Random round-up

I'm a little concerned that a few of my contacts have not gotten back in touch after I emailed, though most were glad to connect even remotely.  In some cases they may be in a deep funk, or in one case where my friend's partner may well have been laid off (as he is in the hospitality industry) they may be completely panicked and scrambling (and emailing pleasantries back and forth is naturally low on the agenda...).  There's not a lot I could do to help in such cases, but there is also no point in pressing them.  They will get back in touch when they are in a better place.  I have been in somewhat closer contact with my cousin and his wife in Brooklyn, though I haven't heard from them in a couple of days.  I'm obviously extremely concerned, as the coronavirus is spreading very quickly, and I don't like their chances if they do contract it.  I'll just try to send good vibes to them and the millions of other New Yorkers who are suffering.  It does put Toronto's lock-down in perspective.

I'll probably take the next two posts to talk about some intriguing on-line art and theatre events, as well as a general appreciation for the way Canadian politicians have really come together and are quite united in fighting this pandemic (which unfortunately does not appear to be the case south of the border...).  But here I'll just touch on a few minor, non-disease, topics for a bit of a change of pace.

I'm still going back and forth on whether to buy Doblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz.  The price for a physical copy keeps going up, largely because Canada's currency keeps dropping (as it is so tied to resource extraction and the oil sands are actually worthless right now*).  The chance of it showing up at BMV is extremely, extremely low right now (and I had checked on my last few visits), not that I would be able to get into the store, let alone be reading on transit any time soon.  As it happens there is a pretty good sale on the Kindle ebook, though I'd rather hold off until I get through a few other ebooks, but by then the sale may have ended.**  Quel dilemme!

On the other hand, I had been extremely tempted by Picasso: The Late Work, and again the price keeps edging higher.

I'm quite sure that I had checked at the library, and it wasn't in the collection, but I checked again tonight, and Toronto Public Library now has 5 circulating copies!  I wish I had known about this before the libraries all closed, but I put it on hold anyway, and it is something to look forward to in June (hopefully!!!).  So one less thing I am tempted to buy.

It did take a while for my on-line orders of New Worlds Anthology (#1-6) to turn up, as this was "needed" to complete my Mr. X collection (as discussed here).  #6 was by far the hardest to source, but I did eventually find a copy.  What was a bit of a surprise is that the Mr. X material in #1 is actually identical to the final issue of Series 2 (#13).  I guess it's not the end of the world, but it was a bit frustrating to go to all that trouble to essentially buy it twice.

What I really need to do over the next few weeks (and I suppose I have far fewer excuses than before) is to start cleaning out the basement (now that I have probably satisfied (for now) my yen to acquire any more comics books between Mr. X and the very last Futurama issue).  It's a bit of a challenge as we cannot donate anything with all the charity shops closed, but they are still taking garbage and recycling, so I can still make some headway.

I have not made much progress at all in sewing the quilt, and I'm trying not to feel too guilty about that.  However, perhaps I will first actually try to make a few face masks (with some leftover cloth) and see who could use those, after equipping my family.  I don't think I know any doctors or nurses, but if no one else could use them I could donate them to the senior centre nearby.

It seems that pretty much no matter the topic, the coronavirus keeps creeping back to the top of my thoughts, so it's probably time to shut this post down and get some rest.



* It is possible that in the medium- to long-term, Canada might start doing better than the US economy, since it appears we are doing better in flattening the curve (and thus probably can restart our economy with less pain), but it doesn't really matter.  When the US economy is in the tank, Canada is also dragged down.

** Actually, I no longer have a dilemma.  It is a bit embarrassing to admit but with everything going on it just slipped my mind.  I ordered a copy of this a couple of weeks ago but had it sent to a US address, so it will be a while before I have it in my hands.  It turns out that the library does have a ebook version, and I've joined the queue for that.

Community Theatre (from before the Crisis)

It definitely seems like a different world now, but I thought I would get a few thoughts down on community theatre as a reminder of what is on pause right now.

