slightly weird

26th October 2026

The Tollkeepers Cottage

Sunday, 25 October, 2026

I’ve been taking so many photos, and it can be hard to decide which ones to share. To show all of them along with my thoughts would mean a lot of blog posts. My blog host people tell me that I need more storage — my blogs are photo-heavy. I’m working on it but need to win the lottery.

Last weekend I met my niece at the Tollkeepers Cottage. I’d been trying to visit for quite some time, and finally I found a date that worked. The cottage is on Davenport Road, a street not too far from where I live, a street that always seems almost suburban. Davenport Road is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, roads in the vicinity of Toronto, with a history dating back to the time when the great ice sheets were melting. It was used as an ancient footpath by Indigenous people as an overland route from Montreal to Niagara. It then became an important trail for French fur traders in the 1600s, and for the first European settlers who arrived in the area in the 1790s, and was slowly converted into a built road during the 1800s. At that time, the roads were just muddy trails (Toronto was called Muddy York), waterlogged after rain and slippery in the winter. The tollgates were a way to improve the roads by collecting money to fund these efforts. Outside the cottage, beside the ramp, were examples of two styles of roads — log and plank.

On the left, examples of the log and the plank style road surfaces over the early years of Davenport Road

Because of its style, this tollhouse (Tollgate #3) probably dates from about 1832. It was built from what we think was just one white pine tree felled nearby and constructed in very rare vertical plank construction (no framing), held in place by bottom and top sills (huge beams). The cottage stopped collecting tolls with the abolition of the tolling system in 1895 and then lay idle. Originally, it sat on the land on the southeast corner of Davenport Road and Bathurst Street. It’s the oldest tollkeeper’s house surviving anywhere in Canada open to the public and among the oldest still standing.

The cottage sits in a wooded park at the North-west side of Davenport at Bathurst

Tollkeepers Cottage original window with a small table beneath, where tolls were collected. A tollgate sits on the grounds

Once inside, there was a land acknowledgement (very common in Toronto, at least), then a large room with a craft table and volunteers helping visitors with crochet, mending, and knitting. Over beside the small gift sales area was a lady who was spinning wool. The atmosphere was friendly. There was a kitchenette area in the main room, and a toilet at the front of the cottage. They made me a cup of tea – no milk today, they told me apologetically. I chose to knit a chicken and chatted with the people at the people. I’d leave my tour-visit until my niece could get there. They were having a meeting after visiting hours ended, and one of the visitors’ husbands arrived with Halloween snacks of crackers and candy. There was a nice, inclusive atmosphere. I felt comfortable and decided it was a good idea to come back to do more in November if I can.

Land acknowledgement and memorium photos

I wanted to make a chicken like this example, but mine was a monster (larger and not as cute)

The cottage was moved and transformed several times in the 150 years since it closed. It was discovered in 1991, not too far away, when land nearby was being redeveloped. Fortunately, a neighbour knew what it was and the developer sold it for $1 and delayed the construction until it could be removed. The Community History Project, which still runs it with the help of volunteers, kept it in a transport yard while they and the Toronto Historical Board raised funds to restore it.

The original plans and records were lost in a fire in 1881, so they needed to find craftspeople who could determine how to restore it. Finally, in July 2002, a house mover transported the cottage to its present location, and the restoration began. This included removing all the 20th-century fixtures that had been added, finding period-appropriate stones for the foundation floor, making bricks and mortar as it would have been made in the 1830s, hand-splitting and shaping cedar shakes for the roof and creating plaster walls and laths for the interior. The original floorboards were numbered, removed and hand washed, and woodwork from the door and windows was removed and re-installed.

They obviously went to great lengths to restore the building to its 1861 appearance, that year being chosen because most of the found furnishings and items belonged to the Bulman family who were living there then. Bulman descendants were able to provide artefacts to add to the authenticity. The City of Toronto designated the Tollkeeper’s Cottage a historic site in 2004.

