Summer of Sandra!
It was a happy day at the Coast offices, let me tell you. This year, for the 14th annual AFF Outdoor Film Experience (formerly alFresco filmFesto), the free series on the waterfront chose to focus on the oeuvre d’Bullock. We chose to rejoice (the reign of dudes has been interrupted!) From July 18 to August…
2014 Sobey Art Award shortlist announced
Going on vacation is pretty great, guys. But you know what’s not so great? Going on vacation and missing the opportunity to post about the Sobey Art Award shortlist as soon as it’s announced. Better late than never! Here’s the short list of contemporary artists under age 40 from across Canada who are up for…
Respect the walking wo/man
Listen up Halifax drivers! When approaching a left-turn advance green, yellow does not mean speed up, especially if you’re not yet in the intersection. What on earth is so hard to understand about the traffic light colour scheme!? Yellow does not mean speed and red certainly doesn’t mean foot to the floor. You’re hurtling through,…
Learn some patience
When I arrived at my building yesterday after work, there was someone wanting to turn left out of the small driveway. I gave them space to leave, since we couldn’t both enter/exit at the same time. There were a few people behind me, three or four, and I had my blinker on showing I was…
Helped a sista out
To the lovely father-and-son duo who noticed me trying to figure out what to do about my flat tire and then offered to change it: Thank you for your kindness. I will most certainly pay it forward. -Dorito Lady
Joining the Fairies and Butterflies with red wings
Those red swings are the best surprise I’ve gotten in a long time, and the perfect one to lift my low spirits. Each time we found one, my day was made 100 times better, so thanks to whoever thought to put them where you did—the world can always use another swing. -We stumbled upon 3,…
Games at The Lord Nelson
It’s a Small World that we should cross paths again, after first meeting in the gardens of Alhambra. Here’s hoping we play again someday. -Player Two
Dealing with the dealership
I’m really sick and tired of taking my car in for service at my dealership (I normally wouldn’t but I have warranty). It doesn’t matter what time I make an appointment or how small this issues I’m waiting minimum three hours. On top of that if I decide to go into work I have to…
Dog Swag
Walking your dog is NOTa fashion fucking god damn show. As much as I love all furry four-legged friends, I feel for yours as clearly you just need to be seen in your booty shorts and your pasty-leg parade deems more important than the number one who relies tirelessly on you and most likely laughs…
Pyschotic Co-worker
Dear Asshole with an abundance of mental issues: We are tired of your ass-kissing. Tired of you throwing 60-pound pallets around us as we work. Tired of you throwing your hissy fits and your water bottles being thrown across the warehouse as you clench your fists and huff and puff like an angry child. We…
Shy Gal
This is a bitch to myself. There are so many guys in this town I’d like to meet. I have missed so many chances to get to know people because I am just too damn shy. I can’t seem to respond to any glances that come my way or even know how to just acknowledge…
How UnCanadian
At a time when flags at post offices, fire departments and all manner of buildings are at half-mast in honour of the three slain Mounted Police officers, the largest flag in the community, visible to thousands from the Bi-Centennial Highway, flew proudly last Friday. I guess lowering it was just not worth the trouble. -A…
Someone is wishing you well
Every single person in this city is lovable and deserving of happiness. -Girl Who Rides the Bus
Traffic Light Stupidity
Guess what—banging on the button 20 times doesn’t make the “walk” signal come on any faster. You only need to push it once—it’s called technology, morons. -Trying To Sleep
Shut your mouth
