Random Access

Hello darkness, my old friend/ I've come to talk with you again.

Sounds like a song that the Northern Leopard Frog might sing to him/herself while getting ready to bed down for the winter in the lovely muck of Rattray Marsh.
Except that the common frog, which is often simply referred to as the grass frog or meadow frog, isn't nearly as common around Rattray as it used to be.
Which has Bob Morris, the biologist at Credit Valley Conservation, a little concerned.
That's why he and the CVC folks, who just happen to include Chair Pat Mullin who represents Ward 2 where the marsh is located, have hired a consultant and are taking action to clean up the marsh. If they can get the support of the provincial Ministry of Natural Resources and the feds, they hope to carefully clean out a foot to a foot-and-a-half of the muck (or is it guck) to get down to the rich organic layer that will allow some of the fading plant life to be rehabilitated.
They also plan to clean up Sheridan Creek, which feeds the marsh, which will be half the battl, or more, in returning the marsh to sound health.
Consultant Glenn Harrington told a public meeting a couple of weeks ago that the chorus of nature's voices that should be present in a marsh the size of Rattray isn't nearly as loud as it should be. Most of the birds and amphibians are still there, "but not nearly in the numbers we would expect."
So the CVC held a press conference at the marsh last week to take the macro picture — the marsh is in trouble and needs our help — and make it micro — by telling citizens what they can do to help the Northern Leopard Frog.
To wit: don't use pesticides on your lawn, leave grass cuttings on your lawn to feed it rather than pumping it full of artificial fertilizers, avoid using rock salt on your driveway, and use an environmentally-friendly de-icing alternative instead. One of the suggestions was particularly apropos when you consider the glam neighbourhoods in the area — some of which were built on what was originally part of the marsh – don't drain your pool water into the street culverts which take it out to the Lake and the marsh.
"It may seem obvious," says the information brochure CVC has produced, "but frogs and chlorine don’t mix." Instead, let the pool water sit for three days so the chemical content is low enough it won't affect your lawn, then dump your water there. The natural filtration system will minimize the damage to the marsh and watercourses.
Here's someone to thank you for your assistance in person:
http://allaboutfrogs.org/files/sounds/nleapard.au
Believe that tune he's singing is It's (Still) Not Easy Being Green.

Wasn't it interesting that the subject of cycling came up so often in the Conversations for a 21st Century City guest presentations?
We spend our lives in cars in Mississauga, dreaming about what life would be like if we could ever get out of them.
Phil Green, Godfather of the cycling movement in Mississauga, helped initiate the ill-fated Cycling For Transportation Committee in 1990. Then he helped refit it when it became obvious that the City wasn't interested in commuter-cycling. In 1994, it became the broad-based Cycling Advisory Committee that still advises council on the subject.
Just back from Boulder, Colorado, which has a population about half of Mississauga's, Green is amazed at what a cycle-friendly municipality has been created there. The bike paths have separate underpasses under major roads; they are concrete rather than asphalt;, the routes and streets are clearly identified; and the pedestrian-activated lights are beside your bike, not 10 ft. away as in Mississauga.
Mississauga has made major improvements since the days when cycling wasn't even on the radar when roads were being planned but we still have a long way to go.
Commenting on a recent proposal to the cycling committee by Andrew Hamilton-Smith and his brother Matthew to promote a new cycling-pedestrian bridge across the Credit River at the hydro fields just north of the QEW, Green says there are better ways to spend money at this point.
The bridge is an idea that has been proposed numerous times before, as is the totally logical suggestion that bike lanes be added to the hydro fields that criss-cross Mississauga to form an east-west and a north-south spine.
"The money should go to build up the — for want of a better term —critical mass necessary to make a cycling network viable," says Green. "In Mississauga, we're putting our minds to it. In Boulder, they're putting their hearts in it. But it's important to note that we are making progress."
Mississauga Meadows resident Steve Largy used to sit on the cycling committee, until he ran for Ward 5 Councillor against Eve Adams a year ago. The air was let out of his tires when he reapplied to sit on the cycling group. Must have spoken out of turn.
"I can say what I want about being blackballed but it's just whining," says the former committee member.
A bridge across the Credit at the QEW would be nice, but other options fit the bill at a lot more reasonable cost, he suggests. Including the possibility of using the right-of-way at the end of The Queensway to create a path down into the valley, with a much shorter crossing of the Credit required over to Blythe Rd. (Does anybody remember the great fight in the 1970s when planners proposed adding another road crossing of the Credit at this same spot?)
This is a critical juncture in the City's evolution and making the bicycle part of the family-friendly municipality we're trying to build is crucial, says Largy.
"We've got to decide what Mississauga is going to look like in 20 years," he says. If we want the healthy city model we claim to, then creating a streetscape that encourages cycling is a given.
"We need to look at families who are interested in cycling and their first concern is safety," says Largy, who works in ward 5. As long as the car is king — and queen — sane parents won't take their children on paths on major roads.
The bike system is getting there but has some major gaps. "We have a beautiful trail system but none of it is hooked up.
"Everybody in Ontario needs to get healthier and the bottom line for that is getting out of our cars, not sitting there dumping crap into the atmosphere. But it takes political will."
Largy is just back from Montreal where he was amazed to see that all of the parking has been removed from DeMaisonneuve Blvd., a major route. An east-west commuter bikeway has been built to replace the parking, with concrete abutments protecting cyclists from vehicles.
"A lot of City staff believe in it (cycling), and know what has to be done, but in the end it's in the hands of the politicians," says Largy, who doesn't plan to run for office again. "The City's slogan is 'Leading Today For Tomorrow.' But it's not happening in Mississauga for cycling."

