Times Square Ball Drop

 

Location: New York City, New York, USA
Address:  1 Times Square
Date:  December 2008
Website:  www.timessquarenyc.org

  Happy New Year!  One Times Square was home to the New York Times newspaper. In 1907 was the first time they dropped a ball on the roof to celebrate New Year's Eve. Don't get confused. The ball drops in the year before. This means the 1907 ball dropped and then at midnight, 1908 was here.

   The ball would slowly slide down a pole during the last minute of the year and then the numbers of the new year would light up. The ball has been upgraded through the years and was even made to look like an apple during the I Love New York campaign of the 1980s.

    As midnight approaches crowds would gather in Times Square and look up to the ball. Together they would ring in the new year, full of hope and promise.

     When the year 2000 approached there was a special Millennium ball built with the latest technology. It dropped for seven years. The ball above is the Centennial Ball. The Centennial Ball was built by Waterford Crystal and had updated LED lighting for more colour options.

     The Centennial Ball was only dropped in 2007 to celebrate 100 years since the very first drop. We were lucky to see it on display in the Times Square Visitor Centre. It only dropped once as a bigger, better, permanent ball was made for 2008. This new ball was made so that it could stay outside all year long.

 

  Since 2008 it has hung around waiting for its annual moment to shine. This photo of the ball was taken in 2010 from the observation deck at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

  This is the ball still hanging around at night in 2013.

    This is a pretty good close-up of the ball in 2018.

    In 2021 this picture was taken on American Thanksgiving. From this angle it is hard to tell if the ball is there. For the 2025 ball drop, another new ball will be dropped with yet another new upgrade for even more lighting possibilities.  

        The Times Square 42nd Street subway beneath the ball drop also celebrates the New Year. In one of the many tunnels and passageways you can find glazed ceramic art by Toby Buonagurio.

    Also in the Times Square 42nd Street station is a work of art called Revelers.

You will always have a ball in New York City. That is never more true than when you are standing in Times Square on New Years Eve.

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Map of Our World
Times Square Ball

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Post # 354

The Flying Foxes Of Sydney

Location: Sydney, Australia
Address:  Royal Botanic Garden, Mrs Macquaries Road
Date: May 2012
Website:  www.botanicgardens.org.au

   The Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney is home to a large variety of plants. This in turn attracts a large variety of birds to live and eat in the gardens. There is also one type of mammal that finds the gardens very inviting. At one point there were up to 30,000 flying foxes who made their home here.

  We first chose to explore the gardens by riding the miniature train called the Choo Choo Express. If we were going to travel under thousands of bats then we wanted a roof over our heads.

  Sure enough we could see little black creatures hanging upside down in the trees. In the bat world, the Grey-Headed Flying Fox is the largest bat in all of Australia and has a wingspan of about one metre.

  After our Choo-Choo ride we did venture over to get a closer look at the colony. When you see them hanging upside down in a tree you might see the thick black wings and a big tuft of orange fur. The big tuft is the fur around their necks. They get their name from the grey hairs on their heads.

  To see all the flying foxes take off and go foraging at night would be quite a sight. We were not lucky enough to have witnessed this. 

  Flying foxes are also known as fruit bats. They only eat fruit and therefore do not need echolocation.  Other bats that use echolocation are trying to capture insects mid air. Fruit is a little less agile.

Other bats may have giant ears relative to their heads. The flying fox looks more like a dog or, you guessed it, a fox. The flying fox is the best looking bat. Some bats look like they are just giant ears and teeth.

 For comparison, this angry little fellow is a little brown bat from North America. He seems rather unhappy to be held.

     Since the large colony arrived in the Royal Botanic Garden they have killed more than 30 large mature trees and damaged hundreds more. The flying fox colonies were moved in June 2012. We visited in May 2012 just before the relocation was to start. 

  Loud music was played to disturb the bats from sleeping. Maybe a local Sydney rock band like AC/DC would have been too much for the bats to tolerate?

  The plan worked and the bats moved to a new location away from the disturbance. You can now find a large colony in Sydney's Centennial Park. If you visit the Royal Botanic Garden take a look up at the trees and you may still see a few flying foxes.

