November 22, 2009
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Ingemar and Me

We visited Ikea last week and decided to buy a pair of storage cabinets that go together end to end to form one long cabinet. The whole business together is about 8 feet long and maybe 20 inches high. The idea is that this is fastened to the wall (look Ma no legs). This is accomplished by attaching to the wall at six separate points along the eight feet.

After assembling the unit, we placed it and I set to work drilling and anchoring. The screws had to go in specific spots in the unit and the unit had to go in a specific spot in the room. Now you might expect that with 6 opportunities, I would hit at least one stud, right? Har! No way. No problem. I got these plastic super-duper anchors that go through the drywall then open up behind it. Each one was good for 80 pounds. There were 6 of them, so I should be good for 480 pounds right? Right. So I positioned the unit and put in the anchors and screwed the whole business into the wall. It looked great.

Tuffy P put our little orchid collection up on it and I was pretty happy. That was before it crashed to the ground with great vengeance, smashing the orchid containers along the way.

Today I cut out a section of drywall big enough to screw a piece of strapping into the studs, then screwed the unit into the strapping. The house will fall down before the unit does. Obviously I should have done this in the first place. C’est la vie.

November 21, 2009
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Where life is…visions of the city

Let’s start with poet Charles Bukowski.
Remember Petula Clark?  Listen to the rhythm of a gentle bossa nova.
You can take the Downtown Train, or stay In the Neighborhood.
I’m going to Kansas City. Then I’m Walkin’ to New Orleans.
Anchored down in Anchorage.

What’s your favourite song about the city?

November 20, 2009
comments 11

Comfort Food

I think everybody has a favourite comfort food. What’s yours?

Growing up, mine was always my mom’s meatloaf. Any old meatloaf didn’t do it for me. It was this particular meatloaf. Naturally, I learned how to make it. It isn’t something I make very often, but every once in a while, maybe once a year, I’ll do one up. Last time, I added a twist – I cooked it out back on the bbq, adding a perfect smoky edge to it.

Here’s the way you make it….

Chop an onion and a green pepper, fine.
Add it to equal amounts of ground beef and ground pork.
Add a generous handful of breadcrumbs.
Add an egg.
Toss in a generous amount of dried basil and thyme and then some salt and pepper.
Squish it around in the bowl with your hands until everything is mixed together well.
Form it into one big or two smaller loaves. Mom always did hers in yellow rectangular glass baking pans.
Cover the top of the loaves with strips of bacon, so that the top is totally covered.
Be sure there is room between the sides of the loaves and the sides of the pan.
Now you have to brush the top of the loaves with the secret ingredient. Don’t tell anybody. It’s Heinz Chili Sauce. There is no substitute. I don’t have any other use for Heinz Chili Sauce, but it’s what makes this “Mom’s Meatloaf”.
Bake in the oven (or the bbq!) at about 350F for about an hour (depending on the size of your loaves…smaller ones could take only 45 minutes.

Serve hot for dinner… but be sure to save some for sandwiches next day, on crusty kaiser buns.

As you know, I’m on the train, shedding pounds…so I’m not going to enjoy this for a while. Consider it a little food fantasy. I’ll post this also on Dinner at the Anchovy’s for future reference.

November 19, 2009
comments 5

Bill introduced to repeal pit bull ban

New Democrat Cheri DiNovo said the government’s ban on the dogs has had “no real impact” on public safety and should be repealed.

“It’s the deed not the breed,” Ms. DiNovo said Wednesday at Queen’s Park where several dozen pit bull owners gathered for a rally. “It’s not the breed of the dog that causes a dangerous dog.”

The intent of the legislation was to protect Ontarians from a perceived threat from dangerous dogs. There are a lot of people lined up against that legislation, and NDP MPP Cheri DiNovo has introduced a private members bill to trash it. Those who want to keep the ban in place will argue that pit bulls are dogs bred for fighting, and have the tools to do a lot of nasty damage. On the other side, many people argue that these dogs can make fine pets, are good with children and so on.

One thing that is sure in my little brain is that outside of any argument about the inherent qualities of the breed, the larger problem is a population of morons who want these dogs for fighting, or to help them act tough, or to be extensions of their oh so small and limp members. I guess it’s easier to ban a breed of dogs than it is to ban a moron though.

Some people argue in the gray area that says, well a pit bull isn’t a breed at all so how can you ban it, and if you ban a pit bull why not ban the various other similar dogs bred to be all strength and jaw? The same folks naturally know exactly the dog they want though, when they buy a pit bull.

I’ve had a dog since spring. Most of you have seen pictures of Memphis, my adorable landseer newf. Newfs have notoriously “soft mouths”, but let me tell you, in the unlikely event that she decided to bite someone, she could easily do a lot of damage. Even though “Newfs are great with kids” and “Newfs love everybody”, and even though Memphis fits those stereotypes, she’s still a dog and I supervise her around kids every time. I figure it’s my responsibility to ensure that my dog doesn’t cause any problems. The fact that she is fairly submissive and super-friendly doesn’t mean I should stop paying attention to her interaction with others – especially kids.

