Flip for Field Guide
Meld Ceilidh Sutherland and Dan Vorstermans’ entrepreneurial spirit, food and drink chops and love for nature and you’ll get Field Guide Restaurant and Bar, their casual restaurant with quality food, opening this fall at 2082 Gottingen Street. Like the field guides to birds and flowers, this one will be a “guide to everything edible in…
Canadian Cell Phone Companies Can SUCK IT
Every morning I drink my coffee and read the Chronicle Hearld. Lately I have been noticing full page ads trying to encourage Canadians to prevent Verizon from coming in to our market. Apparently they are going to steal our “jobs” and ignore the “rural areas”. BLOW IT OUT YOUR ASSES Rogers, Bell and Telus. So…
Does it hurt to say “Hello”?
My boyfriend and I recently moved into a new flat in the North End. At first we were over joyed with how friendly the majority of our neighbours are. Every one is constantly smiling, making small talk, and boasting about the neighbourhood. The only exception has been a damp blanket that resides in the flat…
For Fuck Sakes
Shame on you! I learned today that your cronies have been harassing my friend since October. She has been subjected to mean spirited emails, texts and other forms of embarassment. Get over yourselves, grow up and act like adults ffs. Apparently you all aren’t capable of rational behaviour or any amount of compassion either. —Pissed…
Admit it, you wish you were me!
I write a status on facebook the other day about how happy he makes me. And you, BITCH, comment: aw, it’s a shame you need a man to make you happy and complete! Like, what the fucking hell? Am I out of the loop or something? So if any woman lucky enough to find the…
Could Be Worse!!
I know not every bicyclist obeys the rules of the road, just like motorists. However, I just recently moved away from Halifax to my hometown in Ontario, and let me say, your bicycle bitches could be wayyyyyyy worse. since moving home, I’m baffled by the bicyclists here. Only a handful wear helmets. Many ride on…
Lakeside Poo Poo
Strolling around the lovely boardwalk that edges the lake in this end of the city should not include dodging numerous piles of dog excrement. Children swim at the nearby beach. No wonder the quality of the lake water suffers in the heat of summer with the unnecessary but regular addition of canine rectal contents. FFS…
Croiss-WHAT?!
Sweet tooths at the Seaport Farmers’ Market have croissnut fever, thanks to baker Leah Jones and her Maritime Pasty Company (1209 Marginal Road, 877-4144). It’s a mouthful of a name, an addictive treat, and it’s Halifax’s only take on the cronut™, the trademarked delicacy made famous by New York chef Dominique Ansel. Delving in into…
Two Bitches for the price of one
To my server at a restaurant on Spring Garden road on Saturday, you work in public in close proximity to the public. Please shower and put on deodorant. You stunk to the high heavens of body odour. I’m not exaggerating when I say that I was actually gagging as you were passing food out over…
Silly Woman Chatting is for Kids
WTF… so your husband asked my husband to help him move something. My husband had a few errands to do first but said he would text you when he was on his way home so you would be ready for him to help. Now that you have his cell number you have been texting him…
SappyFest VIII: You were perfect
SappyFest 8. This year, they said don’t get your hopes up. But I was so excited to see the wind turbines that, by the time we hit Sackville, New Brunswick, I was using my outside voice in the car. Hopes were rebelliously high for the sweetest, most intimate music festival in Canada. And Sappyfest, the…
Lifeguards
So I joined a facility a few months back and everything is fantastic!…..except the lifeguards at the pool. Basically I am preettty sure that if I or any other fellow man or woman actually had something go down they couldn’t do jack shiggity aka we would all drown not one of them is actually fit…
Ooh la la Osheaga
Words by Amanda Wenek, photos by Ashley Lynn LeBlanc (unless otherwise indicated) Well, another year, another successful Osheaga pilgrimage. This is my third year hitting up the fest, and with each year it gets a little busier and I feel a little older. But I knew that the early sell out of Osheaga was a…
Scenesters
But what the fuck is up with so many women being obsessed with the bar type, band standing, scenesters? You’re such a fucking low self-esteem cliche hiding under your false – and booze fueled – sense of self-confidence. Stop drowning your insecurities with the empty loser hook-ups and drunken nights, and maybe you’ll find something…
New York or bust
“I was entirely shocked to have been accepted,” says local playwright Kristin Slaney, on the news of her acceptance to Columbia University, to their notoriously difficult-to-get-accepted-to playwriting program. And since opening that fateful email, Slaney has kicked it into high gear, fundraising to support the costly, but no doubt beneficial, experience. “They only take around…
Help a sister out
There’s no better feeling than helping people. A genuine smile and thank you is reward enough. —<3
Hop on the bus gus
Up to the moment that I started to ride the bus, thought Bus Drivers are over paid and made fuss But now I ride on a daily basis, I sit, I observe, i listen, I watch peoples faces, there are psycho’s, wacko’s weird ones alike, all with headphones, texting their life Rudeness, coldness, staring you…
Halifax, future ghost town
I love the way this city makes it nearly impossible for anyone over the age of 25 who isn’t enrolled in school or willing to make minimum wage run screaming West. I have had five amazing friends leave N.S this year, not because they didn’t love the city but because they couldn’t GET ANY JOB…
Grocery Missed-Manners!