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Map of Our World
Royal Botanic Garden Sydney

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Post # 353

What We Do In The Shadows

Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Address: 65 Heward Avenue
Date: March 2025

  What We Do In The Shadows is a TV show that follows four vampires living together in a mansion on Staten Island, New York. They are Nandor The Relentless, Nadja, Laszlo and Colin Robinson. They also share the house with Nandor's human servant Gizmo, sorry Guillermo, and a doll with the spirit of deceased human Nadja inhabiting it. Through the six season run of the show, the mansion exterior has been played by three different locations.

  A house in South Pasadena, California was used in the pilot episode and for various establishing shots in the seasons that followed. After the pilot episode, production moved to Toronto, Ontario. The Cranfield House (photo at top of post) is featured in a few episodes. In Season One Episode Three, the vampires feud with werewolves in Laszlo's topiary garden. In Season One Episode Ten, Gregor loses his head, yet again, in a motorcycle accident on the lawn.

   Cranfield House soon became no longer available for use as a filming location. In Season Two, the show set up a facade of the mansion on Eastern Avenue near the studios. For a few years the mansion stood in the parking lot (above) at the corner of Eastern Ave. and Heward Ave.

   In Season Two Episode Six, Mark Hamill appeared on the show as Jim the Vampire. He confronts Laszlo. Laszlo runs away and goes into hiding as regular human bartender Jackie Dakota. For unknown reasons, the house across the street has stars on its side wall. There is no mistaking it when it appears on screen behind characters in the front yard.

 Nick Kroll guest stars in Season Two Episode Seven. He plays Simon the Devious. Simon and Laszlo fight over a witch's hat which may be cursed. Laszlo stands in the street in front of the wooden fence above and gets struck by several cars before turning into a bat and flying into the sewer after Simon.

  There are many locations around Toronto that get used in the show. Another favourite is the Vampiric Council building. Where would the Vampiric Council meet? Scarborough, of course. 300 Consilium Place is the exterior of the building where the vampires go on trial and ultimately in Season Four Episode Three, Nadja opens her night club. At the beginning of this episode, Nadja flies down and greets her guests outside. That is all for now as we have to end this blog.  Bat!!!

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Map of Our World
Cranfield House,  65 Heward Ave,  300 Consilium Place

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Post # 352

This That & The Other Streets

Location: Porters Lake, Nova Scotia, Canada 
Address: 9 This Street
Date: July 2025
Website:  porterslake.ca

  Porters Lake is a small community located about a 30 minute drive from Halifax, Nova Scotia. We diverted through there in our travels in order to see an unusual cluster of street names. We said to ourselves, "We've got to see This!". And of course That and The Other.

    Okay, so follow along carefully as we are only going to say this once (actually a few times). Take Highway 7 through Porters Lake and turn on This Street. First you will come to That Street. Don't turn on that street. Stay on This Street and you will reach The Other Street. If you take The Other Street it will take you back to That Street and eventually you will end up on This Street again. If you had turned on That Street you could still get to The Other Street by following it to the end. The Other Street will take you back to This Street. If you then turn right on This Street you can get back to the highway.  Don't worry about getting lost as This Street dead ends at the lake and That Street always takes you to The Other Street and vice versa. Basically every street in this little cluster touches The Other Street. If you are on a street just take that street until you get to This Street. Stay on this street until you get to the highway. Easier done than said.

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Map of Our World
This That & The Other Streets

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Post # 351

Canary Restaurant

 Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Address:  425 Cherry Street
Date:  July 2016

  From the Palace Street School, to the Cherry Street Hotel, to the Canary Restaurant. The corner of  Front & Cherry in Toronto has a long history.

   In 1859 the Palace Street School was built. The area around the school was residential at the time with lots of homes and children. The Gooderham & Worts Distillery had opened in 1837 and many people who lived in the area worked there. Industry continued to grow in the area and the school closed in the 1880s.  

      The building across from the school was the Canadian National Railway building. Over 200 homes were demolished and replaced with a huge rail yard. It is this building in Kick-Ass, where Red Mist takes Kick-Ass (Aaron Taylor Johnson) to meet Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage) and then they get kidnapped. You can see the Canary Restaurant when the cars drive in and away. Sorry, we are getting ahead of ourselves. More on movies and restaurants later.

   The former Palace Street School building added some additional floors and became the Cherry Street Hotel.

    After the hotel closed the building was used as a warehouse for companies such as Thomas Davidson Manufacturing. The abbreviated writing on the wall has been fully restored.

