The great raccoon stalker of East York isn’t a real thing. Well. It wasn’t until it was. And then it was. So now it is. Camped out in the most urban of environments, this little fucker fucks with me all fucking night. Just me. In this 6×3 space of Earf that I’m trying to get some shut eye on. Finally at one point in the middle of the night, I go all Freddy Newandyke on the creepy vermin, yelling “Motherfucker, I’m trying watch the Lost Boys”. He leaves me alone after that.
Sun rises. Bacon, eggs, and geo-politicals with our international filmmaker and educational hosts heals the trauma from stalker raccoon and the back pain from uneven terrain. I’m easy like whatever day morning this easy, Lionel. And I’m in Toronto for the day.
Bellevue Park playground is some sort of neo utopia in the afternoon. Kids and adults alike are happy and smiling. I’ve literally slept on the bench in this park almost 20 years ago, which is a real feat at my age. This playground though. It looks like fun. It’s taking everything inside me not to go run out into the fountains. But I’m typing this right meow. Rn rn. There’s a super cool swing and I do like me a good swing. The see saw has a fucking line. Everyone is up in here, up in here. I don’t remember it this way.
Meanwhile I think about how empty the playgrounds in Buffalo are whilst I kick Carmen’s ass in tennis some mornings. The hard contrast in playground fun levels is a difficult m pill to swallow. Politicals doesn’t not come up as Americans in Canada. Canada is better maintained. Period. Most public park playgrounds aren’t like this one in the middle of this vintage shop and pretty overrun by homeless at times part of downtown Toronto called Kensington Market. Crazy. The US&A is stuck on a vicious cycle of non maintaining and non usage. It’s bigger and we need a massive movement toward virtuous cycles of our institutions. It takes a massive amount resources and energy to accomplish. Like. Early childhood. Infrastructure. To fucking start. If it sounds like Scandinavia, then we’re Scandalnavia. Massive amount of resources and energy.
Moments later the same phenomenon regenerates itself at the coffee shop. First tho, some sort of wack job of a woman whom ordered a cappuccino moments earlier – apparently in a normal manner – becomes quite unnerving and alarming and Just not ok… to the point of distressing the one-woman barista/cashier. Crazy Keira, let’s her Crazy Keira. She immediately starts shouting loud nonsense the second I walk in and get in line. Crazy Keira then picks up a phone and shouts some form of fake Spanish into it, going on and on so loudly that the barista (she’s definitely a Kim) can’t even hear my order correctly as I resist shouting myself. Crazy Keira keeps going in her with lunatic, brain-fried firm of attention seeking behavior for which she probably could get help. But eventually that bitch gets her coffee and gets the fuck out of the place. It’s takes several millennia for tranquility and balance to naturally return, because Kim, Chad, and I sit silently for a bit in a saucy mix of dismay, disbelief, and disgust.
Back to the goody goodness, it comes in the form of a decently impressive espresso tonic, thanks to Kim’s soldiering on through capitalist hellhole that the coffee service industry can bring. Nonetheless. Here at what I think is Cosmos Cafe, I give it a 6 or 7. Paris France’s offerings may never be defeated in this respect. This one right here is kinda, sorta a little more standard version of one but I’m glad it’s on the menu and I can verify that before walking in. I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve walked into a place wanting an espresso tonic and then just got something else when they didn’t offer one. Because I can’t count higher than ten. Maybe I missed the opportunity to find a good one in Montreal… I shall continue searching menus worldwide for these rare and refreshingly tasty thangs of all thangs. Get you one. Oh. Meanwhile Chad’s munching a 50% off salad that Kim was able to upsell him once we could hear each other again. And he is still celebrating his poop game hard.
We’re gonna scribble outside of the line and hop-scotch all around along the time space continuum now, as I leave the Raleigh Sojourn outside with Chad and explore/navigate my way through Toronto’s Union Station in my now quite dusty and worn Adidas Sambas. No one pays me a goddamn cent to be that specific, yet they should. Uncertainty abounds immediately once we’ve decided to jump on the Lakeshore West GOTrain, a fairly awesome regional train line that accepts a couple bikes on each car for no extra cost. I’m buying two tickets from Union Station to Niagara Falls Ontario, saving us pedaling a good section of kilometers that I’ve already done several times over. Leaving us with about 25 miles down the mighty Niagara and getting us home tonight. Pretty nifty plan, until it’s not. Minutes after a machine gives me a general ticket for any train to Niagara, I’m now being advised by a human being that rush hour trains don’t allow bikes on them and that only rush hour trains go all the way to Niagara. Fuck a duck. Or a buck. Maybe fuck a truck. Struck. Shuck. Yuck. We can go to Burlington and get a bus. Me no want buses. Me no want transfers. Me sad.
Back at the Sojourn, I report my findings to Chad. He says it’s not uncertainties, it’s contradictions. I tell him to turn the fucking high school teacher part of him off. He heads into the station with his bike. I contemplate options and start wondering if we should just suck it up and haul our 100 pounds of bike and gear the entire 100-110 miles. My saddle sore and hamstrings both ask me what the fuck am I thinking? I imagine my hamstrings in Muppet Form. Chad returns. He talked to a manager who says we’re good. Fuck the fuck yeah, Chad. Teach on.
We get our day in downtown Toronto, bringing us all of the above plus an obligatory pork belly Banh Mi sandwich in honor of both that same well-named canine, as well as the possibly ill-named (but equally badass bestie) Isis, both of whom’s earthly remains have been stowed away under the handlebars, of course.
I nosh the Vietnamese sammich hard as we approach this train time with trepidation. More uncertainty and/or contradiction manifests for boarding process and train cars allowing bikes and what not. Henceforth something something something. So I have never been on this train. I go and scout out elevators for various platforms, hoping the 8 minute lapse between track announcement and arrival is enough. Kinda depends on how long it sits in the station before rolling out. Ultimately it’s little sweat and we get on just fine. Occupying a weird amount of space by the doors but sitting right next the correct insignia.
Disembarking in Niagara, its a few twists down to the Niagara River, we pass the Falls as dusk hits and I get sprayed with the usual light mist. A brief break as darkness falls, Charlie Murphy, and now we’re cruising along the Canadian side of the river on a quiet road that possesses not a single streetlight. It’s totally dark for the last fifteen miles to the border crossing in Fort Erie; I’m using up the last of my out-of-country style patriotism before having to re-enter America, and return to my more usual form of patriotism (aka dissent). Musing out loud, I ask Chad, “Now that we have the Gulf of America. When do we get the American Ocean?” and “Which one should we pick? Can there be two American Oceans?”. Chad doesn’t laugh but Customs & Immigration Officer checking our passports gets a chuckle out the information about this long ride from Montreal he’s being given by the two exhausted weirdoes standing before him. We’re buzzed through the gate and I instantly feel the vitriol in the air, citizens waiting for the next reason the TV gives them to hate each other. Three miles later and I’m in my on shower, then my own bed. Go home America, you’re drunk.
Hoping for a Tail Wind 