blogcutter

If the initial stages of lockdown felt like a state of limbo, there's yet another state of limbo occurring six months later.

Six months ago, schools were closing down. Now they're re-opening - sort of. While they only closed for a short time in west Quebec (at least at the elementary level) and have now re-opened for the 2020-21 school year, it looks like school re-opening in Ontario is one colossal mess. I'm so glad not to have to contend with it all!

If we're lucky, the decent weather will persist here through September, October, and maybe even into the first part of November. They've already decided to extent Sunday bike-days at least to the end of September and possibly beyond. I'm hoping for a longish patio season too. It's still anyone's guess what Thanksgiving and Halloween will look like.

Today we went to Parkdale Market and afterwards enjoyed cappuccinos on the patio of Jamal Espresso House on Hamilton Avenue. Rumour has it they may be gone by winter; they had a "for rent" sign in their window, but that may only referring to a portion of their business (there's also a restaurant, yoga studio and tattoo parlour in that block of buildings.

Tomorrow, I'm hoping to brave the LRT again. I'm sort of curious to see if my PRESTO card still works; I haven't used it since March.

Hi, Folks and Folkies! The topic of today's blogcutter café is... coffee! When I was at Carleton University in the early seventies, the on-campus coffee house was called "Arthur's Place" after its genial host, Arthur McGregor (of Ottawa Folklore Centre fame). Later, it moved up to the fourth floor and was renamed "Roosters". On weekends, there was coffee-house type entertainment including such people as Ian Tamblyn and Cedric Smith. By that time, it was licenced to sell beer and wine and a few light snacks. For the longest time, it was the last bastion of the ten-cent cup of coffee.

Fast forward some forty years, and I'm visiting the campus on a weekly basis to take a "Learning in Retirement" course: Phil Jenkins' "A History of Ottawa Culture". Even though coffee house culture is a thing of the past, I thought for sure there must be plenty of places to get a decent (or even mediocre) cup of coffee on campus. But no. There are still all kinds of vending machines serving cold beverages, but nary a coffee machine in sight. Don't students drink coffee any more? Or has Tim Horton's used its considerable muscle to oust absolutely ANY other coffee vendor (be it human, mechanical or electronic) from the campus?

In desperation, I queued up for "Timmy's", though I really don't like their coffee. I find it insipid, there's no real choice of blend, and you can't accessorize it to your own taste. Unlike other chains which are coffee-places that also happen to sell snacks, Timmy's is basically a doughnut shop that happens to serve weak coffee. As for any specialty coffees like espresso, cappuccino and so on, forget it! Yes, they have beverages they CALL those aforesaid names, but I don't consider them worthy of the name.

This column is also something of a requiem for coffee house culture. When the drinking age in Ontario was lowered from 21 to 18 (it was later raised back up to 19), that was the final nail in the coffin of coffee house culture. Ottawa's Le Hibou closed shortly thereafter, although it was somewhat kept alive on the airwaves through CJOH's show "Café Hibou". Then we had Rasputin's, which burned down although a few brave folk are trying to keep it alive through "Spirit of Rasputin's" concerts and small-stage open-mike presentations at the Ottawa Folk Festival.

When I was a teenager, there were Friday-evening drop-in "coffee houses" at our local church. Those of you who like me are of a certain age will know the atmosphere that is required for these things: red-and-white checked tablecloths, each sporting as centrepiece and sole light source an empty Chianti bottle (in signature raffia wrapping) with a candle in it and multicoloured candlewax drippings on the part of the bottle that the raffia doesn't cover.

As they say, nostalgia ain't what it used to be.