The best behaved and best trained dog I’ve seen in a long time is a German Shepherd that lives in our area. He’s an alpha dog, a tough boy, but he’s always under the control of his human companion. If he wasn’t trained so well, he would be way more of a wildcard than a big suck like Memphis, but the fact is that he is trained incredibly well. He obeys commands without question, and his owner watches him like a hawk, and stops him from getting into trouble well before he thinks about getting into it. I don’t worry about this dog because his owner is so totally responsible.

Ultimately, a pit bull ban doesn’t do anything to stop aggressive morons from owning tough dogs. There are plenty of other tough breeds of dog out there, and even dogs that are known to be gentle breeds can be nasty in the hands of a nasty owner.

When we started thinking about a dog, we did carefully consider breed characteristics. We wanted to find the most non-aggressive, friendly to everyone goofy dog we could come up with. To me, getting any kind of head start in that direction by choosing a breed with a gentle rep seemed to be the way to go. I don’t think banning tough dogs is ever going to accomplish much. I just don’t get why anybody would want one.

November 19, 2009
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5

Bau-Xi Galleries in Toronto is organizing a Regina 5 exhibition in memory of Ron Bloore, who passed away on September 4 of this year. They’ve also put some images of Bloore’s paintings up on their website. Bloore was an uncompromising painter with a surprisingly playful imagination, and a very personal vision. He has long been among my favourite painters, and among my favourite people too.

Bloore used to joke that “Canadians paint by numbers” referring to the so-called Regina Five, the Painters 11, and the Group of Seven. He would sometimes refer to all the post-Group of Seven landscape painting in Canada as “half past seven”.  Who could have guessed that the exhibition Bloore organized in 1961 in Regina of five local painters (including himself) would rocket them to national prominence.

I don’t know how many of my readers are familiar with the painterly ideas these guys were laying down in the early 60s, but if you have a chance to see it, I’m sure this memorial exhibition at Bau-Xi will provide a taste of some very fine painting.

Filed under: Art
November 18, 2009
comments 6

Toronto food carts in trouble

This year, Toronto decided to finally allow food vendors to sell food other than hot dogs and sausages in street carts. Unfortunately, it wasn’t so simple as that. The City decided to severely restrict locations, insist on particular and expensive food carts, and charge extremely high fees.  The City even regulated the percentage of time the owners themselves had to be on-site operating the carts. One article I read suggested a couple invested $80,000 in the venture but business wasn’t good enough for them to make any money.

I think the City went overboard with the regulations. As a friend of mine pointed out to me yesterday, Bangkok has hundreds of street carts selling an enormous variety of foods….and nobody dies.

That said, I’m not that sympathetic to anyone who considered investing $80K in a business selling $5.00 items one at a time was a profitable idea, especially not with ongoing steep yearly fees and a short Toronto selling season.  I’m sure a lot of potential cart operators got out their calculators, figured it was a losing proposition and bailed early in the game.

The City does need to have some regulations. There has to be some basic health standards and inspections. As well, there has to be some level of control over locations. Otherwise, there will be war with restaurant owners. I think having a variety of food carts is good for the character of the City, and so I think fees should be on the low side, rather than the high side, to enable it to be a profitable business. If vendors can’t make a living selling street food, it won’t take long before there is no more street food. The City has to re-examine this whole business.

November 17, 2009
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Sometimes I forget…

…that the relatively peaceful way of life we are fortunate enough to enjoy here in Canada is by no means normal everywhere around the globe.

MOGADISHU, Somalia — As a Spanish warship looked on, a $3.3 million ransom was delivered by boat Tuesday and Somali pirates freed a Spanish trawler and its 36 crew members.

Until the last couple years, I thought pirate stories were just that, romantic stories from a fabled past, yet piracy is big business today. It seems that pirates off Somalia are regularly seizing ships and holding crews for huge ransoms.

The recent end of the monsoon season has brought calmer seas, allowing easier sailing for pirate skiffs that continue to take vessels despite the presence of an armada of warships from the United States, the European Union, NATO, Japan, South Korea and China.

There have been over 300 pirate attacks in that area this year.

November 17, 2009
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TTC needs to learn from St. Clair mistakes

An LRT line along Eglinton Ave in Toronto is getting closer to changing from a proposal to a construction project. This one is extensive compared to the ongoing St. Clair project, including two significant undergound sections. A completed Eglinton LRT would be quite an achievement in Toronto, creating a much needed major east/west transit corridor across the north end of the City.

After watching the mess that has characterized the much smaller St. Clair project over the past couple years, I have to wonder if the politicians and the engineers have the ability to pull off a really big project like Eglinton. When we moved from the St. Clair and Caledonia area well over a year ago, the St. Clair project had already been dragging. I visited a friend up that way a few days ago and had to think carefully about finding a route that would allow me past the huge current construction tangle. The whole business has taken far too long and has been far too disruptive to that community. When they finish, a streetcar ride from the subway to Gunns loop will be 3 minutes quicker than before the construction. I wonder if anyone has tried making a calculation of the number of construction days per minute saved?

I think that to be successful with a gigantic super-ambitious project like the Eglinton LRT, more thought has to go into planning a disruption reduction strategy.  Local businesses have to be given greater consideration and support from the city. Otherwise the Eglinton LRT just doesn’t make sense.