Canadian Cell Costs - Part I

I've been ranting enough on Twitter about this, so I figure it deserves its own blog posts. First, the background:

For around 13 years I was with Bell Canada for my cell service. From a monochrome-screened bar phone, to a slider, to a shiny LG flip phone, to my iPhone 4, and briefly, a 5s.

I've never really had much of a complaint with regards to the service (other than my folks' place being between towers in a bit of a dead zone), but man have their prices ever sucked. My first phone was under my mother's work plan because it was a huge improvement over what was publicly available and my company didn't yet have an individual cell plan deal in place. I moved to my own work's corporate plan when I upgraded phones.

The problems started with the next move, to the LG. I wanted a new phone. This meant a new plan. I said I wanted something close to what I currently had. They gave me a plan that I shouldn't have been able to get (I had no idea at the time). The next bill, Bell changed my plan without telling me. I didn't notice until a few bills later, and Bell refused to make any changes or refund the difference.

Luckily, I had an ace up my sleeve in a friend who worked high enough in the Bell hierarchy to complain on my behalf and get actually helpful people to call me. The problem was resolved beyond my satisfaction and I was happy. The next upgrade to an iPhone meant the inclusion of data - that whole move was actually painless, just add $25/month for 500MB of data. Not a great price, but the best option at the time based on how cheap my voice plan was.

Then came the end of that contract.

My Bell friend and I have long since drifted apart, so calling him up out of the blue would just be rude. Instead I opted to go through the regular channels. It consistently went something like this:

"My contract is up soon. I want to upgrade my phone, which I know means I need a new plan. Here's what your competition is offering. Can you match it?"

"Nope."

"So for 13 years I've been a loyal customer, paying my bills on time, using extra services like roaming plans, and you can't even make an offer?"

"Nope"

"I guess I'll be leaving then."

"Okay, have a nice day."

Wow. Considering I have my Internet connection and landline with them too, this was... surprising.

So I hemmed and hawed and finally, after months of wanting to toss my phone against a wall every day, walked into the Apple store and paid full price for an unlocked, non-subsidized phone. It was worth it to not be tied to any of the carriers in this country.

Then I did the math and discovered something - there are no real phone subsidies.

If you bring your own phone to the big 3 providers (Bell, Rogers, Telus) - you get $20/month off your bill on a two-year contract. That's $480 you're paying towards your phone.

iPhone 5s 32GB - $819. On contract? $329. Difference? $490. $10 in subsidies from the phone companies, if you don't include time value of money calculations. The rest is you paying $20 more a month to get a "cheap" phone up front.

Whoopdeefuckingdoo. That's not a subsidy, that's a phone mortgage.

I'll continue this in another post with some rough comparisons between my options, and how I think these guys will hurt themselves in the name of protectionism and short-term greed.

Or Else What?

As a kid I remember it occurring to me that "or else" could mean nothing. Counting to 3 without a defined punishment at the end means that 4 could be what comes next.

I often find myself also thinking how delicate the agreed-upon rules of society are. If you walk out of a store with a bag full of stuff, that's shoplifting. I'd like to think most people don't steal because they know it's wrong. Many probably don't because they're afraid of getting arrested. But the reality is that if you went somewhere you rarely frequent and randomly walked out of a small store without paying for anything, that you'd probably never be punished.

An extreme example? Maybe. But so many rules are set up with the expectation people will act decently. The line "make me" or "what are you gonna do about it?" come to mind.

Which brings me to Rob Ford.

Toronto's Mayor's foibles and fuck ups have been well-documented. The latest twist is his friend, Alexander Lisi, a "stand-up guy" by Ford's own written admission, has been arrested for extortion, drug trafficking, and probably a few other things. The press got the documentation for the search warrants released, and they were revealing. Photos of Lisi and Ford going through spy-level package drops and meets, possibly drinking and driving, and generally looking shifty. Along with these came the admission from the Chief of Police that the cops also now had a copy of the crack-smoking video in their possession. The video Ford said didn't exist. The one that Ford had hoped had been mostly forgotten.

Oops.

So with this revelation, the media descended on City Hall. Ford came out, mumbled his way through excuses, and said he wasn't going to resign, because there was no reason for him to.

He's kind of right.

There are no criminal charges against Ford. Even if he WAS smoking crack in the video (and his lawyer has already said it wasn't crack in the pipe, or more accurately, that they can't prove it was crack, because straws offer good grasping support), that's not enough evidence to charge him with anything. It just means he's a liar, which most people already knew.

If you were accused of a crime and told to quit your job, would you? Or would you defend yourself? Especially if there was no actual charge, just the public casting you as guilty.

Ford SHOULD temporarily step aside to avoid being a further distraction, with the promise to return when his name is cleared. But he won't do that either.

For he knows full well that there's nothing anybody can do to him. Council can't have him removed. There's no recall option. The Provincial Government can only remove him if he's charged with (or convicted of?) a crime. He also knows the support he has left is among die-hard morons who would stand behind him as he threw puppies at a button that would nuke the city. So in short, what can be done to him? He'll just keep deflecting and denying and hoping it all blows over and is forgotten.

What this will do is reignite the investigations into his life and past. He will have no privacy, and no secrets. He knows the police are following and recording him. His friends are rapidly getting arrested. His allies are abandoning him to save their own hides. It will end up being him, his brother, David Price, and maybe one or two council members who are too stupid to get away.

Oh, and I expect Lisi will look for a plea bargain to avoid court, which could keep the video under wraps indefinitely. Because for some reason, the Ford family seems to be scarier to criminals than jail.

Here's hoping he doesn't see a second term.

Credit and Context

Hrm, a post on Blogger about a gripe that was catalyzed by Tumblr. Maybe I'll tweet about it.

Tumblr - I'm still not sure I "get" it, but I have one that I post at infrequently. It's a decent way to find some interesting stuff that doesn't necessarily make it to Twitter. One of its major problems, however, is the lack of proper sourcing. Lots of pictures, comics, gifs, etc., fly through it without being attributed to the original source. I've seen a couple of my photos on there with narry a link to my Flickr page or mention of me. I assume similar things are happening elsewhere on the Web as well.

[there was a part in here about Tumblr making it hard to anchor to the original source. This seems to be something they fixed, so that part is gone now.]

There are users out there that do try though.  The Frogman comes to mind as someone who tries their best (or at least, his assistant does) to find out where things are from originally instead of just hitting the reblog button. Likely because he creates a great deal of original work that gets ripped off.

Wil Wheaton is another who has championed sourcing your material. But he often falls prey to the beast of "it's easier to hit reblog".

Case in point, this recent post.

This one caught my eye because I instantly recognized the location. It's the Distillery District in Toronto. That truck is all over the place. I've taken some shots myself. Thinking that "hey, Wil retumbld a shot from my city", I clicked on who he got it from. It was from an actress, who as far as I could tell was neither a ballerina, nor photographer, nor from Toronto. It seemed unlikely she was the original source. In very light grey and a tiny font, hidden amongst the tags of her post, was a "source" link - to a Tumblr of a 19-year-old dancer, or at least dance enthusiast. Okay, this seemed to be getting somewhere. Except that there was nothing else like this in her feed, and no more links to earlier sources. It seemed that this was just someone who liked the shot and put it up without attribution.

To be fair to Wil, he had a more visible link to this same source on his post

So I spent a whopping 5 seconds copying the link to Google's search-by-image tool, and found this article in Chloe Magazine about Heather Ogden, a Principal Dancer of the National Ballet of Canada. The second image in was the one in question. With two others from the Distillery District. Photography was credited to Aleksandar Antonijevic - whom another search revealed is another Principal Dancer in the National Ballet, who also happens to be a photographer.
 
