Saturday, September 1, 2018

A Taste of the Theatrical

August 2018 - Distillery District Toronto



August 2018 - Toronto ON

I forgot to post John's lunch from Niagara on the Lake last week.



This has been the summer of theatre and we had two performances booked this week.


Saturday
Cee's Odd Ball Challenge
Lens'Artists Challenge
Pink Saturday
Six Word  Saturday
Niagara on the Lake

It was a busy week last week, three days in Montreal and a day in Niagara on the Lake NOTL. So we decreed today to be a go nowhere day. I had menu planned and shopped for the weekend.

I had lots of posts to catch up on.



Potato salad and fried chicken for dinner.

Sunday
One Word Sunday
Past Meets Present
Inspired Sunday
Shadow Shot Sunday

Lamb chopsmaple dijon roasted carrots with onions and mashed parsnip potatoes.


Monday

Awakened to a foggy very wet humid day. I hemmed and hawed about going out and then decided to do some tidying and reoganizing instead. We both then spent the afternoon reading our books, in face we each read a whole book in one day.


Fun video of our Hamilton City police.



Pork chops with gravy, potato salad and sliced tomatoes.

Tuesday
Tuesday Treasures

Our financial advisor booked lunch for us at LBS

We headed to the Distillery District for a Soupepper production of Bed and Breakfast.


Wednesday

We took the 12:30 shuttle downtown to meet our financial advisor for lunch at this very expensive restaurant for lunch. None of us were terribly impressed.
The lunch menu was not extensive, I have seen the dinner menu and it had more choices I would have liked. Called "lbs" and pronounced pounds it touts itself as a seafood restaurant. The name is also an acroynm for Lobster Burgers Salad.


My steak sandwich with blue cheese was delicious. But John thought his haddock was a really small portion served only with two pieces of broccolini and our other diner was not impressed by the number of bones left in her branzino.

We had theatre tickets so it wasn't worth while going home after our meeting. We ran a couple of errands, poked in a book store and had coffee before heading to the Distillery District. First order of business to find the brain project.


Recognized as a National Historic Site, Toronto's Distillery Historic District contains over 40 Victorian buildings that document the city's and the nation's architectural and industrial heritage. Between the 1830s and 1890s, the firm of Gooderham & Worts grew from a small windmill in the wilderness to the largest distillery in the British Empire and, for a time, in the world. The 20th century brought war, prohibition of alcohol, globalization, decline, and, finally, the area's rebirth as a vibrant arts and cultural district.






Between the 1830s and the 1950s, the shoreline abutting Gooderham & Worts moved about 500 metres south. This migration occurred incrementally, as when the company added a new wharf in the 1840s or filled in around its grain elevator in the 1880s and '90s, and in great leaps, as when the Toronto Terminals Railway Company built its raised waterfront viaduct in the 1920s and the Toronto Harbour Commission implemented its 1913 waterfront plan from the end of the Great War into the 1930s. The once prominent waterfront industry became landlocked and serviced by railway and motor vehicles.



One day...a pair of Fluevogs!




We saw Bed and Breakfast put on by Soulpepper Productions. Two actors perform a multitude of characters. Lots of laughs and some tears.

When Brett inherits the family home, he and Drew move out of fast-paced Toronto to set up a B&B in a picturesque tourist town. But will these big city boys face friction in their new community? With dozens of hilarious characters, all portrayed by two actors, Bed and Breakfast is a heartwarming comedy about “being out” in small town Ontario, family skeletons in the closet, and finding a place to call home.




Thursday

An early start to Stratford for an afternoon performance of To Kill a Mockingbird.

The weather has been fantastic so we packed a picnic, and wouldn't you know, we needed our jackets to sit outside!

The front entrance with the Arthur Meighen Gardens, created in 1996 as a gift from the Meighan family. Arthur Meighan (1874-1960) was born not far from Stratford, and twice served as Canada’s Prime Minister (1920-1922; 1925-1926).








Side entrance, love this sculpture, you can see more of these gardens in the link above.




The gift shop has some unusual and interesting theatre related items for sale.






