t-dog

chicken hot dog, originally uploaded by suddenly.

i saw these hot dog stands all over downtown toronto. they have insane line-ups at lunchtime (and it’s the only street meat on offer in this town) so i thought i’d give it a try. the S.O. had a beef hot dog and i requested the chicken hot dog, cuz i’m a lady, after all.

i have to say, it was pretty damn good. it’s $2.50 for a jumbo-sized frank that’s grilled, not boiled. the sturdy yellow bun doesn’t fall apart after you slather on the condiments, of which they offer multitudes:

bacon-onion-relishpeppers-pickles

corn and olives??

ketchup-4 mustards-sriracha!

they have the standard sauerkraut, ketchup and mustard (like 4 varieties of the yellow sauce!). but they also display some unconventional options like corn and sliced olives. and sriracha, that tangy hot sauce you get at thai and vietnamese restaurants.

all the condiments and garnishes are free of charge. and if you’re REALLY lucky, a homeless person will come harass you as you chow down on your t-dog.

museum of inuit art

museum of inuit art, originally uploaded by suddenly.

we now return to our regular programming of suddenly susan visits t-dot…

(the role of the local torontonian will be played by the S.O.’s friend.)

local torontonian: what’ve you been up to?

suddenly susan: we took our out-of-town friends to the museum of inuit art.

LT: the where?

ss: the museum of inuit art. it’s at queen’s quay terminal, in the harbourfront centre.

LT: there’s an inuit art museum in toronto??

ss: uh…yeah. you do live here, right?

the museum of inuit art was kewl. so kewl, even the locals don’t know about it. my favorite pieces were by an inuit (duh!) artist named judas ullulaq. he does these picasso-ey sculptures made of whalebone and sinew. (and you were gonna toss that sinew you trimmed from your steaks!)

so go MIA at the museum of inuit art. they even have a deal:

Pay for a regular admission at any one of the Bata Shoe Museum, the Gardiner Museum or the Museum of Inuit Art. Be sure to get a receipt. Then, within 7 calendar days, grab a special person, present your receipt at one or both of the other museums and enjoy 2-for-1 entrance!

then you can save some loonies and feel more cultured than the local t-dotters.

queen street west

queen street west, originally uploaded by suddenly.

took the out-of-towners to west queen street west, a hip neighborhood in t-dot that’s been compared to the lower east side of NYC (minus the jewish legacy, puerto rican residents, and the housing projects).

queen street is a great place for shopping AND help pay for your canadian brethen’s doctor bills. y’know how michael moore was talking about canucks getting free healthcare? that’s because every time you shop or dine in the great white north, about 12-15% is tacked onto your purchase and that money goes toward healing the sick. the canadian government used to allow foreigners to reclaim that tax at the airport, like how it’s done all over the EU (because why should foreigners pay into a system that won’t directly benefit them?), but for some reason the smart folks in ottawa abolished that. it’s a brilliant plan really–one that NYC could easily adopt. i’m sure all those european tourists who visit the big apple wouldn’t mind paying another 4% on purchases if that means tommy will get the skin graft he needs.

so if you wanna help torontonians get all the surgery and meds they need, you can head down to queen street and spend all that pretty blue money at these places:

magic pony: a shop for figures, illustrations, and urbanwear. think of it as a toy store for adults –but not those kind of toys. get your mind out of the gutter. they have an art gallery in the back.

heel boy: well-edited selection of shoes (although the black label pumas i almost bought there were $50 more than in the US pre-tax!)

preloved: they take old granny sweaters and re-sew them into fun geek-chic clothes (this could so be a project runway challenge!)

irie food joint: a lovely jamaican restaurant with good grub. it left an impression on me with it’s wall of red stripe bottles and the artwork made with beard shavings (ew).

we popped into lots of different clothing stores along queen street — even one with jeremy scott’s outlandish designs — and for some reason, almost every sales assistant was asian and most likely korean. woohoo! korean-canadians represent!

foot fetish fantasy: homage to high heels and little feet

19th-century black satin boots, originally uploaded by suddenly.

the long lost best friend from high school (LLBFFHS) came to visit with her hubby. our first stop in t-dot: the bata shoe museum. this AWEsome museum is dedicated to shoes throughout the centuries from all over the world. they have everything from little lotus shoes for bound feet to ginger spice’s platform boots. here are some of my favorites from the collection:

white wedding shoes

high stilt shoes

roller clog – netherlands

late 19th-c. manch platform shoes

little shoes for little lotus bound feet

you can check out the 100+ photos i took in my flickr set.