It took far longer to ramble on here than to actually find where this image came from. It's really not that hard. It's even easier if the original poster includes a link in the first place. I mean, I have 10 links in this post alone. They're really easy to use.

Well, It's a Start

There's a post making the rounds in these parts from someone who voted for Rob Ford (henceforth known as Mayor Laughable Bumblefuck - H/T to Cory Doctorow). In it, the author tries to explain his ignorance at the polling station 2 years ago. How he thought Bumblefuck had more achievable goals, and that the stories of his ineptitude HAD to be overblown, because nobody could be that much of a buffoon, right?

Of course, he now realizes how wrong he was.

It's no excuse. You were a fucking moron.

I'm glad you've seen the error of your ways and are looking to make amends. But because of people who couldn't be bothered to spend about 30 seconds THINKING about the idiot who would be Mayor, we've had 2 years of bumbling idiocy from His Worship Bumblefuck.

Seriously, other than the union negotiations, can anybody tell me something productive he's achieved? And I'm not talking about the increase in civic interest because of his floundering.

Anybody with a brain and 5 minutes of time to read should have been able to see that Ford's "plans" were useless. That his promises held no ground in reality. Sure, we all wanted to believe there was tons of "gravy" at City Hall, but a look at the numbers showed that Toronto was pretty efficient as it was, and that the savings that could be found wouldn't amount to enough without severe cuts to services.

That aside, Bumblefuck's unadulterated aggression towards things like realistic transportation, bikes, urban dwellers, environmental causes, Pride, crime prevention over policing, or any sort of personal responsibility, not to mention his racist comments, legal troubles, and general stubbornness and buffoonery should have been red flags that he wasn't the mayor you wanted.

Sure, Smitherman was no peach himself, but was clearly the lesser of two evils. And when you vote for the lesser of two evils... YOU GET LESS EVIL.

The worst kind of voter is the uninformed one. The one who steps behind the box still debating who they'll vote for because they DON'T UNDERSTAND THE POSITIONS OR THE CANDIDATES. I'd rather you had come out and said "I got Rob Ford, I knew he could be a disaster, but I thought he was the better choice because his politics lined up more with my own." I might disagree with you then, but at least you'd come off as someone who gave a damn.  Instead you sound like you flipped a fucking coin because you got tired of hearing aspiring teachers cheer their union. Mayor Laughable Bumblefuck wasn't some unknown. He wasn't Rossi or Thompson. He had been a Councillor for TEN YEARS. His voting record and NUMEROUS public fuck-ups were well known. To say, "...claims about Ford’s ineptitude seemed not just exaggerated, but made up. Could anyone be so wildly unfit?" just says, "I was too lazy to use Google."

I'm glad you learned a lesson. I'm glad you're telling other people it's okay to be ashamed of their terrible choice. But maybe you should also talk about how you could have avoided looking like such an idiot in the first place.

But you ask for clemency. Fine, now that that's off my chest, you have it. You were young and inexperienced. You actually believed a politician and not your own brain. Never make that mistake again. If something sounds like it's so easy it should have already been done, spend at least a few minutes trying to find out why it hasn't. And for whatever being you choose's sake, don't EVER walk into a polling booth still trying to figure out who gets the X.

Trojan

A post that has nothing to do with high school mascots or condoms, and only a little to do with dead civilizations.

Last week I was grabbing a whack of zombie papercraft for my final photography assignment. Somewhere in all that I accidentally downloaded a trojan. Specifically the SMART HDD malware.  This insidious piece of software creates the glorious illusion of a hard drive failure by throwing up a bunch of real-sounding error messages, wiping out your desktop, blanking out your start menu, hiding entire drives and making them read-only, preventing anti-malware software from running, and restarting your machine.

Oh, and then it throws up a believable Microsoft-like taskbar bubble that warns you of problems, and launches a legit-looking analytics and recovery program.

It had me fooled for a second.

Except a physical scan of 120GB of space isn't that fast.

And the "failed" drive is a solid-state drive, which wouldn't be subject to typical drive failures. Especially not as epic as was being put forth.

And my data drive is a mirrored RAID, so I know I wouldn't lose everything.

And my Windows is set up to display hidden files, so I could still see them, except they were all faded-like.

And the Intel drive monitor was still running and everything was green.

And after it "scans" it informs you that you only have the trial version of this software you've never seen before and you can upgrade to the full one that fixes things.

In short... no way it was actually a drive failure.

So the search began to figure out how to get this piece of crap off my machine. Luckily, I have a Macbook and phone nearby that both give me access to the Interwebs.

Solutions were long and complicated... do this, then this, run a sub-user cmd prompt, get this program... cripes.

So fuck that. I reset, restarted in Safe Mode, disabled the program startup in the registry (it's a series of random letters), and restarted normally. No more annoying "failed drive!" popups. Run a couple anti-malware programs and remove this crap.

Except my desktop and start menu were still blank, and all my files still hidden and read-only.

Hey wait... system restore is still on.  2 days prior image returned... everything looks normal. Files still marked as hidden and read-only. Damn.

Mass attribute change, knowing it might cause a few minor problems, but I could live with that.

But there are still lingering problems. Thunderbird keeps redownloading mail I've already grabbed. Every 5 minutes.  Some games don't work because Securerom got fucked (there's irony in there somewhere).  So now comes the fun task of reinstalling crap that don't work and hoping that things like config files and saved games are kept.

I don't even know how it was delivered. Since all I was grabbing was PDFs and JPEGs.

Stupid fucking trojan.

Tit for Tat

Yah, yah... Toronto politics.

Okay, quick recap: Toronto had viable transit expansion plan and funding. New Mayor comes in, tries to scuttle plan for some unaffordable less expansive plan that is all underground because he wants that, despite driving everywhere. Council grows a spine and stands up to him, with major help from his hand-picked head of the Transit board., who I can only believe learned something about the city's transit by being in charge of it. Mayor rejects compromise that would make him look like a winner and quasi-decent leader who is learning from mistakes. Council restores old plan, tells Mayor to go fuck himself.  Mayor calls council irrelevant. Mayor's lackeys fire Chief General Manager of TTC, who has worked there 35 years. Why? Because he did his job and told the truth about how dumb the Mayor's plan was.

Mayor and Councillor Stintz (TTC board Chair) both wanted to revamp the board. They reached a compromise, and then something happened on the Mayor's side that derailed the whole thing. Likely that he refused to acknowledge the will of the council. Compromise was 5 Councillors,  4 citizens, current board in place until June.

Yesterday, Council shitcanned all the Mayor's lackeys from the TTC board. The 5 lapdogs who fired the GM are now wondering what board they can sit on now. They also changed the makeup of the board - now 7 councillors, 4 citizens, with the councillors being appointed immediately, citizens coming on in June.

Board, including Chair was dissolved, and then a new one voted on. Stintz was re-elected as chair, and the 6 other members were minus all the Mayoral asskissers from before, replaced with a heavier pro-logic group. In short, Mayor gets his ass handed to him again. This time, the vote in favour of Stintz' plan was even more in her favour than the last big one.

So now there's a TTC board that's aligned with council, meaning yet another avenue of roadblocks from the Mayor has been repaved for smoother driving.

Oddly enough, Mayor Ford has yet to open his mouth yet, likely because his handlers have pointed out it's harder to put his foot in it that way.  He was barely in the meeting yesterday - you know, where he should be as a leader.

