Photo: "red" by -stacey-, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

Your Toronto morning news roundup for Thursday May 1st, 2008:

Smoking in a car when children are sharing the confined space within may soon become illegal in Ontario. Legislation has been introduced, but I suspect there may be some pressures from the stinky tobacco industry to curb it. This one will likely continue to spur heated "it's my right" and "that's junk science" debates.

Too much vodka, plenty of emotional aggitation, and a heart condition are my guesses. Early reports describe an unfortunate incident yesterday at Pearson airport. A man on board a flight from Moscow landed in Toronto dead after having been intoxicated, and having to be restrained by the flight crew. That's not a flight I'd want to be on - it makes a relentless, screaming baby seem like milk and honey.

Photo: "If You Come Back This Way" by DL10, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

Your Toronto morning news roundup for Wednesday April 30th, 2008:

Toronto and Mississauga police discovered what might be the largest meth lab in Canadian history. They can't confirm the size of the haul, but hope to be able to do just that after a couple more days (?!) of sorting through the industrial facility. Uh oh!

City council was busy making big decisions (and deferring a crucial one to a later date):
- more red light cameras are coming to an intersection near you (previously debated on blogTO)
- an underground tunnel along York St. joining Union Station to the PATH system has been given the go-ahead.
- the critical TTC essential service question will be deferred to September (and the Star article contains what might be the best photo of Mayor Miller ever, so do click through)

Photo: "man and nature" by angiemckaig, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

Your Toronto morning news roundup for Tuesday April 29th, 2008:

Details are slowly coming out and the root causes of the snap TTC strike on Friday are becoming clearer. It turns out that there are a few members of the union executive that want Bob Kinnear gone. Furthermore, Kinnear has said that he won't be issuing an apology to riders, and that the TTC Chair Adam Giambrone should have kept the ridership better informed of the threat of a strike. Kineear has shown that he's keen on collecting the bucks for union members, but when the heat's on he's quick to pass the buck.

Keep a keen eye on your money. Toronto police have issued a public warning that there are a significant number of counterfeit $100 bills making their way into the mix. If you end up with one, do the right thing and turn it in rather than pass it on to an unsuspecting and undeserving recipient (Kinnear style).

Remember back in the day, when the infamous panda-laden Mr.Pongs truck would cruise the club district after drunken revelers were unleashed on the city at 2am? Given the right circumstances (read: hunger, convenience, a pocket full of bar change, and seriously alcomahol-blurred judgment), eating a giant egg roll off the mobile Chinese food truck satisfied. Nostalgia aside though, it paled in comparison to the experience of a short trip up to one of the many late night Chinese restaurants on Spadina - a Toronto tradition that continues today.

Late night Chinese food on Spadina isn't your normal weekend dining experience - in so many respects. Forget about ambience, a comfortable chair, and a slow-moving yet attentive server. If you're lucky, you won't have to wait in line only to then be seated at a large, round, communal table with drunken strangers quipping slurred phrases like "I think I ate here once but I can't be sure because I was so wasted." And if you're lucky, the lineup you've just managed to navigate won't end up cramping your space after you've been seated.

But minor annoyances aside, which definitely impart charm and legitimacy to the experience, nothing beats a great chow down at one of Toronto's better late night Chinese food joints. They're a great option for a fast, cheap, and delicious meal (and some are known to serve "cold tea" after hours). General Tao's Chicken at 4am in Kensington's Chinatown is something every Torontonian should experience.

Photo: "The Bars" by ariehsinger, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

Your Toronto morning news roundup for Monday April 28th, 2008:

Bow-chicka-chicka-bow-bow. It's hard to find a decent lap dance these days. Free porn on the net, the high cost of dancing licenses, the proliferation of illegal massage parlours, and an ongoing crackdown on foreign dancers are all identified causes for a major shortage of strippers and the high number of closures of adult entertainment establishments in the GTA.

The future home of Toronto's first Africentric school has been chosen. Sheppard Public School near Sheppard & Keele already runs after-school black heritage programs, has a lot of vacant space, and is accessible by public transit (most of the time).

The Amalgamated Transit Union Local 113's promotional "We Move Toronto" web page (cached) AND their "Worth a Million" page (cached) are both broken.

White hat hacks, denial of service attacks, too much traffic for the databases to handle, or taken down intentionally by the webmasters? Anyone an SQL geek and care to speculate?

The union's staff page is still up and running.