I guess it can be a fairly thin line between community theatre and the black box theatre that I generally favour.  I suppose the main difference is that, for the most part, the actors in community theatre accept that they are are not on a professional track and they are a bit older than the artistic troupes at black box theatres.  Perhaps this is not universally true...  What does seem to be true is that they lean a bit more heavily on broad comedies, so Norm Foster is commonly programmed, for example, whereas in the past it might have been Neil Simon.

I don't think I saw much of what would be considered community theatre in Chicago, but there were actually two groups in Vancouver that shared the Jericho Arts Centre out at Jericho Beach (I will say it was a lot easier getting out there after I signed up for Car2Go!).  One was the United Players of Vancouver and the second was Ensemble Theatre Company.  I thought I had seen another show by the United Players, but the only one that I am sure I saw was Alan Bennett's The Habit of Art in 2013.

I'd say Ensemble Theatre was a little more ambitious, usually taking on a Jacobean play each season.  I saw them doing Middleton’s Women Beware Women in 2013. I can't quite remember why I passed on seeing The Alchemist in 2012, but it probably was related to the theatre being pretty far from my house and I don't think I had Car2Go at that point. As I indicated, they do seem to be a bit more ambitious, and they are relocating to a theatre on Granville Island, so maybe they shouldn't be counted as community theatre any longer.

I don't really put Alumnae Theatre in the same category as community theatre, though it probably is one notch below professional theatre.  It's conceptually much closer to black box theatre (in a quite nice theatre space), though Toronto Irish Players (which rents out space from Alumnae) fits reasonably well into the community theatre grouping.  I've never actually seen anything by Theatre Etobicoke, and they seem to only put on one show a year.  The Scarborough Players are a lot more active, but I haven't gotten out that way to see anything by them either.

I've seen a handful of performances by the Village Players out in Bloor West.  I had a couple of bad experiences out there (Ken Ludwig's Fox on the Fairway was particularly terrible) and had largely written them off.  But then this season they were doing Tennessee Williams's The Glass Menagerie, and I thought this would be a good one to take my son to, and the acting was solid, as was the overall production.  So I decided to be a bit more open-minded towards them.  I then saw Lindsay-Abaire's Good People (just before the hammer came down on live performances) and the acting was very good.  They definitely have a tendency to pick weak but crowd-pleasing comedies, but I'll definitely give them a shot in the future on a case-by-case basis.

I've probably seen the most plays over at East Side Players, which probably not coincidentally is the one closest to me (performing in the Todmorden Mills Heritage Site in the Don River Valley).  They do put on high quality performances, but I do find myself frustrated with their decisions.  There was nothing I wanted to see in the 2017/2018 or 2019/2020 seasons (though I might have gone to see Disgraced if Mirvish hadn't put it on just a year or so before).  However, the 2018/2019 season was solid (and would have been amazing if they hadn't swapped in Shelagh Stephenson's The Memory of Water for MacDonald's Good Night, Desdemona; Good Morning, Juliette).  I really disliked The Memory of Water and left at intermission, which I think is the first time I've bailed on them.  Note that I'm not the only one that strongly dislikes this play (see the very critical review in Variety).

I have enjoyed these plays the most at East Side Players: Speaking in Tongues by Andrew Bovell, Wonder of the World by David Lindsay-Abaire, Office Hours by Norm Foster and Time Stands Still by Donald Margulies.

One thing that is particularly nice about East Side Players is that the building they are in almost always have art on the walls for sale.  One time there was a small photography exhibit (linked to the Scotiabank's Image Festival).  This was probably my favourite of the bunch.

Calvin Lee, Rain

While most of his recent work features photos of dancers hard at work, Calvin Lee also has a portfolio of textures, from which this photo is drawn.

So that's a bit of an exhaustive run-down of the community theatre I've seen in the recent past.  Here's hoping it isn't too much longer before they can get back on the boards!