The headline in The Toronto Star today says, "Region opts to keep windfall from 'Toronto tax.'
Windfall? WINDFALL?
Wait just a minute here.
If Mike Harris tells us we, as Mississauga residents, should donate $40 million a year from our City property taxes and give it to Toronto to pay for a higher level of social services than we can afford in our own municipality, and then Dalton McGuinty has second thoughts and refunds our money, is that a windfall?
Absolutely not. It's our tax money, which people who were elected in the City of Toronto had no business spending in the first place.
It's a classic case of taxation without representation. If Toronto councillors spent the money frivolously, how would we know in the first place and what could we do about it in the second place?
Guess we could call all the friends we have in Toronto and ask them to vote against their incumbents.
The slow phasing-out of the pooling money paid by the four surrounding regions to Toronto is not found money — it rightfully belongs to Peel taxpayers.
Regional councillors decided to keep the money themselves yesterday and use it for human services spending, including providing some of the dental programs for the needy which we had been paying for in Toronto but weren't available here. The pooling rebate is reducing the tax hit from Peel this year by 1.3 per cent to 4.3 per cent.
• • •
Have heard stories for years about the herd of white-tailed deer that roam around the University of Toronto Mississauga campus (we're apparently not allowed to call it UTM anymore. That's gone the way of Erindale College.)
Students often see deer grazing near the Five-Minute Walk between the South and North buildings. They are usually greeted only by a doleful glance from the animals as acknowledgement of their presence.
Yesterday, I made up for lost time. On Principal's Rd, there was a furtive figure on the road as I passed in the car. Sure enough, creeping up the road and then parking, there were not one or two or three but at least seven or eight (It was hard to count because they kept moving around in the woods) deer. They were ensconced in the backyard of the artist's cottage, which was once the gardener's house for Lislehurst, the beautiful heritage property where the principal lives.
While some of the deer, several of which were obviously in their first or second years, browsed under the snow cover, some helped themselves to seed that had been knocked down from the bird feeder.
Fast-forward to today when Credit Valley Conservation (CVC) General Manager Rae Horst is talking about the fact that climate change has arrived in Peel in a big way. Witness the gypsy moth infestation and frequent incidence of opossum, among many other things.
"We're at a dangerous time," says Horst. "We know things are going to get worse."
One of the key ways to help species survive is to develop natural corridors that allow urban animals to move around, especially if hotter weather forces them to move north to survive.
The private lands south of Dundas St. where deer are common, UTM and Erindale Park and Riverwood and the Culham Trail lands are an example of the linked systems that create the corridors necessary. Hence the success of the white-tails there.
"We are protecting the odd pockets of woodlands here and there but we need have those connected to some kind of corridor system," says Horst, "or some of these species are not going to make it."
The CVC is counting on the public to help make it happen —especially to pitch in with the huge amounts of tree-planting that is going to be required to mitigate the effects of hotter climes. CVC plants about 70,000 trees a year with the assistance of the City of Mississauga and Evergreen, but some 500,000 are needed.
CVC decided to drop its education program in 2006 when the Province chopped its budgets. Fortunately, Peel Region picked up the ball and came through with $5 million to start a climate change campaign.
But the authority is reviving its public education programs now. Climate change is one issue where the public seems to be ahead of the politicians. Make no mistake about it: Money spent on climate change isn't window dressing — it's about survival of the Northern Leopard Frog and the Jefferson salamander and, ultimately, about another species at the top of the food chain which is sometimes a slow learner.

