The announcement of a plan by Quebec to make the unvaccinated pay for stresses upon the provincial health system led to more than 7,000 people signing up for their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. François Legault’s latest threat built upon a boost in bookings after vaccine passports became mandatory in alcohol and cannabis stores.
Politics beyond the Pizza Hut
The attempt at an Ontario Liberal comeback by picking apart each pandemic thing implemented by Doug Ford evidently includes claiming that clearer public reporting on hospitalizations is a government cover-up. Meanwhile, an independent effort to get Toronto parents to share antigen test results has ended due to low participation.
Toronto Eaton Centre is getting a $77 million makeover from Cadillac Fairview. Days after the death of its architect, Eb Zeidler, the landlord revealed renovations that include a $60-million replacement of the galleria skylight roof. The process includes sending Michael Snow’s Flight Stop geese for maintenance before their reinstallation.
Speaking of strange sports
What looked like rapper Kodak Black in flagrante delicto from a distance at a Canucks vs. Panthers hockey game in Miami turned out to be some sort of co-ed twerking exhibition. The same night in Toronto, a complaint by Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker about the distracting Raptors mascot brought surreal life to an empty arena:
Ian Greenberg dead at 79. What he co-founded in 1961 in Montreal with his three brothers as a photo finishing service in Miracle Mart stores led to Astral film labs and production that had a big payday with Porky’s. A media division started with Canadian pay TV, followed by more television and radio bought by BCE.
Finally, when Logan Roy calls…
Succession has been repeatedly invoked as art imitated in life by the family drama at Rogers Communications. So there was something inevitable about Brian Cox, who plays the crotchety patriarch on the HBO show, being paid $875 to make a Cameo clip on the topic. Rogers confirmed it was “a practical joke“ delivered to Edward Rogers:
