Johnny Strides does Weston

Johnny Strides is a prolific, ‘Toronto based youtube channel that focuses on walking, cycling, transit videos and livestreams in the city.’ Recently the channel did a tour of Weston, beginning in Cruickshank Park and walking down Rogers Road Weston Road to the UP Express / GO stations and doubling back to Lawrence.

“Johnny” misses Weston Village and its beautiful homes entirely after a tantalizing glimpse along Church Street when he emerges from Cruickshank Park. The gratuitous use of ‘troubled’ in the title didn’t win me over either. On the plus side, he does seem to do a fair amount of homework on the area and discusses that as he walks through. He gets a bit bogged down in the station areas before heading to Lawrence for his bus home.

The comments on the video are quite interesting. One commenter from Philadelphia noted that, “For a neighborhood with a bad reputation it certainly doesn’t look bad at all… coming from a person from Philadelphia which is sooo much worse. I do think Weston could use some greenery though.”

Westonians may wish to offer “Mr. Strides” some suggestions for another video on Weston. Watch the walk through below.

Two new food franchises coming to Weston.

Walking along Weston Road on Sunday, two new franchise eateries were in evidence. One is Osmows; advertising ‘Modern Mediterranean Cuisine’ and at 1971 Weston, the other is Fahmee Bakery – a Jamaican / West Indian specialty dish take out restaurant with mainly good reviews on Yelp. Fahmee’s top dishes (according to Yelp reviewers) are jerk chicken, jerk pork and spiced beef patties. Fahmee has no web presence and their Landsdowne location couldn’t tell me when they’re opening here. This is the former location of Perfect Blend that sadly closed in September.

Fahmee Bakery at 1971 Weston.
Osmow’s at Weston and Elsmere.

Osmow’s is a large chain founded by Sam Osmow in 2001. Specializing in shawarmas and wraps, they have an extensive menu that might complement the Greek dishes at P&Ms. They’re setting up at Elsmere and Weston in the old TD bank location. Readers may remember that TD moved (all but a machine) back in 2018.

When news about opening dates comes in I’ll post it here.

Update: Dolkar Tenpa at Osmow’s Head Office tells me that they’re hoping to open next month.

An update

Thank you to all the kind people who emailed me. You’re too much. And thank you to those who gave suggestions and helped me clarify my thoughts a bit.

To be clear, it’s not (just) the comments that have got me down. Here’s a notification I received last week from my computer:

As you may know, I’m a college teacher. It’s a great job and a privilege, but it has meant spending a lot more time on screens since the pandemic began. And, of course, when I’m not working, I’m often computing one thing or another.

I honestly find that screen time number hard to believe, but even if the number is off, I feel like I’ve been spending 12 hours online. I know I’m not alone!

Adding WestonWeb to that—well, honestly, it was too much. I just wasn’t doing as good a job as I think I should.

Anyway, I’m going to take another week off and try to get some more sun on my face. I hope you can, too.

WestonWeb Archives

During the past eleven years, Adam has faithfully kept Weston residents (and ex-pats) informed about local happenings. Guest writers have come and gone but Adam has persisted, providing a local news resource that few other Toronto neighbourhoods can boast. This is in addition to being a husband, father and teacher. In the last two years my contribution has been somewhat tempered by cancer treatments which have rendered me less enthusiastic at times so Adam has been carrying the load almost single-handedly. Needless to say, the pandemic hasn’t helped either.

While Adam ponders the future of WestonWeb, this might be a good time to reflect on the stories covered since he started the blog back in 2010. All of the articles are still available with most features intact. What follows is a set of links to articles by (approximate) month. (There is a search feature already built into the site but this list tackles the chronological progression of events.)

Incidentally, if you feel that WestonWeb is an invaluable resource, you might want to send some words of encouragement to [email protected]

Winterfest 2021

For the second year in a row, there will be no Santa Claus parade in Weston. Instead, this year Weston Village BIA is hosting an event they’re calling Winterfest. It’s happening this weekend; half of the activities will be online mainly through Instagram and there will be a physical presence on Weston Road consisting of musical pop ups, ice sculptures and something called Holiday Installations along with Winter Treats at the Commons, 34 John Street.

More information here.

Party’s over

I’m going to shut down the comments on our website. Sorry about that—the party got out of hand, and I’ve had enough for now.

There are three reasons. Two are technical, and one is my own failing.

First, the report-a-comment function isn’t working. Second, I’m not always receiving emails when new comments are posted, as I should. WestonWeb is old and decrepit, and some things just aren’t working as they ought to. As a result, some comments I won’t allow have been getting by me.

Finally, my enthusiasm for WestonWeb has always ebbed and flowed, but as you can maybe tell, it’s pretty low at the moment. I’m not checking in often enough to keep a handle on the corners of the site that have gotten out of hand.

So, lights are up, music is off. Thanks to those of you who came with love.

In other, related, news, I think I’m going to take a week or two off to see if I can rekindle some enthusiasm. I see that this is our 4000th published article, and it seems like as good a time as any for me to take a break.