"Widely throughout eastern North America, the log house has come to symbolize a simpler life and, for many people, a counterpoint to the accelerating complexity of urban life at the start of the 21st century. The log cabin has an exceptional ability to draw one's mind back through time and give a sense of roots and time-depth. The Port Credit log house triggers memories simply by being visible, and that is enough: it is a function that carries beyond the four walls, freely available to all who pass within sight."
So wrote a group of citizens, including University of Toronto Mississauga Geography Professor and former heritage committee Chair Tom McIlwraith five years ago, when the abandoned, drafty and derelict Port Credit log cabin badly needed some friends. It looked at the time that the cabin — likely built sometime in the 1840s in Mono Township and moved to Mississauga to be used as a clubhouse by a group of practical Scout leaders in the late 1960s — might have made its last move.
But a coalition of citizens and City staff stepped up with a proposal to move the cabin from Port Credit to the Bradley Museum and, fortunately for everyone, the cabin will be serving a lot more functions than simply stirring memories by "being visible" in future.
Like so many other, portable log cabins before it, the structure will gain a new purpose from its move.
It took four years of fundraising, two years of construction, and some major-league scrounging for sponsors and materials but the Port Credit frog house has been turned into a prince, thanks to a public kiss from a community that proved it cared.
From families lining up to have their kids' pictures taken with Santa in the cabin, to rides in the forestry crew buckets for a buck apiece, to purchases of "chain saw art" forged from surplus wood, right up to the candlelight galas put on by Michael's Back Door, the public campaign to rehabilitate the cabin raised an impressive $150,000 for the move.
The stalwart members of the Friends of the Museum, including John Pegram and John Van Camp (in the Rob Beintema photo above with Museums Manager Annemarie Hagan) have guided the project throughout, investing their inspiration with plenty of perspiration.
Fram Building Group, one of a large group of sponsors, pieced together the reconstruction and sourced period floorboards and doors to give the cabin an authentic, cozy feel.
A new fireplace has been added which will be used for making maple candy at March break. Bradley volunteers can make pancakes indoors in the kitchen rather than in the freezing barn.
The exterior staircase to the second floor, the sprinkler system and the wheelchair-accessible first-floor washroom won't fool any history buffs, but they do satisfy the code requirements for what is now a municipal building.
The real heart of the building may be the second-floor loft, a beautiful bare space that invites a bunch of sleeping bags to be tossed around helter-skelter as a group of Cubs or Scouts prepare for a wilderness sleepover in deepest, darkest Clarkson.
Outside the loft, with its tiny perfect windows, will be heritage apple trees, a fire pit for cookouts, the Bradley Museum that opens the door to our collective past, and the surrounding oasis of woods that draw you back in time to when this was place was called Merigolds' Point.
Returning to the citizens' proposal of 2002, this is what the many signatories wrote: "A log building, by its structural nature, is portable, and may gain significance through demonstrating that by being movable, it survives.
"Societies live by their stories. The Port Credit log house tells a compelling story of many generations of use, rejection, adaptation and rejuvenation. This is a story of persistence and the continuing utility of a rudimentary, vernacular art form. It's about changing context and seeking opportunity and about the celebration of achievement."
And about how, unexpectedly and joyfully, a new chapter in the life of an old building can come to be written by a community that recognizes and honours its past.

When Fran Rider, now executive director of the Ontario Women's Hockey Association, decided she was interested in playing women's hockey, there wasn't much to choose from.
"It was 1967 and there was no place to play," she recalled today. "I saw an article in The Toronto Telegram about a tournament in Brampton and I went up there. I showed up and that's when I first met Mabel Boyd. She invited me to play on her team and that is how it started for me.
"There were players there who had never skated before but it didn't matter to Mabel. Anyone who had an interest in hockey had a place to play. She got me started and she did that for thousands and thousands of girls of all ages over the years. We owe it all to Mabel. She was one of the pioneers in women's hockey and she really opened up the opportunities for everyone."
Boyd died Monday at age 86. Her life is a reflection of the amazing challenges and amazing strides that women's hockey has made.
Boyd first fell in love with the thrill of patrolling up and down left wing while playing with boys her own age as a kid on Etobicoke Creek, when it could still freeze over.
She told former Mississauga News Sports Editor Mike Toth in his definitive book on the history of local sports, Birth to Millenium, Mississauga's Sports Heritage, that, "when we started, there was nobody to play against. We managed to put a team together and even found a sponsor (St. Lawrence Starch.) We played against teams from Brampton, Barrie, Mimico and Lakeshore."
When Mabel and her family moved to Tomken Rd. at Burnhamthorpe Rd. in 1956 to run their garden nursery business (C.E. Boyd and Sons) Mabel began playing baseball at the old St. Patrick's Church at the southwest corner of Dixie and Dundas.
Ever the organizer of a league she could play in, (nothing thrilled her more than playing) Boyd organized her first team of female baseball players in 1958. Pretty soon, the league was growing and Boyd was organizer, equipment manager, coach, publicity chair and just about everything else you care to name.
Then she turned to hockey, founding the Mississauga Girls' Hockey League in 1967 and mentoring it as it grew from 15 players to 200 teams in the 80s to the burgeoning enterprise it is today.
In the 1990s, Boyd was still invented leagues she could play in: the Women's Master Hockey League for those over 35. When she lined up against Mabel Walker in the Huntsville Honeys tournament, their combined ages totalled 144, not that the Mabels were counting. In her 70s she was on record as the oldest registered hockey player in Canada and she played until she was 74 or 75.
Her niece Michele Offer recalls that she and her sister could never miss a hockey game, because Aunt Mabel was always the one picking them up. "Heaven forbid that you couldn't lift your equipment bag because if you didn't have enough energy to do that, you didn't have enough energy to play," she laughs.
Boyd played hockey with her sister, daughters, and grand-daughters although she didn't get to play with any of her great-granddaughters.
Son Jim, who still lives not far from the Tomken homestead, remembers his mother playing ball with her children all night on the old farm where they lived on Browns Line. "At the end of the night, the dog's teeth would be bleeding because he played backfield behind us kids and a few balls got through us," he laughs.
His mother was as likely to be on the end of the wheelbarrow as her father. She was always physically strong. Boyd spent the last four years of her life at the Mississauga Life Care Centre across from Trillium Health Centre. "When she tied a knot in a bed sheet, the nurses couldn't untie it," says Jim. Her Alzheimer's disease kept her from accepting her induction into the Sports Hall of Fame in person.
When the family moved to Tomken Rd., the ice rink there would be flooded every night and kids would appear from all the streets around to play.
"If my mother ever ran for mayor of Mississauga, the only thing we would all be doing is playing baseball or hockey," jokes Jim. "Nobody would be fixing the roads."
Although she won lots of awards (Mississauga Sports Hall of Fame "builder", 1992 Most Outstanding Contribution to Community Sports, 25 Most Influential People in Mississauga Sports), Boyd is likely to be best remembered for the absolute joy she found in competition.
In Brian McFarlane's book Proud Past, Bright Future, One Hundred Years of Canadian Women's Hockey, Samantha Holmes recalled travelling as a 12-year-old, to the first-ever World Women's Hockey Championships played there.
"She is known as the grandmother of female hockey," says Holmes. "She had just arrived and she was happy to see someone from Mississauga. She asked me if I had my hockey equipment and, when I answered 'Yes,' she said. "I do too. Let's show the folks here in Ottawa how to play the game. Mabel is 68 and has been playing hockey for over 50 years. Also she started the Mississauga Hockey league, so if it wasn't for Mabel, I wouldn't be playing."
Countless others can say the same.
"She truly enjoyed watching other players and seeing them learn new skills," says Rider. "The game was always greater than a win or a loss. It was always about the joy of participation.
"She has left a huge, huge legacy," adds Rider, who followed in Boyd's pioneering footsteps. "She was a role model in women's hockey. And to show how far we've come, now our role models are Olympians."
The funeral service is 1:30 p.m. Friday at Skinner and Middlebrook in Port Credit.

