The Shwa gets shafted and The Star gets snippy
Posted on August 25th, 2009 –
Last Friday morning, a familiar voice from Chew Chew’s, my weekly greasy spoon, broke the morning slog; I had won!
Yes!
Every week I left my name and number on the back of that blasted breakfast receipt along with a healthy tip (*wink wink*) and now, finally, it had been drawn. “Yes, R.! I’ll be by to pick up the certificate on Saturday! Wonderful! Thanks so much!” (R.’s the tall, thin guy with a stache, glasses, and porn-star do. He conducts himself like the place is his – which it may be. In a good way, I mean.)
Unfortunately, Saturday was the day of the big power outage in the neighbourhood. You may have read the blow-by-blow in the new Twitter feed thingy I added at the right (what do you think of the name “Tweetness”?) I didn’t think anything nearby would have power so I decided to postpone until the following day.
On Sunday I strolled into Chew Chew’s like a man about to win something. I was thinking a free breakfast, maybe two? It’s a mom and pop joint so I figured it wouldn’t be anything big. But still, nice to win :)
R. handed it to me the moment I walked in. A couple of conditions were stapled to the front:
Okay, that’s fair. The weekends are probably the busiest times, and while they provide free food, they wouldn’t want to get stiffed on the taxes. And a tip is nice.
The part beneath the note simply has Chew Chew’s address and a notice that this ticket expired on August 31, 2008. Again, mom and pop joint; I’m sure it’ll be kosher when it comes to redemption time.
No mention of the actual prize though. I flipped it over:
Wow. I’d just won a coupon. With newly revealed, pre-existing staple holes. A re-used coupon.
My typical bill is around twelve dollars so I’d be saving a buck twenty. I tip considerably more than this. And I can’t imagine the next time I’ll be there on a weekday. *sigh*
I don’t think I’ve ever kept my feelings about the Shwa (an east Toronto burb), a secret. But having gone through this emotional roller-coaster, I totally empathize with them when they got the news today. KISS (yes, the rock band), was supposed to play there after the Shwabians won an online contest involving lots of votes. It was supposed to be one of those we’ll come to your little town if you can all pull together kinds of contests. Clearly Oshawa has a lot of KISS fans.
So can you imagine how elated they must’ve felt when they won?
Ah, good for them. Most of Oshawa revolved around the auto industry, and that went tits up here just like it did everywhere else. They really could’ve used a break like that. So when KISS crapped on their parade, I was genuinely saddened to hear about it. I mean, I might not like to be in the place, but that doesn’t mean I wish it harm.
KISS decided on good old Toronto because, as their spokesman put it, “the size of the production turned out to require a larger venue”. Bummer. They said they’d do something, but didn’t quite say what. Those lines are so far apart, you can read a whole stage play between them: “Ummm … shit … we can’t do the concert there … a … an autograph session? … that’s pretty weak … ummm … something … for me to come up with later”
Hope it’s something good!
While on the subject of reading, I came across a couple of articles, well, a few articles, that caught my attention in the past few days. The first was by the Toronto Star’s David Olive who kinda beats up on bloggers when he says that when the going gets tough, bloggers run to the mainstream media for a paycheque. Well, I don’t know about you, but this blog is something I just like to do. I have a steady day job and TCL is my excuse to get outside, get some fresh(er) air, and some much-needed exercise. It also forces me to keep my eyes open every day and just try to observe. Instead of sitting at my stuffy Toronto Star desk pontificating about all bloggers’ nefarious motives. Besides, my means to world domination are other. After that, who needs money?
Is it possible that some bloggers would be pleased as punch to merge into the mainstream media? I bet you could find a few. Is it possible that sometimes blogs feed the mainstream media? It’s been known to happen.
Nota bene (heh, the only Latin I know – I use it when I try to sound lawyery): I made mention of “The Bridge” (a police flick), way back in May. I suppose that I could have asked a few more questions, but whaddya gonna do? I don’t recall going to reporter academy, I’m just a guy living his life. And I happened to be there first :P
Oh, and you may recall the short interactions I’ve had with Steve Mann, watery musician and cyborg (the links explain all). Well on Sunday, out of the blue, The Star got the exact same idea! Yeah, totally ripped me off.
Anyhow, I didn’t want to argue against the mainstream media. Clearly I’m a news-breaker and some of them are just biters, that’s all. And sometimes I’m just lucky. Sometimes there are as many reasons to blog as there are bloggers. For me, it’s a way to escape the Dilbert strip I otherwise live in. If someone paid me a few bucks to write what I was gonna write about anyway, minus a couple of expletives, I wouldn’t be against it. As long as I wasn’t against it, dig? I fail to see the evil. But hardly suckling at the tit.
Ooh! Laundry’s done! Very good news. Star, I give you permission to break it. You know I love you, you big lug. *playful punch on chin* Mail the cheque(s), I trust ya ;)
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August 26th, 2009 8:42 am
Poor Oshawa! I am trying to think of a Dorothy Parkeresque joke, along the lines of her immortal use of 'opium' in a sentence: "I opium mother feels better."
Oshawat you get when you're just part of Metro.
Or something.
August 27th, 2009 2:27 pm
Haha! Well put, Lidian.