Our weekly recap of the week’s news nuggets in Toronto will bring you up to date and add some fuel to your small-talk tank heading into the weekend.
Rob Ford profile in Esquire
American men's magazine Esquire has published a long feature on Toronto’s own Rob Ford in their March edition. While the story is familiar to most people in this city, the profile did have some illuminating moments, such as when Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong says that it wasn't the crack that made him lose respect for Ford, it was when he used “the p-bomb.” Oh Denzil, no one thinks that word is worthy of its own bomb.
Expensive car spontaneously combusts
As if the electric car industry didn't have enough trouble, a Tesla model S (which retails in the states for just under $60,000) suddenly caught fire in a Toronto garage this week. The car had just been taken out for a drive and was not even plugged in at the time, although battery might have caught fire by itself.
Feds fund Scarbourough Subway
This week, the Government of Canada released another magnum opus of a budget. At 417 pages, it’s hard to pinpoint everything that the government has commited your tax dollars to this year, but one thing we know is that the Stephan Harper will be funding Rob Ford’s subway. Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, a close personal friend of the Ford family, officially allocated $660 million for the four subways stops, the rest of which will be funded by a Toronto tax increase.
Tories hold, Dippers gain and Grits lose in Ontario by-election
It was by-election week in Ontario, and depending on where you stand, it was either a roaring success, a terrible failure or something to just be peevish about. The Progressive Conservatives managed to hold on to their Thornhill seat, but failed to pick up a formerly Liberal seat in Niagara Falls, where leader Tim Hudak was born and raised. The PC candidate narrowly lost to the NDP’s Wayne Gates, a city councillor and president of Unifor Local 199. Despite the win in Thornhill, Hudak took the loss in Niagara Falls poorly, and lashed out against “union elites” who “buy influence” in between pouts.
Team Toronto to bring home Gold
The Sochi Olympics are here, and Team Canada is kicking ass and taking names across the board. But even if Team Canada superstar (and Toronto native) Patrick Chan didn’t bring home to gold in men’s figure skating, some Torontonians will likely be having a party anyway. Chan’s greatest challangers, Japanese skater Yuzuru Hanyu and Spanish Skater Javier Fernandez, are both trained by Canadian Brian Orser, out of the Toronto Cricket and Skating Club.
Beer at 6 am? YES PLEASE
Ward 19 Councillor Mike Layton has proposed a temporary allowance for bars to sell alcohol at 6 a.m. over the final four days of the Winter Olympics. Those days would cover both the men and women’s gold medal hockey games, and while the law seems amazing and fun, it also might be over-optimist and jinx our chances of winning the gold. We can’t have it all Toronto, it's never worked that way before.
Drake has a Beiber moment
It was a bad week for Drake. The Toronto-born hip-hop sensation, who is normally total boyfriend material, took to Twitter on Thurday to rant about being omitted from the cover of Rolling Stone magazine. Calling the press “evil” after his story was bumped to make way for a story about the late actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, Drake also said that he was “disgusted” he wasn't told of the change. After the internet widely called him out for being a whinny baby, Drake wrote a long apology on his blog.
No better way to say “I love you…. and crack cocaine”
It appears that even on the loving occasion of Valentine’s day, there must be a Rob Ford. Toronto artist Scott Graham has designed a series of Valentine’s Day cards featuring our mayor’s romantic visage, with such messages as “I must have been in one of my drunken stupours, when I fell for you.”
Toronto Public Library tells the Cool Girls to vandalize
But how do you celebrate V-Day when you’re 15 and like… so over it? The Toronto Public Library has invited teenage girls to come over for a Friday night of dressing in black, writing break-up letters and defacing romance novels, which hasn’t gone over so well with writers of said romance novels who think they’re already under respected enough as it is. But like, whatever, you can’t keep a teenage rager at the library down, ya know?
Don’t give hearts, consume them
Is there a cool way to celebrate Valentine’s Day? Probably not. But if there was, it would be by eating the hearts of animals and plants. Here is a list of restaurants in Toronto that offer up that truly rebellious fare.
