June is a great time to get a little prideful. Tuesday was the fifth anniversary of legalized same-sex marriages in Ontario, and Pride Toronto kicks off next Friday and runs until Sunday, June 29. (Keep an eye on Torontoist for full details on the Pride to-do list.) In the meantime, it might be a good idea to get in some exercise. Don't take it personally: it's to prep for the 5K Pride and Remembrance......

A ten-year-old Toronto girl with a lemonade stand is more than three-quarters of the way to raising $100,000 for heart and stroke research. For purposes of comparison, when I was ten years old, I really liked riding my bike. Former Liberal MP Charles Caccia died of a heart attack on Saturday. The highly respected MP represented Davenport for approximately seven thousand years and was both a former Minister of Labour and Minister of the Environment.......

Raising awareness for Sunnybrook's Underwear Affair, a group of daring individuals dressed in underwear-based costumes—makeshift superheroes if you will—entered Union Station's Great Hall during rush hour, and froze in place for five minutes, as home-bound commuters rushed by, doing double-takes all the way. The Underwear Affair is a 10k run and 5k walk on August 23, which aims to raise money for below-the-waist cancers, such as prostate and ovarian cancer. Costumes are encouraged! More......

It is, right now, just after midnight. It is very, very, very cold outside. And Ryerson's Engineering Student Society is currently in the thirteenth hour of shoving a Volkswagen Beetle around their quad, with more than ten very, very cold hours left to go. Why would anyone sacrifice their warmth in -15° weather? This time around, the same zany kids who dye their bodies purple for fun (and engineering pride) are doing some crazy......

The final lineup for the benefit concert for the O'Keefe family has been announced. Organized by Andrew Copland—John O'Keefe's close friend and the Duke of Gloucester's head bartender—the concert aims both to honour John O'Keefe, who was killed walking home from the bar a month and a half ago, and to raise money for an education fund for John's son, Iain. This Sunday, March 2, the Mod Club will host a mix of Toronto......

Last week’s fire on Queen West didn’t only destroy some of the neighbourhood’s best stores; it also put the dozens of people who lived in apartments above the shops out of a home. Some of these folks didn’t have insurance and lost most of their possessions. Many of the artists who lived in the buildings lost their work, and thus their source of income. It’s great to see a neighbourhood—and Toronto as a whole—come......

A variety of opportunities for residents to help out the victims of the Queen West fire have been popping up all over the city. Right now, the best way you can participate is to walk into any Scotiabank location and make a cash donation to the newly-established Queen Street Fire Fund––effective today, the fund set up by the City of Toronto will assist all of the residents affected by the fire––but as Ward 20......

It's been a little over a month since John O'Keefe was killed outside the Brass Rail, walking to the subway from the Duke of Gloucester. While the makeshift memorial outside the Rail is gone now, the man it was for is far from forgotten––by friends, family, or city. Many of the stories about O'Keefe have told of a dedicated, loving father; indeed, the reason why he left the Duke of Gloucester early––a friend wanted him......

Torontoist is ending the year by naming our Heroes and Villains of 2007––the people, places, and things that we've either fallen head over heels in love with or developed uncontrollable rage towards over the past twelve months. Get your dose, starting Boxing Day and running into the new year, three times a day––sunrise, noon, and sunset. Is there anything as satisfying as waking up to that little dancing alarm clock every morning on Breakfast Television?......

In every neighbourhood there is one dude who goes a bit overboard with the Christmas lights. It's the stuff of bad Christmas movies. But few go quite as far as the Lindsay family, who seem to be trying their best to outdo the ZooTV tour. Every year since 2000, the Thornhill family has dressed up their home with a bigger and better light show. The lawn lights are buried under snow right now, but......

Still missing some gifts on your holiday list? Here's a last-minute suggestion: the 2008 Toronto Fire Fighter Calendar. What better way to suffer a snow storm than with the company of 12 buff do-gooders? In addition, proceeds go to Princess Margaret Hospital to benefit the Fire Fighters' Cancer Research Fund. We caught up with Mr. July himself, Drew Foote, at a autograph signing at the Bay on Yonge Street this afternoon. Drew is a......

A new poll shows that the majority of Canadians will call the cops on you if your party is too loud. Thus proving once and for all that we are a nation of killjoys. GO buses will run over the holidays. So, no sense worrying about a strike interfering with your vacation, commuters! (Your job, on the other hand, may well be screwed.) Stephen Harper's latest excuse for not doing enough to combat climate......

You may remember our coverage of the excellent Vice film Heavy Metal in Baghdad. A documentary following the Iraqi heavy metal band Acrassicauda, we reviewed it at TIFF and called it “one of our top films of the festival” before interviewing one of the directors, Suroosh Alvi. Although Acrassicauda have since managed to escape Iraq (and then escape Syria) with the help of Vice and many generous donations, the band is still in trouble,......

The Hidden Cameras are back home, and we are all better off for it. As we mentioned in this week's music listings, the Cameras––they of the Mississauga-bred now world-famous exuberant gay pop fame––are playing an AIDS benefit concert this Thursday night at the Great Hall in Hart House (7 Hart House Circle), with proceeds going to Toronto People With AIDS Foundation and AVERT International. The show, with Montreal's Sister Suvi and Toronto's Allie Hughes, will......

In an age of hipster irony and shirts to match, the Joy T-Shirt Project and its slogan, "Wear the World on Your Heart," seem impossibly sincere. But the "we're all connected" paradigm rings true: each shirt features the face of a real person—not Paris or Perez, but Sonya from Toronto or Sabry from Algeria, or one of over a hundred others in the online catalogue—hand-drawn and silk-screened over the wearer's heart. "It's more than just......

