The South Bayview Bulldog

Down on Yonge Street near the Eaton Centre they’ll be closing down the street on Sunday for Youth Day. Very worthwhile no doubt. It is of note that there will be no closures of South Bayview however.

A project which is both important and charming is underway in Toronto to locate the 326 moose which were painted and displayed all over the city in the year 2001. It would have to be one of Mel Lastman’s most worthwhile undertakings. Now a Toronto filmmaker, Anna Sand, and director/photographer Derek Rucas, have set a challenge to find and make a documentary about The Moose. They’ve made the short video above. Their site is wherearethemoose.com and it has thumbnail photos of all the moose and their found or missing status. As you might suspect, the vast majority of the moose are missing. It will be a big job to locate them. It may be that some will never be found. But many are still with us. We have all seen Florence Moosengale at the Integracare offices on Moore Ave. Some moose are being found by interested parties. One such local person is to be met at his website rudy.ca.

Now that the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that interest earned on bank accounts on Indian Reserves is properly non-taxable, what’s next? The court rebuffed two decisions which had concluded that interest earned in a reserve credit union or similar firm was taxable because it was “earned in the general economy” — that is, off the reserve. But what really mattered, said the high court justices, is that it was deposited on the reserve. Hmm. Are you thinking what we’re thinking? Would it be possible to transfer a wad of cash to a financial institution on a reserve and thus make interest tax free? The news stories do not address this issue and it may well be the unstated proviso is that you have to be a member of the band to get this advantage. But shouldn’t that mean that natives can get their interest tax free even if it’s deposited at Yonge and Bay? They’re exempt from sales taxes off the reserve. Readers no doubt would be grateful for a legal view.

Tremblett’s Valu Mart at Bayview and Davisville is undergoing renovations. A large sign outside says the store will remain open throughout the work. We hope to have more on this renovation tomorrow.

Well sure, 437 is Toronto ‘s new area code. The others, 416 and 647 are, like they say at school, totally maxed. But in a town with hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens, a number can be a very important thing. Stay away from 444. It means certain death. So far as we can tell, there’s nothing too stressful about 437. But most would be happier with 888 (great wealth) but it’s taken, or 520 (I love you). Maybe the next time. Here’s the government news release: Today, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) announced a new area code to manage the telephone number shortage that will affect Toronto, Ontario, the region currently covered by area codes 416 and 647. Starting March 25, 2013, new telephone numbers assigned in the region may be given the area code 437. Existing customers will keep their current area codes and phone numbers. These measures are being implemented in response to the Canadian Numbering Administrator’s assessment that the region will run out of telephone numbers by July 2015.

For a modest little blog like the South Bayview Bulldog, the response to our story from last night about the Thursday local outage of Rogers cable, Internet and wireless phone service has been considerable. Some took the time to comment. Thanks to them we can surmise that the outage effected Moore Park and some points to the west. Two readers from St. Clair-Yonge wrote to us. But more than 150 readers have checked the story indicating, perhaps, that the event had some relevance to them.

South Bayview and all of Toronto will be still be very hot today, even though the temperatures are somewhat lower than yesterday. The fall of three or four degrees in the predicted high represents a fair drop in the way we feel. Celsius degrees carry quite a wallop. Importantly, the humidex index will plunge after Thursday’s record-breaking heat. But will be hot over the weekend. Environment Canada has cancelled its weather warning, but Toronto’s extreme heat alert remains in effect.

The New York Daily News is reporting this morning on how a baseball great has fallen into a life of fraud. Former Mets outfielder Lenny Dyksta is said to have faked a $37,593 balance on an overdrawn bank account as part of his alleged scheme to defraud dealerships of luxury vehicles. Dyksta was one of the heroes of the New York Mets 1986 World Series victory.

The launch of the new subway trains on the Yonge line today recalled the somewhat cynical observation that in Toronto the rich ride north and south while the poor ride east and west. Not nice but you might find it hard to get the clearest of reasons why TTC bosses did what they did. Of course only a few of the new trains went into service Thursday. It seems likely that for the next few weeks most riders will do their commuting in an old train. Inveterate strap-hanger Sandra Zhang promises to take some pictures and give us a review as soon as she sees one of the new trains. But naturally there is lots of comment out there already. One man, who stands six foot four inches, thought the headroom at the doors was a bit lacking. Others said how much they liked the visual read-outs of station names. So much better for those listening to music. You still have to pay a little attention. The new trains won’t automatically rescue you from a feckless iPhone daydream all the way to the end of the line.