Day: April 16, 2022

This week in forbidden tweets

Generally I think it is a good idea to keep it positive and light on twitter. I especially try and avoid political tweets. However, I found that hard to do this week. To stop myself, I kept a log of all the things I was going to tweet about but didn’t. The following is the log.

(The good thing about sharing them in a blog is you can moderate who comments on such things. I don’t mind saying such things: I do mind having to fight with randos.  I also don’t like to make people read things that they don’t want to read. Twitter does that to you: blog posts don’t. Here’s the things I was going to tweet but didn’t.)

  1. saying things are a war crime doesn’t amount to much. If it did, Kissinger would be locked away. (Lots of people talking about war crimes, as if somehow this will result in some action. It might, but it’s very unlikely).
  2. just because you feel justifiable sympathy for Ukraine doesn’t mean they aren’t lying to you (I mean, maybe 120,000 Ukrainian kids were taken to Russia, but given how the war is going, do you really think Russia is organized to do this?)
  3. accuracy in a war zone is a rare commodity. (Always remember that.)
  4. there’s no way Marine Le Pen is going to win, but it’s fun and dramatic for journalist to make like she will (I mean what is this, her third or fourth try? Every time people get all excited about her chances, and then she fades away. I don’t know why this time is different and I haven’t seen an explanation)
  5. Tucker Carlson’s whole schtick is to get people riled up by hosting vile people.
  6. Elon Musk has nothing more important to do than troll people. (Seriously. I think SpaceX and Tesla now are run by adults who know what they are doing. Musk is just farting around trying to get people to pay attention to him.)
  7. It is a losing game to take people like Musk or Carlson at their word. (The two of them are terrible humans, although Carlson deserves a lower level of hell then Musk.)
  8. The problem with following right wingers or the side opposite of you is that they tweet a lot of thoughtless garbage to show they are on Team Right (or Team Left) (I tried to follow right wingers to get some perspective, but the perspective I got is most of them aren’t critical thinkers. )
  9. People who are good writers can have some amazingly bad opinions and ideas (ahem, David Mamet. Pathetic.)
  10. People thinking highly of something Pierre Poilievre said about housing while forgetting he is PP (I have no idea what Gerald Butts and Chantal Hebert were pumping him up this week. He’s PP! Skippy! A French version of Stockwell Day! All hat no cattle! Sure, he can win the job for head Conservative, but so what? So he can fight Bernier to see who is more like Trump? If support for the Liberals collapse, and that’s a big if, I can’t see him coming out on top. Maybe he will….Doug Ford did. )
  11. Kieran Moore doesn’t care what you think he should do. Some doctors are bad at their jobs. Likely more than you can imagine (I mean this guy is Doug Ford’s man. What else can I say?)
  12. Writing about cancel culture on university is boring. (And yet so many people on twitter love to write about it)
  13. People complaining about consultants. Oy. (They have no clue what consultants do or why. But consultants make a great straw man).

No, I will not be commenting on this post on Twitter. 🙂

Coffee tourism: why coffee lovers should visit Toronto (and Torontonians should go to College St.)


For many years I’ve actually visited places partially because of my love of coffee. Really! I went to Vienna where the coffee was amazing and Costa Rica where it was less so*. I am sure there are many people like me who make good coffee a reason to visit a place.

If you are one of those coffee lovers, I recommend you visit Toronto. Just one street alone, College Street, has a wealth of diverse coffee shops to make you happy.

To see what I mean, read this: Toronto’s College Street is a destination for global coffee | The Star. Not only are there many great coffee shops, but they serve a wide range of coffees, from Italian to Vietnamese.

I live here, but I might act like a visitor and do a College Coffee Run soon. Meanwhile I will satisfy my need for great coffee at De Mello near me. (Coffee lovers, go there too.)

* Costa Rica fans, take note. Costa Rica exports amazingly good coffee in my opinion. I just couldn’t seem to find it there. Fortunately there was so much beauty everywhere, I didn’t mind too much.