1. The tragic wrong-way crash on the 401 that killed an infant and his grandparents was triggered by a theft from an LCBO store. This week the Toronto Star quoted an LCBO employee as saying that theft "is a daily occurrence." When I first moved to Toronto, the LCBO was still essentially a drug dispensary: you chose a bottle from a product list, wrote down the stock number on a form, gave the form to a cashier, and paid. Then you trudged over to a long counter with a long lineup and presented the form to a dour middle-aged male clerk. Finally, after the clerk had disappeared into the stacks, retrieved the bottle, and handed it over, you could escape from the store, sheepishly clutching the brown paper bag containing your drug of choice. I'm sure that more than one Ontarian of a certain age is remembering that system--archaic, judgmental, privacy-violating, and hugely annoying, but pretty much 100 percent theft-proof.

2. In keeping with my resolution to get over myself and get out of my head, I impulsively booked four social events this week. Coffee with F. at Mercurio, lunch with C. at Lalibela, wine and chat with L. at her apartment, and lunch with H. at Holt Renfrew. I'm kind of exhausted (because I'm so out of practice at socializing), but wow, was it ever fun. (The lunch at HR was temporarily disrupted when a sleekly blonde and highly tanned lady a couple of tables down from us jumped up from her seat and gave her companion an impromptu tennis lesson, swatting invisible tennis balls towards the ceiling while declaiming on technique. Of course she drew the attention of the whole restaurant. Rich people are allowed to be as overtly weird as they please, I guess.)

3. The Buffalo PBS channel is now airing "My Life Is Murder" without, as far as I can tell, any advance promos or notice. I found it by accident, and I am thrilled to see Lucy Lawless again. This is a show I'll stick with for as long as it's around: low-stakes (so far) mysteries, amusing, and clever--and it features a cat! Win-win-win-win.

4. This news, however, is lose-lose-lose-lose. "Run the Burbs," as the article says, "celebrates non-toxic masculinity, community, female friendships, and the complexities of intergenerational relationships between immigrant parents and their children and grandchildren." It does all that while being both goofy and smart. As usual, I'm not a member of the show's target demographic; nonetheless, I really looked forward to seeing the Pham fam onscreen every week.

Monday, October 9, is Thanksgiving Day in Canada. Despite everything bad that's happened this year, I'm still going to say "thank you" to the universe for all that's good.

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Happy Thanksgiving to all who are celebrating.

For the first time since the pandemic started, I attended an indoor social gathering of more than four people.

A close friend was hosting a life celebration for her recently deceased father (who was also a good friend), and I very much wanted to be there. So I braved up, masked up, and TTCed up to a location north of Bloor Street--not far north, just south of St. Clair, but still outside my normal grazing/shopping/walking area.

The good: I saw people whom I hadn't seen in ages, and I caught up on their activities, trips, and family events. There was stimulating conversation and a stunning buffet, and endless amounts of my friend's dad's favourite wine.

The less good: Out of maybe 30 or 40 people in attendance (age range from 30+ to 70+), I was the only one who was masked. A number of physicians and other medical professionals were among the guests, along with several people who were, I knew for certain, immunocompromised in one way or another. I was fairly sure that most if not all of the guests were fully vaxxed and boosted, but still. Anyway, I took off my mask for the purposes of eating and drinking and talking, and I left it off until the party was over.

I spent the next X number of days waiting for plague symptoms to appear. Thankfully, there were none, and repeated tests showed no Covid. But I was on edge for a couple of weeks. In most public settings these days, I'm the only one, or almost the only one, who's still wearing a mask. I wish I could decide whether to feel prudent or paranoid.