Toronto: take one

I forgot about this memory so we're backtracking a bit back to the winter season of 1986/1987 when I was in grade eight. One of my friends whom often hosted porn parties on lunch hour came up to me one day and asked me an intriguing question, he was curious to know if I would be interested in going downtown Toronto with him on the upcoming p.a.day that was approaching. Normally my parents would forbid me from venturing into the evils of the city but this proposition had an interesting catch to it. His mother worked downtown and she would be chaperoning us on this adventure. 

My folks were a bit skeptical but they agreed and I was extremely eager, they were even kind enough to give me $20 towards my shopping excursion. What they didn't know was my friends mom was actually working that day so we wouldn't necessarily have an adult supervising us. My mother dropped me off at my friends house the morning of, on her way to work. It was still pitch black outside. I got loaded in the car with my pal and his mother, then we drove to the train station downtown Brampton, where she parked her car and we boarded the go train. We arrived downtown and headed to her place of employment, which was a luxurious building overlooking Nathan Phillips Square. We ate some breakfast there, then went ice skating down at the square for awhile. After that we returned to the break room in her building for some hot chocolate to warm us up while we overlooked the newest wrestling magazines that i picked up along the way.

Once we were warm again and ate some lunch, we decided to venture up to Yonge street and begin exploring stores. I really don't have much recollection of where we went asides from the worlds biggest book store, some surplus shops, Warriors, which catered to all your martial art and ninja needs, and rock memorabilia stores which were otherwise known as "head shops" it was here that I felt I had truly found what I was looking for. The one head shop in particular was down a set of stairs that led into a large, grungy, unfinished L shape basement. The place had a few glass counters filled with pins, patches, and smoking accessories. There were a lot of band posters and flags that were only five dollars each. I quickly found my first ever Beastie Boys poster and was happier than a pig in shit! 

the beastie boys poster I bought.

The rest of the place was gridlock full of folding tables that were covered in bootleg t shirts of just about any and every band you could imagine. All the shirts were black with white print or vice versa, and all were also only five dollars! Once again I spotted the B Boys, this time on a shirt which I snatched up with lightening speed.

Proudly rocking my B-Boys shirt @ new years dinner.

I also found a shirt emblazoned with Freddy Kreugar from the film A Nightmare On Elm Street 2, which happened to be a new fave of mine, so naturally I grabbed that one too. I can't remember anything else I bought that day but the trip was a success and I was very happy with my purchases. I rocked those two shirts with pride religiously. My first trip to Toronto was a success and I was already eager for the next time I would get the pleasure of returning...



Freddy shirt very simular to the one I bought.



Q

Our teacher in grade 8 was known amongst the students simply as "Q" due to his last name that matched mine as far as epic last names go. Mr.Quattrochiocci, or Mr.Q for short, was my home room teacher in grade eight. I can't remember if he was a phys ed teacher first and foremost, if he wasn't he should have been considering the fact he stood anywhere from 6'2-6'4 and was in pretty good shape. Q was easily the biggest teacher in the school and could have been an athlete or a pro wrestler without question. I honestly can't remember what his teaching forte was, but being a home room teacher left him to cover all the basics for us like math and English. 

I believe he was Italian. He had thick black hair that slightly receded on either side of his widows peak, and a thick, bushy, black moustache that could put Super Mario's to shame! To be quite frank he looked like a seventies porn star, straight up! In the beginning of the year I found Q to be the most intimidating teacher I ever had, based on his constant scowling face and sheer size, but he didn't hold a candle to Mr.Hoyte as far as belittling students went. Q was actually pretty laid back and even comical at times, but me being a metal head b boy and him being an alpha male jock, obviously led to us bumping heads over the course of the school year. For a teacher he was actually quite the "ribber" (wrestling term for practical joker) and it was hard to pull a fast one on him, although I did manage to make him go red faced a couple times during the school year. All in all he was a bit of a hard ass who always got the last laugh. So I made it my mission to change that.

Closer to the end of the year we got an assignment in music class. We were to group up in 4's and perform a song. I quickly grabbed the reigns for my group and decided we were going to fix Q's wagon once and for all! My brilliant idea was to make a song about him called "Q" which would be a parody of the Beastie Boys song "Girls". Our group quickly figured out how to play the xylophone part of the song, now all we needed was a beat. Thankfully I had bought a drum machine from Toys R Us the previous year, so I programmed the entire song into it and our music was done.

Synsonic drum machine from "toys r us"

Now we just needed some lyrics. If my golden memory serves me correctly it was I that single handedly wrote the lyrics which went something like this:

Q! all we really hate is Q!