To the professional-looking business man who freaked out on me and my co-worker on Barrington, what right do you have to question my pride of Nova Scotia for throwing out cigarette butts on the sidewalk? Really you just had to freak at the first two workers you see doing that? Try fucking following the next…
Searching for an old friend
We met in New Brunswick At a res that was gross. We raved about Harper and hoes vs bros. We dated some jerks And laughed over drinks One time you broke someone’s window I think. It was fun while it lasted, But you moved away. I figured we’d probably meet up again someday. Well now…
Coat Conundrum
To the ‘executive coat check girl’ at the dive club in downtown Halifax: First you ask me to pay double the cost to leave my sweater inside my coat at coat check. When I say that’s a ridiculous rule but I’ll take the sweater you then refuse to serve me. When I ask why you…
No….*I* dodged a bullet
I’ve been doing online dating for quite some time. Being considerate, when getting a message from a woman I’m not interested in (be it she’s not my type, something on her profile I don’t like, etc), rather than ignore her and leave her wondering what-if, I politely tell her something along the lines of “Sorry,…
OCD: Obsessive Creepy Douche
Please leave me alone. I have no interest in you. I told you that in the nicest possible way that I could and now you are blowing up my phone with hateful words. Being a douche isn’t going to make me magically have an interest in you. -Please Go Away
Pipa transforms into The Brown Hound
“We just wanted to just to start something fresh, something new,” says Victoria Dunham Gaspar of the decision to re-vamp Pipa in favour of a new look, new menu and new name—The Brown Hound (named for an actual brown hound names Jones). “Portuguese and Brazilian was a hard sell in Halifax,” she says. “After four…
No Animal and The Prince of Pig Alley
Tim Lake Rena Kossatz, Jeffrey O’Hara and Maggie Hammel take a walk on the wild side Playwright Bethany Lake’s entertaining double bill delves into the dark corners of the criminal mind. No Animal is a short play that has a killer and a criminal psychologist squaring off across a table. The writing is taut, layering…
Quit playing head games
In honour of Bike Week and all of the helmet talk in this week’s issue, we encourage you to use your melon by protecting it. In efforts to help you keep your brains at their absolute safest as you’re cruising the back roads, speeding to work or sweating your way up Duke Street, I Heart…
Unsolved Little Mysteries
Little Mysteries Books (1663 Barrington Street) has been holding it down, selling books, crystals, oils and tarot readings downtown for 20 years. “In retail years, we’re positively ancient,” laughs Vanessa Smith who owns the store with her mother Sandra. Some web buzz arose in the last couple of weeks when a For Lease posting popped…
Anna’s Cafe is moving
Last Friday longtime lunch spot the Montreal Grill’s (5151 George Street) served its last meals, took a final bow and shut down its busy downtown location for good in the name of retirement. But its space won’t lay dormant for long—with its current address (1820 Hollis Street) slated for demolition, Anna’s Cafe & Grill will…
Garden thief
To the asshole who keeps stealing garden and landscape material (stone blocks, stepping stones, plants) in the west end: You do realize that this sort of thing is sold in stores, don’t you? Why don’t you stop stealing our stuff and go buy your own? We know you’re around now and we’ll be watching for…
To all the union haters!
Let’s get real boys and girls—this is happening because it needs to. You can’t treat your employees like shit and expect no repercussions. Running a “family” business can backfire when you give all your other employees little to no trust. Remember: all those “untrustworthy,” underpaid employees are all highly educated and well-organized young people, with…
Switch it up!
