xmas tree

This is an xmas tree inside the Eaton Centre decorated with 4000
Swarovski crystals. there are no xmas lights on this whatsoever.

catchdaflava

what I did today?

if we can all see the future

.... well, not all omens are from gods. Some are just things to mess
with your head.

As for the classy door front, it didn't prove to be any indicator of the
insides. Essentially, much of this former-Chapters was gutted and
replace with standard Winner's decore and mechandise.

Level one seemed mostly walled-off as backroom area. The new Winners
experience starts on level two. Where once, Private school girls sat on
the floor to read Teen magazines, they're all-grown up now and finding
bargin heels and 14k jewery. They also sell perfumes on this level, but
nothing you would actually wear.

This leaves level three. And it jusr turned out to be like every other
Winner. I found the same Ike Bekar coat here same as the one in College
Park, Vaughan Mill, and Sheppard Centre. I don't find "exclusive" items
for this location, except for the shopping baskets, which is too bad.
The whole point behind having a "premium" brand is to create the
illusion of higher class products. By distinguishing this store-branch
from all the others, Winners management shoukd have made at least a
token effort for exclusivity. Special deals, different, "higher" brands,
etc. At the very least, they should've gotten ride of those Jones of New
York watches from the display case.

Anywho I will drop back by there in January to see if anything changed.
Meanwhile, Winners in Vaughan Mill is still the best place for hard to
find brands on a bargin.

I saw

I saw this sign on the subway and got all excited. It was an ad for
Winners @Yorkville. They dropped the normal white-and-purple for black.
I was anticipating this ever since I read about it a few months ago on
Toronto Life. As soon as I saw the sign, I knew I should go. ( talk
about effective marketing)

depression again

I seem to be sunk by an overwhelming blue spell. Don't know what to do about it.

I am starting to wonder if I am depressed and therefore unhappy, or I need my unhappiness to stay sane.

hiptop

Joined the hiptop nation a few days ago.

Now posting thru avantblog.

Humdrum

Just another blue sunday.
Updating blog as if it was automatic....
sigh.

so so slow a day.

Eau Sauvage

Got a new bottle of Eau Sauvage today off ebay.

Shouldn't be long now.
I got through this stuff like a SUV on gasoline.

Some time now

I haven't really made a post in a long time -- 3 1/2 months, to be exact.

I wish I could attribute it to being lazy. If that were the case, I can try harder.

The problem for my lack of activity, unfortunately, is both endemic and outside of my control.

Yeah, the problem is work. Full-time.
It sucks the energy and time right from under you.
I barely got enough sleep, let alone do anything else since I got that darn job.
What a nightmare!

Now with no job, no cash, I will make a better effort to do better.

Two days ago, a girl I knew from rez was leaving for Korea.

I accidentally stumbled on the meeting and stayed for the fairwell dinner.

Boy, did I ever have a strange time.

Everybody who were in the same year as I was in University are, now, all grown up.

One girl is doing her masters. One is getting married. One is already married. And one is gonna buy a house soon.

... and all I just sat there and ate my Cornish hen with the feeling when I was 10, and going to dinner with my parent's friends.

Things

I've been super busy the last two weeks.

Started a new job, but mostly, I've spending a lot of time with vistors from out of town.

It really got me to thinking about Toronto when I am spending so much time introducting the city to people, showing them the different sides of the place.

The city is so spread out. Everything is on major roads while everywhere, there are houses, even in the heart of downtown.

There is so much DIFFERENT stuff. If I know somebody well enough, I can take them somewhere that they are sure to love....

... but somehow, I always find myself back in Chinatown & Kensington. I must have a certain affinity to the place.

What the fuck is wrong with Americans?

AP news story, "'Deep Throat' Probably Won't Be Prosecuted"

Who in the right mind would want to prosecute the guy?

I mean, first off, he is 91 years old.

Second, helped took down NIXON.
This is NIXON.... y'know the most crooked US President in history.

I don't even understand why the guy doesn't get a ticker tape parade down New York.

Short-term loans

On a CP article on May 29, entitled, "Crackdown on payday loan companies hits snag", Bob Whitelaw, association chairman of the Canadian Association of Community Financial Service Providers, said, "If I loaned (someone) $100 dollars for five days, and charged them $1 . . that's 107 per cent. And that's the issue we're dealing with when you take a small short-term loan and look at it on an annual rate basis."

