I've got a quiet Sunday evening to myself, so it's time to write. I had a cold over the weekend and didn't go outside much, except to the grocery store and a rehearsal at school. Instead I did lots of puttering, and now our apartment finally feels like home. There's pictures & mirrors on the walls and a place to put our toothbrushes in the bathroom. And best of all, the cat's sleeping on my lap...

The conservatory orchestra had its first concert a few weeks back. The dean got up and spoke before the concert, and began his remarks by saying something about how he was sure everyone on stage was wishing he would shut up so we could start playing. It was intended to draw chuckles, I'm sure, but an elderly man sitting a few rows in front of Capella started clapping. I wish I could get away with stuff like that.

Now the cat's gotten up and my legs are cold. Bah.

The day after I wrote my last post and said something about not having time for doing fun stuff there was an all night "contemporary art thing" in town. It went from 7 pm to 7 am, and there were all sorts of crazy art installations and happenings all over. The pool by Jim and Anna's house (we also moved since the last post... The apartment was painted dirty-mop-water brown, and they painted every wall, light switch, and electric outlet. Now it's blue, orange, and lime green [kitchen] and looks so much better.) So, the pool by their house was turned into a modern Roman bath, with DJ's playing music, and gold reflective plastic across the ceiling, and lots of inflatable pool toys floating around. My two favorite things, though, were both dance-related. "Ballroom dancing" was a big room, with music DJ'd by 10-year-olds (for the attention span and lack of musical prejudice, I think), and lots of playground balls. I don't think the artist intended a giant crazy game of dodgeball, but that's what he got. The other cool thing was a group of dancers that dressed up as cops and EMT's and responded to 'emergencies' (at least, I'm hoping the quotes are deserved) by holding each other and dancing. Very sweet, somehow.

We went to IKEA and bought things without causing the other person to cry.

I've had this list kicking around my head for a little while now, and it's time to share it. Here are Things I Like About Toronto:

1. Streetcars.

2. The direlect streetcar turnaround near out apartment. It used to service the Canadian National Exhibition, I think.

3. The streetcar drivers ding their bells at each other when the pass by.

4. Street addresses ending in "1/2" are fairly common. My favorite so far: 2 1/2 Palmerston Avenue. So British and quaint.

5. You buy beer at the Beer Store, but wine & liquor at the Liquer Control Board of Ontario.

6. Municipal composting.

I like more things that just these 6 things, but specific Toronto things are a short list. Our apartment, school, the great people we've met, are all non-Toronto specific, if you see what I mean.