Cus in the morning it's Q!

And after recess it's Q!

I hate the way that he talks 

And he's such a big head jock

And you can never make him smile

He gives you homework in a pile

That's about all I remember but you get the idea. So I programmed the beat, one guy played the xylophone and we all decided to do the vocals. 2 of us did the rhymes simultaneously and one guy did the backups which consisted of "bomp bomps" Around this time I was working on some murals with a few other students in preparation for the grade 8 graduation. My music teacher was actually allowing me to cut class so I could help get these murals done on time. On the day of our performance I was painting as usual when my group came to inform me that it was our turn. I told the guys they would have to do it without me as these murals had to get finished. The guys were upset and insecure but I assured them they'd do great without me, as we had been practicing religiously and had our song down tight. I showed them how to run the drum machine then returned to the murals. 

Grad day. Mural of me @ bookfair by Sanjai. My initials "kt" on the other one.

My group returned awhile later and they were all ecstatic! Our song was the stand out performance and we had received the best mark in the class. I was extremely proud of my boys and myself for that matter, as I was the brainchild behind the whole project. Mr.Q was even brought into the music class to witness the performance which left him red faced with embarrassment and sporting a huge smile from ear to ear. Even though our song was a success, inside of me was a feeling of failure. What nobody ever knew until this present day was I actually suffered from stage fright when the moment of truth arrived. I had previously been very outgoing in music class and drama class, but for some unknown reason I was full of anxiety that day and could not bring myself to perform in front of the class. I felt terrible for abandoning my group yet I felt like a proud father at the same time since they had nailed it without me. I used the mural as an excuse to skip out on performing. The only saving grace was the fact we had the top mark in the class, which restored some of my dignity. I didn't know it at the time but this was just the beginning of an ongoing battle with stage fright that would haunt me for years to come...

Boston Trip

So the big trip for the grade eight students that year was to Boston Massachusetts. Surprisingly I was allowed to go on the trip considering I had more visits to the principals office that year than any other. If I remember correctly it was a close call though and somewhat of a last minute decision which resulted in me being grouped in a room with 5 other guys, 4 of which I couldn't fucking stand.

The bus trip was much more longer than the Quebec trip the previous year, and as always I had my trusted cassette Walkman with me. My Beasties/DMC tape was in effect as well as the newest "LL Cool J" release "B.A.D." otherwise known as "Bigger And Deffer". I'm almost certain the owner of the tape was an Asian kid named Thomas Chen. I mentioned him in anonymous fashion many posts back as the kid at the breakdancing display who had the most epic back spin ever. Thomas let me listen to the tape and that helped kill time, lost in my headphones visualizing the lyrical content in my ears.

B.A.D. cassette

When we finally arrived it must have been well into the evening but the sun was still up. Our hotel was almost a horseshoe shape which surrounded a pool, and every rooms balcony overlooked the pool. I dropped my bags in my room and stood on the balcony examining my female classmates in their bathing suits. We spent the rest of the night having wrestling matches in our hotel room, and yours truly, the biggest wrestling fan in the school, did not partake. Since I was grouped with guys I despised I did not want to interact with them whatsoever....except for the one guy I liked. I opted to listen to my Walkman. 

Our trip took us to all the Bean Town landmarks. The Boston Tea Party, The Green Monster, Cheers, and we also went whale watching as well as to some indoor marine park. The trip wasn't that enjoyable for me except when I was throwing lit firecrackers out or hote window at people, until one day when they took us to an outdoor market type place full of all kinds of different shops and vendors. I bought handcuffs and a butterfly knife. The next thing I knew a bunch of kids came running up to me excitedly, they were in such shock they couldn't even get their words out. They dragged me to the front entrance and pointed down the street where I saw none other than WWF giant Big John Studd leaving the market. My trip had meaning now.

Big John Studd

Unlike my Quebec trip I don't really need 3 blog posts. My memories are a bit vague of the Boston excursion as I didn't really have a great time there all in all. I was at the point in life where I had developed a sense of people, seeing them for what they are, or were, or weren't. At the time I was peering through the fake facades of all these popular kids and seeing the realness of the people they considered lower class or beneath them, like my computer buddies. I had attended their parties in the past and fulfilled them with amusement as "the crazy kid" but my days of being the court jester had come to an end.