Now, note that if I took a non-collateralized loan at a bank, even with my shitty record, I may get somewhere in the 18%-21%, nowhere near the 107% Bob is talking about.

However, I am sort of curious as to why SHORT-TERM loans are so high in interest in the first place. An one year term deposit right now is 1.30%. 2-year, 1.70%. 3-year, 2.05%. In other words, price of money goes up the longer period the loan since the lender must deal with the risk of super-inflation in future years.

However, for payday companies, the fact that these loans are SHORT-TERM make it excusable for them high interest rates. The rationale is that since it is only a dollar on a loan of $100, it isn't really that much... and 107% is some kind of financial hocus-pocus from the convertion to annualized terms...

Unfortunately, Bob is plying a bit of smoke and mirrors. Creditworthiness is not at issue here, short-term loans are less risky than long term loans. A debtor's financial situation is more predictable over a short-term basis than a long-term, as is inflation and interest rates.

Got a new job.

Yeah,
SO I am finally working again.

This time, a skip tracer.

I don't know. Sounds silly, but y'know, work is work.

Some dick on craigslist

I saw an good appt listing on Toronto-Craigslist today.
Called the guy up at 9:00am and nobody picked up.

He called back at 11:00 and was all pissed off. I tried asking about the place, next thing you know, the guy was like "I am real busy," and just hung up. WTF?

If you don't want your place rented out, don't advertise.

Now I know. Amerie

Even before "1 Thing" I thought this girl was hot. Now I just found out she is Half-Korean. How cool is that? Hello, Asian sister! A very fine sister, at that.

Among my friends love is a great sorrow

I was hanging out with my friend today and we started talking all the way on the Spadina-University line.

One thing led to another and suddenly I started telling him about all my other friends who are pairing off -- "squiring."

I started telling him about how a lot of my friends aren't really marrying for love. They are all hitting the "quarter-life" stage -- 25 years old. They are transitioning to real adulthood where it is no longer crass to judge others by the size of their stock portfolio.

Stability becomes key. And many of my friends -- males -- are just looking to get married to whatever girl that can provided them with "home and hearth." Lots of them want children, a little slugger to play catch with, that type of thing.

It's a scary thought for me. I have a hard time thinking like that.

Anywho, my friend Cliff, he is a little younger, and didn't know anybody that's transitioning to that stage yet. So, he was more than a little surprised when I talk about how many of my friends don't want to marry a woman they love.

It's too unstable, I told him, they need a woman to keep them on track, not somebody that lits the fire. The fire of love is the most wonderful feeling in the world, but they so often go out of control and your whole world get burned. Much safer with vegetable love. After all, Mrs. Bennet is not as bad as most people think.

I don't think he quite got it. I think I should've been a "safe-speaker" and kept quiet. Or better yet showed him Housman's poem.

More on railcars

Okay.

I took a bus yesterday on Dundas East as oppose to the normal streetcar ride from Yonge to Sacksville.

It was different.

The bus did feel a little more crowded. Noisy. Also bumpy.

I retract much what I said earlier about "railcar madness"... although not too much. There is still a strange religiousity with the streetcar group, especially in T.O., I find disturbing.

Oh, B! Further trials of an autoparts mogul.

Belinda is rocking the boat again.

The latest (implied) word from the CBC was that Peter and Belinda broke up. (They were using past tenses all morning to refer to their relationship.)

There was also a suggestion that the defection came about as a result from a heated exchange between B and Harper. Allegedly, B liked some parts of the Liberal budget. (Who doesn't east of Manitoba?)

A alternate subway map for Toronto

This is great!

It's what Toronto should've been if it were not for a decade of failed transit funding policies.

http://www.sonivius.com/~steph/newttc.pdf

More visions of America

I must censor myself for not writing in this more often. I've been busy. It's hard. Computer was broken. Blogger was acting up...... basically, I dropped the ball. Shame on me.

Anywho, I was reading again Whitman and pondered and thought of his wonderous lightness. His poems are "more brilliant than the sun."