Come on “lady” you are old enough to know that the polite reaction to needing to invade my personal space in getting produce is to say excuse me. As you recall, I sternly said “Oh I am sorry excuse me” as YOU grabbed across me not once but several times and made it impossible for…
Happy Farmers’ Market Week!
Many of us tend to stick to our weekly (or daily) market-going routines, buying fresh goods from familiar faces, finding new favourites and tasting a little bit of everything. But, did you know there are over 30 farmers’ markets across the province doing their thing, selling things made, grown, caught and farmed right here at…
Dreaming of Je T’aime
For many, parenting can sometimes feel similar to the image of a hamster on a wheel, constantly running without ever reaching your destination. Alice Patterson is a Haligonian, mother and entrepreneur who has developed an idea to solve some of that chaos. Patterson is in the process of creating Je T’aime Eco Artistic Living Space…
Breaking news: Councillor Linda Mosher to won’t ask for reversal of Chain of Lakes Trail sewer pipe decision
Update, Tuesday, 1:05pm: Councillor Mosher now says she won’t ask for a motion of recision. Her email to me, just now: Tim – I was delayed, on way to council. I noted your story, you misunderstood my comments, my point was as a result of taxpayers having to fund an additional $9 m for the…
crystal crescent crusader
to the kind individual who noticed i left my keys (presumably) sitting on the roof of my car while swimming at crystal crescent beach this past long weekend, and thought to cleverly tuck them away in my gas tank nozzle for me to discover, i sincerely thank you. it is people like you who make…
Share the road…
We all need to share the road, sure!! However stop driving your bike down the middle of the road and/or refuse to move over for cars. I know it’s the proper thing to do but not everyone can bike to work or live within biking distance. Sharing is a two way street soo move your…
merry times
voluptuous hugs and wide-mouthed smiles stretch for you, halifax, and the endlessly incredible friends of mine that dwell within you. this city feels more like home than home ever did, and i feel truly lucky to have spent my early twenties discovering you. every day i witness or experience genuine displays of kindness and love,…
Double americano in a g/medium cup
You came into my cafe tonight for an americano and I could hardly talk to you. I think you were wearing a band tshirt saying The Revenge on the back or something, but I was trying not to stare. Your eyes are mesmerizing. I want to know you. —Come back!
Entitled motorists
This bitch goes out to all those motorists who feel entitled to our city’s roads and have the gall to suggest that cyclists also pay licensing fees to cover the cost of road infrastructure. Fuck off #1: Roads that cyclists use are usually located in the city. City road maintenance is financed by municipal revenues…
It’s about time
I have been an avid motorcycle enthusiast and have driven many since 1972, what was once considered a male dominated sector is now being balanced out with more female drivers. At one time you would only see women on backs of bikes, in the last 10 or so years, I am seeing this trend starting…
Barber blues
I work as a barber for a living. When a customer comes in I ask, “may I help you”? Sometimes a man will be sceptical of my abilities because I am an attractive woman. Ok fine I can accept that begrudgingly, but do you have to actually ask me if I can cut hair? That…
Stranger in Spryfield
I just want to send a huge amount of love and many “thank you”s to the man that helped me carry a cat that had been hit by a car to his owners house last night. You made a really tough situation a lot easier, and i really appreciated what you did for me, and…
Things haven’t changed have they
You pretend you are happy. You pretend your choices in the last year were the right ones. Week after week I listen and can see your sadness. Remember the last time you were happy and try to find it again. —A couple of chairs away
I guess thats why they call it the blues?
