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World's Worst Underwater Magician

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. Water too cold in Toronto in April - new underwater camera tested in local pool In anticipation of the completion of a product review article that I am writing for Diver Magazine, I have shot and posted an underwater video on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W83vzlzMxYA . The review is about the new Kodak Play Sport. The video camera looks like a cell phone but is in fact built to be taken underwater without a housing! Members of the Etobicoke Underwater Club assisted as I taped Marianne Collins conduct an underwater magic trick. After filming her waving her magic wand and making a flower grow underwater I decided to call her the World's Worst Underwater Magician.

Toronto Star: Destruction to construction - Dust to Dust in the Condo industry

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. Wrecking and recycling From a brewery to beer cans Destruction to construction By STEPHEN WEIR SPECIAL TO THE STAR HOW IT'S BUILT It is taking a lot of Molson's muscle to recycle Toronto's landmark lakeside suds factory. An environmentally bent demolition company is painstakingly deconstructing the Fleet St. Molson's Brewery, turning it into powdered concrete, ingots of steel and, eventually, aluminum beer cans. Even as the Molson building is being taken down, there are still parts of it that tower above the nearby raised Gardner Expressway. The shrinking factory is a beacon for the disappearing industrial district that once employed thousands along Toronto's eastern waterfront. The beer building and almost all other factories and warehouses in the Bathurst and Lake Shore area are being shuttered, shut down and converted into upscale housing projects. "This puppy was over-built. There are at least 3,000 metric tons of steel in there. It was as though they we

Toronto Star: Turning Starch Into Award Winning Homes along Port Credit's waterfront.

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. Washington’s Urban Land Institute believes you can’t take the starch out of lakeside Port Credit condominium project By Stephen Weir When the US research organization Urban Land Institute (ULI), set out to pick the ten best land-use projects in North America, Europe and Asia, one of the 21 finalists was the Port Credit Village development on Lake Ontario's north shore. The Washington based nonprofit association vigorously likes how the privately owned Fram Building Group has transformed a demolished starch factory into a lakeside condominium project which, through its design, encourages residents to work at home, walk, ride bikes and use mass transit. The annual competition is based on ULI’s guiding principle that the “achievement of excellence in land use practice should be recognized and rewarded.” Its Awards for Excellence makes an all-encompassing holistic examination of each nominated project, looking beyond its architectural design. The criteria include: “leadership, contr

UPDATE on underwater records -FIRST UNDERWATER TWITTER, emailed press release received

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. Ukrainian Journalist, Julia Gorodetskaya, Sends World’s First Underwater Tweet WORLD'S FIRST UNDERWATER TWEET It was an unforgettable experience—to tweet side-by-side with dolphins at a depth of 19-feet underwater. Odessa, Ukraine April 19, 2010 — Ukrainian TV journalist, Julia Gorodetskaya (@gorodetskaya), recently sent the first underwater tweet from the floor of the 19-foot-deep dolphinarium, “Nemo,” in Odessa, Ukraine. The scuba tweeting session was broadcasted by local media and documented by regional press. The preparation process and the underwater tweeting was also filmed and broadcasted live by Boris Khodorkovsky (@netocrat) to his QIK account and placed on Youtube and other social media services. Julia Gorodetskaya Sends World's First Underwater Tweet The tweet was sent via a mobile phone sealed in plastic, using Opera Mini’s Web-interface of Twitter. The tweeting was organized by a national mobile operator with the help of professional divers, who prepared the pho

Hubble in orbit on Toronto's Big Screen

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. HUBBLE HOOPLA COMES TO ONTARIO SCIENCE CENTRE, HUBBLE FILM'S DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHYSAYS IT TOOK 20-YEARS TO GET 8-MINUTES OF SPACE FILM James Neihouse, the director of photography for the Hubble Imax film, was a down-to-earth fellow while fielding out-of-this-world questions from the media at a March Toronto press preview held at the Ontario Science Centre. The Canadian film maker talked at length about two decades of challenges he faced in getting useable large format space footage for the movie. Niehouse said the film about the in-space repair and update of the orbiting Hubble Telescope, took 20-years to make and yet has only 8-minutes of IMAX quality out-of-this-world footage. Why? The camera, weighing over 300 kilos, went into space onboard a US shuttle loaded "with just 5,400 ft of film. That's all we could get on board and in the camera!". (footage from helmet cameras and shuttle cameras flesh out the spectacular film). The Shuttle could not accommodate a

