fun within prescribed limits
A friend s wife suggested, about 10 years now, that I consider AquaFit for physical activity. That suggestion came during my running phase , so I didn t outride reject it if maybe keep it as an option along with yoga. Fast-forward a decade, and a move across the country later, I started living in a neighbourhood that had a YMCA being built, one that would be a few years behind schedule. On July…
The organizers of Towel Day, the worldwide (universal?) celebration of the life of Douglas Adams on May 25th of every year reached out to me, and from them I received positive feedback about my idea to organize an event in Toronto next year . What I d need for the event to be successful: A co-organizer, if only because I don t like being the only person responsible for a thing. With 364 days to…
It’s Towel Day …again. I couldn t find any related events in Toronto this year, so I ll went out search of other hoopy froods who know where their towels were. Biking around Toronto Islands and Biidaasige Park, I saw zero people s towels. This time it happened on a weekday, a Canadian non-holiday weekday I happen to have off due to reasons unrelated to a certain American holiday which it coincides…
At China Books Review, Jeremiah Jenne pulls out of the archives The Private Life of Chairman Mao by Li Zhisui and reviews it with the context of over 30 years having now passed since its publication in 1994. The book allegedly detailed the life of Mao Zedong, longtime ruler of China, up close and personal, all in the context of the history of the Communist Party s including its rise and…
Several years and two weeks ago, Douglas Adams passed away. It continues to irk me greatly that such an intelligent and funny voice was silenced on that day, and regularly I think of what he would have loved and hated about the current era. He remains highly influential in my life, every Thursday reminding me of it must being Thursday, and continuously seeing no contradiction in striving to be…
Sunny and cool, with cloud cover to give us breaks from the unrelenting light from the sun, is my kind of weather. Being naturally warm-bodied, any time the temperature goes above 23° C, I start to shut down. Spring in Vancouver is my favourite place-season, followed closely by fall in Toronto. After moving to Canada s largest and therefore best city in 2015, I came to appreciate what a winter…
Read Part I first. Chapter 5: The Ending I had considered going to the overnight portion of the marathon, but resolved that if I couldn’t sleep, I’d make my way over. It turned out I slept well enough, and checked out of the hotel just in time to make the discussion with the scholars. On the first day, the moderator didn’t ask my question, but I knew I have another chance. At this morning’s…
Chapter 1: Moby-Dick Talk to me long enough, and I ll bring up the subject of whales. I m awed by the fact that the largest animal that has ever existed (the blue whale) exists today; that they live in the sea but breathe air; that the can hold their breath for 40 minutes, sometimes longer; that they swim for great lengths to feed and rest; and other facts that don t seem possible. It would…
Some things have changed since I wrote about listening to albums in 2018 , and some things have stayed the same. The two biggest changes are 1) having a much better listening experience thanks to new speakers and headphones and 2) listening to entire discographies (or, sometimes, "essentials" playlists) when a new album comes out. One of my best purchases during the COVID-19 pandemic, spending so…
A fog wave rolled through Toronto recently, and it made for muted streetscapes and haunting photographs. That last one is mine. Every time I pause to look at the CN Tower, the thought "I can t believe I live in Toronto" occurs to me. So I take a photo of it, post the sentiment to the now-defunct social media site Twitter, and copy some over to an album on Flickr . It made some sense to come here…
Another pandemic year, another Towel Day . I finally read Don t Panic: The Official Hitchhiker s Guide to the Galaxy Companion by Neil Gaiman earlier this year, and it was everything and more that I hoped it would be. It has a hard-to-fathom amount of detail about the life of Douglas Adams and the production of the series. I brought the towel I got as part of Vancouver Public Library s One Book…
I m nominally a Blue Jays fan, enjoying watching baseball and them being Canada s only major league team. In the late 2010s, however, I realized (for the second time 1 ) being a fan of a single team wasn t as enjoyable as being a fan of the sport. I also didn t watch much sports during 2020 and 2021, because the dread around the pandemic overshadowed the product on the field, and the quiet of the…