Duane & I as  " the turbanators"

The Commodore Kid

As I mentioned in the previous post, a lot of my time in grade eight was spent wrestling or on the commodore 64. Today I was going to continue from my last post but I thought I'd delve into the c64 and keep the wrestling story on hold for the time being. Although neither of these subjects ate directly related to music I still decided to write about them, as I don't have much grade 8 material left. There are still a few stories to be told and I'm trying to stretch it out before I get into grade 9 and things really start to snowball.

So my friend Alex had the commodore 64 in grade six, and I was at his house every chance I could be. Al lived right across from the school so we'd play on lunch and I'd go over for sleepovers a lot, which consisted of watching movies like The Warriors, Friday the 13th, and the "Ninja" trilogy with Sho Kusagi....and of course we'd play games on the computer. I was amazed at how many cool games he had. Eventually my friend Duane got one, and he lived around the corner from me so I pretty much became a permanent fixture in his house. I had also had a falling out with Alex so this was now my only place to play c64 unless I was visiting my cousin Gord.

Duane and I fishing. A rare moment away from the computer.

So in grade 8 the school started using c64's and they actually established a "computer club" in the computer room on lunch. All you had to bring was yourself, and if you owned games you were allowed to bring your own discs in and play them. I had no games so I used koala pad a lot, it was illustration software that the school board had installed on all the computers. I got quite good with my creations and when I got bored I'd walk around and see what other kids were playing. 

Eventually my cousin Gord sold me his c64 and he had tons of floppy disks full of games! I was now bringing my own games to school with me. I also started trading games with other kids which brought my game collection to epic proportions. The majority of these kids were bookworms, nerds and loners, the kind of kids who generally would get picked on day to day. That wouldn't be happening anymore now that they were supplying me with all the newest games! If someone wanted to bully one of these kids they'd have to go through me first....and no one ever did!

A hero for the geeks & the nerds!

I became more and more into the commodore now that I owned one. I spent practically every waking minute in front of that thing when I was home. There were endless games and even programs to make your own games. Plus I was learning all the commands and coding in school so I could actually make my own choose your own adventure word games, similar to "Farmers Daughter" one of the commodores finest filthy masterpieces. 

The summer after grade eight I ended up meeting my old Asian friend Patrick, whom I hadn't seen since grade 5. We were going to the same highschool in September so we started hanging out again. One day Pat took me to his cousin Bernard's place to rock some games on the c64. Bernie had an accessory I had never heard of before that would introduce me to an entire new world via the c64....the accessory was called a modem.

Obsessed with wrestling

Apologies for missing yesterday's post, as per usual life was a little hectic, thankfully it's never in a bad way!

So grade 8 was great, asides from my rekindling with rap via the Beastie Boys and RUN DMC, I spent most of the year obsessed with wrestling and the commodore 64 computer. I had tons of wrestling VHS tapes as I used to tape matches every Saturday afternoon and the occasional Saturday night when SNME was on. I had started collecting wrestling magazines in grade 7 so by this time my collection had grown quite large. Wrestling figures were also in abundance inside my toy box and I'd virtually wrestle with whatever type of action figures I could get my hands on, be it G.I.Joe or He-Man.

My obsession with wrestling grew and grew, I knew everyone's stats, dates of historic title changes and so on. Things got to the point where I didn't even want to be a rock star anymore, I was determined to be a wrestler. Our school had a wrestling team so I decided to join, from there on I had a brief stint with the amateur wrestling team at school until I decided to use a vertical suplex one day and that was the end of my amateur wrestling career.

Not to be bested I decided to start my own wrestling promotion, the BWF. As far as I know the BWF could have possibly been the first ever backyard wrestling organization in Brampton. My friends and I made up the small roster and we had matches every day on lunch, created title belts, declared champions and kept stats. Wrestling was also influencing my artistic side, as all I was creating through grade 8 were wrestling comics or animated flip books of wrestling.



A good portion of the bwf roster


The BWF was getting bigger and we had a new kid who invited himself into our organization regardless of the fact that we blatantly didn't consider him apart of it. His involvement and annoyance would lead to an epic historical day close to the end of the school year.....a hair vs hair/ title vs title match between him and yours truly...

Fan Expo 2012

Current event time once again! On Friday I attended the Fan Expo in Toronto for my ninth consecutive year in a row. I attended the first expo back in 2004 and it has become a tradition to attend every year since. I always go with my best friend Jerry, one or two of his daughters, and of course my son Gabe who has been every year now since he was born.