Now, some leaders realize that they have to reach a compromise with the representatives they supposedly lead. This can be done either by meeting them partway, bullying, bribing, or convincing.  Ford is not great orator. He's shown that his arguments time and again lack any validity in the world of truth and logic, so convincing is right out. He successfully bullied and bribed for a while, but has since run into issues bigger than his short term threats and promises. He's been offered compromises that are HEAVILY in his favour time and again and rejected them without a second thought.  Most people would realize they're beat at this point and that maybe they're part of the problem. Some people, like our esteemed Mayor, entrench themselves further, bury their head in the sand, and throw tantrums.  He continues to neuter himself in the eyes of the city and the province. He continues to be an embarrassment to those he claims to represent.

And as he continues to lose power and face, he'll continue to lose supporters. Those who still vote unquestioningly with him will drift. Those who have become so embedded with him that they can't escape will seek spin. There's his major ring-kisser who has shifted his rhetoric to include his riding more often now - possibly in an effort to play the "I fought for my riding's best interests!" card when elections roll around again, and hope that's enough to beat the "He stuck to the Mayor like a conjoined twin!" spiel from whoever his opponents will be.

As before, if nothing else, he's made the citizens of Toronto give a damn about their political process.

Bleeding Blue and White, Turning Red

Fuckin' Leafs.

1-8-1 in the last 10 games. 4 points out of a playoff spot. Only 3 points ahead of BUFFALO? Give me a break.

What a joke.

I agree with not much being done on the trade deadline. Other than a goaltender, no trade would have made a major difference with the club.  But the goaltenders worth anything that were available would have come at far too high a cost for them. When Evgeni Nabokov and Jonathan Bernier are your top options, their prices are going to be inflated.

Nash? Obviously nobody wanted to pay the price for him.

Dustin Brown? Might have been nice, but hardly improves a team fighting for a playoff spot. He's a good addition FOR the playoffs, but not scrambling for them.

The reality is that most deadline signings don't have an effect on the acquiring team until the following season. It takes more than 20 games to find your groove with new teammates and new coaches.

So, nothing was going to get fixed by dismantling the rebuilding effort.

Look, I said before the season started that the playoffs would be a fight. We were as likely to be in 11th as 7th with this team and this division. The emergence of Kessel and Lupul as bona fide stars is welcome, but the death of our secondary scoring, complete inconsistency in goal, and godawful defence has more than countered the upsides. Those last two points have really come home in this stretch. Where before the Leafs could win on top-line scoring alone, the turnovers and bad goals of late are gifting points to opponents.

But that's not the worst of it. What really pisses me off as I've watched this collapse is the lack of energy on the team. It started when they played 4 games in 6 nights a couple weeks back.  The Leafs were DEAD after the first game. They could barely stand up, let alone skate end-to-end by the third period of the second game. By the end of the week I half expected to see them snoozing on the bench.

If you can't play the 2nd half of back-to-back games without looking like your legs are made of wet noodle, then you're sure as shit not going to make it ANYWHERE in the playoffs. Where the fuck is the conditioning?

Outside of Lupul and Brown, are there any players on the team who can go a full 60 minute game?  I wish the whole team was made of clones of these two. Brown can't score, but he's scrapping and banging and shooting to the last second, whether it's 5-0 leafs or 10-0 other guys. Kessel still looks like he should be on a beer-league team, and it shows as the long stretches play out.

I think back to the Pat Burns days, and him running the team hard every single practice. They'd be gasping for breath when the sprints and drills were over. He told them they'd be thankful when they were in overtime in game 7 of a playoff series. That year's team saw a game 7 every round. And more overtimes, double overtimes, and triple overtimes than any team has ever seen. They played hard every damned shift.How the hell is Wilson letting his team look this poorly conditioned?

So now, 19 games left, four points out, 2 teams to climb over, to JUST make the playoffs - the team needs to be shaken up. Firing Wilson at this point serves no purpose. If they miss the playoffs, he's in trouble.  But knowing Burke's loyalty to his guys, I expect you'd see the rest of the coaching staff scrapped first. Goaltending coach Francois Allaire should be the first out the door.  He may be highly regarded, but his method clearly isn't working with what he's got.

At this point, with 9 of the next 11 games on the road, the Leafs need a kick in the collective ass. They'll be away from the (rightfully) booing fans at home, away from the Toronto hockey media circus, and that can't hurt. But they'd better be flying a few Marlies around with them too. Time for Kadri to skate around for a game or two again, give Colborne a shot, why not Carter Ashton? They can't hurt any more than we're hurting. Would it kill them to put Scrivens in net for a game? If nothing else, the enthusiasm from these guys could be a refreshing change right now. The teams hits the ice already beaten now. It's an embarrassment.

I accept rebuilding. In fact, I embrace it for the Leafs. Too many rebuilding efforts on this club have been stopped dead by a playoff run or unexpectedly good season. I'm glad Burke is sticking to his guns. But at this point? We should be fighting for 6th, not 8th.

The Flailing of a Failing Dictator

More Toronto politics folks.

When we last left our intrepid mayor, he had suffered a defeat at the hands of council. His lackeys looked chagrined, and he was at a bit of a loss.

To the surprise of nobody, he's been lashing out in his own special petty way.

First, there were the Ford-side councillors who sent a letter to our Provincial government that said "hey, council is irrelevant, so you should just ignore that vote."

You don't get to pick and choose if you're relevant in a democracy. You can't cry because you didn't get your way and say you don't matter. Because the next time something goes your way, but the people up the ladder don't like it, they can say, "huh, I thought you said you were irrelevant."

Idiots.

Then word came that the TTC chief general manager, Gary Webster, had sent a report to Ford a while back basically saying, "Um, dude, your plan for a subway makes no sense, will never make sense, isn't feasible, and would be extending a mistake made over a decade ago that resulted in none of the promised gains."  Also known as the truth. Our esteemed mayor and his lackeys decided this report wouldn't be released to the public or council - you know, a vital piece of information that could help inform their decisions about the project.

That same guy made the mistake of telling the truth at the big special council meeting too - 135,000 more people served using the LRT plan instead of the subway plan. Far better value for the dollar.

In short, he wasn't making friends with Ford.  He refused to drop to his knees for the emperor of Toronto.

So Ford's lackeys on the TTC board called their own special meeting of their group, and fired the chief general manager. The guy who's been working for the city for 37 years. Why? For no just cause, but because he didn't kowtow to the Mayor's whims.

The sycophants who still side with Ford toed the same line - "A civic employee should hold the same vision as the Mayor."

No. A civil servant should serve the needs of the citizenry. The ideal civil servant should be apolitical, and be relying on facts and the truth. They shouldn't twist these things to match the current administration's viewpoint if it's directly at odds with reality.  This is why there is a civil service and bureaucracy - to maintain a steady flow of operations as leadership and mandates change.

Oh, and the vote? 5-4. Exactly along the lines of those who "want subways" and those who have a fucking brain.

But, council has still spoken. Firing the guy running the day-to-day of the TTC doesn't change that. It's the bully going after the random kid because his teacher gave him detention and the Principal backed it up. I'm sure Webster's replacement will be someone more in-line with our Mayor. Which means more roadblocks and stumbling blocks to a realistic transit solution finding its way into my city. But hey, anyone who thought Ford wouldn't muck up the works instead of accomplishing anything of significance needs to have their independent thought examined.

Edit: Turns out Webster was one year away from retirement. Also, The Holy Roman Mayor managed to say that the "general public" wanted the TTC to "move forward" with a straight face. I assume he fist-pumped once he was out of sight.