Over the last two months, we ve seen the Omicron variant rip through the worldwide population and cause the Ontario government to close indoor dining yet again. That shutdown lasted about a month, rose tensions around the province, further elevated by the convoy of trucks that took over downtown Ottawa . Members of the convoy did attempt rolling through Toronto, but police had learned the lessons…
The COVID-19 pandemic continues, and since I last checked in, I travelled back to British Columbia twice, once in late October to say goodbye to my dying mother , and another for the Christmas holidays. The first trip was a no-brainer, as she only had days to live, and after her passing I spent some time in Vancouver seeing people I didn t think I d ever see again. VIEWS pic.twitter.com/17d12DRASv…
Since July of this year, I ve been to Hamilton twice, went to an Ontario cottage for the first time while living in Toronto, and have gone to a co-working space every couple of weeks or so. While I ve mostly been working from home, I haven t exactly been sheltering in place like I did for the previous 16 months. The two trips to Hamilton were to see the Honey Badgers of the Canadian Elite…
My review of The Minister , an Icelandic TV drama, appeared in the September 2021 newsletter of the Icelandic Canadian Club of Toronto (of which I am currently the secretary). I am reprinting it here with permission. The newly elected prime minister of Iceland has a secret that could topple his carefully crafted coalition government. On the heels of promising to only take power if the electorate…
My first trip outside of Toronto s city boundaries since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic was this Friday, to Hamilton. The closest CEBL basketball team to Toronto, the Hamilton Honey Badgers 1 , opened up their stadium to fans in the past week, so I took advantage by buying a ticket to Friday evening s game. I had a dentist s appointment in the morning, work after that, and a surprisingly busy…
The impetus for my interest in all things China came from a woman in my high school that I admired, who thought I was a communist. She was part of a conservative family, my being part of a social democratic family was a source of debate between me and her, and as a graduation gift, she gave me the controversial book The Private Life of Chairman Mao: The Memoirs of Mao s Personal Physician by Li…
I knew Toronto was trying to set a record for most COVID-19 vaccinations in one day at a single venue , but signups were so popular that I couldn’t get an appointment. I had managed to get on the waiting list for a pharmacy beforehand, and on the actual day, Toronto Vaccine Day, I walked by Scotiabank Arena mainly just to see the crowd. By the time I got there, the line had dwindled, but it wasn t…
Planning ahead for the July 1st long weekend, I took the 2nd, a Friday off (which it sounds like a lot of people did), as well as today, a Monday, with tomorrow off as well so that today isn t my Sunday. It was the perfect opportunity to go to Toronto Islands. In my previous two visits, I was able to have a hot dog at the Riviera Pub, but this time I was denied on the grounds that it was on the…
I ve taken in every Winter Stations since 2017. It s an art exhibit usually held on Woodbine Beach during the colder months at the start of the year in Toronto. Generally, the art pieces are large, often inviting people to interact with the art directly by going inside it or using the controls to make something happen. I attended last year s event just as the COVID-19 pandemic started, keeping the…
It’s not a city without museums and art galleries, though. Open ’em up. — Richard Brynj ó l f s s o n (@sillygwailo) June 11, 2021 Toronto feels like a city gain. On Friday, Ontario opened up retail businesses to limited capacity and allowed outside dining on patios, and while I managed to avoid the lineups and had breakfast by my lonesome outside my favourite diner, it felt like a breath of fresh…
The earliest memory I have of reading Hitchhiker s Guide to the Galaxy was actually through the text-based computer game. My dad got it for the ASCII-only computer we had at the time, and it came with a "Don t Panic" button and a piece of fluff, which I would much later learn was called a "feelie" inserted into Infocom games of that era. I didn t get far in the game, but I would subsequently read…
This month was uneventful except for one day. Up until then I had spent a month wondering when I d get a vaccine. I had registered with UHN when they offered appointments to 18+ in my postal code, and quickyly shut it down after getting too many registrations. I also registered with my local Shoppers Drug Mart and with Rexall, thinking that while it didn t cover all the bases, at least it covered…
On a Jane s Walk in 2019, we were walking Wellington Street, which changes to Douro St. at Strachan Ave. and I beheld the King-Liberty Village Pedestrian/Cycle Bridge 1 . Construction, said the sign, would to complete in Spring 2020. My first photograph of construction was in May, 2019: Construction, as was just about everything, was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, so every two weeks, I visited…
