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| Calvin and Hobbled |
Occasionally I get tempted out of the Brampton bunker for the odd Toronto soiree. There were a couple this week:
Do folks remember the Toronto Sun? Monday marked the 40th anniversary of the Little Paper that Grew until Quebecor shrunk it.
Several alumni gathered at house bar Betty’s across the street from the grocery store where the Sun used to publish. Among them were old pals Jim Slotek (recovered enough from a nasty spill to be up to 5k a day again) and Calvin Reynolds. There were quite a few former Sun, now Toronto Star folks at the gathering, including Linda Barnard, Jennifer Bill, Peter Howell, Derek Tse and Tim Fryer (Woody McGee is at The Globe). There were even more if you count Sun alumni who now deliver The Star.
Saw former Go Bimbo Go! frontman B.J. Del Conte at the deal. B.J. pulled several classic pranks during his Sun tenure, eventually getting chased out of the building by Paul Godfrey. Cool!
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| Telling Rachel Sa Bruce Kirkland’s real age |
John Cosway, who so tirelessly maintained the dishy Toronto Sun Family blog these past five years, was in attendance. He has put a big -30- on that site, but Sun alumni craving the latest Sun shenanigans can now track each other, with pictures, over at the new Facebook group site: Toronto Sun and Related Media Companies–Employees & Alumni. Snappy name, huh? They left off “Incorporated.”
UPDATE: Already shortened to Toronto Sun Family. Perfect.
Stories were shared at the friendly gathering by a few who were there in the go-go ’70s of how much fun Paul Rimstead was to read–and what a nightmare he was to edit and manage.
Speaking of booze, the folks who brew Canadian Club whiskey, in conjunction with the TV kids over at Astral and Corus, held a little speakeasy-themed Boardwalk Empire bash on Richmond St. Thursday night. Rimstead would have spun five columns out of it.
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| Murtz and unidentified flapper |
You could go upstairs and sample how 12-year-old whiskey tastes different than 10-year-old hooch. (It does!) Canadian Club was, like, medicine in America during prohibition, snuck across the border or even ordered by prescription through doctors. I’ll drink to that!
There was a contest to see who wore the best ’20s-era garb. Party hound and reality TV pontiff Murtz Jaffer somehow failed to take home the prize, despite the fact he wore the red suit. The tribe has spoken!
Boardwalk Empire, which is getting more and more intriguing in its second season, airs Sunday nights at 9 on HBO Canada.
A classic, prohibition-era automobile was parked out front of the stealth speakeasy, a nice touch. Not sure if it was really the password but the guy on the door let me in for saying “Swordfish!”
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| I wish. |