You date the same guy over and over and over—plaid shirt, beard, bar type dude/douchebags—and you expect different results. You are either: A. Stupid B. Desperate C. Insecure D. All of the above I suspect your answer is D. Yes, indeed. D. -Douchebag
Mom from Heaven
It seems like I can never say it enough but just know from the bottom of my heart how blessed and thankful I am to have you and your family make me feel welcomed and loved. I want nothing but the absolute best for you. May you never stray too far away and remember I…
Arms way
It’s early Saturday evening. A hedge of limousines wraps around the Public Gardens and a dull chatter hangs in the air like a low cloud. It’s not until I see the creased tuxedos and wrinkled taffeta that I realize: it’s a prom night. Droves of girls wander around in gossamer fabrics, sunlight firing from sequin…
Cud Eastbound’s parting gift
“I tend to use a lot of allegorical imagery in my music, particularly about animals and creatures of the forest,” says soon-to-be-former Halifax folk singer Cud Eastbound. “Between travelling, my dog, my friends and the occasional heartache here and there, I don’t have trouble finding inspiration in the world.” On Friday, Eastbound will release his…
Free Will Astrology
HAPPY BIRTHDAY Gemini (March 21-April 19) In Marcel Proust’s novel Swann’s Way, the narrator speaks of how profoundly he is inspired by an older writer named Bergotte: “Each time he talked about something whose beauty had until then been hidden from me, about pine forests, about hail, about Notre-Dame Cathedral…with one image he would make…
Wrong numbers and sex work
Q A few months ago, I started getting hang-up calls from numbers I didn’t recognize in Boston. Then weird texts started showing up, trying to set up “dates.” I responded to the first few because I figured someone was giving out a fake number that just happened to be mine. (I kept my cell phone…
Wrong numbers and sex work
Q A few months ago, I started getting hang-up calls from numbers I didn’t recognize in Boston. Then weird texts started showing up, trying to set up “dates.” I responded to the first few because I figured someone was giving out a fake number that just happened to be mine. (I kept my cell phone…
Room to tow
“We have metal-working equipment, safety equipment, welding machines.” Tom MacDonald is showing me around his workshop. “It’s essentially a bunch of bikes that have been stripped down for parts, and the good parts survive and the bad parts we chop up and make into cool creations.” MacDonald is the coordinator of the HFX Trailer Share…
10 doors to open
Haligonians get to visit places they usually just walk by this weekend at the second annual Doors Open Halifax. Forty venues throughout the city, such as service centres, historic sites and places of worship, are open for the public on June 7 and 8. Doors Open’s founder and president, Hugh MacKay, thought the event would…
The Fault in Our Stars
The Fault in Our Stars, based on the wildly successful novel that is so adept at existing it had a perfectly timed placement in the new season of Orange is the New Black last weekend, is a maddening melodrama in the Sad Teen Death Movie genre. Hazel (Shailene Woodley) has terminal cancer. Gus (Ansel Elgort)…
Celebrating Johanna Dean
As rush hour ends on May 28, a crowd of about 300 cyclists pedals along Dartmouth’s Windmill Road at a jogger’s pace. At times a bike bell rings out and others chime in. It is cool but sunny, much like the afternoon Johanna Dean passed away. A week earlier, just before 3pm, the 30-year-old elementary…
Brains matter
Bike helmets are so contentious an issue that even if they’re not at issue, people have issues. Just in time for Bike Week, The Coast peers into the love-hate relationship we have with our helmets. Ben Wedge, co-chair of the Halifax Cycling Coalition, says he still gets emails over a mistaken Metro headline last November,…
Common problems
In 1763, when King George III granted 235 acres of land, “for the use of the inhabitants of the Town of Halifax forever,” the bicycle had still not been invented. These days, the Halifax Common is many things for many people, but one thing is certain: the intersections that surround it are not built for…
Amber Dawn’s poetic justice
Poetry is renegade. Poetry is sex. Poetry is rebel. Poetry is Amber Dawn’s first love. Her sophomore book, How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler’s Memoir (Arsenal Pulp), brings the award-winning author to Halifax for the first time, reading with Kaleigh Trace, author of the forthcoming Hot, Wet and Shaking: How I Learned To Talk…
On passing time, and days good and bad
If you are reading this on the day it hits the street, it’s June 5, 2014. The Coast is celebrating its 21st birthday and therefore born in 1993, the year I turned 39. And 39 + 21 = OMG. Today I turn 60. Which I cannot fucking understand. Please believe me when I tell you…
HIFF gets road trippy
Seth Scriver went to NSCAD in the late ’90s. When asked what degree he graduated with he asks for clarification: “You mean, what was my thing?” Yeah. “It was a Bachelor of Fine Art, Interdisciplinary—that’s like a Bachelor of Fuck-All of Everything.” Now he works construction. But when he gets together with Shayne Ehman, which…
The show still goes on
On Sunday a suspicious fire damaged Park Place Theatre, Shakespeare By The Sea’s headquarters at Point Pleasant Park, days before rehearsals for its summer season were scheduled to begin. The fire started in a trash can after midnight, spreading to the building and damaging the roof and attic, along with much of the seating. The…
