So, I took a little walk after work today, not as long a walk as I'd intended, because it was sort of cold and I didn't really feel like walking all that much, but two things struck me as I walked along. I was heading west on Bloor and first came to a group of protesters wearing loud yellow (orange?) pickets, doing their protesting thing outside the Quality Hotel on Bloor St. As I neared them, I was able, first, to hear what the woman was yelling through her megaphone, and then to read their pickets. It seems this dozen-person group was made up of the cleaning staff of the Quality Hotel. It turns out, the hotel is planning to, if not already doing so, pay these workers per room, rather than by the hour. How vile is that? Come on, by the room? Where are we, Mexico? What, I ask, would happen to the poor souls stuck cleaning the room of some hideous slob, a job that might take twice as long as a typical room, rather than the ones cleaning the room that was barely touched? I mean, let's just penalise hard work a little more, why don't we. I thought, as I walked past them, "What a crappy world this is."

A few blocks further west, nearing Spadina, I began to make out the strains of music, but it was directionless, bouncing off the walls of the surrounding buildings and being muffled by the car engins idling at the lights. When I reached the corner, I found the source, a young man, maybe his mid-twenties, dressed like any old joe on the street. He looked like he probably played highschool football before turning to a much more respectable (this is not sarcasm) career in busking. He was playing an electric guitar, and he didn't suck, either. What got me, though, and a whole lot of passers-by, was that he was playing hard rock riffs - at any moment, I expected him to break into some Iron Maiden, or something. Then he took off on a crazy solo (if you can cut into a solo when you're the only one playing) and I thought, "Satriani. He wants to be Spadina's Satriani." I smiled broadly, and went into the drug store thinking that maybe it wasn't so bad a world afterall.