Recklessness

I'll keep this shorter than usual.  It still blows my mind at how stubborn and callous some politicians are.  It is absolutely incredible how low Trump can go, and yet every day he sinks lower.  What's so incredibly depressing is that he is benefiting from the (completely undeserved) impulse to rally-round-the-leader that occurs pretty much in every national crisis.  Aside from deep partisan enemies, people have this instinctual urge in times of danger to feel that there is someone in charge who knows what he (or she) is doing, and whoever happens to be in charge get this mini-wave of support (even a tosser like George W.).  It's absolutely laughable that such an impossibly reckless and terrible politician is going to benefit from this.  All I can say is I am so glad the elections aren't right around the corner, or he would probably win.  By Nov., his complete inadequacy and the fact that he drove the US into a deeper crisis will likely lead to Biden beating him (unless of course he gets the virus on the campaign trail...).  Even a few people were saying that Boris Johnson was acting more like a real leader,* though this seems just as fanciful and mere wishful thinking, and they generally stopped saying that around the time he and his health secretary caught the virus.

The Brazilian stongman and general rightwing dickhead Bolsonaro is going to add unimaginable misery to Brazil by claiming the whole thing is a hoax and not supporting social distancing and generally feuding with the governors of Brazil.  No question Trump is going in the same dangerous direction, though even he doesn't go this far (or not calling it "a hoax" any longer though still half-heartedly feuding with governors and as always reversing himself frequently via Twitter).  In any case, I am still holding out hope that both Trump and Bolsonaro get the disease and in a particularly nasty form.

Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised, but the left wing leader of Mexico, AMLO, is not covering himself with glory either, and is completely downplaying the seriousness of the situation, assuming that it will mostly affect the rich, whom he basically despises, and will leave the poor alone.  Fat chance of that.  So I am quite sure that Mexico will be in a terrible, terrible position in about 3 weeks.

I don't have a lot of hope that humanity will learn from this and will start electing smarter or at least less pathological leaders down the road.  It just seems to be a lesson that we need to learn over and over again, but it never sinks in.  Sad.


* I was completely flabbergasted when I read this in the Guardian, and I wonder if the article has been scrubbed, since I simply can't find it again.

Missed Opportunities (Recent)

I try not to dwell too much on things I passed on, since I follow so many different arts and it just isn't possible to do everything (this is certainly one reason that I am extremely resistant to add in anything new into the mix, particularly dance or opera).

I have a few minor pangs of regret that I didn't see the Banksy show last year, though I just thought the ticket prices were far too high.  I did discuss checking out a play up at York U (Goodnight, Desdemona; Good Morning, Juliette) with a friend of mine, but she was too busy, and I didn't feel like trekking up there by myself.  I had seen the play once before (at Brock actually), so I don't feel deprived.

I did debate going off to see TorQ two Thursday ago, in what would have been one of the very last evenings at Hugh's Room (I didn't even realize this was a jazz club, which doesn't speak that well of its abilities to get the word out!).  I was starting to get a bit uneasy about being out for any events, so I passed.  I have seen TorQ quite a few times, so it isn't quite as severe a blow.

There were a couple of concerts last year I got serious about too late and they were sold out.*  This includes Antibalas at the Horseshoe and Bruce Cockburn at Koerner Hall (though he almost only comes through on solo tours, and I'd much rather see him and his band).  I'll probably think of a couple more down the road.

I guess this is more like two years ago, but I didn't go see Collective Soul, since one time they were at the Phoenix, and I would have had to stand all night (and I am just too old for that!), and then they were at the Budweiser Stage, and I try to avoid that place.  (That said, I am slated to see two concerts there this summer and early fall, and I will not moan about going out there if the world has returned to normal and the shows go on...)

Oh, that reminds me that many years ago I passed on a chance to see Toad the Wet Sprocket playing in Chicago, and that I was going to make up for it by seeing them this summer out at the Budweiser Stage (correcting that previous missed opportunity).  The jury is very much still out if that will happen.