There are a million cat stories (unfortunately) in the big city and this is only one.
More than a month ago, a letter carrier whose route is near Paisley Blvd. and Shepard Ave. in Cooksville became concerned about a group of cats that were always around one house, where someone was feeding them.
She told fellow postie Tina Kendall about the problem, because she knew Tin volunteers with The Mississauga Humane Society. That is one of several local no-kill animal welfare groups that struggle through with little money and incredibly dedicated volunteers to try to deal with the abandoned and feral cat population.
Kendall went out to the house, where every stray in the neighbourhood came for free food, and found a litter of five kittens.
One of the cats was easy to catch. She had a deformed back leg, which stuck out at an awkward angle, and her rear end was covered with infections from where she had been hobbling around.
Kendall easily netted the female kitten, who was named Hobbles by the veterinarians at the Dixie Animal Hospital, where she was taken for treatment.
Her splayed leg was caused by a birth defect. After the infections were cleared up, X-rays were taken.
That's when it was discovered that that someone had shot Hobbles with a BB gun. One of the pellets had lodged in her spine, reducing her already limited mobility.
Yesterday, Hobbles underwent surgery to amputate her deformed leg and remove her tail.
"Most animals can walk a little on three legs and she's doing very well so far," says Kendall. She will be allowed out of her cage a lot more now as she continues her recovery.
It's not known whether it will be possible to put Hobbles up for adoption, since she has problems with both bladder and bowel control. "She pees a little bit every time you pick her up," says Kendall. Most people don't want to deal with those problems. "She still has accidents a lot.
"But we are not going to put her down. We will do whatever we can for her. It's a matter of time now and waiting to see how she recovers and how she can manoeuvre herself around."
While the group is hoping someone will adopt Hobbles, the kitten may never recover to the point where that is feasible. There are probably a lot of vet bills in her future.
And speaking of vet bills, the Humane Society is also always seeking donations to pay for those. Although some vets give them special rates, the cost of spaying, neutering the strays, who often are sick, is enormous.
At its web site, www.mississaugahumanesociety.com/, the charitable group has more than 100 perfectly healthy cats for adoption.
As for the sick puppy who would find sport in taking target practice at a kitten who can't even run away, what can you say?
Well, probably what fellow Mississauga Humane Society volunteer Cathi Persaud says: "Anyone who would that that has deeper problems, where it starts with animal cruelty. They obviously need help."

You know how Mississauga City Hall has been trying for eons to get coverage for our fair city from those aloof media types in Toronto?
Seems the only time the downtown media would venture out our way was when there was murder and/or mayhem about.
Every once in a while over the years, Mayor Hazel McCallion would make the trip down to the newsrooms of To. to make a pitch for more coverage. A reporter would be duly dispatched for a couple of months.
Problem was, he usually couldn't sell a story to any of his editors unless it involved Hazel ranting at Mel or Hazel ripping the face off the latest provincial or federal minister who stepped out of line.
Things looked particularly bleak for Mississauga peddling its line in the mainstream media last year when The Toronto Star closed its west-end bureau, which long-time local reporters Frank Calleja, Bob Mitchell and Mike Funston used to ably man.
Suddenly, however, Mississauga is back on the media map in the big city.
Front-page stories appear in The Star on the political rewiring of Enersource, complete with urban affairs reporter Royson James attending to columnize the primitive territories.
The National Post seems to be regularly staffing council meetings. Yesterday there were two stories on its Toronto (let's not get too literal) pages from Mississauga City council.
What could possibly be behind all of this sudden interest in Mississauga?
How about Big Teeth, Big Hair, Big Wind from Ward 6?
Yes, it is definitely The Parrish Effect.
The Post and Ms. Parrish have had a hate pact going on for some time, after the paper ran a major hatchet piece a few years ago. She sued, they apologized and they have agreed not to make up anytime soon.
So The Post is probably hanging around to try to catch her in the act (again) of flapping her gums without putting her brain in gear.
You'll recall that it was a Post reporter (disguised as a judge for the City's Urban Design Awards and how did he qualify for that position anyway?) who reported La Parrish's off-hand bad-taste joke about the apparent immortality of our Wrinkled Leader, The Mayor Who Would Not Retire.
And, of course, that is the storyline — the Parrish- McCallion tug-of-war — that everyone is gearing up to cover.
With few exceptions, no one in the Toronto media knows, or cares, who sits on our council except for She Who Is In Power and She Who Is Impatiently Waiting For Power.
If The Toronto Sun ever shows up to cover Mississauga council (Where is John Schmied now that we need him?) we'll know for sure that we have a mayoralty race on our hands.
By the way, guess who is organizing the light and sound show for our July 1 celebrations at City Hall?
That's right: Carolyn Parrish — Our First Lady of the Fireworks.