The March weather was unseasonably warm, and restaurants were allowed to open their patios, so extroverts were happy to see each other again. I was happy to get out of the house and break out my lawn chair and sit in the park. The one closes to me is under construction until at least September of this year, so I am walking 10 minutes to a park nearby. It does not have a closed-off dog off-leash…
12 degrees Celsius and sunny during “Spring” in Toronto was the perfect weather to do a tour from the book Toronto Architecture: A City Guide by Patricia McHugh and Alex Bozikovic. Ontario lifted its "strict stay-at-home order" last month, so I no longer felt guilty about wanting to visit the neighbourhood adjacent to mine. Grange Park is a neighbourhood in downtown Toronto that feels like a…
First, the summary for March: Ontario only recently lifted its “strict stay-at-home order” for Toronto, which most people interpreted as a strong request. Retail shops opened to limited capacity while restaurants still cannot accept dine-in patrons. The vaccination effort in Canada has only really gotten off to a start. While the government had set that expectation, it has been frustrating to see…
We are still in lockdown. The previous weekend, the Ontario floated two trial balloons, one suggesting the province would reduce restrictions, another to say they would go on for longer. I ve done more or less what I ve been able to do since the outset of the pandemic, which is to say go for daily activity (and, now, thrice-weekly runs) and get takeout from restaurants in my neighbourhood. To help…
Christmas came and went. For the first time in my life, I did not go to Vancouver Island for the holidays, and did not go to Vancouver to see friends. I kept the family tradition of eating Pizza Hut pizza on Christmas Eve alive, as did my family. On Christmas Day, I cooked Christmas dinner for myself. Turkey (though fried, not baked) with Brussels sprouts, mashed potatoes and stuffing and gravy.…
To ring in the new year, I completed the University of Toronto tour from Toronto Architecture: A City Guide by Patricia McHugh and Alex Bozikovic. It took place over 3 separate days, the first day cut short by the need to return to attend a virtual event, and the second day cut short by snow. (I didn t want to get the book wet.) The University of Toronto is located in Downtown Toronto, next to…
Toronto is in lockdown, the most restrictive since the pandemic began. It means no dining out, no gyms, and curbside pickup for retail. No barbers or hair salons. I had decided not to get a haircut after March anyway. I would have been comfortable with getting a haircut, but I m using the pandemic as an excuse to grow my hair. It s still not an Italy- or Spain-style lockdown, since there s no…
Today is Name Your Computer Day . I name my computing devices after minor characters in the Hitchhiker s Guide to the Galaxy series . Sometimes it leads to confusion, like the time someone wanted to AirDrop me a photo and wondered why it was going to a device named Anjie and not "Richard s iPhone". For each of my devices over the years, from VPSes to laptops to external hard drives (I named the…
Faced with the need to get some sunshine and exercise the day before it was expected to rain in Toronto, I flipped through Toronto Architecture: A City Guide by Patricia McHugh and Alex Bozikovic, looking for the closest tour I haven t done yet. University Avenue was the logical choice, as The Globe and Mail had just featured Bozikovic s article on a proposed redevelopment of the boulevard that…
As feared, ActiveTO has come to a close. On the last day possible, I did get out to the eastern eastern section of the Lakeshore Boulevard Activeway , and there were few others there. I learned of some routes to the east side of Toronto that should come in handy during the warmer months, especially if there are activities at Woodbine Beach. Taking transit there was a bit of a slog pre-pandemic…
With in-person events cancelled in the Greater Toronto Area for the duration of 2020, that opened up my schedule tremendously. I largely avoided online or virtual events, with a few exceptions, such as events that I helped organize through the Icelandic Canadian Club of Toronto, and a birthday party or two. I m used to spending extended periods of time at home, so I took the opportunity to fix my…
Since last time I checked in, I had a couple of days of vacation in the same week, meaning two 3-day weekends in a row. I spent one of those days on Toronto Islands again . I played several location-based games, and even ground-truthed a couple of microconfluences. The other day I kept open in case I was needed for helping with an online event the Icelandic Canadian Club held. It was a great…