   In 1965, the Canary Restaurant moved from University Avenue and occupied what was formerly the lobby of the Cherry Street Hotel. It remained in business until 2007. During this time it served many a meal and was also a popular filming location.

      In 1990, The Kids In The Hall aired a sketch that ended outside of the restaurant. It was called Hoopla and Bruce McCulloch steals some salt and gets away in a car driven by Dave Foley.

  In the movie Three To Tango, Matthew Perry (Friends) and Neve Campbell (Party Of Five) run across Cherry Street in the rain. You get to see the Canary Restaurant sign all lit up in yellow and blue. They sit just inside the first big window and enjoy what they are told is tuna melt. Afterwards, they both throw up on the sidewalk.

 Some other movie diners also eat at the Canary. In Maximum Risk, Jean Claude Van Damme and Natasha Henstridge have a coffee beside the window to the left of the photo above. They discuss their predicament and then exit the restaurant and head south down Cherry Street.

  In the movie Get Rich Or Die Tryin', rapper 50 Cent is trying to impress a girl over lunch. His crew comes in and joins them at a table in the center of the photo above. When asked what he does for a living he tells her he is a rapper, a gangster rapper.

 A lot has changed since 1996 when The Long Kiss Goodnight was filmed. The condo towers now rise high above everything. The area around the Canary Restaurant has been named the Canary District in its honour. The buildings all have a fresh coat of paint too. When Geena Davis throws Samuel L Jackson out of her car, it is on the west side of Cherry Street in front of buildings that no longer exist. In a bit of a continuity error, Geena dumps Samuel and drives around the corner in front of the restaurant. As he lies on the pavement, she drives past the Canary one more time before stopping to pick him up.

 I wouldn't get too comfortable lying near the corner of Front and Cherry streets. In the 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead a whole bunch of zombies come running from Front Street and head north on Cherry Street. As the small group of human survivors makes their escape in fortified buses, they drive away from the Canary Restaurant and then drive away from the Canary Restaurant again. Who's driving that bus, Geena Davis?  No, this times it's Ving Rhames at the helm. He drives Sarah Polley and an ever decreasing cast of characters to safety.

 The most recent change in the neighbourhood is a new Indigenous Hub. It sits right beside the Canary Restaurant building. This metal wall artwork features an etched bear, wolf, turtle and more. No matter what happens around it the Canary Restaurant building will be there to witness it all.

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Map of Our World
Canary Restaurant

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Post # 350

Halifax Ice Cream

Location: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada 
Address: 1709 Lower Water St #108
Date: July 2025
Website:  thefogcompany.com

  On the east coast of Canada, one of our favourite things to eat is ice cream. Thankfully, there is no shortage of vendors to choose from. These are a few of the places that we visited near the waterfront in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

  Cows ice cream was founded in Prince Edward Island in 1983. They have since expanded to other provinces and there is a Cows located on the waterfront in Halifax. There are many flavours to choose from and you can get a good, simple cone or cup.

  They also have lots of cow merchandise such as t-shirts and parody postcards.

If you want something a little crazier, then you want to visit The Fog Company. Each ice cream comes with a fog of cotton candy. The Gimme Smore (above) has chocolate ice cream covered in fudge and marshmallow. The huge cotton candy fog hangs off of the cone. These creations require some skill to eat without dropping any ingredients.

  Our favourite was Seas The Day which comes in a cone covered in fog. It is vanilla ice cream with a mermaid's tail and an edible paper whale sticking out of it.

  Fog and whales reminds us of the whale watching we did from Brier Island. It was about a 3 to 4 hour drive from Halifax. We feared we may not see anything due to the thick fog. It cleared up just in time for us to catch a few whales, along with this grey seal (above) before our tour was finished. Back at the Brier Island Whale Watching restaurant we got huge cups of ice cream that really hit the spot.

   Back on the waterfront in Halifax we visited a dessert spot called Creme. They had lots of fancy treats.

  This time we had a strawberry mousse that looked like a strawberry.

   Since ice cream does not travel well, we bought some souvenir chocolate from Peace By Chocolate with some very Canadian wrappers. Peace By Chocolate is also located on the waterfront.

  There is a list of some places to enjoy ice cream or other sweets while in Halifax. Up near the Halifax Public Gardens you will find Dairy Bar. They usually had a lineup so we didn't get a chance to try it during our visits. The only thing that stops us from having more ice cream is time.

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Map of Our World
The Fog Company

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Post # 349