Education Minister Stephen Lecce is scheduled to speak Friday morning on a plan to distribute six million free menstrual products per year to school boards over the next three years. Ontario will become one of four provinces that provide free menstrual products to students through an arrangement with Shoppers Drug Mart. The news conference may be seen here when it begins.

Boji the Instanbul transit canine

Cat Art Show

Budi and Sekali are expecting at the Toronto Zoo

The animal faces in this trio of tales mean the news is all good. It starts with the fascinating video story of Boji, the Instanbul transit hound, who has become a well-behaved and celebrated national figure as he makes his daily commute through the timeless City. Then at centre a glimpse of the stunning art created at the annual Los Angeles Cat Art Show. No dogs allowed. Lastly we have an orangutan hook-up of historic proportions at the Toronto Zoo where endangered species Budi and Sekali are expecting.

One injured in multi-car tangle at 401 and Brock St/Kevin Misner 680 News

Police say there is at least one injury in a tangle of vehicles on Highway 401 near Brock St. at Whitby Thursday. The injured party was airlifted to hospital via Ornge air ambulance (photo below).

Old Colony three-alarm at home under construction/Assistant Chief Jim Jessop TFS

The Toronto Fire Service is still cleaning up from an all-night three-alarm fire at a mansion under construction on exclusive Old Colony Rd in North York. More than 50 units were required at the site of the fire which was spotted about 10 p.m. Tuesday.

Kept fire staff busy all night/Kyle Hocking 680 News

Teacher Nicholas Mills

Jeremiah Perry

A Toronto court has found that teacher Nicholas Mills is not guilty in connection with the drowning of a teenage student Jeremiah Perry during a canoe trip at Algonquin Park in 2017. The charge was criminal negligence causing death. In her decision, Superior Court Justice Maureen Forestell said the conduct of Nicholas Mills, a C.W. Jefferys Collegiate Institute teacher who was in charge of the school trip, did not “reach the level of moral blameworthiness necessary for criminal liability.” CTV

Would any teacher have said no?

Here’s what The Bulldog wrote in 2017: Others might have done the same. Rather than deny Perry the broadening experience and inclusion that the trip represented, they would have found the risk/reward odds favoured letting the boy go. That would have been against the rules and wrong. But it is easy to understand.

Glen Stewart Ravine by Cami Mendes bellatrixphotography.com

Residents are invited to explore Toronto’s ravine network during a City-sponsored ten-day period called Ravine Days. It’s well underway but lasts until October 10.

Falcon Building at 522 Mt. Pleasant Rd

The Falcon Building at 522 Mt. Pleasant has been listed recently for $6,250,000. Realtor.ca notice.

Moore Ave at Mud Creek Tuesday morning/Bulldog

Work has begun to repair sinking pavement on Moore Ave opposite the south gate to Mt. Pleasant Cemetery. The road at this point is a well-used crosswalk for hikers and cyclists into the Mud Creek Ravine. Many decades ago travellers on Moore Ave crossed the ravine on a bridge where the Beltline Railway passed underneath. The road remains perennially unstable and has been rebuilt many times. Workmen at the site Monday night said Moore Ave would open “sometime tomorrow” and indeed the street was open at dawn Tuesday. But a large steel plate covers an excavation and it is clear work remains. City road crew tackles growing depression on Moore Ave — 2018.

Moore Ave at the former Beltline Railway Bridge site/Bulldog

Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp appear to slowly be coming back online Monday night after experiencing global outages throughout the day. Service resumed for some users at around 6 p.m. EDT. The outages left people around the world unable to communicate on the platforms for more than six hours. CTV

The busiest border crossing between Canada and the US has reopened Monday after a two-hour closure while police investigated the discovery of “explosives’ on the Canadian side. Police say the Ambassador Bridge between Windsor and Detroit is now safe but it is unclear just what was found.

Facebook and Facebook-owned apps Instagram and WhatsApp have been hit by an outage on Monday affecting users around the world. Users around the world reported being unable to log into any of the services a little before noon eastern time on Monday. The website Downdetector, which collates complaints about web outages, said there were more than 30,000 Canadians complaining about an outage. Instagram logged 21,000 reports of outages, while there were at least 14,000 reports about WhatsApp in Canada alone. CBC

Facebook Whistleblower

Meanwhile, Facebook is plummeting on the stock market after allegations that the firm has “pursued power over truth”. The allegation and documentation come from Frances Haugen, a former product manager at the company. She made the revelations to CBS 60 Minutes.

A timely warning to those who walk and cycle through Mt. Pleasant Cemetery that the gates are now locked at 6 p.m. Frances Morton expresses her gratitude to a cemetery attendant who dashed around the other evening to release citizens who found themselves locked in. She adds a light note: “My kid was particularly thankful as he felt we might become fare for zombies as the sun was setting.”