Best of Toronto Mike
Total 96 Posts
I've been doing this for almost five years now, and I monitor the site statistics fairly closely. I think I've got a pretty good idea as to who reads this content and the raison d'etre. People typically fall into one of six groups. 1. Family, Friends and Acquaintances These are
Yesterday Michelle was Wonder Woman and James was Spider-Man. They asked me to be the Green Goblin. Somehow, at that precise moment, "goblin" sounded like "gobbler" and I blurted out something I hadn't thought about in at least a couple of decades. I told them I was the Alphagetti Gobbler.
As I age, I find it harder to interpret the distance between the current time and a memory. For example, while reading the paper this morning I got lost in a synopsis of the Blue Jays' first 30 seasons. There was a blurb about Dave Stieb losing a no-hit bid
I've been looking for an offline challenge. I've noticed that outside of fatherhood, all my recent personal challenges have involved a computer. It's time to set a goal that doesn't involve staring at an LCD screen for hours at a time. I was inspired by Saint Ralph. For some writing
I spent the morning in Brampton with Freddie P. I was greeted with a great cup of coffee and a raisin bran muffin from Tim's, a perfect way to start a Saturday morning. I was there for our Movable Type education transfer. His web site is now a real blog
I have a copy of the unreleased soundtrack for the movie Saint Ralph. If you shrugged your shoulders and muttered "so what" under your breath, I encourage you to read the entries on this page. Now that you're up to speed, you know I've been in love with Gord Downie's
Being a Maple Leafs fan in the 80s was tough. There were some awful teams in that decade, but hope arrived in the mid 80s when we drafted #17, Wendel Clark. I will never forget the 1985-86 post season when we swept the Chicago Black Hawks in three games. That
I mentioned Michelle loves to sing. One of her favourite songs to sing is k-os' "Sunday Morning". She just loves that song. This morning, which just happened to be a Sunday morning, she was singing this song while she coloured. I thought it was pretty damn cute and took a
I received a fantastic email last night from Andrew Lockington. He stumbled upon my "A Homemade Hallelujah" entry in which I spread my love for Gord Downie's cover of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" that appeared in the movie "Saint Ralph". Here's his email. Hey man, I was the composer on Saint
As I enter my fifth year of blogging, I find myself 360° from where I began. In the beginning, I was writing for a few members of my family and a few friends. That was my audience and the stats proved it. I remember when I first saw the number
I was lucky enough to be a little slice of broadcast history this weekend. Regular visitors to this site have seen me write about The Humble & Fred radio show. It began in 1989 on CFNY-FM (later renamed Edge 102) and was the morning show I awoke to until it
Yesterday I wrote about songs that reference Canada. I promised I'd share my ten favourite musical references to my home and native land. Here are my top ten with apologies to Stompin' Tom Connors. "Bobcaygeon" by The Tragically Hip - I'm starting this list with Bobcaygeon because it's a village
I was bouncing around YouTube looking for NHL content when I saw someone had posted Pond of Dreams. This was a 2.5 minute clip that aired prior to the 2000 all-star game. I remember watching it then and getting goose bumps. Lemieux's lines are a little stiff and it's
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about a survey conducted in Britain to learn what the most requested funeral songs are. Naturally, this got me wondering what songs I'd choose for my funeral. I'm really hoping my funeral is so far in the distance that I'll have plenty of
Cheri DiNovo, the NDP candidate in yesterday's provinicial by-election in Parkdale-High Park, will replace Gerard Kennedy as our Member of Provincial Parliament. She beat Liberal candidate Sylvia Watson by more than two thousand votes. For the second time in less than a year, this riding which previously overwhelmingly supported the
Although this blog has been around for almost four years, I only started accepting comments in early February. That's almost six months ago, but today a single entry received more legitimate comments than any other entry in the history of this site. Throughout the day, well over a thousand fans
A well placed piece of music in a film can alter the meaning of that song for all eternity. Try and listen to Bill Conti's "Gonna Fly Now" without envisioning Rocky Balboa's run up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Some will think of Gord Martineau, but most
All day long I've been getting hits from people Googling Humble Howard leaves mix and other similar searches. I rank rather highly for these searches, thanks to this entry about Fred Patterson getting the boot last September. I listened to Humble & Fred every morning for years when they were
Pop quiz, hot shot. What is SLS? If you don't know, you're new to these parts, and that's perfectly alright. This entry is going to bring you up to speed lickety-split. Consider this an updated sequel to the original SLS101 guide. We'll call this SLS 2.0. What does SLS
Even before I saw "Saint Ralph" I was hunting for an MP3 of Gord Downie's cover of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah". Last month I linked to a site that was sharing several covers of this Cohen classic. I left a comment on that site telling everyone about my search for Downie's
I love playing ball. I always have. From the moment I played my first game of tee ball at Lessard Park I was hooked. What I lacked in natural God-given talent I made up for in heart and soul. Baseball has always been my favourite participation sport and I've given
After a restless night of the most severe back pain I've ever experienced, I decided at 5:00 this morning to visit St. Joseph's Health Centre. At the very least I figured they could rule out anything serious and prescribe some heavy duty pain killers. Even in the very early
This game had nothing to do with the final score. It honestly didn't matter. This was James' first football game and the first time Ricky Williams touched the ball in a game as a Toronto Argonaut. Williams only played one quarter and didn't have a single solid rush, but being
Deciding to completely ignore my plea, Doug Flutie has called it a career. They list him at 5-foot-10, but there's no way he's that tall. 5-feet-8 would probably be closer to the truth. What he lacked in stature he more than made up for in heart. The highlights break nicely
I mentioned I was putting together a wedding playlist for my brother's wedding next month. I wanted 100 songs that were decent, wouldn't offend and had an appropriate theme for such an occasion. This wasn't as easy as it sounds, and to make things a little trickier, I capped the