The parents’ room with a baby crib/cot and small desk

Close up of rope bed (method used from the 16th to 19th centuries). These ropes would be regularly tightened to support the mattress. It's where the expression 'Sleep tight' comes from — Close up of rope bed (method used from the 16th to 19th centuries). These ropes would be regularly tightened to support the mattress. It’s where the expression ‘Sleep tight’ comes from

The children’s room, one bed for the girls, one for the boys (Blurry)

Great castiron stove dominates the living space

The living room with a dining table. No couches! The collection window is the small one at the back

The cottage newsletter arrives every month, promising craft lessons, tours and more. I’m ready for it.

Adrianna and I left there and walked down the street for a while.

The Spirited Coffee Shop is in a building with lovely art deco design. We had a drink there after our cottage visit

This TTC construction worker mural is north of the Dupont bridge by the TTC offices and garages.

Wall art on Bathurst Street cannabis dispensary north of Dupont

On the stone wall along the perimeter of the TTC Hillcrest Complex. This is the (TTC) Toronto Transit Commission’s historic, massive maintenance facility and operational hub. It features the retro, industrial TTC stencil typography painted directly onto the surface—reminiscent of traditional municipal transit equipment markings rather than standard modern station signage

12th October 2026

Short Walk on Clinton Street

Sunday, 11 October, 2026

First, I’ve updated my Live if you want to go see how my health is going.

I’ve been on a bunch of walks, which I’ll regale you with soon. OK, maybe two or three, but growing. It’s my attempt to get more active and beat this annoying pre-diabetes. I really have a long way to go, but every bit counts…I hope. The walk on Friday has a bit of a history in itself. I have been trying to go to the Tollkeepers Cottage, which is a historical site not too far from where I live, but it’s hard to find an opportunity to get to their monthly Sunday open house. The next one is on 18th October, and I’m hopeful. That’ll be another blog. Meanwhile, their newsletter lets me know about their free walks. I got in touch with them to ask if I’d be able to manage it. They were super friendly, telling me that they were planning to start some shorter and slower walks for people who need that. Would I be interested? I would! Then last week they got in touch again to say that they had a trial walk planned nearby, and I was invited to be there. I accepted right away.

We met at the Christie subway, one stop away from my base, and I decided to get Wheeltrans there and to make my own way back, since I had no idea how long the walk would be, and I’d have an opportunity to check out the Korean Supermarket. I’d been trying to get there for some time. There were six of us plus our guide, an older lady with a lot of energy. I was impressed and envious! I took a lot of photos, so this will be mostly that, with some stories where I can.

Koreatown runs from Bathurst Street to Christie Street, one subway stop long. At Christie subway is the Korean Tiger, there since 2004. It was originally just for Christmas, but storage in the meantime proved a problem, since it kept getting stolen. The answer was to keep the popular tiger in place year-round. It’s impressive at 17 feet wide by 8.5 feet tall and represents Baekho, the sacred guardian of the western sky from the ancient Goguryeo mural, and was placed to pray for the neighbourhood’s prosperity and well-being. Gorgeous at Christmas!

The following are photos along the short block from the Tiger to Clinton Street. We were told about Korea’s journey to its current written language, which is wholly phonetic today, when originally the written language was made up of characters like the Chinese. The phonetic writing means that language learning has speeded up considerably.

We turned onto Clinton Street, where our history walk continued. Along the way, we saw quite a few houses that were decorated for Halloween. And the colours are changing. I love that.

I may have forgotten to take photos of the newer builds on the street. They came about when the local abattoir, which slaughtered smaller animals like goats and sheep, burned down in 1999. These houses have a Toronto look, but not like the original houses on the other side.

Newer house on Clinton Street, following the typical Victorian style popular in Toronto