Living Minimal in a Toronto condo - there is a Zen to reducing possessions

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  Now and Zen - condos have few walls and no place to exhibit art Before the coming of Zen Zen and Now.  Designing for nothing at all!  Minimalist movement takes root in urban centres   By Stephen Weir I recently pitched the Toronto Star on an update of this story which I wrote for the PDRA magazine in the US 5-years ago. After digging the story out archives I decided to post it, story is as relevant then as it is now It’s a designer’s worst nightmare -- a wealthy client with no possessions and no desire to acquire any. But, wait, as both Seinfield and Sheila Doris know, there is real money to be made when comes to the Zen of nothing! “North Americans are over-run with stuff,” exclaimed Sheila Doris “ We are junkies for stimulation, we don’t lightly give up on our toys.”  But, as the Canadian educator and decorator told a large group of interior decorators, the times are changing!  Speaking at a standing-room-only PDRA sponsored series lecture in Toronto, Ontario during the Canadian

Stephen Weir Writes a Story so that he can get a Guinness Book of World Records' Listing (most scuba record stories by a writer in an attic on a Mac)

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. .... For writing about the things that divers do to get publicity for their causes (and themselves). PART ONE How to generate press for a non-event? Set a world’s record. Build the world’s first or the world’s biggest. Do something that no one has done before, or set a record for doing it over and over again. Hold your breath. Hold all your neighbours' toes. You can even make the world’s smelliest Taleggio (stinky cheese) and attract reporters willing to take a sniff. No one knows this better than scuba and skin divers. There is a certain amount of implied danger in anything you do underwater and as result the media sits up and takes note when there is a potential underwater accident. Hold your breath for 10 minutes and no one will care. Do it underwater? CNN will be knocking on your door. Play bad billiards in the rec room and no one, not even your family will watch. Do it underwater? Headline news. No matter how obscure your record is, announcing it generates publicity in prin

And the Beat Goes On: Part Two of Recent Underwater Records

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. Stephen Weir Writes a Story so that he can get a Guinness Book of World Records' Listing (most scuba record stories by a writer in an attic on a Mac) PART TWO Dive Record Story continues from http://stephenweirarticles.blogspot.com/2010/03/stephen-weir-writes-story-so-that-he.html I have been writing on a casual basis about underwater records for Diver Magazine, divermag.com and this website. A colleague of mine at Diver Magazine, Quebec based diver/explorer/film maker/ record keeper Jeffrey Gallant, has set up a website to keep track of the many underwater records set – some are Guinness records, others are simply proclaimed by individuals (who may have had a record amount of Guinness). http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=30587750&id=1090578941#!/pages/Drummondville-QC/The-Diving-Almanac-Book-of-Records/303917838845?ref=ss Since I last wrote about underwater record attempts in 2008 I have received emails and clippings about over 30 new underwater feats of daring and fooli

Canadian Queen City (Toronto Island) sailors compete in Miami - Bacardi Cup

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. Good ship(s) Canada sail in the week long Bacardi Cup. Queen City Star Class boat finishes 73rd, another Canadian team finishes 4th A pair of sailors from the Queen City Yacht Club took part in 5-days of Star Class races in the Miami's Bacardi Cup. Skipper Greg Poole and crew Jeff Imai took part in the 83rd running of the venerable regatta. Poole and Imai were not the only Canadians in the race, according to our correspondent/photographer Pat Whetung (and commodore of the QCYC) reported from the races that " there are boats from the Royal Hamilton Yacht Club in Ontario, and entries from Quebec and British Columbia." "There were 84 entries in total this year." she continued. "That makes for a very long start line filled with skilled boatmen. There were 10-12 Canadians on the start line each day." The race schedule was hampered by bad weather, organizers called it a "vicious storm system which lurked north of Miami." As a result some races w