Nazareth was right, love hurts! It burns you when your hot, god dammit! I just want to thank you for helping me find my heart place long enough to break it. I never knew what love was till I met you, and to be honest it sucks the big one I wouldn’t recommend it to…
To the Stunning Blonde on the Ferry…
We rode the ferry over to Halifax the morning of August 1st. You were stunning in a green dress, with your blonde hair in a loose braid over your shoulder. My day started off miserably, but just seeing you (and that million watt smile you flashed as you held the door for me) made my…
Someone’s gotta call you out
You are a bunch of exclusive, incestuous pricks. Get your heads out of your asses and start involving people in your work who you haven’t slept with. —Tired of your bs
Anne Macmillan’s Little Lakes public swim
Anne Macmillan has been swimming her heart out (read up here) for her Fieldwork residency, Little Lakes, and you can reap the benefits this Wednesday, August 7 at 3pm by going on a super special lake excursion with the artist. Little Lake 44.496667,-63.721667 is the destination. It’s got to be a magic lake, Macmillan’s been…
Healing garden is being constructed in memory of Raymond Taavel
A blighted vacant lot on Gottingen Street is being transformed into a monument to Raymond Taavel. “I call it a healing garden, but really what it is is a grief playground,” says artist Brian Pace, who started the garden at the former Mitchells Environmental Treasures site. Gay rights advocate Taavel was killed nearby, last year.…
Enchanting new video from Mike O’Neill and Devon Sproule
Watch this with your eyes, the official video for “You Can’t Help It”, the opening single from Sproule and O’Neill’s upcoming album Colours. Directed by Paul Curreri, this video features a lot of emotion and personality and good dance moves. Colours is out on September 24th via Tin Angel Records. They’ll be touring the UK…
Catch up, NS!
How is it even legal for places to pierce with a piercing gun when it isn’t able to be fully sterilized? Hello HIV and hepatitis! NS has to catch up with the times and enact piercing laws. It’s absolutely disgusting. —!!!
Puppeteer banned from waterfront
A legal battle over the civil rights of a pair of puppets—and their handler—will play out in a Halifax courtroom next month. At issue: Does the Waterfront Development Corporation, a publicly owned corporation, have the authority to ban people from the harbourside boardwalk? Puppeteer T.H. Hatte performs in schools and at festivals. His brochure lists…
You don’t deserve it!
You don’t deserve the praise, the media coverage, the awards, and certainly not the money. So you think you have talent? So you think you deserve this more than everyone else? Guess what- you don’t! So while the rest of us are struggling to make our voices heard, remember that it’s only because of your…
No more Love for this Bitch
That certain special someone is in the news again. Not only for the exact same thing she’s been caught doing before, but assault! Can someone tell me why our government can’t put the boots to this bitch and lock her away? It’s painfully obvious that she’ll NEVER stop and that she’s evading taxes on top…
SappyFest VIII: Begin!
Watch this space for updates from The Coast’s intrepid correspondent Adria Young during SappyFest VIII. Will she see all the bands you like? Will she take hilarious photos at the Sackville, NB Shoppers Drug Mart? Will she pick up a job waiting tables at Mel’s and never come home? (A: I hope so, probably, I…
Bus pass
It was hardly an interaction, and you told me that your place of work didn’t stock bus passes as another company next door sells them, and for whatever reason, I thought you were incredibly charming. And beautiful. —Pedestrian
City Council of Idiots
Letter to City Council expressing my anger about ripping up the nature trail to install stupid wastewater pipes. I am here to express my extremely strong concerns about the tearing up of the nature trail to build waste water pipes. I am sure as hell against it. I am aware that the government and city…
whats up
When are you going to take responsibility for your actions when you drink? Its always everyone else’s fault. Dude, you got a major problem. —everyone you jam with
Thugs
Really? 20+ grown men with bullet proof vests, tazers, pepper-spray, etc couldn’t subdue a teenage boy armed with a knife? The Toronto police force must be full of wimps. He was walking away from you when you shot him. Perhaps resisting arrest, even. Did you fear for your own safety or the safety of others…
To the darling clipping her fingernails on the #7
It’s your world, darling. We’re just living in it. —Everyone else
Missing Cats and other things
I’m sad that you can’t find your cat. And I’m sure your show at X Pub will be GREAT. But stop stapling, nailing, pinning and taping posters to street trees. Smarten up and fasten it to the hydro pole, you dummies. —Tree Lover
Good news, it’s Agricola Street Brasserie