I had been hoping (and planning) to see the Sarah Sze exhibit at MOCA.  In fact, there was one weekend where larger cultural institutions were shutting down, but the smaller ones were open.  I went to The Power Plant at Harbourfront, and I would definitely have made the trip out to MOCA, but it closed along with the AGO.  It's not my biggest regret (out of everything that is going on), but it is the one that I could have handled differently had I known just how quickly everything was going to shut down.  It is true that the piece is being loaned to them by David Mirvish, so he may well let MOCA hold onto it for a couple more months after the quarantine has been lifted.  Certainly I hope so, but I have a lot of other things to worry about at the moment.

That covers a lot of the cases I was thinking about.  Some of the other things are wishing I had grabbed a couple more library books before the libraries all closed, but as I noted, I really do have plenty to read, and I might not actually get around to all the library books, regardless of how long I have to read them. I suppose if I had 100% foresight, then I might have grabbed Bottom's Dream by Arno Schmidt from the Pratt Library at Victoria College, as I would have the whole spring to read it.  This is apparently the only copy of the book in the entire city, and there's no way I can read it in 2 weeks (when things get back to normal) as it runs just under 1500 pages.  But this may well be a curiosity that I wouldn't actually like all that much, and really I have quite a few more pressing things to do first, like read Fante's Bandini Quartet or reread Durrell's Alexandria Quartet

A lot of the other stuff is out of my control.  I don't know if Picasso is coming to the AGO this summer or not, though I would say probably not at this point, but it won't be a missed opportunity since no one in Toronto will have that opportunity.  Most of my tickets through May have now been voided, but, again, everyone is in the same boat, and it isn't like I just forgot and missed a show.  I do try to take advantage of things when they crop up, and, consequently, I don't have lots and lots of regrets about missing out on artistic events.**  I certainly do regret there is almost nothing to do at the moment, though I suppose this too shall pass.


* To spin this a bit more positively, I did get tickets to the sold-out Laurie Anderson show, as well as Lowest of the Low at the Horseshoe.  I believe Angela Hewitt's performance of Bach's Goldberg Variations was technically sold out, though there were a few no shows.  Her upcoming (and rescheduled to October hopefully!) performance of Art of the Fugue is also sold out, and I have a ticket for that as well.  And it was a major coup to get a ticket to see Salman Rushdie speaking at the AGO.

** In terms of what I did see before the curtain came down hard, two full weeks ago (already such a different world), I saw Knives Out at the Paradise (which was amusing but not a great movie by any means) and Good People by Lindsay-Abaire at Bloor West Village Players (with lots of seats between people in the largely empty theatre).  While I have some quibbles about the way the character is written (it is not really convincing in the end why she doesn't fight harder for her severely disabled child), the performances were top-notch.  I would have been upset at myself had I skipped these opportunities before the expert guidance tightened up and made such outings a thing of the past.

Teleworking - Week 2

We are nearing the end of the 2nd full week of teleworking.  In general, it is going ok.  It is quite draining to do on-line meeting after meeting.  That was a huge problem yesterday, but I don't have nearly as many meetings scheduled today or Friday.  Also, fortunately, my team has far fewer group check-ins or team meetings (maybe 2 short ones per week) compared to other teams.

For me, work always blended into my "real life" too much anyway and, when I am trying to solve some problem, I'll be working at odd hours and for far longer than my scheduled work hours for the week.  This crisis really hasn't changed anything for me in that sense, but I think it is a bigger challenge for others, not used to working this way.  If anything, I find I am working a bit more right now, esp. as there are so few "real world" distractions and places to go, though there are just as many on-line distractions and the siren call of the news sites and the coronavirus counter.  I was good and didn't watch The Show Must Go Online during working hours (a new play, The Taming of the Shrew, starts today at 3 pm Eastern), but I did record the audio stream and then was able to watch the video stream later on.  It's a bit unclear to me if they are only going to archive past shows for a week or longer.  They've revamped the site a bit, suggesting they expect to archive the shows longer, which is amazing.  I haven't donated to the Patreon page, but I probably will this week, as I start deciding how much to donate to arts groups vs. the Canadian Red Cross, United Way and so on.

At least for the moment, I'm actually reading a bit less than I was before the crisis -- and watching no more tv, movies or video streams (with the exception of The Show Must Go Online), though that may change eventually as the new routine becomes more routine...