Continuing a historic tradition of corporately sponsored holiday cheer, the 35-foot "Swarovski Crystal Wish Tree" was formally unveiled last night at the Eaton Centre. The star-studded event––a Children’s Wish Foundation fundraiser hosted by Justin Trudeau (yes, the Justin Trudeau)––drew a sizeable crowd of shoppers. Very few members of the audience seemed to actually know what they were lining up to see, though, as the tree was hidden by an enormous curtain for the better part......

Last year, 26-year-old Ines Markeljevic had an idea. Why not try and set a Guinness World Record for the most people doing the Thriller dance? "I'd been doing the Thriller dance for nine years. It was my own sort of Halloween tradition," she says. She had learned the dance as a teenager, and had performed it not only at Halloween, but also for charity events and dance competitions. "For my tenth year, I wanted......

Will the province take over the TTC? Apparently such rumours are all the buzz in political backrooms. Which are kind of like political bathrooms, except that the backrooms have no toilets or sinks or indeed any serious practical use, which is why they feature so prominently in government. Torontoist's suggestion, from its own backroom: let Pizza Pizza take over the TTC. Then we would at least get Rip-Off Charity Pizza Days more often. Jim Flaherty's......

Before all the fuss over Halo 3 there was the video game greatness of Pong. And before that, there was good ol' fashioned ping pong. Since 2000, The Dedicated Association of Ping Pong Players has been keeping the table tennis dream alive with bi-annual tournaments, the next of which is taking place on Saturday. Up to 500 people are expected to attend the event at the Steam Whistle Brewery ,which will feature drinking and......

Merriam-Webster defines "telethon" as "a long television program usually to solicit funds especially for a charity." Almost from the dawn of broadcast television on both sides of the border, time has been set aside to urge viewers to support a long list of causes. This tradition began in 1949, when a 16-hour telethon to raise money for the Damon Runyon Memorial Fund to fight cancer brought in just over a million dollars in pledges......

Torontonians aren’t that cold, even if we have to be given a reason before hugging a stranger. If you’re tired of handing over cash every time you simply want someone to gather you in a warm embrace, or you’ve collected so much money from selling hugs that you want to do some charity work, then luckily for you the Free Hugs Campaign has unofficially deemed September 10 International Free Hugs Day (one of many).......

Torontoist has always had a soft spot for felines, which is why we think you should know about an excellent kitty-benefiting event taking place this weekend. For ten years, the Annex Cat Rescue has been taking good care of stray and feral cats in and around the Annex. Their good work includes finding good homes for stray and injured cats, helping to humanely control the cat population, and monitoring feral cats for illness. The......

It's been almost four years since Firefly was cancelled and nearly two since the release of Serenity, but the series' following is still as strong as ever. "Browncoats" (what fans call themselves) around the world are uniting in spirit to celebrate series creator Joss Whedon's birthday this weekend by organizing screenings of Serenity for the fan community. All proceeds from the screenings will be going to Whedon's favourite charity, Equality Now, a group that......

It's Thursday, which means it's the first day of North By Northeast and the end of our previews. In the final installment of our NXNE recommendations, we'll guide you through the best that Saturday has to offer. And, if we may say so, Saturday has a lot of good stuff to offer. Before heading out, you may want to fuel up at the 2nd Annual Back Lot BBQ put on by Six Shooter Records. It......

Thousands of people came from far and wide to Dundas Square this weekend in an attempt to nab a spot on Canadian Idol. Instead of holding auditions in a private, indoor venue, as in previous years, producers decided that they would make it a concert event. They included performances by last year's winner Eva Avila, American Idol runner-up Katharine McPhee, and Vancouver pop-punk band Faber Drive. Toronto media darlings Michele Mandel from the Toronto......

Each week, Torontoist chooses the most interesting cases from the Toronto Police Service crime blotter. All charges are alleged until proven under law. When the police weren't busy trying to manage opening and closing the Gardiner a bunch of times after the Great CN Tower Ice Incident of 2007, they had their hands full with some skeezy characters this week. • The Fraud Squad is in full-effect these days with yet another charity fraud arrest.......

“Use more…waste less!” That’s the motto of the new barter-community web site known as SwitchPlanet. SwitchPlanet is now open to the public as a beta version (which might explain why the interface is a little less than intuitive). The site facilitates trading DVDs, CDs and video games with an online community of people who create lists of the items they want and the items they wish they had. The currency of SwitchPlanet is known......

If you think the holiday season's message of giving and charity and love is temporary, think again. Local bands have come together to produce the Friends of Bellwoods Compilation, which will raise funds for the Daily Bread Food Bank. Ex-Death From Above 1979's Sebastien Grainger, The Paramedics (starring Bry Webb of the Constantines), Ohbijou and The D'Urbervilles will be playing the CD release party this Friday at Tranzac, where you can also pick up......

Not everyone's December 25th consists of bulging stockings hanging from a mantel, unwrapping presents in the reflection of Christmas tree ornaments, and a grandmother in her pearls and green and red apron carving a turkey at the family dinner. For those not living in a movie, who are boycotting the holidays, or who forgot about Santa’s birthday, Torontoist has the guide to an alternative Christmas. Those Charity Drives Were for a Reason Remember the......

If you could make just one wish for the entire world, what would it be? Austin Hill wants to add your wishes to his collection and hopefully raise some money for charity along the way. The aim of the Million Dollar Blog Post is to gather one million comments, each containing a new wish. 148 people have taken part thus far, leaving comments like, "My one wish for the world is for the harmony we......