I don't want to tread upon tired conventions, but somethings are eternal. It is nice when you find wisdom in the words of the old. Whitman's "As I Sat Alone by Blue Ontario’s Shores" so aptly describe every image we have of America.

http://www.bartleby.com/142/152.html

I especially like:

A Nation announcing itself,
I myself make the only growth by which I can be appreciated,
I reject none, accept all, then reproduce all in my own forms.

A breed whose proof is in time and deeds;
What we are, we are—nativity is answer enough to objections;
We wield ourselves as a weapon is wielded,
We are powerful and tremendous in ourselves,
We are executive in ourselves—We are sufficient in the variety of ourselves,
We are the most beautiful to ourselves, and in ourselves;
We stand self-pois’d in the middle, branching thence over the world;
From Missouri, Nebraska, or Kansas, laughing attacks to scorn.

Nothing is sinful to us outside of ourselves,
Whatever appears, whatever does not appear, we are beautiful or sinful in ourselves only.

(O mother! O sisters dear!
If we are lost, no victor else has destroy’d us;
It is by ourselves we go down to eternal night.)

******************************************

It's so damn unapologetic. So fresh, so surely.
So much to love and so much to hate in George Bush's America.

this is a test of plog!

Cruelty has an American Heart

And Jealousy an American Face;

Terror, the American Form Divine

And Secrecy, the American Press

Railcar madness

I was surfing the web today and found an interesting if not disturbing sight.
There seems to be an inordinate number of sites devoted to tram cars.
The stranges part is the argument that railcars offer a qualitatively better service to riders.

While I ride those damn things as much as anyone else, I never did see the romanticism people generally attach to them. They are old, slow, and make that high pitch squeaking sound every time they turn a corner. I am no fan of buses, but at least they don't squeak. Subways I do like, even if they do squeak. They're fast. But I don't understand these arguments about streetcars being better than buses for the riders.

Arthur Miller died today.

It seems to be really important, though I don't know why.

It is just one little death amongst so many deaths in the sea of the world.

Y'know, it's funny, I've never had the feeling that he was ever alive in the first place.
I always assumed that he was dead in my lifetime. Like so many greats of the world, he and I can never share anything. He could not be my contemporary.

I guess, though, that while he and I shared period of time living, his greatness will always render him peerless. And as such, his life and his death is greater than all of us, a blaze of white fire in the heavens. Miller is now immortal and therefore, eternal, trancending all times.

It is a boon for all of us to play some small role in history as witnesses to his earthly passing.

Man, maybe I should get out more.



Apparently, Nelly and Tim MacGraw has put out a duet. I haven't heard it yet (or maybe I have and I just thought it was muzak.)



I am told that Nelly doesn't rap in this, he sings.



While I understand the easy crosscover between the two genres, i.e. they share an audience base and themes, it does SEEM weird.



I mean, I used to listen to Tim MacGraw's version of "Gin and Juice" and it was the funniest thing. Now, this Nelly thing is totally legit. Without the tiniest ting of irony.

This is interesting...



www.spadinayorksubway.ca



Apparently, the proposed subway extension from Downsview to YorkU is suppose to go all the way into Vaughan.



If built, this would be the first time TTC runs a subway train outside of Metro...

My internet connection (Rogers Hi-speed) seems to bit acting up again. It spittles and pops. Goes real fast one minute and stops.



I hate my fucking ISP.

Waited till the last minute to finish something. Again.



I had planned two weeks in advance too. Just never got off my ass.



Sigh. Why do we do these things to torture ourselves?

This is a test of the AvantBlog system.



This better work.

Tainted Chocolate Milk

So I found out today that I got one of those tainted Sealtest chocolate milk.
I don't know what I am suppose to do with it.
Pour it out, feed it to house plants, or get a refund.

Can I even get a refund?

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hiptop open

hiptop open

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Bunch of Graphics

a pic of me

I wanted ...

I wanted to have a blog about Toronto.

I wanted to do this for a long time now. Not just about some little part of some intersection, but the city as a whole.

It is, I think, a nice city -- a good city.

I think it is often underrated. Torontonians themselves underrates themselves.

Just like the other day,


I saw this music video by K-OS on MuchMUSIC. It was set in the intersection of College and Spadina. Everything that is there was there. The Silver Dollar Room, the crappy billard place.

The only exception was that K-OS got into one of those NY checkered cabs.

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