Obvoiusly I know that I don't live in Toronto anymore, but this trip made me feel it. I knew three people in town, my regular breakfast place is now a bar, I forgot which level of the St. George station was Bloor/Yonge, I didn't have a Remembrance Day poppy.... But the flip side is that I really do very much live here, in which I rejoice. So there you go.
Of note: most of the people I chatted with in Canada, whether old friends or perfect stranges, said "How 'bout your election, eh?" and I said "Yeah, I know, I voted and got the heck out." They are so sad. And I don't blame them one bit. I'm sad too. On the positive side, I have signed up at Marry an American.
- We kept seeing the name Val Kilmer graffited up and down Queen West, and I am happy to say that other people are as mystified as we are. See here and possibly the creators.
- Then breakfast at a Second Cup and a nice long chat. We had decided against our umbrellas that morning but were not too deterred by a late-morning rain as we splashed merrily down Queen, in and out of stores. Hit Romni Wools and dropped a bundle. Then Tamara tried on some gorgeous dresses and twirled about.
- Dinner at the Duke, a Massey favourite. Couldn't for the life of me recall an appropriate beer, since I didn't drink beer when I lived in Canada, so had an Alexander Keith's IPA, which I did remember being big on my trip to Halifax and was quite yummy. Instituted the rule of the "talking french fry," which you must be holding in order to speak. Then largely ignored said rule.
Friday - A trip on the Queen and Spadina streetcars, plus some wandering in the Annex, led us to the Future Bakery for breakfast.
Future is my very favourite Toronto eatery, and I think I could spend a whole day just sitting and sipping and watching the world go by on Bloor. (And Brunswick, of course. One cannot forget Brunswick. Although one can forget theBrunswick, which is skankity-skank.) - We walked back down Robert Street to the Harbord Bakery where I scarfed down a nanaimo bar, the food of les dieux canadiens. On to Kensington Market to browse seasonings in bulk, real butcher shops, and second-hand clothes.
- Tam headed back to the hotel to meet Luci for lunch and I wandered up to campus to the UT bookstore. Resisted hoodies but got a drooled-over book The Museum Called Canada - with a name like that, how could I not buy it?
- Met Stephanie at the ROM, where the staff door clerk was the same guy as when I volunteered in 1997 - refreshing sameness. We had Vietnamese and caught up. V g.
- To Massey to meet Chris. We looked at an exhibit of Picasso's ceramics and were not inspired. But were cheered up at SpaHa for fries and a foofy coffee.
- Dinner at the Queen Mother with Alex and Sven. More hugs and catching up. I love visiting!
Saturday - Breakfast at Fran's, where Tamara finally found a smoothie and got tea with not one but two pots of hot water. I don't know how we ever got her out of there. In honor of one of the many fine things I learned while living in Toronto, there is finally a photographic record of my coffee cream cow trick.
- Adventure on the TTC to the Distillery District, a complete surprise to me, becuase the last time I heard it was just an abandoned distillery occasionally used to film not-particularly-good movies and episodes of Due South, but is now full of art studios and restaurants. Tamara rented the "audio wand" self-guided tour and did a brilliant job at repeating the tour for all of us to hear, although she was missing the Canadian accent. Which is definitely not her fault and is no strike against her.
- Then to our cute little B&B in the Annex, the Admiral St. George. We chose this B&B for its location in the Annex and for its name, in a tribute to one of our favorite characters in Persuasion.
- For evening entertainment, I inadvertently sent Luci and Tamara on a wild good chase for movie theaters in Yorkville, not knowing that whatever the theater in the bottom of the Bay at Bloor/Yonge was gone and forgetting to tell them where the Manulife building was. But they wound up at Hemingway's in Yorkville and had rave-worthy chocolate mousse cake. Meanwhile, I met Chris and Tatiana for dinner on Roncesvalles and then got to meet their lovely dog Huxley.
Sunday - After an amazing breakfast of fruit salad and croissants, we wadered through the Annex and campus and back up to Yorkville for sock shopping and the Bay at Bloor/Yonge. On the way we cut through Queen's Park and ran across a Remembrance Day ceremony with bagpipes. Strangely moving to watch. I was most jarred by the heavily Christian language, which didn't resonate with the "cultural mosaic" Canada I know.
- Went to the Bata Shoe Museum and the Super G grocery store for Cadbury and maple-themed souvenirs.
- Dinner at Hey Lucy and then on to the theatre! The Royal Alexandra is lovely but it seems that in 1909 the people in the upper balcony didn't have knees - or certainly wouldn't be expected to use them after sitting through a show.
Thursday