SUN TRAVEL STORY: 5-STAR HOUSEBOATING ON LAKE POWELL

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Vacationing Large in a Five Star Houseboat Canadian boats let Lake Powell visitors put on the Ritz .     First class on Lake Powell Posh pampering on board Canadian-built luxury houseboats     By STEPHEN WEIR, TORONTO SUN Sun, June 4 / 06     If the plush deep padding of the houseboat sofa wasn't already absorbing your Speedo covered derriere; you'd probably be on your keester anyway. The shocking beauty of the sword-edge cliffs that line the famous Utah/Arizona watercourse will stagger even the most jaded holiday boater. There are places along the Lake Powell Canyon system that are so narrow you can lean out from either side of the upper deck of the rented five-star houseboat and touch the smooth 200 metre tall walls. So abrupt are the sandstone cliffs it is only at noon that the sun will light the flybridge of your $10,000 US a-week-floating condo. A super-sized Bald Eagle lazily circles above in the scorching desert updrafts; hungrily eyeing the Canadian tourists stewing i

Living Large on Lake Powell - World's Number One Houseboat Destination

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. HOUSEBOAT IN NAME ONLY Living Large on Lake Powell aboard a Canadian built mini-cruise ship By Stephen Weir BOATING BUSINESS MAGAZINE 3.24.06 … There are sections of canyon lining Arizona’s Lake Powell where the direct light of day only reaches the deck of passing luxury built Canadian houseboats at high noon. Looking like Mother Nature’s T-square, the sandstone walls soar 200 feet straight up from the blue cool waters of the waterway. Situated at the top of the Grand Canyon system, the man-made lake, with its 2,000 mile coastline, is the world’s number one houseboat destination. In fact, the breath-taking beauty and the relative ease of boating on Lake Powell are credited with kick starting both the concept of five-star American house boating vacations and the luxury houseboat building industry in British Columbia. Imagine an on-the-water vacation aboard a 75 ft long houseboat that comes complete with central air, a corporate sized hot tub, a wine cellar and a theatre-style enter

What you need to know about Canadian Houseboating on Lake Powell

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. SIDEBAR TO LAKE POWELL HOUSEBOAT BUILDING AND CRUISING STORY PUBLISHED ABOVE Contact Information for companies mentioned in this houseboat feature Orca Houseboats Ltd. 304-1488 Hornby St. Vancouver, BC V6Z 1X3 Phone: 604.646.0484 Fax: 604.646.0408 Email: info@orcahouseboats.com Twin Anchors Marine 675 Old Town Road, P.O. Box 318 Sicamous, BC V0E 2V0, Phone: 250.836-3028 Fax: 250.836-3038 Website: www.twinanchors.com Waterway Houseboat Builders Ltd. Box 728, Sicamous, BC, V0E 2V0 Phone: 250.836.2595 Fax: 250.836.2535 Email: builders@waterwayhouseboats.com Lake Powell Resorts & Marina Aramark Region Office 2233 Dunlap Ave #400 Phoenix AZ USA 85021 Phone: 602.331.5200 Fax: 602.331.5294 Website: www.visitlakepowell.com Selected Ontario Houseboat Builders TIECO (custom built steel hulled houseboats) 511 1000 Island Parkway Lansdowne,ON, K0E 1L0 Attn: David Williams Phone: 613.659.3159 Fax: 613.659.3183 U-Fab Boats (houseboat kits) 459 Highway 29, R.R. #4 Smiths Falls,O

To Russia and back on a Sea Doo - Soviet guns pointed our way - boating magazine adventure feature

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. To Russia and back on a Sea Doo Pack Ice Pas De Deux In 1998 I worked on an adventure TV show that saw a group of Canadian and American boaters travel from Alaska to Russia on Sea Doos. I wrote the show script and went on the trip. The Globe and Mail took the following story and held onto it for almost a year before giving it back (with a kill fee check) ... a boating magazine and a Vancouver based boating newspaper subsequently bought and carried the piece. The actual adventure aired as part of Power Boat TV. By Stephen Weir Passing through the Anchorage airport, Russian wilderness expert Andrey Velikanov stopped in front of the departure lounge newsstand, looked at the stack of clear plastic wrapped Playboy Magazines and gave loud thanks to Hugh Hefner. “Yeah, and to Jim Beam and the Marlboro Man too.” Mr. Velikanov was tipping his baseball cap to the American icons of sin because a gift of cigarettes, alcohol and “adult” magazines helped facilitate his release from arrest on a r