Our first story came at Crestfallen Lane, and it was a long and surprising one. It’s an unusual name for a lane, but Crestfallen was a horse. He was among four rescued from a glue factory. The rescuer was Dr John Gerald Fitzgerald. Children were dying from diphtheria, and the antitoxin to save them was brought up from the USA at great cost. Fitzgerald bought the horses, housed them in a shed at the back of the houses off Clinton Street at Barton, and injected them with the diphtheria toxin. He then used their blood to deliver antitoxin to children who would otherwise have died. He stipulated that the families should not be charged. He established Connaught Antitoxin Laboratory (later, Connaught Laboratories) at the University of Toronto to provide affordable Canadian supplies of diphtheria antitoxin and rabies treatments. His contribution eliminated diphtheria in the area. Fitzgerald, as director of Connaught, was also a key figure in the development of insulin, Banting and Best’s laboratory being just upstairs from the antitoxin headquarters. Sadly, mental health illness ran in his family, and he committed suicide in 1940 at the age of 58. It had not been the first time he tried to end his life. Shamed and forgotten due to the stigma of suicide, although Banting and Best were two of his pallbearers, it took some years until his grandson, James, discovered his grandfather’s story and wrote a book – What Disturbs the Blood – about it. He wrote this article about his grandfather’s remarkable life and contribution to the field of medicine. There’s much more to the story of JGF, too much to write about. In 2004, he was posthumously inducted into the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame, a titan of Canadian healthcare. This story really moved me. It reminded me of Alan Turing, who, despite such heroic work, was shamed at the end of his life.

There are many lanes in Toronto, all named after people who matter. This next lane is John McIntosh Lane. Bonnie Gibbons, an ancestor of John McIntosh, lives on Barton St. John McIntosh “discovered” the McIntosh apple in 1796. There are now 300,000 trees around the world. The family has lived in Toronto for three generations.

This ordinary straggly plant is milkweed. It looks like something any gardener would love to get rid of, but it is the egg-laying plant for the Monarch butterfly, so it’s left alone here on Clinton Street

Our tour guide, Marilyn, shows us some of the pollinator plants. This small house was so pretty, my favourite one on the street, along with the following

The most interesting house on Clinton Street is the home of Albino Carreira. When this Portuguese-Canadian man was injured on his construction job, he filled his idle hours by glueing coins to his house. He sliced pool cues, then added beads and shells, then whatever he could find. People call it the wood-cake house or the bug house. It would take a very long time examine what’s become an absolute spectacle. Every inch of the house, the laneway, the garden, and even his van is covered with toys, beads, and different objects that struck Albino’s fancy. I’ll need to come back many times to see it all. I also had a flashback to the graves I’d seen in New Orleans of children, which were also covered in toys for them to play with. This was that on steroids.

The tour ended and I headed for P.A.T., the Korean supermarket. At the side on the north and south of the road were two large murals.

Inside the supermarket, the first thing is the taiyaki stand. These are fish-shaped waffles filled with either vanilla custard or red bean. My brother and I shared one when he last visited. Pretty good! They sell hundreds every day.

The supermarket isn’t fancy and I think the prices are quite high compared to Chinatown, but it’s interesting to browse. Note the elegance of these chicken feet!

Just a few more photos on my way to the subway, where I missed my ride for free within two hours by five minutes. Woe! And who knew you could get a handroll with natto in it? I passed it by since it’s on the second floor and I can’t get up there.

Opposite Christie subway station is Christie Pits. The Toronto local baseball team plays here, but I’ve never made it to a game. One day? Christie Pits was made by Garrison Creek, a defunct stream that features throughout the west end of the city. It was once an escavation site for sand and gravel used as building material in early Toronto. More about the creek some other time. The ravine that was created was called Shacktown when it housed poor immigrants. By 1909 the gravel was depleted and it became Willowvale Park. The name Christie Pits arrived in 1983, named after Christie Street. In 1933 a riot took place. A mainly Jewish baseball team was playing aginst the St. Peter’s (Catholic) team, when the latter unfurled a bedspread displaying a swastika. Others joined in and the fight lasted until 1am. Fortunately, there were only a few injuries, one hospitalisation, but no deaths. The police chief, who had already witnessed anti-Jewish sentiment in other areas of the city, sent just 2 or 3 police attended and four people were arrested. After this incident, the mayor outlawed the showing of the statistika. The park is difficult for me to navigate since it really is quite deep, but I’ll try to skirt the edges some time before or after the snow.

I was quite proud of myself today for braving the subway alone. Gold star! When I got back, the restaurant was deep into pumpkin season.

7th October 2026

Little Portugal walk

Tuesday, 6 October, 2026

Just another few weeks until the clocks go back in North America. I heard that this might be the last year we do that here in Canada. I wonder.

