Margin Notes: Arts, Argonotes, Polls, Isom

A pair of artists carried their works toward their booths at the Queen West Art Crawl inside Trinity-Bellwoods Park in Toronto, Ontario on 19-September-2010

TORONTO, ONTARIO - The last weekend of summer led to quite a few events along my routine walk downtown this morning. I passed through the Ukrainian Festival before it woke up for the day, through the heart of the Queen West Art Crawl (shown above) as set up was going on, and past the rush lines for the Toronto International Film Festival--quite an eventful walk.

* * * * * *


Argonotes performed on the rotating turntable of the John Street Roundhouse in Toronto, Ontario, before crossing the street to the Toronto Argonauts game on 19-September-2010

I was heading downtown to the Toronto Railway Heritage Centre, where there's no telling who will visit the exhibits on any given day. Today, the highlight was a visit from Argnotes, the band of the Toronto Argonauts, who decided to take a spin on the centre's 1929-era turntable before heading in to the Rogers Centre for the game.

* * * * * *

I missed the end of the Ukrainian Festival today (well, technically it's still going on a few blocks from here), but I have one more note to offer from yesterday. Of all the local politicians, the unseated Peggy Nash seemed to get louder applause than even current Member of Parliament Gerard Kennedy, and I wasn't standing anywhere near the people dressed in orange. This is a phenomenon I've noted before, but it didn't translate into votes in the last election.

* * * * * *

No Federal election has been called in Canada, but there's a mayoral race in Toronto and quite a lot of controversy about the Long Gun Registry. Probably as a result, I have been asked to participate in three Internet political polls in the last week, which has to be a record in my experience. I haven't seen the results released from any of them yet.

* * * * * *

I wasn't polled about Islam, yet I think the quote of the week has to go to activist Jacob Isom. After grabbing the liquid-soaked Qur'an off a barbecue in Texas where a radical Christian preacher was going to burn it, he reportedly told the preacher: "Dude, you have no Qur'an!"