To Kill a Mockingbird review in the Globe and Mail summed it up perfectly.
Director Nigel Shawn Williams has brought the late playwright Christopher Sergel’s faithful dramatization of Lee’s novel about racial injustice, set in 1935 Alabama, to the Festival Theatre’s thrust stage in a gut-punch of a production that resonates deeply amid a seeming resurgence in white supremacist rhetoric south of the border.


The large ensemble drama features a feverishly felt performance from Jonathan Goad as the white lawyer Atticus Finch, who is assigned the job of defending a black man falsely accused of rape, and a wonderfully simple and centred one from the young Clara Poppy Kushnir as Atticus’s daughter, Scout, the white girl from whose perspective the story is told.





We wondered if the sheriff was the same actor that starred in An Ideal Husband which we saw last month, and sure enough it was Tim Campbell.

After the show we drove to Millbank to Anna Mae's bakery for some gluten free goodies.
John said we should do lunch here to next time we're in the region.


Some sights on the way home.



GPS in the way!




Friday
Weekend Reflections

John took the car to the dealership for routine check up. I went downtown to pick up a library book on gluten free bread maker recipes.



It was pretty entertaining as I waited for the shuttle home. The air show was rehearsing overhead for the weekend.

Fanfest had started at the convention centre.
















Dinner out with BIL and his partner, at Salt on Ossington, a fun trendy street, constantly reinventing itself.





Salt is a Spanish wine and tapas bar and it did not disappoint. Our server was friendly and very knowledgeable. We ordered a multitude of shared plates, ceviche, steak tartare, lamb meatballs (the best), ribs, sardines, gnocchi and all was good. The ceviche was my least favourite, both in quantity and taste, it didn't have enough bite.





Good friends, food and wine, a perfect evening.



REMINDER
September Squares #InThePink


BOOKS


August 2018 - Stratford ON


Sleep Tight I really enjoyed this perfect lazy summer read. Love all the sneaky planning that went into her disappearance. 

Scissors Paper Stone a guilty read about family secrets, by the author of The Party which I read a week ago.
Also finished Home Fires also by Elizabeth Day and started Paradise City also by Day. I kinda have an author crush at the moment.

Also started Bellevue Square, set here in Toronto and a Giller prize winner. I am not entirely sure whether I will finish this, and the reviews are mediocre for the most part.




SHARING WITH:

Beth hosts Weekend Cooking where you can post anything food related.
Saturday Snapshots is hosted by West Metro Mommy.
Sundays in my City
Seasons
Monday Walks
Monday Morning Blog Club
Through My Lens Monday
Our World Tuesday
Wanderful Wednesday #wanderfulwednesday
Wednesday Around the World at Communal Global
Travel Photo Thursday
#WeekendWanderlust

10 comments:

  1. What a fascinating look at your vibrant city! I'd love to visit the distillery district, and the parade of costumed fans must have been a hoot. Great photos.
    My Saturday Snapshot post features a hiking adventure at Mount St. Helens.

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  2. The Fanfest shots are a whole lot of fun!

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  3. Love the distillery district photos and the great costumes you saw. The Arthur Meighen Gardens look beautiful. The steak and blue cheese sandwich sounds yummy. And good reading going on too!

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  4. It looks like another great week of food and culture (not to mention flowers and costumes!) ;-) It's always enjoyable to see all of your pictures.

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  5. So many wonderful photos. Wondering what you saw at Shaw Fest. Haven't been there in too long. No Stratford this year (unless we make it to the one in England!). Must check out their 2019 season!

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    1. We saw Hound of the Baskervilles at Shaw. We've been on a theatre kick!

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  6. That's a very cool looking lady jester, Jackie :) :) Wishing you a great week! Many thanks :)

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  7. Lovely shots . Keep commenting in my blog because I love your comments.

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  8. It has been a long time since I have been Toronto. We had s similar fanfest call dragon con here this past weekend though I was out of town and did not see the parade of costumes. Lunch looks yummy!

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  9. What fab photos Jackie! The Arthur Meighen Gardens look stunning. I agree, that sculpture is fab.

    Thanks for sharing with #MMBC. Have a great weekend. :)

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