It’s starting to look like autumn/fall. The weather channel says that we are about two weeks behind. This summer didn’t have the long hot weeks that Toronto usually has, and it seems Europe suffered the most. They’re also predicting a milder than usual winter ahead. I hope we won’t send the bitter weather elsewhere.

A few Sundays ago I surprised myself by walking through Little Portugal quite a way. I had meant to do this so often and not made it. I wanted especially to see some of the street art along the way and…mission accomplished, or as best as I could manage. It was punctuated by a snack of bolinhos de bacalhau and instead of a pastel de nata, I opted for a children’s size chocolate ice cream, my weekend treat. This will be a lot of captioned photos, so should be an easy read. First, a little history:

Little Portugal is located west of downtown in the “Old” City of Toronto. It’s a mainly residential area along Dundas Street West with some visibility on College Street. The main or high street of the neighbourhood is along Dundas Street. It was named after Henry Dundas, a Scottish politician, whose name is now controversial since he famously was responsible for delaying the full abolition of slavery, the Slave Trade Act 1807. Dundas Street itself is a major historic arterial road connecting Toronto with the western suburbs and passing through several cities in SW Ontario. It was originally intended as a military route to connect the shipping port of York (now Toronto) to the envisioned future capital of London, Ontario. It has various landmarks as it passes from Leslie through the central Sankofa Square – renamed from Dundas Square – past the Eaton Centre, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and into Chinatown, the Kensington Market area, then through Little Portugal and eventually to the regional centres of Hamilton and London. Toronto has a large Portuguese population, 23%. In Little Portugal itself, over 50% are Portuguese. Portuguese immigrants arrived here beginning in the early 1950s and continued into the 60s. Many of the shop and business signs in the area are in Portuguese, and along the way you’ll see street signs declaring this “Portugal Village” or “Rua Açores.” This was my walk, from home, down to Dundas Street, then along from Ossington Avenue to Lansdowne Road. It’s not very far away.

Walking down Ossington Avenue, past the Child Care Centre

I walked down to Harbord Street (a good walk for me) and visited the cyclist tribute, quite the nicest I’ve seen in the city, before hopping on the bus down to Dundas West

The famous “hare” street art piece in Toronto is the “Eastern Cottontail” mural created by renowned Portuguese environmental street artist Bordalo II. Artur Bordalo (Bordalo II), famous for constructing large animal sculptures out of recycled trash and discarded local waste to highlight overconsumption and environmental destruction.

Rental bike (Tangerine sponsored) stations come with their own solar panels. It intrigues me. Bike Share Toronto says the system heavily relies on solar energy. The art feels Portuguese. Artist unknown (so far)

This is the artist whose work I don’t like. Their stuff is everywhere in Little Portugal, so they’re likely Portuguese-Canadian, and elsewhere throughout the city. Each to their own. 1357 Dundas St W Portuguese Fisherman, Pablo West (Looking through sites, it seems more than one artist is using this style.)

Love this. PASSAGE is a prominent public mural along Dundas Street West created by artist Brother Moises and curated by the Dundas West Open Air Museum to celebrate migration and resilience

Azores Parkette celebrates the tile. Inaugurated in 2025, establishing itself as a key meeting point and connection for the Azorean community in the city

Love me some fire escapes. NYC and San Francisco have the best so far

So far this is one of the best utility box art pieces that I’ve seen

1547 Dundas St W, Dundas West, Jose Ortega

At Sully’s Gym site at 109 Ossington Avenue (just south of Dundas Street West). Painted by artist Ben Lory, the mural commemorates Muhammad Ali training at the gym ahead of his March 1966 bout against Chuvalo, Canadian heavyweight icon. They had two fights, Ali winning both. Coincidentally, the day I walked by, Chuvalo had just died

