Results tagged “ottawa”

Hope is a cruel thing for a sports fan: no matter how bleak the situation, as long as there's a straw in sight we'll happily clutch at it. Case in point: Leafs Nation, of which we're proud, occasionally defiant members. We've been flip-flopping over the Leafs all season long. A few weeks ago we'd written them off, then watched as the team put together an impressive run (which included comprehensive victories over the Ottawa Senators and the Boston Bruins). Suddenly, they were back in the thick of things—and hope, suddenly, sprung eternal once more.

You've got less than three weeks to prepare yourself for Earth Hour on Saturday, March 29. That's when people around the world are being encouraged to turn off their lights for one hour to raise awareness about global warming. Toronto was the first Canadian city to sign up for the international event late last year, and has since been joined by most other GTA municipalities, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa, and many more—close to 50 cities across the country at last count.

Far be it from us to conflate professional sports with Bill Shakespeare—but the Toronto Maple Leafs’ actions before, during and after Tuesday's NHL trade deadline recall Macbeth’s famous words: full of sound and fury, yet ultimately signifying nothing. Charges of heresy will be duly acknowledged.

Torontoist Environment Editor Chris Tindal is currently engaged in a federal by-election campaign. This weekly column is an attempt to offer a behind the scenes glimpse into what it's like to be that mysterious Other: a politician.

It's been the best of times, it's been the worst of times for the Toronto Maple Leafs; in fact, the past couple weeks have been nothing short of surreal. First, the best of times: wins against the high-flying Ottawa Senators and Montreal Canadiens, followed by a thoroughly unexpected Hockey Day in Canada victory over the league-leading Detroit Red Wings, have given the team a boost. Injured players are getting healthy. The return of the much-maligned Bryan McCabe has apparently galvanized the team's defensive corps, not to mention relegated Andy "The Cause" Wozniewski to the Toronto Marlies. Mats Sundin, meanwhile, who turns thirty-seven years old today, has fifty-eight points in fifty-seven games—not bad for a guy with a "career-threatening" injury (we'll never tire of using it against you, Steve Simmons!).

Do you think you can turn your lights off for an hour? The WWF is challenging people around the world to do just that at 8 p.m. local time on March 29. The global event is called Earth Hour, and the goal is to raise awareness of global warming. Last year's inaugural event took place in Sydney, Australia, where more than 2 million people and 2100 businesses turned off their lights. The result was a 10% reduction in the demand for electricity during the hour-long action.

Deep in a Toronto basement is the former office of budget dentist, Dr. Jimmy Connolly. Though he claims to have been a dentist in Kosovo, Connolly, whose real name is Gzim Bytyqi, isn’t licensed to practice in Canada.

Ottawa to introduce new fuel economy standards. They will be "at least" as stringent as American fuel economy standards. In response, David Suzuki blew upon a party horn sarcastically and waved a tiny flag, his derision apparent to all and sundry.

Photo from Monolith Festival.

Sections of downtown core shut down for fear of falling debris. David Miller responds by initiating the "Less Wind Now" campaign, encouraging Ottawa to build "a giant wall" around Toronto to serve as a windbreak.

Once upon a time, we would hear the word "dodgeball" and be swept back to a simpler time, when colours were flourescent, New Kids on the Block were popular and dodgeball was little more than an excuse to work up an adolescent sweat. It certainly wasn't a sport. Redass was a sport; dodgeball was really just a way of scoring easy marks in gym class.

It looks like there will now be a reprieve for all of you filthy, dirty scum who have dared to engage in file-sharing, downloading, and the elusive but nonetheless nefarious "time-shifting."

A new study says that diseases and parasites from farmed fish are having devastating effects on wild salmon stocks in parts of B.C. Skyrocketing global demand for seafood means fish farming can be very profitable, even when the cost of frequent tractor replacements is taken into account.

Urbanist is a photo series that will look at developments, architecture, trends and activities happening in various cities––including our own––to inspire the urbane urbanist at home to make Toronto a better place. Sometimes what makes a city great are small, less obvious things that make you smile, or better yet, engage your environment in a more active way. Around Ottawa, you can find swap boxes like the one shown above on telephone poles or construction...

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Last time we checked on 178 Bathurst Street, it was just beginning to relive its Bassmint-era techno days with Derrick May at Crosstown, now closed. Since then, things underneath the Queen Street West and Bathurst Street Pizza Pizza have come full circle. Until 1999, Christian "DJ Unabomber" Poulson operated Bassmint, a famous party spot and afterhours that still conjures memories of sleepless nights for...