Addendum #2: I forgot to mention that the whispered cost of terminating his contract early? $500,000. Yup. Ford's desire to turf someone who didn't agree with him will cost his beloved "taxpayers" half a mil so he can sit at home instead of working for one more year for, I assume, less money. CHOO CHOO! What's that? Oh, it's the GRAVY TRAIN!!! WOOO WOOO!! Thanks for stopping that your Worship.

Note: "His Worship" is actually the proper title/address for the Mayor.

The Better Way

This is Toronto-centric. Also, it's long. Leave now if you don't care.

Yesterday, an astounding example of community activism and municipal democracy happened in my fair city.  But first, some background.

Our previous city government, under mayor David Miller, approved the most ambitious transit plan that Toronto has seen in decades. Ours is a city of the car - gridlock during the day, poor bike infrastructure, 3 subway lines, and a bunch of streetcars and buses. The Transit City plan would use LRT lines to expand this infrastructre - replacing a line at the end of its life (Scarborough RT), replacing a dozen bus lines with one contiguous rapid transit line (Eglinton), providing those with the worst commute in the city with a sleek new system (Finch), and extending other lines to the people who needed them.  Environmental assessments were done, provincial funding was guaranteed to the tune of $8.4 billion, and while some compromises had to be found, it was full steam ahead to finally expand a system that had only seen a stub of a subway line added in the previous 30 years of explosive growth.

If it all worked out, even more ambitious plans were in the works - a downtown relief line, extensions to University and College campuses that are currently a pain to get to, connections to major attractions and the airport. In short, what would eventually be better access through one of North America's largest cities.

Then came Rob Ford. Our current buffoon of a mayor. He campaigned on "ending the gravy train" at City Hall. He promised those wonderful "efficiencies" that are all the rage but never really found.  He also promised a subway to our eastern wing, Scarborough.  A subway that would run along a stretch where the density is far too low to support such a system. Hell, they build a Sheppard subway in the 90's that they considered closing in the 2000's because ridership was so low.  He wanted to extend that mistake.

So day 1 in office, he "cancelled" Transit City. A plan, that while not perfect, was our best hope for comprehensive transit in our lifetimes. A project that was fully funded, fully supported, and where DIGGING HAD ALREADY STARTED.  Why? He wanted a subway to Scarborough. Fuck the rest of the city.

So he marched to our Provincial leader and demanded they let him have his way. They acquiesced - an election was coming after all, the world was jerking to the right, and Ford had some sort of inexplicable momentum behind him.

So work stopped. The organization in charge looked at alternatives. Ford demanded that the $8.4 billion, instead of building 2 new lines, replacing a 3rd, and extending a 4th, all be dumped into burying the Eglinton line and replacing the Scarborough RT. Because that's how much it would cost to take a reasonable plan for that street (buried for a bunch, surface route in lower-density areas) into a "subway".  I guess it beat his alternative - the whole kitty into the subway to the east that would be underutilized for 50 years.

But all was not lost! No! He also was going to find magic beans he called "private sector money" to pay for his glorious Sheppard subway to Scarborough. Of course, nobody in the private sector had been consulted. Nobody had done a study to see if it was even feasible. But dammit, Rob Ford felt it in his gut, so it would be!

Except it wasn't. Instead of a proper feasibility study, he asked one lackey to put together a report. This guy came up with "yah, it could happen. If we have road tolls to pay for 60% of it." Road tolls being anathema to politicians in this city. I dunno, New York seems to get by with them. I hear  London has adapted too.

Anyway, along with this report came a legal decision that another councillor had asked for. A prominent legal firm here determined that no, Rob Ford was not, in fact, a king. He couldn't unilaterally cancel a plan that had been approved by the council. The council had to vote on it.

Drats! Democracy again?

And that was the release on the giant boulder at the top of the ramp. Within days of this opinion being released, Ford's plans were being squashed. Karen Stintz, former Ford lackey who he had hand-picked to head up our Transit Commission turned on him. She presented a compromise! A COMPROMISE! THE HEATHEN! She suggested that maybe Eglinton could be unburied a little bit. Not as much as originally, but also not all underground. It could save $2 billion that could restore some of the other plans a bit, and give Ford a boost for his white elephant subway.

The response? NO! NO! NO! Ford gets tantrumy (as is his wont) and his lapdogs on the TTC board turn on their leader and vote her down.

So she says, fine... I tried to be nice.

She gathered up more than half the councillors and had them sign a petition to call a special meeting of council. This is an exceedingly rare occurrence. I'm not entirely sure it's EVER happened before. This meeting was to put forth the original plan in all its glory for final approval. Mayor be damned.

Rob cried and whined! NO! I'M THE MAYOR! PEOPLE ELECTED ME TO BUILD SUBWAYS!! I WILL REND THE EARTH WITH MY BARE HANDS AND YELL CHOO! CHOO! DOWN THE TUNNELS!

Or something to that effect.

The councillors approached him right up the last minute, offering compromises that would still make him look good. There could still be a subway! Just make an allowance here so the poor (literally) people on Finch can get to work faster.  He refused.

So yesterday, the full council met, made speeches, pleas, and motions. Even then, a compromise was made - Sheppard was left off the table. It would be further explored to see if a subway made sense. Rob still bitched. He tried to get the whole thing delayed - that was defeated quickly, and he disappeared for hours afterwards.

His yes-people spewed blatant lies and the same old misinformation to try and swing the vote and instill fear. They read letters from citizens that sounded hand-written by the mayor himself so effusive of his plan were they.  Those who supported the original plan spoke clearly, used facts, and even a bit of sarcasm and humour to shoot down their opponents. They swayed a couple more votes in the process, and in the end, 58% of the council voted to approve the original plan, and tell the mayor to go fuck himself.  In far more political language of course.

So naturally, the mayor called the meeting "irrelevant", his #1 fluffer said the meeting was an exercise in ramming things down their throats.  Some of his supporters looked a bit ashamed that they were following such a moron who had no respect for democracy.  Some claimed the mayor and the province should just ignore the wishes of council. After all, the mayor was elected, so people want what he wants. The rest of council, also elected and representing citizens, be damned.

Then, our esteemed mayor went out the broke-down, soon-to-be-replaced Scarborough RT and rode it. He asked people if they'd rather a subway than that piece of crap. Unsurprisingly, they said yes. Of course, he didn't ask if they'd rather have ANYTHING other than that piece of crap.  It was a publicity stunt that screamed of desperation.

But, to the chagrin of him, and joy of more than him - the province came out almost immediately and essentially said "We will do what council wants, not one man."

So, now the next step comes. Metrolinx (the overseeing organization) now has to figure out the logistics. The TTC has to move forward with them. The mayor will likely try a few more things to stop it, but for now, the will of the people and their representatives seem strong.  People are fed up with a 3rd-rate transit system in a gridlocked city.

This mayor has been a disgrace, and embarrassment, and a fool. We have him for almost 3 more years. But his defeats are starting to pile up as the level of political activism in my fair city continues to rise. People are involved in the process in a way never before seen. They've realized that their voice counts, and that they can bring change where they want it.  Either Ford has to learn to accept compromises, or he has to get used to losing. His "Ford Nation" is now a small island, and it's shrinking.

Oscar-Winning Annoyance

I suppose I could put this on Filmchaw too, but it's more rant than review.

TIFF runs more than their big annual festival in these parts. They have a rather impressive tower now that houses theatres, workshops, a gallery, and other film-related stuff. In many ways, it's a year-round festival of various films and concepts.