St Clarens Parkette. Need to get closer to see the mural next time

Sentimental. Canadians are not normally nationalistic, but that’s changing

Need to research this art. The sandwiches are very popular, though

1628 Dundas St W, Scratching the Surface, VHILS – “Sra. Idalina Azevedo – Part of my ongoing Scratching the Surface project, this new mural celebrates and honours the Portuguese immigrant women who toiled as janitorial workers in the high-rise office towers in downtown Toronto in the 1970’s. Portuguese “cleaning ladies” have been a constant presence in the lives of countless Portuguese-Canadians as mothers, wives, breadwinners, community members, and activists, and are an example of strength, resilience, perseverance and courage for us all.“

Conceiçao by Hanna Lucatelli. Another tribute to Portuguese immigrant women’s contributions to Toronto

Lula with a peek at 1585 Dundas St W, Lula Lane, Clandestino + Fiya

More research needed for this mural but it seems to show different immigrants

1665 Dundas St W, Violeta’s Guardian, Clandestinos Crew

Tiled icon by the ice cream shop, Moon Milk

Bit of a rough area near Lansdowne Avenue, where Dundas Street and College Street are only a few steps apart

Final stop. The No Frills Supermarket at Lansdowne Avenue and Dundas Street. Great butcher here

I didn’t capture everything along here. I’m not sure if I’ll go back to get the rest before the snow falls. Time seems short, but I’ll keep going.

26th September 20266th October 2026

Reflections on being not quite a flower child

Saturday, 26 September, 2026

In this blog post, I’m reflecting on my past a bit. You’ve been warned.

Bluehost is reminding me that it’s been another year, and they want more money. I’m not a fan of monetising what amounts to a private journal sometimes, but I’m starting to see the beauty in it. I write a lot and could find a topic, but not sure I have the energy for it, to be honest. Seems to be a full-time job. I actually have two cousins (well, daughters of a cousin, which is what again…?) who run successful social media accounts. At a funeral reception before I left London, I almost turned fangirly when re-meeting them. Many years ago, forget how long but I should definitely dig it up, I wrote an article about blogging. At that time it was a completely unknown term. An online friend of a friend whom I interviewed told me about a concept now known as independent journalism. He talked about how “in the future” people on the street would be the ones to deliver news, as it happened, before the papers printed and spun it. I thought it a curious idea at the time, but I also thought how very obvious it seemed. Twitter was just a budding site then. I hung on silly things like Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore giving blow-by-blow accounts of their seemingly ordinary home life, Tweeting back and forth like a competition, and I didn’t have to dig for them since there were so few accounts to follow. A few people, including me, would tweet to Kirstie Alley, and suddenly we became her little cabal when she developed Phitter, something a Google search won’t even show me anymore. When she turned a bit weird and then when she died, it felt like a personal loss. Social media has evolved, but not necessarily in the best way.

Back patio was all packed up for the holidays. Peaceful. They’re back now, and I actually missed looking out at the lights and the smell of woodsmoke

Recently I posted to Instagram images of art affixed to utility poles in the neighbourhood. Somehow I missed the “best one” right outside the house. Cake, yes! (I’m off cake so this will have to do

The garden next door is at its peak, and I’m waiting for the harvest, although I’m not invited. It will be a long winter. The other day, quite by chance, I looked outside to see that the Old Man was visiting “my” garden. I wonder what he was thinking.

A deep discussion in the garden. Harvest plans?

I’ve had a flurry of dining out opportunities. Some fancier than others. Here’s some news, though. I’m invited to dine downstairs as a reward for “taking care of things” while the restaurant was closed. Stay tuned. Could be interesting.

I had brunch with my niece and her close friend. I’m not a fan of a typical breakfast, so I chose the giant (yep) croissant with smoked salmon, burrata and arugula (rocket)

A calorie and carb blow-out at Swatow, a restaurant I’ve been going to for decades. Satay beef with gai lan on fried (crispy at the edges) noodles, and I snuck a few pieces of the delicious lemon chicken

I have yet to do my brief street art tour at the western end of Little Portugal, but I have been capturing a few familiar sights around town. Must slot in that LP visit soon.

This is the side of Sanko, a Japanese food shop on West Queen West. This is their new painting, and I finally had an opportunity to photograph it. I’m usually speeding by in transport

While not actually art, such nonsense catches my eye

Meeting with my niece’s friend, Mandy, brought back some great memories of living in San Francisco – a really precious time in my life. Love that city. My niece, Mandy, and I had gone away for a few days there together way back when. We had the best time. I immediately dug out my photos Shortly afterwards, my brother brought up San Francisco again and it felt like one of those happy coincidences.

