Life In Scarborough: Gulls Before A Storm

So the wife and I spent our evening  on the balcony of our condo unit drinking a bottle of wine.  We noticed a flock of  gulls in the air, surfing the turbulence in advance of a line of storm clouds.  These were  the same gulls that usually inhabit the roof of a Metro across the parking lot from us, standing in their 100s in the shallow puddles that form after a rain.  Normally you imagine them groundlings, begging for a wedge fry from people going to and from their cars.

But tonight they had all taken to the air. And they were like a mob of kids on their skate-boards.  This was not about looking for a meal.  It was all about skidding sideways like the guys in Tokyo Drift, but through the sky, and diving and darting and pulling a rivals tail-feathers in full flight and swooping low and then sailing 100% vertical on a hot  current.

And their squawking seemed exultant, not at all like the sound they make fighting over the spilled guts of a squirrel someone has run over with their car.

Its nice to watch animals "having fun".  They are always so into it.

Ontario Election Leadership Debate Analysis

I didn't watch it.  I was eating wings in my favorite wings place watching a hockey game.  But I was checking my twitter feed occasionally, and this is what I gleaned from it.

1) Kathleen Wynne's opening pitch speech was good.  Something about yeah you hate me but you like my policies sorry sorry sorry yada yada.  She got a few good jabs in later against Doug Ford.

2) Doug Ford fumbled the Nazi meme thing.  "You are all motherfuckin' Nazis," he said of the NDP.  He also looked "stiff".  Which, if you've ever met the guy...you can mistake him for a cardboard cutout of himself.

3) Andrea Horwath didn't say anything worth noting, as far as I can tell.  But she didn't get trapped into anything either.  So for her that's a win.

So maybe a 0-0-0 draw, or  0-0 negative 1 score for Mr. Ford for misplaying the Nazi card.