Week Eight

Toronto!!!

Hi all, just had a lovely walk last night up the street from our place and this is two of the views we saw... weather cooling a little and really pleasant.

Week Eight? Eek this means the time is going really fast and my dream days here are finite. I did find myself telling someone that I could live here.. but I've yet to survive a Winter... so I shouldn't speak too soon. I asked Peter if he could live anywhere in the world where would it be... he said "Brisbane, Sydney or Melbourne" so it doesn't sound like Peter will want me to live here!

Peter is very down on his city and gets very frustrated about the way it is being run... does seem to be a lot of unending roadwork and disruption to life ... we rarely go out without having to detour to go around a road block at night because police have closed roads due to crime. If you watch CP24 which has 24 hour Toronto news, weather and traffic updates you would think the city is riddled with crime...

This got me curious so I've checked comparative crime rates between Brisbane and Toronto... can only find between Australia and Canada and they reveal usually that we're pretty close on most things... though Australia higher usually. I can't vouch for this stats website, NationMaster.com but it seems to claim it has stats on all these things... click on each to get the stats link.

Murders per capita
Robberies per capita (Australia tops this one fairly significantly)

Rapes per capita (both countries very high comparatively sadly)

Total crimes per capita (this one is just interesting because it puts NZ at number two... Australia doesn't rate but that's most likely an error of omission)
Unpaid diplomatic parking fees (just for something curious... )

Significant event this week of course the death of Senator Ted Kennedy. CNN covering it wall to wall and it is interesting to watch places in and around Boston that Lainey and I will visit in a few weeks. TV is pretty much only via cable here and we get more many many US channels. Number of possible channels would have to be in the hundreds but I still miss old Aunty ABC.

Big event for us was buying a DSLR camera (Nikon D90 Rick and anyone interested in details). I have only the most basic knowledge so far of how to make her work. Nevertheless, over the weeks you should see the quality of the images improve as I practice and start my course in September. Peter delighted in hunting down the best deal and has gotten into the excitement... here some shots of him opening the boxes, setting up the camera and reminding me of my sister Wendy when we were kids opening my presents on Christmas morning saying "Lindy wake up! Look what Santa brought you!!".

More festivals on... this one a couple of blocks east of where we are living. I went with Liz (we joke about going on dates) to the East Asia Festival, though I haven't worked out how to capture them yet... there was lots of colour here... which I seemed to miss! Liz and I having a Curry. She's a lovely woman and I really appreciate her generosity of spirit ...

Being arty with new camera... shot from outside ICI...

Public hearing for the liquor licence for Ici, the restaurant, is now likely late September. While the partners are getting frustrated... there's another wedding to cater this weekend so I'll be on the job again with my slicing peeling threading and deep frying!! I'm enjoying the days before the restaurant opens as I know it will be crazy once it does and it is nice to have Peter to myself for parts of most days. Here are the partners... JP, Jennifer and Peter... JP and Co.

Oh and finally the week wouldn't be complete without a visit to China Town. Enjoyed these images (you might have to look closely at the labels to get the humour) in our favourite shop yesterday. We did buy an old chicken and he's cooking away right now... for a long time I suspect!

Love the Half old Chicken!

Bye for now

Love

Lindy