Winter is needless to say, especially after this weekend, not my favourite time of year.
There are benefits, however. Like watching the Browns and the Bills slug it out in a good old-fashioned three yards and a cloud of snow dust-up.
Or enjoying the wildlife attracted by the various backyard bird feeders.
On Saturday, while waiting for predicted Armageddon/blizzard, we spent some time watching a grey squirrel foraging through our backyard stores of dry leaves (to add to the compost next spring and summer) to select just the right ones to stuff in his mouth and take home for nest repairs.
We are, obviously the home supplier of choice for squirrels.
Last year, instead of putting the leaves in a plastic bag because of a temporary shortage of those, the leaves were put out in those paper bags that you can take to the curbside for yard waste collection.
Instead of taking the leaves so kindly provided, the squirrels ripped off the paper liner, stuffed it in their mouthes and scurried off to use that to line their nests. You could see some of it flapping in the breeze in the nearby pine where they were nesting.
We were left with a lovely brown frozen leaf sculpture on our patio as a result — a pile of leaves apparently defying gravity.
If you want to feed the birds in our neighbourhood, you must first feed the squirrels. If a supply of black-oil sunflower seeds is not left on the ground, then you are likely to come home to find your feeders on the ground — the victim of a flying kamikaze squirrel squadron.
When the snow arrives in drifts as it did this weekend, the bird population swells. This weekend we had four male cardinals at the same time (a record), juncos, goldfinch (just the niger seed, please) chickadees (suet preferred), a red-breasted nuthatch, blue jays and the usual assortment of finches, sparrows, starlings and mourning doves.
But late Saturday night, when the birds were finished and we were watching a DVD of Guys and Dolls and marvelling once again at Frank Loesser's marvellous score, I noticed a shape moving around in the shadows under the overhang where the squirrel feed is scattered. Figured it was just a skunk, as they are regular visitors.
Was surprised and delighted, when the outside light was turned on, to see an opossum revealed.
Or rather the hind end of what we assumed to be an opossum by his shape and pink, ratty tail.
Eventually, he did turn around and confirm the diagnosis, ignoring the ohs and ahs as he foraged for sunflower seeds in the snow. Went out to augment the supply by tossing some fresh seed his way, but he took umbrage at the intervention and half-waddled, half-trundled off behind the shed.
In the past few years, possums have been moving north with the climate change. Have seen some while driving, but this was our first encounter of the bakyard kind.
Yet another good reason to keep the bird feeders full: You never know when Pogo might drop by for dessert.

Mississauga's best-kept retail secret - the I'm for REAL (Revolutionizing Environmental Awareness and Lifestyles) store - isn't going to be a secret anymore.
And that is a very good thing.
When Shelley-Ann and Michael Solomon started the business on Earth Day 2006, they knew they had their work cut out for them. Located to the rear of the row of shops on the west side of Queen St. in Streetsville, the problem was that no one ever found the mecca for "green" shoppers, even though it featured an amazing array of products, from clothes to personal care products, to art, to fair-trade chocolate.
The Streetsville locale closed in August but I'm for REAL has lived up to its name by resurfacing in a perfect spot — in the retail row of stores inside the emergency entrance of Credit Valley Hospital, in what used to be the building's main lobby.
"In the other location, we were bringing every person in the door," says Shelley-Ann, a big smile on her face as she and her sister held the official opening of the new location Friday. "We literally had to create that person ourselves."
In its new home, there are 3,000 staff who already have a keen interest in health, and a ton of visitors who are thinking more about their health because they are patients or they are visiting patients.
For the first time ever, I'm for REAL truly has walk-in trade.
Despite the tiny size of the space (308 sq. ft.), the Solomons still manage to carry an enormous range of products and, through the wonder of the Internet, many more are available for the asking.
The store abounds in bamboo and hemp products and a big seller for Christmas is a series of wood puzzles, in the shape of Canadian animals made of rubberwood, which many new Canadians love to send out of the country to relatives.
This is one shop where you'll never have to worry about toys with lead paint, or clothes treated with chemicals or products that made from sweatshop labour.
Since Shelley-Ann, who just happens to have a master's degree in behavioural medicine, is a natural born educator, it makes sense to have a little library too. Cook books (Foods That Fight Cancer) books for expectant parents (The Complete Organic Pregnancy) and new parents (The Womanly Act of Breastfeeding) will catch the eye of lots of browsers, especially those looking for presents for patients.
"The response so far has been wonderful," says Shelley-Ann. "A lot of people who are in the hospital are going through major health issues and are really thinking about what they can do differently for themselves and their bodies."
If you can't be bothered with learning all the details of the problems of plastics filled with bisphenol A or the issues surrounding the toxic chemicals used to produce most cotton, you can let I'm for REAL do the research for you and be assured you are getting an environmental responsible product.
Dropping by with her mother to do some shopping Friday was Stephanie Crocker, Peel Environmental Alliance Youth Alliance coordinator at Ecosource.
Carrying a puzzle in the shape of a beaver, Crocker says, " I love that this is an ecological toy," she says. "I see people wheeling big buggies away from Wal-Mart with carts full of really unhealthy things for kids.
"I'm for REAL is making the connection between health and the commercial products we choose to put in our homes and in our bodies," says Crocker, pointing out that the Solomons also have gifts that simply can't be purchased anywhere else.
Grassroots on Bloor St. in Toronto carries many similar products, "but it's a long way to go and a lot of the things I'm for REAL has are unique," says Crocker. "I love supporting this store."

