like fun.

Flight

The city is green, steepled and calm,
words strung like beads worn close
to the skin to count and recount and
the nearest we get to heaven today
is in seeing a distant osprey
lift its wings, prepare for passage,
bear all the weight of our imagining.

Charmaine Cadeau [As usual off the TO subway. I took the photograph from the Observatory at the Canada Life Building],

According to statistics the largest commercial seal hunt since 1956 took place this spring, killing 352,953 seals (The International Fund for Animal Welfare). “This year, the Canadian government allowed about 320,000 young seals to be killed on March 29 to “ensure the health” of a booming seal population.”( Orlando Buisness Journal ) Consequently many organizations all over the world decided to pressurize Canada into ending the seal hunt. One of their main strategies is boycotting seafood completely in the hope that fishermen will leave seals alone to ensure their livelihood dependant on fish doesnt suffer. There is also a boycott planned for Canadian seafood produtcs ( harpseals.org ). Apparently ex-beatle Paul Mccartney happens to be a major player in the seal protection campaign as well.

Now admitted, these harp seals are super cute. All white fluff and liquid eyes. Which is why I chose not to put up an image, since it was bound to digress from the main issue at hand. A couple of questions which I think need to be reflected upon and have been brought up by various people:

Pro-Boycott:
- If an animal is not required for food or clothing purposes etc. then is it right to kill it?
- Every orgasim has a right to live
- Bashing seals over the head is inhumane
- Planned genocide (pertaining to animals)

Those who think it’s frivolant:
- The cute factor seems to have taken over.
- Cats and dogs are put to sleep regularly to prevent their population from getting out of hand. How is this any different? Take for example the cancellation of the bear hunt in the North of Canada a couple of years back. Now the population seems to have gotten out of control and is threatening humans.
- Overpopulation of seals would have a drastic effect on the fishery industry. The seals would end up eating the majority of fish meant for human consumption.
- Wouldn’t Paul Mccartney be better off aiding “humans” in say Africa or Somalia instead of sitting in his million dollar mansion and hugging seals?

Confession: I happen to hate Japanese food. Or well majority of it. Sushi is completely bland and tasteless and tempura etc. make me feel a tad quesy. So it was with major apprehension that I went to this place and only agreed because it was a collegue’s last day at work. Gist being was better than I expected. Some of the people in my group ordered Teppanyaki (~ $10) which is a Japanese version of stirfry. In this place one of the chefs comes by and makes all teppanyaki dishes in front of you. They even make the egg fried rice in front of you. Lots of green garlic butter gets utilized.

I, thinking I was doing the safe thing, ordered Oyako-Don ($12) which is “chicken, onion & shitake mushroom stewed in sake with egg, served on a bed of rice”. Mine was minus the Sake or atleast hopefully since am not quite sure the server understood. This was ordered because the chap sitting on my right reccommended it. I seem to have sidestepped the fact that he was Korean which would come to haunt me later. Halfway through the meal he informed me they put a raw egg in what I was eating. And Im not talking about eggnog kinda raw egg where the egg gets cooked in boiling milk. Im talking about just dumping a raw egg on rice. Obviously my appetite went out the window.

However again thats me. The teppanyaki looked really good and it was a fun lunch. Again am quoting lunch prices but I think these Japanese places are usually fairly ok in the evenings too. I so wanted to do the sitting on the floor thing but the owner seemed to be into low black tables.

As usual my very quick synopsis. Nice decor. Great service, although I admit my soda did not come without ice as requested but considering it was a group of over 20, that can be forgiven. For that matter the soda also cost a hefty $2 but sort of expected at high-end restaurants. I ordered the Pesto Chicken Fusilli ($11) which was much better than I expected. Full of flavour. The servings seem small but were quite filling. Friends had various sandwiches which were huge. Apparently one of my friends tried a number of different things and felt the Blackened Steak Salad ($13) was the best. All in all, I think is a nice place to go if theres a formal occasion. Also do keep in mind I quoted lunch prices…

The Short Circuit 2 Award for Most Inept Disguising of Toronto: The Man

Although I suppose I should have expected it with Eugene Levy in it. On top of that the title for the award is a riot.