They've just started this season's various series(es?), one of which is Food on Film. This series consists of 6 films about food, followed by a Q&A with a chef of some fame.

Last night kicked off with Babette's Feast and a Q&A with Scott Conant (owns Scarpetta, judges on Chopped, been on Top Chef).  The movie won the best foreign film Oscar for a reason.  Conant gets on TV for a reason. These two things were able to drag this first event above its two shortcomings.

First, the good. Babette's Feast is a Danish film about a small, remote, fishing village/religious sect.  The people live a pious life with little luxury. Meals are a mush of bread and ale, or saltfish soup.  Along comes Babette, a French woman escaping the French revolution of the mid 1800's.  She slowly adjusts these simple meals - a little bacon, a spring of rosemary, some onions. Nothing much, just enough that the locals notice and appreciate it.

Then an anniversary comes up and she offers to make a French feast for the village. This brings up questions of spiritual devotion among the faithful, and memories of one man's greatest meal ever. It's a hell of a feast, and a great piece of film-making.  If you can take subtitles, don't mind a slow start, and like food - it's a must-see.

After the film, Conant showed himself to be affable, confident (almost to the point of arrogant, but not quite in that annoying way), gracious, and a good interview.  Sadly, Jason Bangerter, the executive chef of the TIFF restaurants isn't much of an interviewer.

The night started with the resident Chef receiving an introduction that seemed to go on forever. Every restaurant he worked at was listed in detail. I'm surprised it didn't start with "His first dish was a sublime scrambled egg he made whilst still in utero".  By the end of the celebration of Bangerter, you'd think the guy was the second coming of Joël Robuchon. In comparison, Conant was practically introduced as "some guy who cooks."  I'm not sure how you get away with talking up the interviewer more than the guest.

Bangerter's interview style was very much the "I ask a question, you respond, then I move to the next with wooden grace" style.  Rarely was it conversational, nor did he seem able to follow up on interesting answers.  Or if he did, it was in the middle of another answer, as if it took 2 or 3 minutes for what he heard to sink in. Considering this should be a meeting of peers, where the insights of an accomplished chef add to the observations of a celebrity chef regarding a movie about food, it fell flat. I hope he improves as the series goes on.

But that was overshadowed by the woman in my vicinity who wouldn't shut up. Before the movie, during the movie, during the Q&A, it was an endless stream of patronizing pedantry and agonizing arrogance spewing from her.  "Oh, I'm only seeing this one, because none of the other films hold any interest at all for me."  "That's a black truffle." (said in the "how can he not know that?" tone when an audience member was asking a question).  Commentary loud enough to drown out the dialogue of the film. The ire was already rising by the time she took the mic for the Q&A and felt she had to correct an audience member, and both executive chefs on the stage with this stunning piece:

"It wasn't a cow's head. It was a calf's head."

Thanks. The world needed that minutiae shared. I suppose her point was it was veal demi-glaçe and not a beef one, but throw in the attitude and audacity and I wanted to tear into her. THEN she gets into an "argument" about women in the kitchen with Conant. Her point, "Woman have always been a force in the kitchen in Italy."  This was in regards to an earlier discussion about how women are becoming more prevalent in restaurant kitchens in North America.  Conant's response was along the lines of, "I wouldn't limit it to Italy. There are amazing female chefs in Spain, Hong Kong. Michelin Star chefs. There's one that is easily one of the top 50 in the world in Italy and everyone should try her food if they have the chance."  In short, he agreed and expanded. She came back with "No, but I'm talking Italy. Like, if you go back a few years, they've been big in Italy."  It was like she was expecting an argument and didn't know how to deal with agreement. An obviously annoyed Conant came back with "Sure, there was Catherine de' Medici if you really want to go back."

As she spoke, the nails-on-chalkboard annoyance across the room was palpable.  I'm incredibly happy she won't be at any future screenings in the series.I also gave an internal cheer when she was, once again, answering audience questions to nobody in particular and was just wrong enough to be wrong. [under her breath loud enough for everyone in a two row radius to hear] "It was sour cream."  [Conant] "That was crème fraiche."

But despite these unsavoury aspects, the film and guest were able to elevate the experience. It's a solid concept for a series, and I look forward to the upcoming films. After all, you can't control who buys a ticket.

Why You're Failing

It isn't, as you say, because there's so much competition in the business. Or because everyone has the basic technology at home and don't want pros to do it. Hell, it might not even because you're an arrogant douchebag.

Actually, that last one is probably why.

Here's the thing. You started the class by telling the teacher, who has decades of experience and seems to make a pretty good living doing his thing, that you had all the latest brand-name gear because your clients always asked what brands you used. He replied that he's never been asked that, and uses supplies from hardware and dollar stores.

You told him your camera didn't have a very basic setting that every camera has. He told you that you had to be wrong. You disagreed. You were.

We were told to bring in at MOST 50 pictures to the assignment review. Most people brought 25-50. You brought 300, claiming you read every line of the assignments and took a "scientific approach" to them. You obviously missed the lines that told you how many shots to bring in. You also failed to apply the science of "gee, will anybody in the class dedicate the time to look at 300 pictures? How could I possibly display that many?". Everybody tuned out when you tried to show stuff, most of us laughed about it.

The class has preached simplicity in lighting. Direct quotes from the guy you said "it is an honour to learn from" - "You don't need more than 1, maybe 2 lights and reflectors." "Learn how to use one light before using two." "The biggest mistake I see in lighting is people pulling out more and more lights to control shadows instead of using only a couple properly". So what do you do on the lighting class? Pull out 5 lights, 2 reflectors, and 4 partitions to light your model. Why? Because you know what you're doing of course. The fact most of the class lined up to take pictures of your model had little to do with your lighting skill and more to do with your model and the fact most of the class are sheep. Some of us didn't climb your stepladder to get the shot, and the person grading you sat against the wall chatting with those who weren't dazzled by your bullshit.

When asked why you're taking the class, you replied "so I can get my degree, because I've been doing commercial photography for years now but can't get some jobs without paper to back it up." I'm pretty sure the teacher rolled his eyes.

There's more, but my brain hurts every time you speak.

No, your business is getting tougher not because of outside factors, but because you're too fucking arrogant to figure out what an unpleasant moron you are. It's hard because you've spent your money on time on things you don't need and for advice you don't take. You give off an aura of "who the fuck is this asshole?" the minute you open your trap. Eventually you'll be holding hand puppets at the Sears portrait studio and blaming the Internet for your lot in life... while people who stopped looking for excuses and started fixing their own issues will still be doing what they love, and getting paid by your former clients.

Wait, Democracy Works?

That bruhaha about usage based billing (UBB)? It took a turn for the better a couple days ago.

Quick aside re: Canadian politics:

We have 4 major political parties - the Conservatives, Liberals, NDP, and Bloc Quebecois. The big 2 are the Conservatives and Liberals. The NDP are the "far" left who are generally pro-union, pro-tax, and more recently - pro-citizens. The Bloc only runs candidates in Quebec and has the stated goal of leaving Canada - so they don't really count in this topic and are only mentioned for completion's sake.

The NDP and Liberals have been against UBB for a while now, and once the shit hit the fan and petitions were being signed, the Conservatives were dragged over the line to also oppose it. Being the party in power, they were the big ones.

The Prime Minister took a personal interest in the issue, and the Industry Minister, Tony Clement went on the Twitters and told the world (or all 8700 of his followers) that the CRTC would either have to change its decision, or they'd do it for them

Win.

Now, it's not over yet. Even if the CRTC or the government strikes this down, restores competition and the avenue for innovation, and we all go back to merrily Netflixing our entertainment, this could rear its ugly head again.

