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Snake from Degrassi

When I first moved to Toronto I went out for breakfast at a place called Mimi's. It's right next door to the Oak Leaf Steam Bath on Bathurst street.

If you've ever read In The Skin of a Lion you'll know that's where people used to go to cleanup after a long day building the city. It's a different kind of steam bath now.

So on this fateful morning, in the restaurant was none other than Snake from the Degrassi Junior High/ High/Next Generation series. Over the years I lived in Toronto the first time around, I learned he is most people's first "star" sighting. Like the city welcomes you by showing you Snake.

On Thursday night, while I was at the Drake Hotel to watch my friends The Russian Futurists, I saw Snake again. It's no big deal now he's such a man around town, and I have seen him lots of times.

Today, as I left my building, I saw another kid from Degrassi- Liz (she was Spike's best friend.) She was riding her bike past my place.

It was as if Toronto was saying welcome back.

5 things I like about Toronto today

You may have heard that Toronto was voted the third most polite city in the world, after Zurich and New York. People here are about a million times nicer than this girl was raised to believe. Five other things I like about Toronto, today:
1/ I walked to work in 25 minutes
2/ There are people everywhere- including lots who are also walking to work.
3/ When the subway comes into the station and the split second before it reaches your spot on the platform, the train pushes all the air into the tunnel, into your hair and past you and there is a rushing feeling of vulnerability and power at the exact same moment.
4/ The heat- everyone complains about the heat in Toronto and the humidity is sort of disgusting, but when it's hot here it's like you are being embraced by the heat- wraped up in a hot blanket, like every pore in your body is on fire and tingling.
5/ Stanley Park- the little green space beside my new house- it sort of makes me feel a little closer to home having a Stanley Park so close.

You Belong Here

There is a bumper sticker on the back of many of the cabs in Toronto, "You Belong Here." It's a funny bumper sticker to me because they invented the slogan during the SARS summer, which was my first full summer in Toronto. They came up with the campaign to try to bring people back to the city after the whole  disease-no-one-understands-with-an-extremely-high-death-rate thing.

It sort of makes me nostalgic for that summer when I first moved here- when I learned all about the N95 mask, and was lucky enough during the blackout to see a shooting star from the top of the building I work in.  Back when I thought air conditioning was a luxury and not a necessity, when I never walked more that 5 blocks and before I knew that turning across streetcar tracks on a bike is a tricky proposition.

What I don't miss about the first time I lived here- looking for an apartment without mice, cat pee smell high rent or really freaky roommates; getting lost at/on the subway/streetcar/mall; having no friends; living in the basement of a house where a mouse lived in the dishwasher.

My new place has lots of light, I have great friends close by, the local pub makes a mean chicken pot pie, my plants have survived the winter and after the super-fun saturday night dance party, I know my summer of fun has begun.