I love Canada. Toronto is a vibrant diverse city where, darn it,
\neveryone is friendly and everything is nice. That is not to say that
\nthere are not misunderstandings.<\/p>\n
For example, I was talking to the Groom’s brother this morning in front
\nof the Holiday Inn Express. Well, trying to, anyway. I could not hear
\nthe bull horns on the 16th floot, but the noise was palpable down on
\nLombard street, across from Gilda Ratner’s Cancer Support Club in the
\nold fire house.<\/p>\n
I am a little confused this morning- not unexpected, considering all
\nthe activity of the Friday in Toronto, and there were elements of the
\nwedding party scattered across the St. Lawrence neighborhood. I had
\ngrand plans for getting to the Farmer’s market early, but considering
\nwhat happened at the Starfish Oyster Bar, and before that at the Boiler
\nHouse restaurant\u00a0 in the historic Distillery District (where all that
\nRye whiskey came from during Prohibition to flow throught Detroit and
\ninto the thirsty palates of the great American Heartland) and even
\nbefore that at the Cathedral for the rehearsal for the wedding and
\nbefore that after the plane dumped me at Lester Pearson International
\nAirport.<\/p>\n
Which is all backward, but that is precisely how I am feeling this
\nmorning, and that is exactly how Local 75 is feeling as well.
\nInterestingly enough, or not, the demonstration commenced with the
\ninflation of a great gray rat with fierce red eyes and sharp incisors.<\/p>\n
At one point he seemed to be devouring the man who was trying to
\ninflate it- you will have to check the Facebook page for the image,
\nsince apparently the iPad cannot handle embedded pictures and the
\ncapabilities of a real computer.<\/p>\n
Anyway, Local 75 of the International Hotel and Restaurant Workers
\nUnion told me they had been without a contract for almost a year, give
\nor take, and this was not a strike, just a labor action with a giant
\ninflatable rat, whistles and bullhorns.<\/p>\n
“What do we want?”<\/p>\n
“Contract!”<\/p>\n
“When do we want it?”<\/p>\n
“Now!”<\/p>\n
It is gray but not raining. There is plenty of coffee in the lobby and
\nlots to look at outside. I’ll tell you more about it as it happens.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2011 Vic Socotra
\nwww.vicsoccotra.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I love Canada. Toronto is a vibrant diverse city where, darn it, everyone is friendly and everything is nice. That is not to say that there are not misunderstandings. For example, I was talking to the Groom’s brother this morning in front of the Holiday Inn Express. Well, trying to, anyway. I could not hear […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-socotra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1280,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions\/1280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}