Filbert Steps, San Francisco — Mandy at the top of the Filbert Steps, Russian Hill (my favourite area) back in 2005

I had a great boyfriend in San Francisco (a story for another time maybe), and we’re still in touch – um…57 years later. I owed him an email:
(edited)Today my brother was talking about visiting me in San Francisco in the Union Street hotel place. It brought back all kinds of memories; I remember so much and yet not enough. He mentioned getting a salad in a place called Minimum Daily Requirement. Do you remember the name of that restaurant that everyone in that place ate at? Was it there? It was always lentil soup and bread and butter as far as I remember. I did look it up to see if I could find it online, even as a historical place, but nothing came up. That made me think about cruising through the supermarket and eating food before I got to the cash register. I think you weren’t keen on me doing that, but I was hungry and broke. I don’t remember how long I had to wait for my first wages and finally being able to eat properly. Here’s another thing that happened – one of the guys I stayed with before I eventually got a shared room in that place worked in a shop on Fisherman’s Wharf. I love going down there, but one of the things that happened was that I picked up a lot of crazy junk really to decorate my places with, and he never charged me anything but told me to just walk out. Thinking back, that was all wrong, but at the time it seemed sort of normal. What days they were. Also remembering how we all lived like we were in a hippie commune with everyone sharing what we had and spending time in each other’s rooms. The hippie times were dwindling, but I remember that outside on the streets I often saw Barefoot hippies with crazy clothes, and their barefoot children traipsing through North Beach or sitting in Washington Square Park. I wish I had taken photos in those days. The fact I didn’t is just crazy to me.
To my brother I wrote (edited): It was a “hotel” room, more like a doss house. I can still smell it sometimes. There was one toilet, one kitchen, and one shower room on each floor. That’s where I met Txxx, newly arrived from Tokyo – he lived one floor down. If that’s the name of the restaurant, I don’t remember, but we were there a lot because it sold lentil soup with bread very cheaply and I didn’t have any wages at first. Everyone knew each other in there – Lots of hippies. We shared everything. The hippy movement was in its last days, but I remember a lot.

The memories tumble in if I let them. I can say that my life has been a reflection of the incredible times I’ve lived through, post-war existence among ruins in East London, hitting just the right age at the beginning of the Mods and Rockers, Swinging 60s London where I was the most innocent of groupies, and Liverpool when it was the ‘centre of the universe’ as my friend’s husband reminded me the last time I saw him there, arriving in the emergent city of Toronto (and hating it for sooo long before I made friends and got my musician boyfriend, who I realised later was a selfish ass), living in Orange County, North Hollywood and San Francisco when we were all flower children, Living in a Toronto commune when I went back …I’ll leave it there before I’m lost in the past.

I’ve done a few walks recently and will share the photos soon. I’m delighted to get out, no matter how briefly. This makes me think about how much walking I’d be able to do in San Francisco now. Those hills would certainly be more than a challenge. I’m just so happy I got to experience them back when my legs felt the pain, but every step was worth it.

10th September 2026

Flips and Flops

Saturday, 5th September, 2026

What does it say about me that I started typing the year with 19..? Ouch.

I’ve had a gooey, beyond-itchy eye, so I decided to call the on-call eye resident at Western Hospital (listed in my post-surgery notes). He suggested I go to the clinic at 6. I got there to find two people ahead of me. The resident checked me out and, after pushing on my eyelid for a while, told me I had either a blocked duct or a mild infection. He’d be calling my surgeon and asking them to get me in for advice. Meanwhile, I should try warm compresses and some massage. If I didn’t hear from the surgeon’s office by Tuesday, give them a call. I had a nice long walk after that, pleased with how well I seemed to be walking. When I was three bus stops away, I heard music. The Portuguese church had a concert to honour a religious festival going on, so with a long wait for the next streetcar, I settled in to watch the show. I must check out when the next festival is. The whole thing reminded me of being in Torino, where the concertgoers love to join in with the local dances.