See, an election is coming. This puts what could be a very popular issue to rest quickly. But once the dust has settled and we have 4-5 more years before the next election? Well, easy issues like this become less important. The companies involved are no doubt willing to wait it out a bit and start over again with their backroom dealings and flimsy excuses that anyone with an ounce of technical knowledge could disprove. They will try again.

Here's hoping everyone will still be willing to stop them.

Nearly Criminal

Bell. Grr.

Bell - Canada's major phone company. Also does satellite TV, Internet, and owns a bunch of crap. I've covered this before.

I've also mentioned how I'm in their rapidly dwindling echelon of hated users. Not because I use their phone lines, or their cell service, but because of my Internet usage. You see, I'm part of a dying breed - the guy on the Unlimited plan. The "lines" I'm on aren't the upgraded variety where I can get "up to" 25mb/s, but I have no bandwidth cap.

In their ongoing to attempt to get me to leave, they up my rate by $5 every 6 months. The latest increase just came in. This one coincided nicely with the CRTC's ruling that resellers (ie.- 3rd party providers using Bell and Rogers' lines) can now get screwed by the big boys. Where before, you could leave Bell and go to someone like Teksavvy in order to avoid caps, that option is now gone. Sure, you'd still be on Bell lines, but you'd have 200GB/month. Now? Teksavvy is forced to drop their cap to 25GB/month because our regulatory institution is in the back pocket of corporate Canada. Fuck.

Bell might now win. I'm now paying more per month for old service than their top-tier "fiber" (not really fiber) option. That one has a 75GB cap and for $5 I can add another 40. 75 isn't enough... 115 should be. If not? Another $5 for another 40.

But the whole thing pisses me off. Canada is a country that is ruled by monopolies. Bell was once the ONLY phone provider - it was government mandated. Rogers was once the only choice for TV in Toronto after it crushed or bought its competition. Eventually, Rogers moved into phone service, Bell into TV, and both into Internet and cell phones. But while they'll compete against each other, they're pretty united in hating the consumer.

See, Netflix came to town a few months ago with a streaming service. Rogers also has a bunch of video rental stores, and their VoD service. Bell has its VoD as well, and both have just launched online VoD. Can YOU see where they might want a convenient excuse to cap users? I can't... must be all this bullshit in my way.

I fully expect to see them partner with Microsoft, Sony, and possibly Nintendo as well - "Hey PS3 users! If you're on Bell, your PSN downloads don't count against your cap!" Considering I get all my games from Steam these days, there's another GB-sucking portal.

And you know what's rapidly disappearing? Physical media. CDs, DVDs, video games in a box - they all have limited retail lives as download speeds and storage increase. If you can grab a 10GB game while you sleep, why go to the store? HD movies streamed instantly? Downloadable in an hour to keep? Can't see the need for a player much longer. Even books are increasingly being downloaded to e-readers. Smart phones connect to your WiFi network to surf and grab apps.

The point being that ALL entertainment and information is going online and being downloaded, and being charged nearly $2/GB (if you don't pay for a block) when it costs at most PENNIES for the companies to provide it is damned near criminal. The fact our regulatory body, who is SUPPOSED to be looking out for the citizenry, the consumers, and the well-being of the country, as failed so epically is disgusting. They've effectively condemned Canada into staying in the stone ages technologically, at the mercy of a handful of large, established corporations who have only their own interests at heart. The small guys can't compete. Their ONLY competitive edge has been taken away. Nobody has the kind of capital required to lay physical communication lines across the second largest country in the world.

The only source of competitive hope would be one of the low-cost wireless carriers investing in a high-speed 4G cell broadband network. Pay for cell service, pay for at-home wireless broadband. Unlimited data on a tethered plan? That would still take some massive investment, but less than burying cable.

That, or the Googlenet will have to come to Canada.

Anybody want to connect a 54km Ethernet cable from my house to a US router?

So It Begins (local politics)

Rob Ford begins his tenure as our esteemed Mayor today.

Always a wallflower and one who likes to keep his big trap shut, he's already pissing me off. This will be all over the place, with no backing evidence, and also, I'm hungover and tired. Forewarned, you are.

"People do not want streetcars. We're going to start building subways and we're going to start right now."

This one sentence contains so much condensed stupid, I'm surprised it didn't collapse into a black hole of stupid, dragging all surrounding intelligence into its stupid maw.

Toronto has an approved and funded transit plan. Transit City will lay out light rail transit lines across the city (not streetcars), cost a few billion over decades, and should surpass the needs of this city beyond that. Assessments of ridership, growth, cost, and environmental impact have been done. Contracts have been signed with various companies to provide vehicles, lay track, etc.. Higher levels of government have approved the plan and promised funding for it. It's all been budgeted, and the ball is already rolling.

Subways are a pipe dream. They'll cost 3-5x more than the agreed-upon system, create even larger disruptions in traffic and daily life (entire streets completely dug up and exposed, buildings and houses torn down for stations, etc.), and would require a whole new round of assessments that wouldn't be completed until at least the NEXT election has come and gone. Sure, subways would be great, if they were remotely practical.

On top of that, subways would be nearly empty. The proposed routes don't have nearly enough ridership throughout the day to support the capacity of a subway system. An LRT system not only meets current needs, but surpasses them enough that it will take decades of growth to reach a level of saturation.

Then there's the contracts already signed. Bombardier and others aren't going to shrug and say, "oh, you changed your mind... that's okay." Hundreds of millions in cancellation costs would come into play. Years of planning tossed out the window. For something that WILL NOT BE REALIZED. "Start right now?" You're fucking dreaming.

Now, this level of idiocy sets of alarms in my head - he can't be THIS stupid, can he? It's some sort of political ploy. Distract the masses with an outrageous claim. The real goal is to just dismantle transit plans until the next Mayor has to make decisions. Something like that. Except that Ford and his team haven't shown nearly enough acumen to be that smart. This reeks of pure, unadulterated stupid. Our mayor can't see past the end of his nose, let alone any sort of broad picture or consequences.

He wants to cut costs, and the FIRST thing he proposes would add BILLIONS to them.

Maybe he should just set up a model railroad and convince himself he's achieved his goal. He can be mayor of Moronia.

Fuck, it's going to be a long four years.

Oh Bell

Bell = Big giant phone/Internet/TV company here in Canada.

Me = Customer who has phone/cell/Internet through them.

I've been coming home to "1 missed call" on my land line for weeks now. Some 1-866 number. No messages, just the caller ID letting me know I've been missing a call. I look it up, it's one of Bell's 3rd party call centres.

They finally called when I was home, and I decided to pick up to tell them to go away.

Turns out, they want to upgrade my Internet service (quel surprise!). I'm currently paying $x/month for the ol' busted service that they really don't want me on (so much so, they up my price by $5 every 6 months). But hey! I can get their NEW service for $(x-5)/month and have double the speed! Hell, it'll be $(x-10)/month if I have other services and bundle! (It won't, because my cell is corporate plan). So I'll just sign you up then?

No.

Wha? HUH? Why not! Faster! Cheaper! Awesomer!

Because I said no.

But? But? B-b-b-ut?

I don't want to be on a new contract.

No contract!

Also, you don't want me on my current plan because I'm one of the last blips on your "no download cap" map since I've had this plan for 5 years.

Yah, but this new one has a cap of 50 GB! No WAY you'd beat that! I'll check!

[insert silence]

So you're average is... umm.. 39.6 GB. Err... and your highest is... umm... 60GB. Oh. Well for $5 more you can add 40 GB!