It goes without saying that I am fortunate to have a job where I can work from home and there are no whispers at the moment of any job cuts or furloughs.  While I am only involved in longer term planning of the transit system, the agency as a whole is directly involved in transit provision and, as such, is considered a vital lifeline in these troubled times.

My home office set-up isn't too bad.  I actually can look out a window and see some trees and a bit of sky, and as the weather warms up, I'll be able to open the screen door and get some fresh air.  The layout isn't completely dissimilar to this Stay-at-Home Dad's den...

I do know that I am not getting enough exercise.  Tuesday I did go for a slightly longer bike ride and then walk (as I had dropped my bike off for a tune-up both because I want to make sure it is in good shape during this crisis but also to put a bit more money into the bike shop, so it doesn't close).  Wed. I went for a very, very short walk but didn't go into any of the stores (or to check out how Gerrard Square is doing with virtually all its stores closed down*).  This morning I did some crunches and push-ups, and will try to force myself to make that part of the new routine.  I should be able to get my bike back this afternoon and go for a short ride, and then I expect I'll take some longer rides this weekend, if I can figure out places where other people aren't also riding.  I'm definitively snacking a bit too much, though there aren't too many sweets at the house, and I'll just have to show some will power in not buying any when I am at the store.  I've never really been a vitamin person, but I am taking Vitamin C until this all blows over.

So it could be better, but it certainly could be a lot worse, and we'll just see how it goes over the next few weeks.  I'm still holding out a bit of hope that there will be some kind of a home Covid-19 test to enable the really widespread testing that we need that might then allow the world to slowly get back to normal, though I am well aware that it won't be business as usual until there is a working vaccine against the coronavirus.


*  Food Basics and Home Depot are open, and can be reached from both ends of the mall.  Presumably Walmart is open (for now) but that means they have to leave the whole mall open but with all the other individual stores shuttered.  I mean I am curious, but not curious enough to go and run the risk of catching the virus.  I'll probably just stick to No Frills for when I absolutely need to go get something.  (At the moment, the lag time in on-line delivery of groceries is pretty long, so we'll probably go ahead and risk it, though I will start wearing gloves for sure...)

Books and E-Books (During a Crisis)

I think for some (admittedly perhaps a very small percentage of the population), one challenging thing about the lock-down is that the libraries are closed (and even for them, it probably barely breaks the top ten things I hate about COVID-19).  There is no question that some Gen Z'ers (ok, my children) ask why I have so many books in the house when there are libraries and various electronic books.  (Most of which were purchased long before Kindle was even "a thing," but I digress.)

Now I can simply point to the shelves and say these books won't be going anywhere if the internet goes down, though it is true reading them by candlelight would be a challenge if the electric grid also goes down...

I guess I've read around 30% of these books (with the box to the right full of books that I plan on reading and then putting out in the Little Free Library).  I have just about the same amount of books downstairs, but I've only read 10% of them.

This pandemic will have to go longer than a year (and I'd also have to lose my job) to really put a dent in this stash.  Which is a good thing over all.

Fortunately, the library does still process their electronic books through Overdrive/Libby.  I currently have Kathleen Jamie's Findings on my phone, and may add Sightlines, though her third book of essays, Surfacing, is not available.  I'm debating adding Amitav Ghosh's The Ibis Trilogy but will hold off for the time being.  Some of Toni Morrison's books, like Home, are available now (and I probably should add that before it gets too popular) but Song of Solomon and The Bluest Eye in particular have very long waiting lists.  I haven't been able to track it down, but I should have The Bluest Eye in the Norton's Anthology of Women's Writing, which certainly should be downstairs somewhere.

I've downloaded quite a few interesting books over the years from the Internet Achive and Project Gutenberg.  I'll probably get through The Go-Between relatively soon, though I don't have any plans at the moment to tackle Henry James, for example.