“It’s pretty simple,” says chef Ludovic Eveno. “We went through so many different names and Agricola just ended up making sense.” He’s talking about his new bar and restaurant, Agricola Street Brasserie (2540 Agricola Street, next door to the also brand new enVie) a project he and partners Mike Hase and Rachel Knox have been…
A Caribbean Twist of fate
Back in May Caribbean Twist (3081 Gottingen Street) posted a ‘Closed for Renovations’ sign in its window. With the promise of re-opening within a week-and-a-half lovers of its Jamaican flavours didn’t make much fuss. The renos—which were being done by Caribbean Twists’ landlord—were a belated follow-up to some zoning issues you may recall, which made…
Hollaback! HRM takes Manhattan
Thirty-two-year-old Rebecca Faria first learned the meaning of street harassment when she was about 10. “I was walking down the street with my mom,” she remembers, when someone leaned out of his car to call her mother a “Paki bitch.” Fast forward to 2011. Faria created Hollaback! HRM, a local website and Twitter account that…
Hot reads! Halifax chefs, the next generation
Too many cooks in the kitchen? Impossible. This week we dished on 10 of the city’s hottest chefs, what inspires their cuisine and why they’re on our watch list. Let me tell you, these folks are PASSIONATE about their craft—it’s refreshing. Read Melissa Buote’s super profile on 2 Doors Down’s superman Andrew Farrell plus nine…
Letters to the editor, August 1, 2013
Roue them all The best test of a truly world- class city is not in the height of its skyscrapers but in the self confidence, cheekiness and swagger of its ordinary citizens: one has only to think of the character of your typical Berliner, Cockney or New Yorker (“Two decades of world-class delusions,” Feature by…
Much Ado About Nothing
What a summer at Shakespeare by the Sea! First there was the purely delightful Snow White, then a memorable Hamlet and now Much Ado About Nothing that, I think, tops them both. It’s fast and funny, filled with hot chemistry and sharp wit. With her spunky demeanor and arch delivery, Kathryn McCormack seems born to…
Swaddle with caution
Q I am a 28-year-old gay man living in a major east coast city. I recently connected with a guy on a vanilla dating website, and we are quickly developing a real interest in each other. After talking online for a bit, we exchanged numbers. Our first conversation was through text messages for the better…
20 Feet from Stardom
It takes a certain selfish, sociopathic ego to become a star, which is probably why the supremely talented yet humble singers in 20 Feet from Stardom haven’t had many movies made about them. Veteran biographer Morgan Neville crafts a history lesson on background singing—from call-and-answer church choir origins, to marvels like Darlene Love and Merry…
Andrew Farrell
Andrew Farrell wears a uniform. It starts with a folded bandana wrapped around his forehead, replacing the stodgy pleats of a traditional chef’s toque. He wears a black chef’s coat over a pair of faded black jeans. A Moleskine notebook is tucked into a back pocket. And he almost always has a mug of coffee…
Free Will Astrology
HAPPY BIRTHDAY LEO! (July 23-August 22) Sergei Diaghilev was a Russian ballet impresario who founded Ballets Russes, one of the 20th century’s great ballet companies. At one point in his career he met French playwright Jean Cocteau. Diaghilev dared Cocteau to write a piece for a future Ballets Russes production. “Astonish me!” he said. It…
The Smurfs 2
A garbled pantomime, nihilistically uninterested in its own cinematic existence, The Smurfs 2 isn’t complete garbage. Originally created by Gargamel, and thus an affront to Smurf God, Smurfette (Katy Perry, whimpering a lot) worries her blasphemous nature will eventually cause the all-male Smurf community which lusts after her to stop paying attention. Now a world-famous…
Brenan Madill
Brenan Madill likes a challenge. Inspired by his family and a stint as a dishwasher-cum-line cook—“It was like an amusement park where you never get off a ride or wait in line, just go go go”—-he enrolled in NSCC’s Culinary Arts post-high school. But after balancing first year with a cooking gig at the Hilton…
Going Hamlet
Hamlet. You’ve seen it before, and you’ll see it again. Why? Because each production mines something different from Shakespeare’s timeless tragedy. In the terrific SBTS version, Rhys Bevan-John is part sullen, sarcastic youth and part self-doubting man. He brings a wonderful intensity to the character and delivers the many so-familiar lines with unique twists that…
2 Guns
“You’re my people,” Mark Wahlberg tells Denzel Washington over and over in the completely nonsensical surprise hit 2 Guns, AKA Tango & Cash Go to the Desert and Also Bill Paxton is There. So the boys are thieves of sorts avenging the death of an associate, and then they end up with $40 million of…
Frédéric Tandy
Frédéric Tandy has let the seasons be his guide since the beginning of his career in the kitchen. A native of Limoges, France, he grew up eating well and taking inspiration from his grandparents’ home cooking, garden-growing and pâté-making. So, his decision to go to culinary school was a natural one. “I didn’t want to…
