The cat is repeatedly jumping from the kitchen table. It’s like that scene in the Matrix where the black cat repeatedly walks past, but no Keanu saying “Whoa. That’s weird.”

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

I wake as SharkBoy jumps from the bed and peeks out the blinds. There are people on the roof next to our building. SharkBoy can see people doing something to the billboard that fronts onto the street, on the roof next to ours.

At 3am, your mind races. We’ve repeatedly caught, chased and hid from various people who have gained easy access to this roof beside us. One night, kids use the roof to try to break into the apartment while SharkBoy was home. Another time, kids tried to use it for a video shoot around 2am. Many times we’ve yelled at kids who go there to drink. The year I moved into the building, someone was pistol-whipped in the back and kidnapped so you can understand that if there is anyone up on the roof, we cautiously decide whether or not to confront, call cops or ignore. If the city didn’t demand that two fire escapes be fully accessible at all times, I would have electrified and chained these access points long ago. Unfortunately, I can’t kill trespassers. The bible and the city say no.

THUNK!

They’re done. The four of them leave the roof. They’re carrying hockey sticks, poles and backpacks and my mind says, “Best not to confront them.” as they leave. They meet round the front of the apartment and hug and take pictures of their work. I begin to suspect their some sort of guerrilla artists group, fucking up some billboards for the mass G20 court date that is happening today.

This morning, Torontoist reports that this was a city wide “raid” on public advertising. Oh you OCAD kiddies! You hipster culture jammers! You fucking Queen Street Rejects. Hey here’s a thought, if you come around our house again, I’ll beat you senseless with a bat and then call the cops. And I’ll take pictures and I’ll call it art: “Bloody Art Student”

Ignore this post. Well read it anyway and get a sense that I was pretty lulled by the media that yes bad things happened, but they happened to the right people. After reading about how Blair lied about the 5 metre zone outside the fence (and apparently all over Toronto in some cops’ minds), I think both anarchists and police are douchebags.

You might have heard that there was a big summit in town with everyone getting angry and pissed off for some reason or another. If you were in Toronto this weekend you were either a cop trying to maintain the peace with extra super-cop powers added on, or you were an anarchist using Black Bloc tactics to get your message across, whatever that stupid message may be (well done boys and girls!) or you were like the majority of us, curious, on-looking, wondering how much our liberties were being eroded, worried the protesters are right but at the same time, thankful there are draconian dragoons whisking nere-do-wells behind the black wall of Kevlar amour, quickly subduing the rabble and carting them away.

Because this is the internet, and because I NEED TO EXPRESS MY OPINION, here’s my thoughts on the weekend:

I think the cops did an excellent job, right up to Sunday night. They might have been rough on some people, and they might have clubbed innocent journalists, but considering their job was to keep calm, follow orders and intimidate the wrong-doers, I think they did that exceptional job, judging by all I’ve read/seen on TV. I do say “up to Sunday night” where things turned bizarre. I’m referring to the corralling of a couple hundred people at the corner of Queen and Spadina, holding them tight for hours in the pouring rain and then releasing most of them without explanation. Police later said they suspected anarchists being amongst the crowd. From many sources who were inside the corral, including a Globe and Mail journalist, it seems 90% of the crowd were people just observing, innocent only for watching a small group of protesters doing their thing.

Reading various reports from journalists and regular people alike (and attempting to remove the hyperbole) I still get the sense that the police (or the people who instructed the riot cops) over-reacted. Extra, super new rights-stripping law in place or not, I got the sense that someone jumped the gun or fell asleep at the wheel in this particular police action. The intimidation got out of hand, which led to the cops waiting it out and releasing the crowd (after some purely Kafkaesque dialogue/actions).

After all is said and done, the best quote from the whole shebang comes from Christopher Bird and Christopher Drost, reporters for Torontoist.com who were on the ground during the Saturday Queen Street cop car buringin (emphasis mine):

In the exterior lobby of the Queen and John Starbucks, a group of protesters formed a human shield covering one of their own, who was apparently getting bandaged up after being struck in the head by cops (according to the group). The protesters got loud when an Italian reporter tried to take shots of the man, demanding their privacy. “You don’t have a legal right to privacy,” I pointed out, and the protesters rightly responded that “this isn’t about legal rights, it’s about being a human being.” And you know, that’s totally fair. What I should have said: “If you complain about being made the centre of attention when you’ve come out expressly to attract attention, you’re an idiot.”

In my opinion, the cops were utterly transparent in their handling of all things public. They may have tried some fearful intimidation on innocent people but they didn’t try to hide it – you got caught in their web, you paid the price. Inversely the anarchists hid behind masks and terrorist-like actions and cry about their freedoms. Irony all around, my friends.

Once a year someone in Toronto convinces various heritage buildings (and other interesting sites) to open their doors to the public (See? See the title? Yeah). Last year, SharkBoy and I nearly died of heat exhaustion while waiting 4 hours for a glimpse inside the Don Jail. This year, we decided to play it cool. If there was a wait more than 5 min, we moved on. Which worked well, especially when we saw that the CityTV building (Who wants to see a design-by-committee-boondoggle building?!?) had an hour long line and we decided to hoof it to the movies instead. Thankfully we chose correctly.

We did get to see the rooftop garden at City Hall and that was beautiful. I was mauled by bush people. Seriously – Bush People. We went up into the 14 floor deck of the Canada Life building and got some great shots. We also saw the inside of the Trinity Church, where the band The Cowboy Junkies recorded The Trinity Sessions. I do have to say that this year was a bit of a snoozefest. When we went into the MaRS building on College Street, we were treated like marketing/science lab rats. If we weren’t asked to fill out questionnaires on computers in the lobby, we were asked to leave stickers on questionnaire plaques all around the building, that had leading questions like “If we could read your genes to discover if you had a defect, and treat it, would you want your genes read?” Uh… DUH! One office we had access to on the 4th floor was the centre for observing prosperity world wide (or some such high concept). Big brain think tank stuff. We were lead around the beautiful Victorian Hospital – converted to office space – by the office manager herself who boasted to us “You know Roger XXX? From the University of Toronto?” Blank stares from us “He’s a big name in academia…” which resulted in us nodding politely. When the office manager asked if we wanted to leave our emails for updates on their upcoming projects, I stifled the comment “Maybe you can tell me exactly how Roger can afford all this?” This summed up my Open Doors vibe this year. Not much interesting.