Tag : Toronto

Every so often while running my group, I feel it necessary to pair up with someone else in order to spice it up a bit. Our recent Christmas Party was a perfect example of that. I teamed up with David Shapiro, a promoter from the U.S. to host a party at Fluid Nightclub. With new injected energy, lots of dancing and hours of socializing happening, the party was very well received. As such, a point to do it again was made. So this year, I teamed up with Steven, one of the members of a mysterious group of individuals who run the copyrighted Saturday Nite Social Mixer’s parties. Quite mysterious indeed as they have no base of operations and are not affiliated with any one group or website, like say, I am with meetup.com. They are like a swarm of happy-go lucky locust, swooping down bars and clubs, leaving only a trail of empty beer bottles and a lot of cash on the hands of the bartenders. It’s a beautiful, if strange symbiotic relationship.

So after a few emails back and forth, the joint effort was a go: We were to pillage Philthy McNasty’s on Saturday, February the 2nd. So I show up and there are tons of people. I one point early in the evening I guesstimated about seventy at least. Now the interesting thing was the sheer amount of people who I did not know. Generally, in my groups there are a number of people who have become ‘regulars,’ or more to the point, just friends. We do not need a social event to hang out at, go for drinks or go for dinner. This time it was very much not so, although it is always a pleasure to meet new people. But every so often, just like one would in any other forum, you meet some really, really weird people.

Take exhibit A: I had taken my camera to take some shots of the social. I am surfing in and out the crowds, introducing myself as I go. This girl is putting on her coat so I think she is leaving. So I extend my hand forward, in a firm and friendly, I-am-NOT-trying-to-pick-you-up way and ask her for her name. After which I was going add that I hoped she had a good time. Instead, her expressionless face, still glued to a TV said:

‘It doesn’t matter…’ In a monotone voice.
‘Uh?’ Did I miss something? Did I have something stuck in my teeth? Well, she wouldn’t know that since she hasn’t even looked at me. Odd…
‘Are you okay?” I asked, and as one of the organizers with a bit of concern.
Her head was still locked to the wall mounted TV, her eyes starring freakishly upwards, looking both distracted and drugged.
‘It doesn’t matter…’ She repeated, slowly.

See, the interesting part when someone doesn’t want to talk to you is that you can always catch hints by their tone of voice and body language. They are always the tell-tale sign. But it gets disturbing when faced with well below Forrest-Gump-like synaptic responses, I simply stall. Should I leave? Should I be worried? Do I still have something stuck in my teeth? Are they high?

She was putting her coat quite alright, so I ruled out drugged or drunk. I wagered she probably thought I was hitting on her. But she still had not even bothered to make eye contact to even determined that I was not. Since I doubt anyone would think a guy holding out his hand the way you do to heads of state while holding a camera in the other as the coolest, smoothest approach to hit on a woman. Bitch? Nah, perhaps just very rude.

I looked at her one last time, her eyes still glued to the TV.
“You are weird.” I said as I walked away. Some people are just odd.

At around 11:00pm most of the girls in the group approached me to inform me of their need to dance. So the party was arranged into three groups: Some went on to Fluid, others to Devil’s Martini and the last to a place called RockWood. I for one, I chose neither, opting for a more quiet fourth option. Needless to say, for what I heard it was a really good night of dancing. That’s what matters.

If you would like to check my groups, try The TO23-35 Social and The 25-40 Social Groups. Although they overlap, they tend to cater to a different crowd. Oh, one last thing, I only share the odd and strange stories to you but they are quite rare. So don’t be shy, come out! Wait on for exhibit B coming soon!

I found Meetup.com quite by chance. Now for those who do not know, Meetup.com is a Web 2.0 social website in which like Facebook for example, members can find like-minded individuals, but unlike Facebook, then meet in the real world and, well, do whatever those interests are on an ongoing basis. You see, I was looking for a language group as I was forgetting my Spanish faster you could say ‘Dos cervesas y tacos por favor.’ So what better way to practice then to speak the language with other native speakers? Maybe even make some friends to boot.

Anyway, so I decided to bite the bullet and joined the Toronto Spanish Speaking Group. Overall it was good, however Richard the organizer left a lot to be desired. Like not showing up to any of his own meetups for example. In fact he never showed up to any outings and after a few attended events I relented to the possibility he was likely imaginary or the work of someone’s fiction. Specially, as I would later find out, if an organizer does not select a time or location, Meetup.com will automatically pick both for you. That’s what I call full service. But you would have to be abnormally dense not to get bored going to the same Starbucks again and again month in and month out. So I became a bit disillusioned.

Eventually curiosity got the best of me as the thought of organizing a group myself kept on marinating in my head. So without much dramatic ado I jumped right into organizing the TO23-35 Social Group.