Back in 2004 when I attended the first expo it was a very new world to me. There weren't many people there that year, no lines ups for autographs, and celebrities weren't charging much for pictures. The first year I went was the weekend before my ex wife and I's wedding so we didn't have much money to spend. We vowed the next year to go all out and we did, we brought $500+ with us to make up for the year before.
Every year since that I've usually brought anywhere from $200-$800 with me for spending money and I always came home with a lot of cool stuff. As the years went on I was buying more and more for my son and less for myself. The expo also rises in popularity annually which in turn brought more and more people each year. With more people comes more inflation! The price of admission seems to creep higher every summer and it seems celebrities are charging more and more money each year for fan meet and greets.

I started attending mainly for the horror aspect of the show and another saddening trend I've noticed is the horror section getting smaller and smaller each year, which is slightly disheartening. This year was no exception as I was majorly disappointed with the horror area. It seemed like there was less vendors than ever and a lot of big, useless displays taking up prime space for no apparent reason. My friend Steve from "The Devils Latex" was really the only saving grace, as well as a few other cool vendors, but I had no intention of buying any masks from Steve as I can do that any old time now, since we are friends and all.

My mask dealer Steve. Devilslatex.com

The show was well organized, which has been an issue in the past but they've really got their shit together the last two years. As always there was lots of cool free swag at a lot of booths, and of course no shortage of fans dressed in costume. I spent months working on my sons Toxic Avenger costume, which he started to dismantle after being there a mere 10 minutes, as he was way too hot. Gabe was also getting a bit bummed out at all the "dang people in his way" so I put him up on my shoulders, and buying him some awesome toys didn't hurt either. I only ended up getting a shirt for myself and the complete collection of Fangoria trading cards. I was actually shocked at the fact I had brought $700 to spend and came home with over $400 in my pocket still,there was just nothing really special that caught my eye this year.

toxie!!!

It was also a little upsetting to see Christopher Lloyd charging people $40 for a glossy 8x10 photo of him and an additional $40 to get his autograph on it. I remember my first year there getting an autographed 8x10 from Doug "Pinhead" Bradley and I only paid $5.00! You can easily judge the size of ego by the variance of prices the celebs are charging. Asides from my disappointments it was still a good day all in all and the tradition continues, I'm sure we'll be back again next August....or maybe even this Sunday!

Christopher lloyd.....will rape your wallet!!!

Legion Of Detroit

Before I start things off here I just wanted to bring a correction notice to your attention. In my blog post "the wall" I mentioned it was the summer before I went into grade 8, as per usual memories manifest as this story unfolds and I recently remembered it was actually the summer before I went into grade 7 that "the wall" transpired.

The summer before grade eight I actually went with my parents to Windsor to visit some relatives on the Greek side of the family. I remember this now as I was in the peak of my wrestling phase of the 80's, there was one thing on my mind during the course of that trip and it was our day trip shopping to Detroit. I was determined to find some cool wrestling toys that weren't available in Canada.

Hangin' with my cousin in Windsor. 1987.

I can vividly remember the images in my mind from crossing the border & driving down the gritty streets. Shoes hung on telephone wires, shady characters drinking on the stoops of there very humble abodes which made houses from the H section in Brampton look like posh mansions, litter and refuse filled the streets and alleys. We finally found what I believe was a K-Mart or woolworths if I remember correctly....or maybe it was woolco.....never the less we found somewhere to shop and thankfully a safe place to park, as my uncle had lost his hubcaps the last time we were here for a wedding.

When we got in the store I was very excited and naturally I headed right for the toy department. I was blown away to see some AWA (American Wrestling Association) action figures and wouldn't you know it they had my all time favorites....The Road Warriors! I quickly snatched up Hawk & Animal but then realized they needed some opponents.

 I really wanted The Fabulous Ones but they were sold out. The only other choices were Rick Martel and The Long Riders, two bikers who feuded with the Warriors on a regular basis. I couldn't stand the Riders and the choices were slim, so who better for the Warriors to beat up on? I picked up Wild Bill Irwin and Scott Hog Irwin. I was actually amazed that my parents bought all four of the toys for me. I don't remember how much they were but the molds they were made from were the same as the He-Man figures, which on average ran for about seven bucks a piece in Canada.

I was happy as could be and felt my trip was complete even though we would still be visiting a few days. I rented some WWF tapes from the local convenience store to pass most of my time there, it was great because they had all different volumes that we didn't have in Brampton. On the way home my dad told me I had to open my wrestlers and play with them in the car so he wouldn't have to pay duty at the border. I happily obliged....how could I not.

This post is not musically related in any way but it naturally unfolded as part of the story. When I started writing this post I didn't even know what it was going to be about. After the correction notice in regards to "the wall" the memories kept coming and the words kept flowing. I hope you've enjoyed today's "out of left field" blog post.