I ve been trying all summer to think of somewhere to go on a day trip. My last outing was to Toronto Islands , and despite a flat tire at the tail end of it, it was a success. I decided against venturing out of town. That was necessarily because I was worried about catching COVID-19 on a train or bus, since the stories I had read of people doing it seemed OK. I just didn t know what I d do once I…
Summer is almost over. I’ve so far weathered the pandemic by continuing to have a job, already having made a bulk purchase in what was temporarily in short supply, and by keeping active by biking the Lakeshore Boulevard Activeway . The office opening up in July gave me respite from the construction across the street. I bike there and back once or twice a week, partly for a change of scenery and…
I m still riding bikes , and still going to the office once or twice a week. I bought a sturdy lawn chair so I could sit in the park next to my building. I reasoned that it would be a useful thing to have post-pandemic as well. I m otherwise sheltering in place because there’s no events to attend. At least there are still places to go . I remain optimistic that we ll get to the other side of this…
I had a vacation day today, the day after a weekend on-call shift. This year I decided I didn t want to work 12 days in a row, so for this weekend and the next time I have pager duty, I have a day off in between. Today started out with breakfast from the diner across the street from where I live, sitting in the park catching up on personal email while sitting on the new lawn chair I bought, and…
The one thing that has kept me going, from the gloomiest times in March of this year, is that time marches forward no matter what. I look at my Timehop recap of where I went and what I said on this day in previous years on a daily basis, the years seem both so long ago and like it was yesterday. Either way, time will its way, and this too shall one day be in the past. I never lost track of what…
Faced with having someone over to clean my apartment, and nowhere to go, my first idea was to sit on my balcony for 2½ hours. Eating dinner there that evening, it was obvious that being stationary in the sweltering Toronto heat would not be a good idea. If it weren t for the COVID-19 pandemic, I would go to a Starbucks and sit inside for the duration, and cross off some items on my task list.…
As soon as it was announced in May, I couldn t wait to bike the sections of Lakeshore Boulevard to cyclists, runners, walkers and others who want to exercise and stay physical distant . My position is: As long as the gyms are closed, the city needs to open up as much public space to move around as possible. I ve gone every weekend it has been opened, missing only one day. (After I missed that day,…
When I lived in Vancouver, I wanted a way to explore the city in a structured way, and as someone who loved riding transit, the perfect way to do that was by doing the tours in SkyTrain Explorer: Heritage Walks From Every Station by John Atkin . Having moved to Toronto almost 5 years ago, I was able to see the city through Jane s Walks and other walking tours, and I was on the lookout for…
Ontario has only flattened the curve, and it has reached a plateau. I would have more confidence in the approach Canada s second largest (and therefore second greatest) province took if we ve increased hospital resources if we need to accommodate a rise in cases, but I don t have a close enough read on that. So far the large outdoor gatherings that finger-wavers thought would lead to spikes have…
In anticipation of the June 3rd launch of Drupal 9 , I spent the weekend a week previous to the launch dusting off the Drupal module I m most famous for: the Pirate module! What does it do, exactly? Like the WP extension, the Pirate module changes your site s content to pirate-speak on September 19th, International Talk Like a Pirate Day . I took the tagline ("Ah, Squiddy! I got nothing against…
The weeks have gone by a lot faster these past 30 days than the first 30 days . Toronto is slowly loosening it’s restrictions, allowing curbside pickup from retail stores, though all restaurants are still open only for delivery or pickup. So far none of the restaurants I get food from have closed permanently, though I don’t have a lot of hope for the diner across the street from me. I take a walk…
Even though I m Canadian, I ve long preferred the American expressions for things. A "furlough" is the temporary leave of absence that employees don t choose, and in recent times has referred to employees during government shutdowns in the United States. I think "donut" is a funnier way to spell doughnut, which is the Canadian spelling. And "shelter in place" is a term I learned during the days…
I have to say, I was skeptical about dark mode in our current operating systems, but since wiring it up to switch to it automatically after sunset, I’m a believer. I know some people always operate their in dark mode, and that s not for me. I prefer the light on my screen to match the light of the day. It s especially nice to have my iPhone in dark mode at concerts, so I can avoid being "that guy"…