Nothing seemed to faze Don Chevrier, who was always the perfect foil for whatever colour commentator he happened to be with working with — Howard Cosell, Tony Kubek, Don Duguid, Doug Maxwell or whoever else happened to be in the booth with the cool, calm and collected play-by-play man.
Chevrier, who died unexpectedly Monday at age 69, lived in Mississauga for many years while working for CBC and broadcasting the Blue Jays games.
He was the consummate professional and seemed unflappable. As Mississaugan Chris Zelkovich, former news editor of The Mississauga Times, reports today in The Toronto Star, Chevrier was once faced with interviewing legendary Chicago Cubs owner/pitchman Bill Veeck on-air with all of 30 seconds' warning.
Chevrier, who never used written notes and seemed to have a library for a memory, brought the interview off with aplomb. Veeck told producer Ralph Mellanby after the experience that he was impressed with Chevrier's baseball smarts.
Former Mississauga News Sports Editor Mike Toth recalls another instance when "Chevy" proved to be a major league pinch-hitter.
The broadcaster frequently co-hosted the annual Mississauga Sports Dinner in the late 70s and early 80s.
One year, another eminent Mississauga broadcaster, Dave Hodge, was lined up to make his debut at the dinner, co-hosting with soccer's Graham Leggatt.
At the last second, Hodge came down with laryngitis and a panicky Toth had to find a substitute. He thought immediately of Chevrier and he phoned his Mississauga home only to find that he was in the midst of flying home from a Florida vacation.
"I went to the airport and he was a little surprised to see me," says Toth, "I asked if he could emcee the dinner. 'Of course,' Don said. 'When is it?'"
"About two hours from now," a relieved Toth said.
"I'll be there," replied Chevrier. He went home, got into his tux and made another run back to Malton, where the dinner was being held that year at the Airport Hilton.
"Everything went off without a hitch, thanks to Chevrier," says Toth. "He played straight man to Graham and they were an excellent combination."
Chevrier always had the host's ultimate gift of making sure the spotlight shone on the guy who was supposed to be the star.
As well as co-hosting several Sports dinners with Leggatt, Chevrier also found time for many years, to appear on the telethon supporting The Mississauga News Christmas Bureau Fund, as it was then called.
Condolences go out to the Chevrier clan, many of whom have Mississauga connections. Son Mal formerly worked in retail sales at The News and still lives in Port Credit. Tim was a staff photographer at The News and worked for years at Credit Valley Hospital. Jeff freelanced for the paper for some time and has a very successful digital photo business in town.
Don's ex-wife Donna is a former business etiquette and image columnist for the paper and has expressed her thoughts eloquently over the years in numerous letters to the editor.
Funeral arrangements have not been finalized.
• • •
There was a big turnout Friday to say goodbye to the grandmother of hockey in Mississauga, Mabel Boyd. The funeral service ended with a powerful, spontaneous rendition of Stompin' Tom's (or Skatin' Tom in this instance) Good Old Hockey Game.
It's been a rough week for Mississauga's sports fraternity.

One of the recommended gifts for music fans this year on those annual gift guides published everywhere is a book called The Top 100 Canadian Albums, written by CBC arts reporter Bob Mersereau.
It's a survey of 600 music writers, artists and other "experts" who listed their top albums. Mersereau then produced his list by giving points to each record marked in a certain position: i.e. 10 points for top pick, seven for second, etc.
The problem with this is self-evident by the winning album, Neil Young's Harvest. While this is a good album, it's nowhere near his best work in my humble opinion and is a mixed bag of themes and quality, compared with some of his much better work.
It says here that Everybody Knows This is Nowhere (#16) of eight Young albums on Mersereau's (most of any artist) on the count is far superior. Would rank several other Young albums ahead of Harvest as well, such as Tonight's The Night, Comes a Time, Zuma and Live at Massey Hall, which just came out this year and was not included in the survey.
As part of the buzz about the book, Mersereau has started a web site which allows people to post their own top 10 albums, which is fascinating.
If you're curious, check the page at: www.gooselane.com/100_albums/?page_id=9.
Over the past few weeks I've been leafing through my old vinyl, mulling over what my list would look like.
First of all, let me make it clear that I am talking about mainline pop, rock, folk and combinations thereof. Always seems kind of cheesy to me to include a token jazz album, like Oscar Peterson's Night Train, which is on Mersereau's list, or a Glenn Gould album, which is also there. Same thing with Rolling Stone Magazine's Top 100 list which I got for Xmas last year. Kind of Blue by Miles or A Love Supreme by Coltrane don't belong on the same list with The Stones or The Beatles.
Anyway, here is my personal top 10 which is based on no survey and no expertise, but is based on a lifetime of listening. As you'll see and, as with most people, my lists run strongly to the music of my youth.
Going to reverse the order, so the suspense builds.