On Wednesday I thought about going for a walk, but the skies had looked dark. I decided to wait a little while. I called the eye surgeon and left a message to call me back to come in. Then an alert came over the phone.

It was horrific. The skies were dark and heavy, bearing down. The rain began. Hail followed. The trees were whipping around. From the bathroom window, the scene was apocalyptic. I half expected to see Dorothy’s house fly by, but instead the tarpaulin from the patio downstairs was in danger of sailing off. Not so bad. While it passed eventually and the sky got brighter, the rain continued. It was an ‘interesting’ experience.

The next day I had a great plan. I would go down to the supermarket and then to the fabric recycle shop. I had been putting this off for weeks. This was the start of One of Those Days. The supermarket visit went well, though.

Obey Giant – Shepard Fairey. I love his work everywhere I’ve seen it.

I got a bag of groceries and set off on my way to the recycle place, ready to take photos this time and leave with yarn, more lace and fabric. My last visit had not been long enough. I arrived to find it closed. Oh no! Understandable, though. I don’t know when I’ll get back. I’m busy for the next couple of Thursdays. Crossing my fingers for them.

Flooded! She came out and told me she was sorry. I wanted to tell her how much it had taken to get there, but this wasn’t her fault

Mind you, West Queen West always cheers me up with its colourful signs and shop windows. Grateful for that because it meant I wasn’t entirely let down by getting out there.

A mysterious painted structure on West Queen West

Nail bar and what looks like another just further along Queen Street

This alley is full of painted garages, but I didn’t have time to stop. The mural has been here for a long time, the tagging is new

Then the flips and flops started. I’ll understand if you flip past it.

The eye surgeon’s office finally called me. I explained the situation, and they asked me to come in a couple of weeks. I protested. I was then offered something sooner that clashed with something else. Would I see another doctor, they asked? Yes! Can you come in at 3, they asked? It was 2pm and I wasn’t so far away. Yes! I arrived and waited. They promised an hour and a half – it was two. Eventually I went in for an initial eye test. I couldn’t read much on the eye chart with my right eye. She was surprised. Didn’t you just have surgery, she asked. Yes, I said, but it was for near vision. You should be able to read the chart, she insisted. Yes, I said, I’ve told the surgeon. Blame me! She then began dilating both my eyes. Why are they being dilated, I asked. I have one possibly infected eyelid. Oh, she answered, the doctor won’t need them fully dilated then. But I waited. After a while went in for the bright light one and follow-my-finger exam – there was a short look at my eyelid. Then they repeated the diagnosis from the emergency doctor. Either a blocked duct or a mild infection, we’ll give you some ointment. I was hopeful to be handed some, but they handed me a prescription. After booking for a follow-up in two weeks, I went down to the pharmacy. I waited again. After about ten minutes, they came out to tell me, this isn’t covered. Of course, I said. Do you still want it? Of course, I said. It’ll be $40, they said. Of course, I said. And I waited for it. Out at the streetcar stop, the wait was going to be long. While in the drugstore, I’d seen three streetcars go by. I resigned myself to the wait when I discovered I didn’t have my sunglasses. Back to the drugstore I went, hoping that I wouldn’t miss this streetcar too. Not there. Back to the stop, where I found my glasses. On top of my head. Of course! At the transfer bus stop I had several minutes to wait, but when the bus arrived, it stopped several metres from the stop and everyone surged ahead. I went as quickly as I could to the door, where the door was closed in my face. Too full. Two more buses came by, empty but not stopping. The third let us all on. I was too tired to care. I’ll leave it there.

The next day while walking, I didn’t see too much damagein the neighbourhood. I found a few downed branches, but that was about it. In the neighbourhood to the south, a wonderful willow tree went down. I’d photographed it two years earlier but hadn’t had a chance to go back. I’m glad I have a photo, but it’s gone. It did help to read that willow trees are actually short-lived, fifty to seventy years. This one had been planted in the 70s.

The Givins Willow, glorious in this old photo, is gone. I’m glad I got to photograph it

There are things to smile at.

That’s it really. Everything is another chapter of flips and flops. Some are more interesting than others.