So right now, when no new TV is on, and I'm not grabbing torrents or streaming shows, I've got an average of 40GB per month. Netflix is coming to Canada as a streaming service. More shows are going online every moment. Steam is my main means of buying games that are many GB in size. Games, even not online ones, send data back and forth. Every piece of software I own gets updates. My blu-ray player connects to the Internet. My Wii does. You don't think I'd eat up that extra cap space in no time? And that $5 extra means I'd be paying exactly the same amount as I am now. For what? A fake maximum speed that will never be achieved because you throttle traffic during peak hours and your fiber optic network is to-the-node and not to-the-door so I'm still bottlenecked by copper wire?

Umm... er... Yes?

I'm not interested. If I find myself interested, I'll call Bell.

I'll make a note... thank you for your time.

No problem, bye.


I can't wait to see if that number is on my phone when I get home.

There Are Rules

Let's blow the dust off this here space, shall we? Proxy dodginess makes for infrequent posting it seems.

There are rules in life that we shouldn't need to be told about. We learn them from experience or common sense. If you spill the jar of candies, you deny it was you. Even if you're sitting in the middle of the confectionery catastrophe with broken shards of candy jar in your hand.

You don't tell your mom you were "playing doctor" with the girl next door. Although it becomes difficult to lie about when her parents call asking about the sloppy sutures and botched appendectomy.

And for guys, there's one we should all know - you stagger positions at urinals dammit. If there are 5 urinals on the wall, you take 1, 3, and 5. You don't stand next to someone if the ability to put a space between you exists. You don't take 2 or 4 as a first choice because it fucks up the system for everyone else. And you definitely don't compliment the guy next to you on his watch.

What AC Needs

So Pauly put up a link to this NY Times article about the "death spiral" of Atlantic City.

How appropriate.

It's a piece that touches on some of the problem areas of the city by the sea, but offers little in solutions or depth. What it does give the impression of, however, is that the decision-makers in town have absolutely no idea how to fix anything.

My suggestion? An enema.

Think big? Think HUGE. AC needs to be flushed out. Entire neighbourhoods, within a block of the boardwalk, need to be razed and rebuilt. The confusing and terrible road system in there needs to be redesigned. The garbage that is visible at every turn needs to be cleaned up.

In short - someone actually has to give a shit about the place.

And maybe, in that rectal torrent, they'll get the casino owner's heads out of their asses. My visit in August, a weekend where the biggest thing going on was the Atlantic City food festival with some celebrity chefs, floored me with the cost. Your boardwalk hotels - and there's not ONE that rises above a mid-level strip hotel in Vegas - were asking more per night than I've paid for twice the quality in the desert. Freebies? Ha. You can't even park for free. And the receipt-swap trick (pay for parking at one hotel, it's good for parking at another) isn't advertised anywhere.

And it's not like these are rookie operators. Harrah's doesn't know how to do the little things to keep people happy? I just lost $1000 in your casino, and now I'm being dinged $10 for parking? Fuck that.

The casino floors are so ultra-80's-cheesy that it hurts to walk through some of them. The smell of desperation saturates the air as you pass seniors pulling their pensions away.

There's a simple reason the Borgata is suffering less than the rest of the city - they have a fucking clue. They do it right. You walk onto the floor and feel like money. You want to wander around, see what the place has to offer, and eventually find a chair and offer up some lucre at the altar of the gambling gods.

The rest? They feel like the casinos your grandmother warned you about. Unsafe, dirty, and untrustworthy.

Burn it to the ground, collect the insurance, and build something people will want to visit. Not something where they want to find a clean shower to wash off the filth and despair they've absorbed during their brief stay.

Yet still, I keep eying the cheap flights from YYZ to ACY...

It Can't Be Monday

That was my thought as I went to bed last night and set my alarms. Half of me still believed the weekend couldn't possibly be over. It was the same thought as the alarms went off this morning. I lay in bed debating if it really WAS Monday or not. When I finally determined it was, I still refused to accept it. Sitting now at my desk, this still seems a remote possibility.

But, it's Monday. The weekend flew by, despite my nearly 6 hours in traffic on Saturday.

From the west end of Toronto to Niagara Falls is around a 1.5 hour drive. An hour on a good day. It took me 3.5 hours to get to the Seneca Casino on the other side of the Canada-US border. Traffic for miles for no apparent reason. Moron after moron on the road, driving slowly on the left side, a wide-open right lane, drifting into my lane without checking a blind spot or using a blinker (since I was often passing them at the time). Many were also deaf as the guy leaning on his horn (me) alongside them didn't seem to make them realize they WERE ABOUT TO HIT ME. It was absolutely no surprise to me when there was a 5-car accident on the way back.

The border wait didn't improve my mood. The trunk search (it's completely empty) only aggravated me more. The families of 12 crossing ON A RED FUCKING LIGHT WHILE I WAS DRIVING TOWARDS THE INTERSECTION nearly pushed me to a vehicular killing spree, but I had no desire to end up in one of those filthy US prisons I've heard so much about. The card death at the table seemed fitting. Up $35 after 2.5 hours (and what should have been around 5).

VinNay had a much better time. Next time - he comes across the border.

But, I picked up my DVDs from our Buffalonian friend and made it back across without incident (which annoyed me because I spent 10 minutes hiding DVDs around my car, but better to not be searched than searched and found out I suppose). I was looking to be just a little late for a friend's birthday dinner, until I discovered that all lanes on the highway were closed at about the halfway point home. So I turned off, grabbed some fast food (a donut will not sustain you for a whole day, not even if it's boston cream), and debated on detours. You'd think a tourist office would have a decent map available.

Detour determined, the ride home wasn't too bad, but took about half an hour longer than hoped, which meant I completely missed the dinner. I felt bad. But I did make it for post-dinner festivities.

Sunday was much more relaxed, brunch with the family for my brother's birthday, chilling out at home watching movies with my best friend, and then driving them home afterwards.

I could have hit 5 different cyclists on that drive and been exonerated of all charges on each of them. People on bikes in the big city are FUCKING MORONS. There are LAWS for bike riding, FOLLOW THEM YOU STUPID FUCKS. Instead of flipping me the bird when I honk at you for running a stop sign and turning left from the right side IN FRONT OF MY MOVING CAR without giving any sort of signal on your bikes without any reflective surfaces and then taking up the whole road - why don't you realize that I could have crushed you under my wheels and slept soundly that night without fear of prosecution because you'd be 100% at fault?

I love biking. I think the city needs more people on bikes. I also think they need to be licensed and held responsible for following the rules like any other vehicle-user. This has been a shitty summer for bike behaviour here.

So yah, it can't be Monday, because the weekend was far too aggravating for it to be over.

Sometimes, My City Annoys Me

Well, it's not really the city's fault. After all, the city is a collection of land and buildings. They can't really be held responsible. Even if you extend it to the people, they're doing their best. In fact, the thought crossed my mind the other day that Toronto succeeds despite itself.

No, it's the bureaucrats. Shocker, I know. When they're not busy doing nothing, they're usually busy screwing good ideas up.

Case in point Toronto a la Cart. A long-overdue idea that was presented around two years ago - Toronto should have more street food options than hot dogs.

It's an old law - the only food you're allowed to sell from a cart in the city is sausage in a bun. This has led to no small amount of hot dog carts throughout the streets of town. Some are good, some are terrible, most are standard. A similar law exists in Vancouver, but some entrepreneurial people started Japandog there and made the most of it. Here? It doesn't get more exciting than a German sausage with some condiments more interesting than pickles if you're lucky.