10. Comes A Time, Neil Young (1978) — Neil's voice always sounds best when contrasted with a willowy female partner, in this case Nicolette Larson. Best version of our unofficial national anthem, Four Strong Winds, outside of Ian and Sylvia's.

9. Go Cat Go, Amos Garrett (1980)— the Midnight at the Oasis man is so versatile and so accomplished on guitar, he masters all genres, as he demonstrates here.

8. Gordon Lightfoot (1966) — so many wonderful songs including the ones that started it all, Here's What You Get for Lovin' Me and Early Morning Rain.

7. All This Paradise, Fraser and Debolt with Ian Guenther (1971) — Guenther's violin weaves its way in, out, over and about the delicious melodies. Constant changes of pace abound with the alternately calm, and then delirious, warbling of Alan Fraser and Daisy Debolt.

6. Elyse, Elyse Weinberg and the Band of Thieves (1969) — Another album of discombobulated rhythms and a different voice you learn to just love. Great cover of Bert Jansch's Deed I Do. "Sweet Poundin' Rhythm" indeed.

5. Jesse Winchester, Jesse Winchester (1970) — Draft dodger Jesse picks up some guys named The Band to jam with and pulls off a superb debut. Robbie Robertson's guitar at its best. Best cut: Payday. Also some Mississauga content here as Al Cherney of Erindale Woodlands played some violin.

4. Blue, Joni Mitchell (1971) — This belongs on the top five list of all artists from all countries. An album of pain and beauty. We could all drink a case of this and still be on our feet.

3. Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, Neil Young (1969) — Everybody knows this is as good as it gets. Try to listen to Bobby Notkoff's violin on Runnin' Dry without getting goose bumps.

2. The Band, The Band (1969) — We showed the Yanks (with a little help from Levon Helm, Ronnie Hawkins' buddy from Arkansas) what Americana should really sound like. A home-made sound with superb singing and playing by Bob Dylan's house band. The Hawks come home to roost.

1. Great Speckled Bird, Ian and Sylvia (1973) — It really doesn't matter if this was the start of country-rock or the Byrds' Sweetheart of the Rodeo was. This is music beyond category with some of Tyson's most raucous and most poignant singing. Some country, some rock, some folk. Amos Garrett on guitar and Buddy Cage on steel are superb. Still sounds just as fresh today.