Just like all group we started small. However we pretty soon exploded… 100 members, 200 members… then *boom* past 300! As of this writing membership is 667 and counting. Not bad, not bad. Then within the year a second group followed, the TO25-40 Social Group. Yes, the names are pretty almost carbon copies, but the demographic is on average older. How many members on that one? 461! And counting… As you can imagine lots of outings and funny adventures occurred within the group, a highlight would be the couple who not only met but ended up married after meeting in one of my groups. Now that has to make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

How do I choose events? Well, a few tequila shots help… no wait…that’s not it. Basically I pick locations through experience. Having been a party kid in Toronto in my younger years helps. I keep track of the never-ending stream of event s going on in the city at any given moment. We have gone patios, lounges, nature walks, indoor rock climbing, roller-blading, museums, movies, wine tastings, dinners, brunches, you name it. Pretty much anything that sounds like a great time to be had by all. That’s the easy part. The hard part is the colourful mating dance I must enlist myself to do with managers of establishments I want to do business with. As locales will not reserve busy nights unless you pay a ridiculous premium in advance or with your first born or a pint of blood from your mother. Selling off a next of kin may also do the trick. They are that anal. Sadly, I can see their point since they do not want to do have empty spaces on a busy night, but that is not the best way to woo future repeat customers. Although so far we have done pretty well. Over 105 events so far!

But all in all, it has been quite the adventure, and an excellent opportunity to meet and see the people and the city of Toronto. I would highly recommend it.

Just in case you are wondering, I can almost feel the strangle-hold of irony chocking me as I write this. You see, about two years ago I had an interesting conversation about the ‘Year of the Blog.’ My friend and I spoke about ease of accessibility and amazing technology penetration in North America. After a sad and ill-timed prostitution joke or two later, we continued. Just two years ago, blogs although abundant in number resembled an endless field of useless weeds. With only a few leaving the rest behind as they sprouted high, both in content quality and lucrative aspirations. But since then the playing field has changed drastically. The weed field is now millions of times larger. Yup, that’s about it, really.

Now everyone and their illegal gardener Ortiz has one. So what do they write about? Pretty much anything. But when I mean anything, I mean anything. Is this a good thing? With over 50 millions bloggers as of last year and hundreds of thousands of posts a day of people dispersing and rehashing the same stories over and over, one would think the times of a draconian, government controlled media outlet to be a thing of the past –Uh, China anyone?– okay, fine. Aside China that is… –how about North Korea?– okay, fine! In North America, at least… but then I think about the war in Iraq and the ever missing WMD’s… Argh! Forget it. I give up.

So the real question is what is a blog? As the name implies it began as an online log, people would write their thoughts, maybe use it as a portafolio piece *hint-hint*. Whether the writing was childish, deeply insightful or just plain dumb, the point was that they were people’s thoughts, ideas and dreams.

Now it is more about posting something and off the press. Anything people think cool and more importantly, before anyone else does. Take this example: A British guy named Bill gets his laptop stolen. He understandably gets pissed. Then next day logs on to his Flickr account and finds a picture of the thief’s face mistakenly uploaded because the thief forgot to log off bill’s account and sign on to his OWN Flickr account. Don’t believe me, click, here. Before I go on, this is a perfect moment for me to add, there is no such thing that will ever be ‘idiot proof.’ Idiocy, like life will always find a way.

Anyway, keep reading at the bottom, there is post upon post of people saying, “Oh my God, I must blog this RIGHT NOW! They post the picture on their blog and rehash the same tag-line, over and over and over again. What is the point of that? So they can look at themselves through a mirror and say, ‘I blogged. Therefore my job is done!’ In the comment section there are at least fifteen people who have posted that they blogged the pic onto their blogs and the link to their own blogs and asking everyone to take a look. Like, ‘hello!‘ we are at the source why go to a blog? Aside to answer the blogger’s cry for attention? Never mind that Bill just lost over a $1000 dollars in computer equipment.

On that note, an interesting point was raised on last week’s Stephen Colbert Report’s The Word segment a few days ago about Andrew Meyer and blogging. Mayer was the student who not only got jumped by six security guards but also taser-ed for asking one too many questions at a John Kerry event in front of an assembly full of students. Every one stood silent and motionless as Andrew screamed ‘Don’t taser me!’ Thank God for all the people who blogged about it the very next day while Andrew sat in jail. Great way for the blogger generation to lead the charge of civil protest and.

So where are we going to go from here? Aside living our writer and exhibitionist’s wet dreams, are we becoming a society of people whose social discontent, whether larger or small is displayed not through civil outcry but in really mean posts on blogs? Go, go society!

Man, I have an urgent to go for walk.

St. Patrick, the patron of drunks everywhere is coming to Toronto. Starting today, the festivities created to test the resilience of the human liver and kidneys began with a loud cheer followed by countless of gallons of green beer being poured throughout the city. You go liver! Break down that bitchin’ alcohol!
Our dear Saint Patrick is one of the Catholic Church’s most misunderstood Saints. Perhaps only second to Jesus and Saint Valentine. Don’t you think that if he had known that because of him millions of people would push the limits of their kidneys year in and year out that he might, I don’t know, promoted a healthy eating habit as well?

You know, to balance things out?

…Or whatever happened to Brigid of Kildare and Columba? The other TWO patrons or Ireland? Have you guys even heard of them? They are probably the ones that advocated healthy eating.
So, to celebrate I will be having a small get together as part of my social group at Hemingway’s in Yorkville. What a better place to toast a drinking holiday than in a bar named after one the 20th century’s most celebrated lushes? And a decent writer to boot.

Here is the link to the outing.