Ferry nice brass
“I’d heard about theatrical performances on the ferry, and I thought it would be fun to surprise people with a mini-concert,” says Paul St-Amand, trumpet player and co-founder of the Bedford Brass Quintet, who submitted his idea on a whim to the Awesome Foundation and won a grant. So, hop on the Alderney Ferry this…
The Way Way Back
The coming-of-age story is one of the best movie genres. The Way Way Back has a terrific cast—Toni Collette, Allison Janney, Steve Carell, Maya Rudolph, Sam Rockwell—and Oscar-winning writer-directors—Nat Faxon and Jim Rash—and a teenaged lead with just the right amount of slouchy, toe-scuff insecurity—Liam James, whatup Jack Linden!—but for whatever reason just never gels.…
Dan Vorstermans
“It seems like sort of serendipity when I look back at it,” Dan Vorstermans says about his first kitchen job. “I cooked by myself, so I was prepping and executing every dish that went out.” This is a man that likes a small kitchen. After a stint at Chives where he managed some time on…
Jessi Gillis
“I fell in love with food when I was 12,” says Gillis. “When all the other girls were reading Cosmo at 13 I was collecting food and wine magazines.” By the time she was 14 she knew she wanted to be a chef. She studied French and Italian culinary arts and at 19 she left…
Spring Garden guided tour
It’s always a beautiful day in this neighbourhood, a tightly knit cluster of big name stores, indie bookshops, vintage boutiques and shoes, shoes, glorious shoes. Spring Garden Road and its surrounding streets are a prime example of what downtown shopping can, and should be. Word, nerds This district of downtown is where some of the…
Luther Shaver
“When I turned 11 or 12 my parents said, ‘You know what, you can cook your own meals.’ I was tripping in the kitchen and falling over sauces and dishes, but you learn your way.” Luther Shavers’ early lessons in food kickstarted a steady stream of them, taking early inspiration from his father’s natural talents…
Beth Muise
“For me cooking is about trying new things and trying to get other people to do the same,” says Beth Muise. “The feeling you get when you go and talk to a table and they tell you how amazing everything was is such a great feeling.” As a kid she thought she’d end up a…
Robert Reynolds
Robert Reynolds is holding down the kitchen at EDNA on Gottingen Street, perhaps a natural progression from his work as sous-chef at jane’s on the common where he worked under one of Halifax’s most unsung talents, Chef Paolo Colbertaldo. He trained in the UK at Thames Valley University, apprenticing at the Berkeley Hotel in London…
Lauren Marshall
Lauren Marshall can remember the exact moment she knew she wanted to be a chef. “I remember one Christmas when I was very small, my grandfather lit a plum pudding on fire,” she says. “He let me blow it out. That was the day I wanted to grow up and do what he did: Grandad…
Virgil Muir
“I’m a self-taught cook,” says Virgil Muir, who handles chef duties at The Food Wolf with Eric Gunnells. “I’m musician and am trained as a massage therapist; I use my senses to do everything I do. The food that I cook is made with particular attention to how it tastes, smells, looks and feels.” Muir grew…
Mentorship shape
The evidence is in: Halifax is special, and one of the outstanding groups of people making it so is our artists. “We have more per capita than any other city,” says Becky Welter-Nolan, programming coordinator at Visual Arts Nova Scotia, a provincially funded organization dedicated to bolstering visual arts. And the reason why we have…
Making a Splash
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what Samm Splash’s The Breakup EP is about. Songs like “Feel Nothing” and “Cheater” do a pretty good job of laying (broken) hearts on sleeves. In the grand tradition of making art out of hardship, Splash admits that she just can’t write a song when she’s happy.…
Rachel Sermanni’s new Scotland
“It’s me, a lady, with a guitar, singing,” says Carrbridge, Scotland’s Rachel Sermanni. The 21-year-old makes her first trip to Nova Scotia for the Natal Day concert at Alderney Landing on Saturday. She joins Joel Plaskett Emergency, Mo Kenney, Slowcoaster, The Will Be Gones and Young River. “I can’t wait to visit Nova Scotia to…
Devil’s in the details
A<fter releasing Kentville-inspired The Town in 2011, The Devil’s Half Acre went on hiatus when lead guitarist Chase Ross moved to Montreal. But you know what they say: you can take the man out of Kentville, but you can’t take Kentville out of the man. Returning a year later, Ross and his refreshed rock and…
Getting ready to Devour!
Unsurprisingly, people are very eager to feast their eyes on Devour! The Food Film Festival. Today, in sunny Wolfville, the fest proudly launched its lovely new brand (see the slick graphic above for a taste of Spectacle Group’s hard work) and a list of the partners hungry to support the project. We couldn’t be there…