It isn't really fair that anyone should have the prodigious talent, combined with the incredible work ethic, that made Oscar Peterson the toast of the jazz world from his pre-arranged "discovery" at a Jazz at The Philharmonic concert at Carnegie Hall in 1949 until his death in Mississauga Monday.
The range of his reach and his talent is absolutely astounding. Any jazz fan can look through his/her collection and nearly trace the evolution of the modern genre through Peterson's remarkable career.
He will be recalled as many things, including the unequalled technician he was at the beginning of his career, who so amazed and confounded his peers. The dexterity and speed of the waves of notes piling up on the beaches of sound he laid down were as shocking to the rest of the world, as was Oscar's own discovery that the Art Tatum record of Tiger Rag that his father Daniel played for him when he was just a boy was not two pianists but just one — and a blind one at that.
His association with jazz Everyman Norman Granz, who discovered OP at the Alberta Lounge in Montréal, introduced him to the world at Carnegie and then made his trio the house band for the iconic Verve label in the 50s, when so much of the legacy of jazz was created, was central to his legacy.
And Granz was just as central to Oscar meeting and marrying his wonderful wife Kelly who is as well known to anyone who knows the family in Mississauga, as her husband was around the world.
The Peterson Trio is the backdrop for so many superb records that built the foundations of the house of jazz, starting with the inspired collaborations with Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald. Those albums arguably feature the two best male and female singers of all time, clearly the best trumpeter in the world and probably the best jazz pianist who ever lived.
The good doctor of the keyboards played with everyone and, when I interviewed him in 2003 for the publication of his autobiography, A Jazz Odyssey The Life of Oscar Peterson, he could drop a funny and revealing anecdote about each and every one, from Duke Ellington to Fred Astaire to Frank Sinatra, at whose cocktail party his trio once played a demand engagement.
In all of the hubbub about his inspired playing in the world-wide tributes now pouring in, there is too-scant recognition of Peterson's consummate skills in the refined art of accompaniment, especially to vocalists.
He made albums with virtually every singer that mattered and a few that didn't, at least until they were paired with Oscar. He had the ability to make each and every one of them sound their best, which is the highest praise an accompanist can receive.
In the liner notes to the reissue of 1963's Bill Henderson with the Oscar Peterson Trio, Henderson says, "You see, Oscar is a singer himself, and he knows. He's like a full orchestra. Whenever he plays, he plays all of the piano. You can hear all the changes and he makes it a simple thing for you to just lay back and sing. He's listening to you all the time and while he's listening, he's playing all the right things for you. There were a couple of times when I thought he was in my hip pocket."
As Richard Palmer noted in the liner notes to the Jazz Odyssey CD, Peterson's skill in the role generally comes as a surprise. "No one could have expected a raw young Canadian whose imperious technique and persona seemed to rival Art Tatum's to be even an adequate accompanist... but Peterson proved to be a highly sensitive listener and steeped in the work of those he now backed. Most important of all, he had an almost unerring instinct for what a particular musician required."
It is this extraordinary radar that makes so many of his albums with the trio and guests, be it Sonny Stitt or Clark Terry or Stuff Smith or Roy Eldridge or Coleman Hawkins or Ben Webster or Dizzy Gillespie with Stan Getz, absolute treasures.
The couple of times I interviewed Peterson at his home, I expressed my admiration for his singing. He would demur and repeat the anecdote about how he and Nat King Cole, who was probably the prime influence on his piano style, along with Tatum, had made a joking pact a long time ago in a New York bar. "He said 'I won't play the piano," recalled Oscar, " if you won't sing.'"
Fact is, he sang very well but, unfortunately, sounded a little too much like Cole for comfort.
The obvious question for a reporter from the local community newspaper to ask Peterson was why he chose to live in Mississauga in 1972. (When, to our everlasting shame, racism raised its ugly head when a group of residents in Sherwood Forrest took up a petition opposing his plans to move to their neighbourhood.)
His answer: "I love it here. It’s so nice to come back to a place I love. Mississauga has a feeling for me. I want to live in a home. I was raised in a home. Mississauga is a city in its own right. If I’ve in any way helped to put Mississauga on the map, I’m happy."
Then he would launch into a tribute to his great friend Hazel, who shared his view on Mississauga as centre-of-the-universe.
In his later years, Peterson was seen much more often in public in Mississauga and he was inevitably gracious, charming and thankful for the honours which a more resentful man might have suggested were long overdue.
I had the privilege to see him perform several times in the past few years, at the Hazel's Hope concert at Roy Thomson Hall, at the superb Ron Duquette and Bill King-produced Living Arts Centre tribute in Sept. 2003 and at the school named in his honour.
But the performance that remains most clearly in memory is the unplanned one at HMV in downtown Toronto for his 80th birthday in the summer of 2005. The official ceremonies were over when Oscar rose from his wheelchair and willed his way to the piano bench to give an impromptu performance of his own composition called Requiem.
He introduced it by speaking of how it had come out of the sense of loss he felt for those the jazz world has lost lately, including bassists Ray Brown, Niels-Henning Orsted Pedersen, guitarists Barney Kessel and Joe Pass, tenor man Al Cohn and “the impressario of the century” as he called him, Norman Granz.
He played beautifully, as Diana Krall (above) and Elvis Costello watched in rapt attention from the other side of the piano.
This was the brilliant work of the mature artist whose physical skills may have deteriorated but who could transmit the profound depth of his pain with a few deceptively simple strokes.
We feel his loss so keenly because he was one of the original architects of the music. He was there at its inception: Canada's quietly brilliant ambassador of swing.
Our one remaining touchstone to the golden age of age of jazz is gone.

In the setting-the-record-straight category: the beautiful wood carving on the front door of Oscar Peterson's home in west Erindale depicts the great pianist, composer and singer Fats Waller.
The references to the door usually describe the figure inscribed as Oscar's favourite pianist, Art Tatum. That includes an entry in Ross Porter's book last year on the 100 greatest jazz records.
Yesterday's Globe and Mail incorrectly said the carving was Oscar himself. If you look carefully at the photo in the paper, however, you can clearly see the distinctive bowler hat and the big smile that is Fats personified.
When I spoke with the pianist at his home just after his autobiography was published in 2002, he explained that the door was a surprise gift. The Petersons ordered the new door and the craftsman, a big jazz fan, added the drawing as a special feature on his own and presented it to the delighted couple. It has been a fixture ever since.
• • •
In my top 10 Canadian albums entry, I intended to include a few honourable mentions, but got too long-winded, as per usual.

So here we go again, this time not in any particular order:

For The Roses (1990) - Joni Mitchell

Hard Rock Town- Murray McLauchlan (hardest name to spell in show biz.)

Tryin' To Start Out Clean- Willie P. Bennett

Kate and Anna McGarrigle

High Wind, White Sky - Bruce Cockburn

Nothin' Can Stop Me Now - Doug Mallory

Third Down and 110 Yards To Go (1972) - Jesse Winchester (how come an American ex-pat comes up with the best name ever for a Canadian album?)

Calling For Rain (2006)- Lori Cullen (Mississauga's own Juno nominee.)

Tonight's The Night- Neil Young

Canadian Sunset (1973) - Stringband

Music From Big Pink - The Band

Trinity Sessions- Cowboy Junkies

Sunday Concert - Gordon Lightfoot

Bedtime Story (1974) - Dr. Music

Jack Himself (1972) - Jack Shechtman

Cowboyography (1987) Ian Tyson

Nashville - Ian and Sylvia

Full Circle- Ian and Sylvia

Is somebody stuck in the 70s or what?