When thrashy experimental punks Quebexico called it a day earlier this year, angry, drunken, often-bearded fans across the country had a good reason to get more angry, more drunk, and grow larger beards. Thankfully, the band's offspring is hitting the same musical highs in the same aggressively DIY manner. TEENANGER, comprised of the 3/4ths of Quebexico that lived in Toronto (Ottawa-based guitarist Davey now plays in the also-awesome Million Dollar Marxists), is a little more garage rock 'n' roll than its members more experimentally thrash past. The same spirit is there, though, and it was the insane, sometimes unreasonable energy of Quebexico that made them such a fine sight to behold. TEENANGER has been forging its own name and identity through some fairly intense shows around the city (a few weeks back, the band tore up Ossington hot spot Baby Doll's strip club), and this weekend finds them kicking ass and taking names at the Tiger Bar (414 College Street) alongside the insanely good Marvelous Darlings and Montreal rockers Demon's Claws. The former kind of sound like an uber-power-pop incarnation of Buzzcocks, while the later are kind of like a Can-Can Dead Milkmen. So, awesome.

Urbanist is a photo series that will look at developments, architecture, trends and activities happening in various cities––including our own––to inspire the urbane urbanist at home to make Toronto a better place. While Toronto has been making headlines in recent years for its investment in artistic institutions such as the Art Gallery of Ontario, Royal Ontario Museum, and the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, Ottawa has been in the spotlight of late because...

Photo of Ani DiFranco by Maria Bree. This week, our must-see show is Ani DiFranco at Music Hall Theatre. Having seen her in concert multiple times, Musicologist can vouch for the fact that the Righteous Babe is an amazing live musician. There seems to be some stigma about liking Ani, but don't fall victim to that or you'll be missing out. If you're looking for something free, Ottawa's Melissa Laveaux plays Hart House's Arbor...

One month into the new NHL season, and this much is obvious: the Toronto Maple Leafs are a mystery, wrapped in an enigma, dressed in the league’s silly new jerseys. The Leafs are scoring more often than your younger sister, but they’re also leaking goals at a potentially historic rate. They’ve lost two games by 7–1 final scores, but they’ve also got an 8–1 win and consecutive 4–1 road victories against consensus preseason favourites (Pittsburgh and the New York Rangers). The result is that the Maple Leafs are one of the most entertaining teams in the league, even if they’re seemingly hell-bent on driving their doggedly loyal fans to drink.

Scandinavian Airlines says that they will permanently ground their fleet of Canadian-made Bombardier Q400 turboprops following three accidents involving problems with landing gear. In response, Bombardier will no longer market the plane as the Q400 Skid.

From left to right: Ox, Morning Gothic: New and Selected Poems, The Mechanical Bird, and Sympathy for the Couriers.

Microsoft has agreed to buy 1.6% of Facebook for $240,000,000, giving the social networking site a valuation of around $15 billion. The deal is good for both parties, with Bill Gates finally hanging out with the cool kids, and 23-year-old Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg getting to throw an awesome kegger.

With much-maligned NHL commissioner Gary Bettman in the crowd, the Toronto Maple Leafs dropped the puck on the 2007-08 season at the Air Canada Centre last night. He was probably unable to catch a glimpse of a homemade sign halfway across the arena that read: “Bettman: ruining the NHL since 1993.”

Toronto places three roads in the province's worst twenty streets. Steeles placed fifth, Bathurst ninth and Dufferin twelfth in the survey of the worst-maintained roads in Ontario. That having been said, be glad you don't have to drive in Sudbury (first, third, eighth and tenth). Take THAT, Sudbury!

Musicologist is Torontoist's weekly concert listings. Check back in every Monday for more.

Upwards of 1,500 protesters from Montreal, Toronto, Quebec City, and Hamilton marched on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Monday to protest the arrival of U.S. President George W. Bush. Bush will meet today with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon in Montebello, Quebec on the two-year-old Security and Prosperity Partnership. The agenda is to include emergency planning for an avian-flu pandemic, the recall of Chinese-made toys, and border security. Demonstrators denounced the summit as anti-democratic and warned the public that Canada's sovereignty is at stake, and anti-war activists chanted "George Bush shame on you/Daddy was a killer too." The otherwise peaceful protest ended with one arrest related to a spray painting incident.

Taking a page from David Miller's Big Book of Intergovernmental Panhandling, Dalton McGuinty is complaining that Ontario is going to need a hot cash injection from the Feds if we're going to get those manufacturing jobs back from Bangladesh. Q: What do you get when you have an NDP mayor, a Liberal Premier, and a Tory Prime Minister? A: If you pay taxes in Toronto, pretty much nothing!