I do have a Kindle reader installed on my home computer, and I have a number of titles that I have ordered.  I'm very much on the fence regarding Doblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz (NYRB).  I think this is a book that will take so long to read that I would prefer to read it on transit and so forth, which implies a long wait indeed!  I think I'll just keep watching to see if I can get a good deal through an on-line bookstore.  In terms of what is currently on the Kindle, I'm probably most likely to read Kingsley Amis's Girl, 20 and maybe Juvenal's Satires.

In terms of physical books, I'll go ahead and read the library books first (Camus's The Plague, Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being and That Time I Loved You by Carrianne Leung).  Then I'll start working my way through the books on Libby.  I have several books of short stories I should tackle, including stories by T.C. Boyle, William Trevor and of course Alice Munro.  I might investigate genre fiction after this.  I've never actually read all of the Sherlock Holmes novels and stories, and that is something else I have in the house, and I might reread Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, where I have read nearly all of the novels at least.  In any case, I am surely not going to run out of things to read, even with all the libraries being closed (at least not when I have the complete run of Dickens and a large dollop of Trollope!).  Hopefully, you are equally well situated...

Camus on Quarantine

I've known about Albert Camus for the longest time, but hadn't read much by him aside from a few short essays in Summer in Algiers (a Penguin pocket book I picked up in Cambridge) and The Myth of Sisyphus, though I don't remember much about that one.  I did read The Stranger a couple of years ago, and naturally I decided I needed to rectify this gap by reading The Plague in the midst of this pandemic.  (I'm in basically the same boat regarding Celine, an even darker writer, and I'll probably get around to one or two of his novels by the late summer/early fall.)

I personally can't vouch for the quality of the translation, but several reviewers felt that the recent (2001) translation by Robin Buss was better than the more widely-known one by Stuart Gilbert.  I was fortunate (and a bit foresighted) in picking up a copy of Buss's translation from the Trinity Library (a day or two after the Toronto Public Libraries had completely shuttered).

The first part certainly rings true with the authorities dithering (and generally waiting for word from even higher up the chain) with at least some people wanting to downplay the dangers to avoid upsetting people and being "bad for business," more or less.  Some things never change.

Then part one ends with Oran being quarantined and completely closed off from the rest of the world.  The next section opens with people coming to grips with their new reality.  "In the first hours of the day when the decree took effect, the Prefecture was besieged by a crowd of applicants who, on the phone or face-to-face with the town officials, were explaining situations that were all equally interesting and at the same time equally impossible to consider.  In truth, it was several days before we realized that we were in an extreme situation and that the words 'compromise', 'favour' and 'exception' no longer had any meaning."

Just a bit after that, Camus notes that some people were able to pass messages through the guards at first.  "This was in the early days of the epidemic, at a time when the guards found it normal to give in to compassionate impulses.  But after a short while, when these same guards had become fully persuaded of the gravity of the situation, they refused to take responsibility for anything when they did not know where it might lead."

This ultimately leads to strict rationing of telephone calls, from a relatively small number of public phone booths, and to the widespread use of telegrams!

So in one sense, we are in a very different situation, as most of the world is now on lock down, and there aren't really any safe places (not that this hasn't stopped some people from trying to flee to rural, remote areas).  On the other hand, we are more connected than ever electronically, and staying in touch (remotely) is probably the least of our worries.

Nonetheless, I was struck by a few news reports about Canadians stuck outside of Canada with few options to return.  Or in particular one family trying to have an "exception" made for their Peruvian nanny, who was not allowed to come back with them.  It's likely that even now there are (too) many compassionate exceptions being made, but people will soon start understanding that the authorities are serious and that the rules apply to them as well.

I haven't seen too many people crowding together, with the possible exception of people too close together at the grocery store (currently exempted as an essential need that people are allowed to travel to undertake), but the stories out of the UK, Ireland, Australia and even France are pretty dispiriting.  What's even more dispiriting is that if we had the ability to do truly widespread testing (and had taken this seriously as people returned from foreign vacations!), we could probably wrestle this pandemic under control in a month or two, but we don't, so we'll try this much more inefficient approach of breaking transmission through "social distancing."

I'll probably just push through the rest of The Plague over the next couple of days, as I don't expect to be going anywhere for quite some time...