Toronto Life articles from March 2000

Toronto Life archives from March 2000

Rogers' communication (radio and television host Shelagh Rogers).
March 1, 2000... In the corridors of the CBC headquarters, the radio and television host Shelagh Rogers is known for a handful of traits perhaps unfamiliar to her listening and viewing audience. Her occasionally wicked sense of humour, for one; a keen...

Remains of the day (City of Toronto Archives).
March 1, 2000... The stale, woody smell of cardboard hangs in the air. And except for the hum of the overhead fan, the dimly lit City of Toronto Archives is silent. The warehouse is eye-poppingly vast, gorged with more than 110,000 storage boxes, all squeezed...

This issue (Toronto streets).
March 1, 2000... I WORKED OUT RECENTLY THAT I'VE LIVED ON 13 TORONTO streets, although only two of them were called streets. The others were avenues, roads, drives and crescents. All of them, like snapshots, recall points of time in what is now, I begin to...

Dark victory (exhibition).
March 1, 2000... Each detail is sharp and otherworldly. A lone shaft from a lighthouse bravely feels its way through a storm; breaker's crash about the beacon's perch in the midst of a spangled, rolling sea. In Holly King's large colour photographs, the focus...

Breakfast in New Orleans, dinner in Timbuktu: Bruce Cockburn.
March 1, 2000... Take a travelling folksinger, a Mississippi bluesman and a jazz traditionalist. Throw them in a pot, stir continuously for 30 years, add two shakes from the ghost of Jimi Hendrix and a pinch of punk. You might wind up with something like Bruce...

High stepping (Paduka: feet and footwear in the Indian tradition).
March 1, 2000... In India, the human foot is venerated as the conduit for the earth's mystical energies; it is also reviled for its tendency to get dirty. No surprise, then, that the culture places great weight on footwear. Paduka is an ancient Sanskrit word...

Fighting words (deeply imaginative storytelling and a genius for tapping into the zeitgeist make Catherine Bush's novels compelling).
March 1, 2000... The noisy Queen Street cafe has become positively steamy since Catherine Bush arrived nearly an hour ago. "It's Important to write what you're passionate about," says the two-time novelist, her pale face flushed. "What you're obsessed with,...

TSE CEO needs plan PDQ: nothing seems to frighten Barbara Stymiest, the sunny president of the Toronto Stock Exchange.
March 1, 2000... TO THE CASUAL OBSERVER, NO INSTITUTION represents the epicentre of Canadian wealth more than the Toronto Stock Exchange. When people think TSE, they think money. Big Money, Soaring share prices. Booming indices. Bay Street. Suspenders....

Board senseless: the Tories have slashed, consolidated and crippled a crucial institution beyond repair.
March 1, 2000... IT'S A WEDNESDAY EVENING AT THE TORONTO District School Board's College Street headquarters, and the trustees have convened for their monthly session. There are two big items on the agenda: a beverage vending contract, and a staff report...

Unforgiven: drugs or no drugs, the greatest Canadian athlete of the 20th century was the world's fastest man. Isn't it time we gave Ben Johnson a break?
March 1, 2000... HE SEEMS SO MUCH SMALLER THAN IN MEMORY. Of course, he could never seem that big again, never be the Canadian idol who streaked past the Yankee star Carl Lewis, took a moment to glance back, raised an arm in triumph, and still covered 100...

Shots in the dark (Works 1, a department of public health needle exchange van).
March 1, 2000... It's 6:15 p.m. and Works 1, a department of public health needle exchange van, is making its first stop on an eight-hour, 60-kilometre run through Parkdale and downtown Toronto. At the corner of Lisgar and Queen, business is brisk: 40...

Gloucester then and now: ... the story of my street.
March 1, 2000... MY NEIGHBOURS ARE BURNING APPLE WOOD. THE drowsy smell drifts across the roofs and winds around a scarecrow of a man in a faded terry-cloth bathrobe. The fall weather is mild, but his bare feet slapping against the pavement must be bitterly...

For the love of challah (Harbord Bakery).
March 1, 2000... The part of town we live in doesn't seem to have a name. It's south of Bloor, between Spadina and Bathurst, and although it looks and feels pretty much like the streets to the north of Bloor, it is not--so purists insist--officially the Annex....

City father: Adam Vaughan on Colin Vaughan.
March 1, 2000... MY FATHER WAS BORN IN SYDNEY and came to Toronto as an immigrant. Perhaps that's why he saw the city the way you see it from the lake, a series of east-west lines, parallel to each other, stacking up and disappearing as Toronto sprawls north. I...

Upstairs, downstairs: ... in their second-floor flat and store below (Greg Perras and Craig Soper have) ... assembled an ode to Danish modern.
March 1, 2000... GREG PERRAS AND CRAIG SOPER LIVE above their store, as shopkeepers did in the 18th and 19th centuries. They're such a polite, well-spoken couple that it's easy to imagine them in detachable Victorian collars and cuffs, wrapping up parcels in...

Girly glam: Loretta Chin.
March 1, 2000... The girl has great bones, whip smarts, a matching set of luggage and, the true mark of civility, an appreciation for limits. "Style," says the longtime stylist (commercials, magazine spreads) and fashion scribe, "is about dressing...

How sweet it is: what do Oro, Boba and the Courtyard Cafe have in common? Pastry chefs who not only lead us into temptation but deliver the goods.
March 1, 2000... THE WORLD IS A POORER PLACE WITHOUT Renee Foote's chocolate sushi. Oh, I know you can still call her catering company, Ginger Island, and maybe persuade her to make some--and no doubt the new chef at Mercer Street Grill has other delights to...

Tasting notes.
March 1, 2000... These notes list producer/shipper, agent (and telephone), CSPC number (V indicates a Vintages bottle), price per 750 mL and region. Consignment bottles are generally brought in by the case from the agent. Rating is on a five-star system that...

Drink list: Via Allegro Ristorante.
March 1, 2000... DRINK LIST Via Allegro Ristorante, 1750 The Queensway W., 622-6677 The place Its strip-mall location belies what you'll find beyond the front door: a boldly baroque room (all cherubs, frescoes and wrought-iron vines) seating 220. Twin Italian...

Mezes (where to get mezes-assorted snacks).
March 1, 2000... MEZES Tapas and dim sum are fine by us. But, for variety and exoticism, their kin from the eastern Med (Greece, Turkey, the Middle East) leave them looking like wallflowers at an orgy. Paraded before a meal, mezes-assorted snacks served with...

Chief David Boothby March 1, 1995 - February 29, 2000.
March 1, 2000... Not with a bang, but a whimper. Mind you, as it was in the beginning for Toronto Police Chief David Boothby, so it is in the end. Just plain Dave, as he will now be known, got off to a rocky start from which he never recovered. Chosen by the...