Buses will replace streetcars on Queen Street, the longest tram run in the City from May 7 to Sept 3. The change is necessary to repair and adjust several things along the right of way including repairs to bridge between the Eaton Centre and Nordstom (The Bay) which hangs close to the streetcar wires. The occasion seems to cry out yet again for an answer to why the City continues to maintain both buses and streetcars for the  frequent occasions on which the streetcars don’t run.

ARSON AT ISLAMIC CENTRE

Police say they have confirmed that a fire at an Islamic information centre  on Weston Road and Humber Boulevard North was arson. Damage is said to be light and no one was hurt.

HYDRO RATE CUT?

And the Toronto Star says Premier Wynne will announce a 25 percent “slash” to hydro electric rates sometime this year. Slash is the word if this is the amount of the reduction in bills. The story is by Robert Benzie and Rob Ferguson. They liken the plan to taking a longer mortgage on your house so you pay less per month. The province has a problem not faced by most homeowners however in the enormous debt it carries requiring a sum of $30 billion a year in interest alone.

Alarm Highrise Commercial – St Clair Avenue b/w Ferndale Avenue / Avoca Avenue, Toronto (6 Trucks)

— Toronto Fire (@tofire) March 1, 2017

Alo restaurant, 163 Spadina Ave., has topped the 2017 Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants list. Alo launched in 2015 with fine-dining tasting menus moves up from seventh spot on last year’s list. The annual list of top restaurants is determined by an 82-member panel of judges and printed in the Canada’s 100 Best Restaurants magazine.

Donald Trump addressed the US Congress Tuesday night and his remarks had references to Canada in several spots. The president ventured a surprising (to many in the US) reference to his desire for overall immigration reform. It is something Republicans and Democrats say is needed but the details on how they might collaborate seems to elude them. Trump spoke admiringly of immigration systems in “Canada, Australia and many others” that were based on the merit of the newcomers. Elsewhere, Mr. Trump returned his daughter’s campaign to assist and encourage women entrepreneurs, a scheme in which she enlisted Justin Trudeau. Lastly, Trump spoke again of his plan to see the Keystone XL pipeline constructed. Canadian Press

MP Oliphant sees there is peameal bacon too

Ladies of the kitchen we salute you

Good work men

Leaside United Church people have posted these pictures of Tuesday night’s pancake supper. Looks good.

The death of Candice Rochelle Bobb, 33, and subsequently of her unborn son may well have been caused by a person who was angry because the driver of the car in which Bobb was a passenger made a U-turn in front of him. Call it U-turn rage. The shooting took place on Pittsboro Drive near Finch Ave. in the north west part of the City on May 15, 2016. Bobb was five months pregnant when she was hit by shots inside a vehicle. She and three others were driving home from a basketball game and were dropping off one of the passengers in the area of John Garland Boulevard and Jamestown Crescent when a suspect began shooting at their vehicle.

U-TURN A THREAT?

Her baby, who family members named Kyrie, was delivered via emergency C-section and was transported to an intensive care unit. He died on June 15, exactly one month after the shooting. Detective Sergeant Mike Carbone said prior to the shooting, the driver of the vehicle Bobb was travelling in made a U-turn in front of an apartment complex near Jamestown Crescent. “It may have been something the offender had seen that prompted them to start shooting at the vehicle,” Carbone said. “The U-turn in front of the Jamestown complex could have drawn the attention of the offender as being some type of threat to them.” Either that or angry-man syndrome.

Pancake fashion statement

This is the day to have pancakes at church, whether you plan to starve yourself during Lent or not. As both the devout and merely aware understand, this is the day preceding Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent, celebrated in our world by consuming pancakes. In others, especially those where it is called Mardi Gras or some translation thereof, this is a carnival day, and also the last day of “fat eating” or “gorging” before the fasting period of Lent. Here is what Wikipedia has to say about this movable feast.

FAT TUESDAY

The expression “Shrove Tuesday” comes from the word shrive, meaning “absolve”. Shrove Tuesday is observed by many Christians, including Anglicans, Lutherans, Methodists and Roman Catholics, who “make a special point of self-examination, of considering what wrongs they need to repent, and what amendments of life or areas of spiritual growth they especially need to ask God’s help in dealing with.” Being the last day of the liturgical season historically known as Shrovetide, before the penitential season of Lent, related popular practices, such as indulging in food that one sacrifices for the upcoming forty days, are associated with Shrove Tuesday celebrations, before commencing the fasting and religious obligations associated with Lent. The term Mardi Gras is French for “Fat Tuesday”, referring to the practice of the last night of eating richer, fatty foods before the ritual fasting of the Lenten season, which begins on Ash Wednesday.

There’s just no telling how these nuts-behind-the-wheel would make out if they were jousting with the moving obstacles of the Crosstown LRT construction along Eglinton. Apparently everyone survived although it is a miracle. The bus is in Peru and the car (or what’s left of it) is in Poland.

Doug Putnam

Geek Games among the music

Music consumers may well be tantalized by the imminent opening (April) of Sunrise Records across Canada. But the Ancaster-based firm seems to be playing a careful game even as it takes over leases for 70 HMV locations in the country’s malls. A news release as to where the stores might be located is light in details — Burnaby, Hamilton, Winnipeg, Square One in Mississauga, St Bruno, Quebec and the West Edmonton Mall. The news release says other locations will be known when “more details are finalized.” A clue to the retailer’s strategy may be gained by checking the location of its nine current stores. Only one is in Toronto and that’s at Cloverdale Mall in Etobicoke. Sunrise president Doug Putnam has made it a point to say all his stores make money. Perhaps the rent in places like the Cloverdale Mall is part of that plan for the youthful businessman. He is also the head of a long-time family firm, Everest Toys. It shares offices with Sunrise Records at 65 Bittern Street off Hwy 53 on the road to Brantford. So the question seems quite open as to whether consumers will see a Sunrise Record store in expensive-to-rent downtown or midtown Toronto.

The Financial Post reports the two big banks have improved earnings for the fiscal first quarter.

Randy Lennox

Mary Ann Turcke

Mary Ann Turcke is off to the NFL. The engineer and Bell Media overseer (CTV and the rest) will become the head of digital media for the football league. Randy Lennox takes over at Bell Media. Many will ask if Turcke’s move involves a way to help her former boss, now an important customer, play Canadian commercials during the Super Bowl. Turcke assumed the top job at Bell Media when Kevin Crull stressed out and tried to censor criticism of Bell by the federal broadcast regulator, the CRTC, in 2015. The NFL and Bell Media, a division of Montreal-based telecommunications giant BCE Inc., have tried to fight a regulatory ruling that barred Bell from substituting its own television signal and Canadian ads over the U.S. signal during the Super Bowl.