Rob and Doug Ford defended their Newstalk 1010 radio show yesterday after Councillor Paul Ainslie complained about the program to the broadcast ethics regulator. Rob Ford said the show is about "reaching out to the community" and "informing the people." Ainslie said the Fords are using the show to damage and attack others "with impunity."

Ford took time after the show to berate Toronto Sun columnist and frequent supporter Joe Warmington. "I'm so fucking mad at you," he said, referring to a column printed Thursday that advised Ford not to chase the sleeping rec employee controversy because of his own political troubles. "You know that stuff is lies. You know I wasn't drunk at the Garrison Ball and that I didn't grab that woman's ass," he said. "Don't write lies."

All three Toronto Zoo elephants have safely arrived at a sanctuary in California. Tora, Thika and Iringa left Toronto in a climate-controlled truck Thursday night and traveled through the United States to the PAWS sanctuary south of Sacramento. There are eight other elephants at the facility which specializes in retired zoo animals.

A homelessness task force announced by Rob Ford seven months into his term as mayor was never formed, the Star reports. Cllr. Giorgio Mammoliti was supposed to lead the group, along with an investigation into arenas and other new infrastructure, but the teams were never created. Emails suggest the pair didn't have a plan beyond the announcement.

Ford's logistics chief David Price will avoid further trouble after allegedly berating a GO transit employee and damaging a station door. Metrolinx said it had no jurisdiction to lay a charge against Price as Via Rail owns the Georgetown station where the incident took place.

New York City is looking to Toronto for advice about new subway trains. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority is considering articulated trains, like the Toronto Rocket, that give riders a chance to move down the train away from unruly or disruptive passengers and increase overall capacity. The TTC says the trains have a downside: puke and other messes tend to spread and there's no front-facing window.

Need a KitchenAid mixer for your kid niece's birthday party but don't want to shell out $300? A new appliance library at Danforth and Coxwell might be able to help. For $50 a year, the store lends obscure and sometimes expensive kitchen tools - ice cream makers, pasta rollers, dehydrators - for 5 days at a time. No excuse now.

Finally, here's a blast from the past courtesy of This Big City, an online sustainable cities publication. It's a map of Canada as viewed by a Toronto resident from Maclean's magazine in 1952. Not much has changed.

FROM THE WEEKEND:

• This Week in Theatre
• This Week In Comedy
• Big budget TV show liquidates its wardrobe & props
• Sleek new boutique is actually a maternity store
• The Best Cheap Hotels in Toronto
• What's a meal like at swanky supper club Buonanotte?
• How designers get ready for Toronto Fashion Week
• That time a giant gas balloon dazzled Toronto

IN BRIEF:

• Man, 25, dies after Scarborough hit and run [CBC]
• Harper sets date for 4 federal byelections [CBC]
• Canadian records toppled at Toronto marathon [CBC]

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Photo by Gregory Thiel in the blogTO Flickr pool