i got a bone to pick with you

where the hal is halifax?

the S.O. is away in halifax for a destination stag weekend in honor of the soon-to-be-married buck.

i was like: halifax? isn’t that where they shot the shipping news?

the S.O.: no, that’s newfoundland.

me: ohhh. what’s in halifax?

the S.O.: some quaint houses. it looks like new england.

me: is it a big party town?

the S.O.: not really.

me: why is the stag in halifax when everyone lives in toronto?

the S.O.: cuz the groom went to school there.

me: um…okaaay.

i’m not sure why grown men would want to hop on a plane to travel to a city with less debauchery in another time zone but that is their bizness. actually, being by myself in the apartment has given me the opportunity to blog and contemplate the creepy art in our sublet, and hence, blog about the creepy art in the sublet. i was going to post some pictures of the apartment owner’s creations but the S.O. advised me to wait until we leave, lest we face eviction for being art snobs. i don’t think i’m being snobbish, i just don’t like this staring at me while i eat:

ok, i’m exaggerating but among the items mounted on the humongous collage in the dining area are doilies, spools of thread, and several animal bones–one of which appears to be the head of a small animal, maybe a possum or even a chihuahua. it makes me wonder where exactly did she get these bones? (that may explain why i don’t see any pets in the building.) and just because you hot-glue-gun a bunch on random stuff onto a canvas, does that make it art? if art is meant to evoke a reaction, mine is: eww.

animal house

kafrey takes his mug shot, originally uploaded by suddenly.

another noticeable difference between toronto and nyc is that people can live in houses in t-dot; big multi-story structures with kitchens and bathrooms larger than a broom closet. this allows torontonians to invite you over for dinner and you can actually seat more than four grown-ups at a full-size dining table complete with legged chairs. incredible!

the S.O. and i went to two such dinners. the lastest was at the home of a banker and photographer. the lady of the house prepared an amazing feast starting with a salad composed of buffalo mozzarella, and tomatoes from their own garden. oh! the envy. (i always dreamed of growing fruit and veg in my own garden.) the next course was mediterranean-style pork chops that were — are you ready for this? — grilled in their backyard! the chops were succulent and thick enough to hold a stuffing of fragrant deliciousness like pecans, caramelized onions, and orange zest.

sigh. i remember the days when i played hostess in my tiny manhattan apartments. i could only invite three more for a seated dinner and i cooked out of a barbie-sized kitchen.

six - feet under

the other advantage of large homes: the ability to own large and multiple pets. the banker and photographer have two dogs and two cats. that’s six in the above picture (so named because she became the sixth member of the family after the two cats and kafrey, the pooch in the first photo).

two hands on a soft body

that’s darius, the naughty black kitty. the other cat is named mia and indeed she was M.I.A. — she went into hiding and never appeared throughout our entire dinner.

dot your t’s and cross your i’s

the S.O. told me that torontonians call their city “t-dot.” huh? “t-dot. because it’s T.O. for toronto, ontario.” ohhh, riiiiight.

people compare toronto to nyc but i really don’t see it. nyc has grit and attitude; toronto is clean and polite. nyc is an ethnic mixed bag; so far, toronto looks mostly white. t-dot actually reminds me of s-dot (S.F.). they’re both sprawling cities with posh, woodsy areas of huge houses, as well as not so savory nabes. they’re both a pain to get around if you don’t have your own set of wheels. and they’re both kinda weird about certain vices. did you know that in the ontario area (and maybe other parts of canada except quebec), you can’t buy beer or wine at the supermarket or neighborhood liquor store? you have to haul your alky ass to a government-run center where they levy hefty “sin taxes” on alcoholic bevs. they have two kinds of centers: one for beer and one for wine/hard alcohol, and they’re always spread out really far from each other. wha? i thought the nazis lost the war…

on a brighter note, i got my kimchi on in koreatown on bloor st. you can read all about my experience on chowhound.com (scroll down to the bottom for my dining highlights). even that reminded me of the k-town in oakland. they’re both in run-down parts of town and serve big portions for small prices. i would go there a lot except, we have to walk 5 blocks to the street car, take it to the subway, then transfer or walk like ten more blocks. the blocks are looong here. i guess as a new yorker and former seoul resident, i take the convenience of public transportation for granted.

all right, that’s enough of my griping. at least for now.