The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century

Rob Ford on his call-in talk radio show, sporting his old ‘do,
before his new, close-cropped, you-can’t-test-this-for-drugs buzz cut.

Dave Price, the director of operations and logistics of Toronto’s raging embarrassment of a mayor, Rob Ford, used to call in to the mayor’s Sunday call-in talk radio show and claim to be Dave various parts of the city. Dave lives in Georgetown, although he’s called in as “Dave from Scarborough”, “Dave from Etobicoke”, and Dave from other regions of the city, always to heap praise on the mayor and his brother, Doug Ford, who lives under the delusion that he was elected to be co-mayor. Dave was he mayor’s high school football coach back when Rob was a student, and was Rob’s campaign manager in the 2010 election.

While this sort of thing is hardly voter suppression, embezzlement, or hey, a complete refusal to explain posing for a picture in which two guys are in jail, one was shot in apparent gang activity and the backdrop is a known crack den, but it still is a sign of the “rules are for other people” approach that His Worship is known for.

Oddly enough, this story was run by the Toronto Sun, the preferred misinformation source of Accordion City’s low-information voter crowd, and normally play the part of Animal Farm’s sheep to the Ford brothers’ Old Major and Napoleon.

In honour of these calls from Dave — well, at least Price was telling the truth about his name — here’s the Kids in the Hall’s classic routine, The Daves I Know:

I’ve been up to more accordion hijinks as of late. I still take it out whenever there’s socializing to be done, and it still results in lots of fun. Here’s a shot of me entertaining my friends Lady Miss “Lake Louise” Verna, Paige and Twyla with my rendition of Taylor Swift’s We are Never Ever Getting Back Together:

The observant regular reader will notice that this isn’t my usual accordion, but the Crucianelli, my serious stage performance axe. I thought it had been a while since it had seen some action and decided to take it out that night.

There is still one accordion that needs a little repair, after which I will take out on the town again. It’s the Lido, and it’s also known as the Chick Magnet for its incredible powers. It’s the accordion in this infamous photo:

A couple of weeks later, I made an appearance at Social Game Universe’s office, not far from King and Portland, where a party was being held to promote Scott Nihill’s upcoming graphic novel, Bleedback. where I got to mix an accordion performance with an opportunity to wear one of those horse head masks:

Click the photo to see it at full size.

The horse mask looks great in profile. Viewed head on, it looks a little alien and disturbing:

A couple of weeks after that party, I caught up with Nathon Gunn at the rooftop of The Pilot, where we ended up stumbling into a party full of energy sector execs and energy policy wonks. Nathon couldn’t resist trying on the accordion for size…

One of the people we met was Ted, who turned out not only to work in the energy industry, but also co-owned the bar (a man’s gotta have a hobby!). He pointed out that the Sattalites, a reggae band that were a big deal on local alt-rock radio back during my misspent youth in the ’80s, were taking the stage. We went a little closer to the stage, and after the band realized that I knew a good number of their tunes, they invited me to jam:

Nathon shot this video clip of me groovin’ along to the reggae beat. I’m from a tropical island, so this comes to me naturally:

A few days after the Pilot jam session was the first official Patio Friday of the year, which took place on the rooftop bar at Remy’s. There were more than a handful of people celebrating a birthday that night, and I made forty bucks and a few free drinks just by playing Happy Birthday several times in a row.

I even got to give a nice young lady some introductory accordion lessons:

Verna shot this Vine video of me playing for the table beside us:

So remember, folks:

It would appear that late night TV talk show host Jimmy Kimmel wants to beat Rebecca Black at her own game by putting out the all-dudes version of Friday: Sausage Party!

The phrase “sausage party” will always be near and dear to my heart, so I’m going to call this my personal favourite summer single. Perhaps you’ll like it too:

Patio Friday is an Accordion City institution, but Lee Dale, its spiritual leader, is out of the country all summer. I think he’s gone off to buy a cowboy hat:

In the meantime, Lady Miss “Lake Louise” Verna has taken the reins, and Patio Friday continues in Lee’s absence. It’s happening today, and it’s happening on the rooftop at Remy’s in Yorkville (115 Yorkville Avenue, about a block east of Avenue Road)! Drop by after work — we’ll all be there!

Steve’s attempt to be funny in front of his Facebook friends backfired completely:

Got some decent seats to Rush, with no rows in front of us, right by the aisle:

…and I didn’t have to kidnap Alex Lifeson, either:

I’ve talked about Caroline’s Kickstarter campaign before, and she’s so close to her goal that I think it’s worth mentioning again. She’s starting a blog called Taste Bluebook, and she needs a little funding to get it off the ground.

Is there anything Caroline hasn’t done? She went to Vanderbilt, where she did a double major with honours, joined the Peace Corps and volunteered in Niger and Madagascar, went into the publishing business in Austin and is now pursuing a JD-MBA in Denver. This sort of ambition means that she’s always figuring out how to match professional goals and personal life. “I’ll be damned if I can’t have my (homemade, of course) cake and eat it too”, she writes, and she’d like to help other professional women do the same.

Time to let Caroline do the talking:

I have long been a firm believer that you CAN have what you want, you can DO what you want, if you just make smart choices and are educated about the necessary skills. You can kill it at the office and throw a great dinner party. You can know how to fix that excel formula and know how to make jam. You can discuss hot-button legal issues and the basics of investing and this season’s fashion trends. You can pursue the path to partner and out-bake your (future) mother-in-law.

There are plenty of fashion blogs out there. There are plenty of finance blogs out there. There are plenty of DIY blogs out there. But the fashion blogs fail to provide much content that can be adopted by readers who work in conservative offices or favor sandals with their shorts instead of heels. The finance blogs can feel daunting and intimidating to dive into for those who just want to learn SOMETHING about investing. The DIY blogs are full of amazing projects, but those renting apartments can’t squeeze that cleverly converted palette garden on their patio, or take up knitting just to have that cute coffee cozy.

Taste Bluebook is the answer. It will offer a a little bit of everything for the young women who are interested in a little bit of everything. With posts ranging from style and cooking, to health and finance, Taste Bluebook will provide ideas and advice for tackling just about any project. The content will be as practical as it is entertaining.

Caroline is soooo close to her goal: she’s raised $820 out of $1000 (and yes, I chipped in), and as of this writing, there are 10 days left to go in her Kickstarter campaign. If you’d like to help Caroline create a useful resource for women who are “leaning in”, could you throw a little money — even five or ten bucks will help — her way?