Not impressed with my first LP

I just read your article about the police raids on pot dispensaries (NOW, May 29). The licensed producer quoted in your article, Tweed, is my new medpot provider. They say their method allows patients to try lots of different options? Tweed requires a minimum purchase of 5 grams per strain, which means, based on their current pricing, approximately $50 to sample something from them.

By contrast, at dispensaries you can buy 1 gram ($10 to $15) to see which strain works best for you. At one dispensary there must’ve been at least 45 different varieties, whereas Tweed has maybe 12. It’s pretty much impossible to see what any LP offers or how their buying policies work until you’re a customer.

A.S., Toronto

The race to legalize

The illegal drug trade has a corporate structure like any other. Money is made. Workers for a corporation often have certain similarities in education and other background characteristics. Pot shops set up in advance of legislation show one thing: legalization will replace racialized workers with non-racialized ones.

Will strict, enforced regulations for hiring be part of the new legal corporatization of the drug trade?

H.E.B. Stuart, Toronto

Meanwhile, payday loan sharks thrive

You have to wonder why medicinal pot dispensaries are considered to be “proliferating out of control” by Mayor John Tory while payday loan shark locations and cash-for-gold storefronts – where no questions are asked – are permitted to thrive.

Chuck Last, Toronto

Gamed bike lanes

Thanks for sharing Six Of The Trickiest Intersections For Cyclists (NOW, May 26-June 1). The lack of a good connection from the Davenport bike lanes southbound over to St. George may well have taken the life of a woman last summer. Someone biking south on Spadina turning left onto eastbound Dupont (possibly heading to St. George) ended up under a truck on the morning of July 16. It looked bad, and it’s a black hole to find out if she’s alive or not. If the city really cared, I think we’d be able to find out from police how someone is doing instead of being prevented by privacy considerations.

There are other dodgy and dangerous intersections with bike lanes in the old core, some quite recently done by the city despite the flagging of safety issues by concerned citizens.

The core needs a divorce from the suburban councillors who make choices for us on -cycling issues.

Hamish Wilson, Toronto

Gord Downie prophecy

It’s impossible to write about Gord Downie (NOW, May 24) without mentioning Canada.

Downie and the Tragically Hip’s music captures what it means to be Canadian so well. While many other Canadian talents were absorbed by the American hype machine, the Hip have remained a distinctly Canadian phenomenon. I’m not sure how the band feels about that, but I couldn’t be happier.

There will never be a more Canadian moment than sitting by a campfire in the woods, surrounded by friends, looking at the stars and belting out Bobcaygeon at the top of your lungs. This is the defining -Canadian experience.

On hearing the sad news about his inoperable brain cancer, I can’t get Gord’s prophetic lyric from Escape Is At Hand For The Travellin’ Man out of my head: “Those melodies come back to me. At times beyond our heartbeat.” Can’t wait to see you this summer, Gord.

Myles Wagman, Toronto

Electric Petunia

No thanks to your music listings, we caught the incomparable Petunia at the Monarch Tavern on Friday the 13th. It was unique, electrifying, inimitable. He returns in August.

Your readers need to now where and when.

J. Challis, Toronto

Sky Gilbert’s deft and dark Terrible Parents

Further to letter-writer Noreen Starr regarding outstanding theatre productions being neglected by your magazine (NOW, May 19-25), I feel compelled to bring to your attention The Terrible Parents, a brilliant piece of theatre written by one of Toronto’s finest playwrights, Sky Gilbert, recently produced at Buddies In Bad Times Theatre.

It was a darkly deft comic masterpiece. Technically, the production was magical and flawless. It was mystifyingly overlooked by NOW Magazine.

Jack Ritchie, Toronto

Toronto’s not so grand facade

After reading your great article by Richard Longley on facadism and the destruction of Toronto’s architectural heritage (NOW, May 19-25), I thought to myself, “Thankfully, the Parthenon, the Coliseum and the Great Pyramids are located elsewhere, because if they were in Toronto we would have destroyed them, facaded them or attached condos to them.”

Toronto once had a grand architectural landscape. You still see remnants on Yonge and Queen, but as you point out in your article, Yonge is now under threat by rapacious development.

In Toronto we don’t need a nutty jihadi group to destroy our history. Our city planners and council will allow it to happen.

Andrew van Velzen, Toronto

Cleanliness next to pride in Attawapiskat

Attawapiskat Or Bust, by Drew Hayden Taylor (NOW, April 28-May 4), was an interesting take on a very serious cultural problem.

My question does not concern relocation, but rather Taylor’s description of Attawapiskat and his claims that “it’s actually a beautiful community.” Really?

The photograph used with the article shows whatever the owners deem no longer of use tossed outside the front door. If you love the community so much that you cannot bear to move, why not show a little home-ownership pride and clean the place up?

Jackie Couch, Toronto

All dressed up at Yonge & Eg

Just want to thank you for covering the Yonge and Eglinton neighbourhood (NOW, April 28-May 4).

The area is full of small business [owners] and independent retailers like myself who value and benefit from this type of coverage. My business, Joshua David, was included, and we are super-grateful, but we are not a menswear store. We would probably fit better with the likes of Canopy Blue and Carbon.

We have already had some confused-looking men wander into the store because of the article. Ha-ha.

David Archer, Toronto