Experts have been warning of an obesity epidemic for years. Governments are encouraging everybody to become more active in daily life.

Despite this, it seems that the Bloor Park Fitness Club by Yonge and Bloor isn't quite latching on to that 'whole health' philosophy - or they just don't want their members excercising for free.

Either way, I found it more than a tad amusing that a health club would be encouraging people to take an escalator when there is a perfectly good set of stairs just around the corner. I suppose nobody wants to work up a sweat before they start working out.

196 years ago, Fort York protected the lives of Torontonians against an invasion from the United States. This weekend (today, tomorrow, and Sunday) the old fortress plays host to a much more lively occasion: the 11th annual Toronto Festival of Beer.

With over 200 different beer to sample, including a wonderful selection of Ontario Craft brews, as well as rare and hard to find Belgian ales, there's sure to be a flavour for everybody - even the non-beer drinkers (the meads are always nice and fruity).

I'll be there on the Sunday myself, tasting my way through as many interesting draughts as possible; expect a full wrap-up with reviews of some favourites soon after - Garry will also be covering the food and BBQ attractions from the fest.

And if BBQ isn't your style, just jump on the rocket and head to the East - the Taste of the Danforth will be serving up plenty of beer-friendly souvlaki this weekend as well.

With the Eucan project firmly and fully binned and with council undergoing a long process in choosing new street furniture, the last thing I expected to see while walking around Little Italy was a new trash can. But there is was: about waist high, blue, and save for some 'City of Toronto' logos announcing who had put it there, completely ad free.

Of course in a city that has rolled out the green-bin programme to all households, it's a shame that they couldn't figure out how to make a section for people to deposit biowaste seperately, but I suppose you take what you can get.

Does anybody know anything about these?

For much of the 2006 edition of the FIFA World Cup it has become a Toronto tradition to jump in your car and blare your horn in celebration of a victory - any victory, be it actual or even just moral. In a break with the past month on College St today, after the Azzurri's thrilling 5-3 shootout victory over France, there was nary an automobile in sight - the streets were simply too flooded with people for cars to have any chance.

All along College from Bathurst to Ossington, Little Italy looked like a Reclaim The Streets rally, albeit one with feverently patriotic - Italian - flag-waving. Plenty of dogs dressed in Azzurri uniforms, countless people with painted faces, one person handing out star-shaped stickers for people to put on their jerseys, and of course lots of Italian flags. People were cheering, people were whistling, people were turning their stereos up to max; it was a street party in its most unquestioningly semi-planned form.

But now, Toronto rests - at least until EuroCup 2008. If only we could get this excited about ourselves as well.

Back in the late 90s - back when the UofT football team still knew how to win a game occasionally - there was a building at the corner of Bloor and Devonshire: Varsity Stadium.

This was when the UofT had a brilliant idea: they woud tear down the decades old stadium, and build a new one in its place - perhaps even with the help of the Toronto Argonauts or the Canadian Soccer Association. Excited by this innovative scheme, they quickly set to work enacting the first part of the plan, before they had finalised the second half.

As things tend to happen, the second half of the plan fell through. Although the walls around the pitch still proclaimed it to be Varsity Stadium, for the better part of the next decade it was really just Varsity Field.

It wasn't so long ago - the 90s - that Toronto was regarded far and wide as a capital for the Goth Scene. From the Sanctuary, to Savage, from the Velvet Underground, to the Savage Garden, clubs abounded, each with their own take on Gothic culture. Some were more fetishy, some were more ravy. Some, like the Catacombs underneath the Sanctuary were all ages, while others like the Bovine Sex Club were just in a strange league of their own.

Nearing the end of the decade, all of that began to change - Savage Garden started going more electronic; Velvet started attracting frat boys, other clubs closed down entirely. In 2000, when the Sanctuary/Catacombs closed down, many worried that it would be the end of the long dark gothic ride that Toronto had enjoyed for so many years. But then, out in Parkdale East, a saviour seemed to appear.