It was a bit of a joke that a city that has over a dozen ethnic neighbourhoods side-by-side-by-side only served hot dogs on the street. You couldn't even find roasted chestnuts or a pretzel cart. But some terrified councillor decades back made sure things were standardized.

So a well-meaning councillor proposed that some variety might be nice. That a souvlaki cart or some roti or dim sum wouldn't be a bad idea. Word got out to the people, and the people cheered. Okay, it's Toronto -- we nodded politely in agreement and grinned a little while talking about it over a beer.

Then it hit city council. There were safety concerns! So it had to be regulated until it was boring. Someone thought it should be unified under a city-wide banner, so "Toronto a la Cart" was born. It had to be healthy! Approval must be given!

Really?

Healthy?

Really?

Healthy street food? Who the fuck cares? We've been eating reconstituted lips and sphincters for decades off the hot dog carts, and you say the food has to be healthy now?

Give me a break.

Sooooo, in the interest of the public good - and the detriment of public enjoyment - it was all combined into a monolith of bureaucratic excess. Specially ordered and made carts were commissioned by the CITY. A specific size. Refrigeration. Specific layout. Black banner overhead with the not-as-clever-as-they-think pun of a name. A small fortune in licensing fees for interested parties. An approval process for the food being offered and the people offering it. Finally, the location was dictated by the city, not by the vendor.

In their final stroke of wisdom, the city, or perhaps more specifically the committee now in charge of the project, decided it should be seperate from the already existing hot dog cart businesses. This meant anyone running a hot dog cart was shut out of submitting an application.

Think about that - the people who have worked selling food to people walking by for DECADES were told they couldn't partake in expanding their offerings. Most of these men and women would jump at the opportunity to sell something other than sausage on a bun. There are as many ethnicities behind those grills are there are corners for them to operate on, and many of them would LOVE to skewer some lamb for you, or boil up some dumplings, or bread some pork, or put a schnitzel on kaiser. And they ALREADY HAVE THE EQUIPMENT, LICENSE, AND LOCATIONS.

But no... they were shut out. People who had no idea how to run a business, but could put together a mean spice rub, were being asked for their life savings in licensing and rental fees and then stuck in idiotic locations. A dust-cloud of a construction site in a condo-heavy neighbourhood (ie.- no business during the day). In front of a war memorial at Queen's Park (only businesses there to offer clients? Government offices). In line with 2 hot dog carts, 2 hot dog and chip trucks, and ANOTHER Toronto a la Cart vendor at City Hall? Yah, that's not overload.

19 applications from a city of 3 million people. 8 carts approved.

The options are interesting enough - souvlaki, injera, roti, etc.. So there's diversity there. The problem is - you can't get to most of them. I'm not going to drive to a food cart. I'm going to pass one on my way home, or to somewhere else. I believe there are currently 2 that I could do that with. There were 2 more (the one at Queen's Park, and one of the ones at City Hall), but they've both shut down until new sites are okayed for them. This means my options are limited to what those two carts have. If I want to try the roti? I need to travel 20 minutes north... by subway. I could walk to the best roti shops in town in less time.

And you know what? I haven't been to any. The whole botched process annoys me too much. I don't blame the poor saps who are behind the cart. I'm sure they're honest people trying to do their best.

Which is hard, because the carts are too small, run on gas-powered generators that have to be topped off regularly throughout the day, and the owners usually have to travel not-insignificant distances to their sites. Oh, and the owner has to man the station at least 70% of the time. You can't hand it off to your son or wife or husband or friend or business partner or an employee for a couple days while you try and rest your feet.

Idiocy from top to bottom. All tracked back to the morons who decided they needed to be attached to the project. The original councillor? After the final plans for the thing came out, he publically stated that he regretting bringing it up. That if he'd known it would become the bureaucratic power and money-grab that it did, he'd have kept his mouth shut.

I imagine the project will fail. It's a 3 year pilot project to see if it can be expanded. Two months in and a handful of the vendors have all but given up. The geniuses in charge will claim that we didn't support the project. We'll say that they fucked it up. In the end, everyone will shrug and move on, and we'll still be stuck with sausages on a bun.

Or they'll let it fall through the cracks and let the market truly decide. Maybe they'll realize they over-regulated and allow the hot dog guys to offer a few other options. Maybe they'll let restaurant owners open a cart within a few blocks of their establishment. Maybe I'll be able to buy a crêpe near the water like you can in Paris (still the best crêpes I've ever had). Or gelato from a bike-cart like in Rome (ditto). Or dim sum from a steamer cart like in Beijing (once again, the best). Or big salty pretzels like in New York (okay, those were dry and terrible).

Or maybe not.

Maybe I should start with smaller ambitions, and just become the benevolent dictator of Toronto, and then move my way up the ladder. I know I'd have your vote.

Meet the New Boss, Same as the old Boss

GM's out of bankruptcy.

Yah, it was 16-year old boy fast.

Well, it's not REALLY out of bankruptcy. See, the "new" GM is out of bankruptcy. Because the "old" GM sold all it's "good" stuff to a company it created that's owned by the US gubmint, the Canadian and Ontarian (really? we're seperating? sweet!) gubmints, the "old" GM bondholders, and the unions. So the brands they're keeping (Chevy, Buick, Cadillac, GMC), and they stuff that still works is in the new company. All the crap? The shuttered factories? The debts? That's with Motors Liquidation Co., or the "old" GM, which will probably never be out of bankruptcy.

How awesome a shell game is that?

You go bankrupt, shove all the bad crap into a generic company and leave it in bankruptcy, and sell all the good stuff to the government and come out with the same name looking all sparkly.

Management will be cut by 20%, and executives tiers by 35%. Around 40% of the dealers are gone, and health care and pension obligations are down $48 billion too.

The promises of fuel-efficient and hybrid vehicles will come to fruition, honest! They'll make cars people want, fo reals! No more executive bloat! Labour costs down! Rainbows and puppies and lollipops for everyone!

Bull. Shit.

There's been a lot of shuffling at the top, there's a new boss, and a whole whack of debt to the American and Canadian taxpayers. The union will sell their share as quickly as possible because they just want the cash, not the responsibility. That way, they can also start holding GM over a barrel again if times get good. Their labour costs may be in line with Toyota and Nissan and the like now, but that will change over a couple decades. If they last that long.

It all smells like crap to me. There will be token gestures. Designs won't be innovative, because that would involve taking a risk, and risks are scary to suits. Expect more cars that look the same as every other car on the market. Expect minor improvement being sold as the second coming. Expect deals and cuts and a million other incentives to buy overpriced vehicles. Expect that eventually, it will be bloated again with focus not on car quality or consumer happiness, but the bottom line and exterior businesses that make more money for them. Why? Because building a fuel efficient car that is fully-loaded and will work for 10 years without needing major service means less sales, less secondary money from the GM service shops, less loans, and more need to keep improving enough that people WANT to upgrade.

GM is floundering. Every commercial, every press release, every piece of news stinks of bullshit and death to me.

The silence from Chrysler is deafening.

Ford, oddly enough, is actually sounding honest. As honest as an American car company can at least. They've had an extra year to get their shit together, having gone bankrupt before the credit crisis. They've jumped on the opening made by their competition's problems and the fact they didn't need taxpayer money to surivive (thanks to the loans they secured when they went under). I don't think they're being revolutionary, but they're playing to their strengths - trucks, the Mustang, and small fuel-efficient cars that have already worked in Europe. All they're doing now is talking about them, and juicing them up a bit. Are they the "new Ford"? I don't think so, but they're newer than the "new GM".