Photo: "Canadian National Exhibition 2009" by Doctor Insomniac, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

Chocolate covered bacon, and what's happening in the GTA (and sometimes beyond):

This is kind of scary. The City of Toronto has decided to allow taxpayer money to be used to fund bureaucrat Geoff Rathbone's libel suit against a giant media company. The Toronto Star posted stories questioning the efficacy and legitimacy of public policy (specifically, the handling of the city's green bin program), and Rathbone (general manager of solid waste) claims that his good reputation is being damaged by false accusations. Sounds like highly debatable grounds to sue for libel, in which case he should be funding his own lawsuits, not tapping into our money!

Toronto's much maligned A La Cart street food pilot program is failing. Not much of a surprise there. After just three months, one of the 8 vendors is already closing shop indefinitely, and two others have relocated because the locations designated to them by the city have not proved to be great for business. Will the head of the program now use taxpayer money to sue the Toronto Sun (or me) for having a negative opinion?

Last night a two-alarm blaze at (Old) Cabbagetown's historic Winchester Hotel was extinguished quickly and the building saved from being razed. Damage appears to be confined to the roof, and the cause is still under investigation.

Gene Simmons is blaming the media for having blown the whistle on the secret show KISS planned to play in Oshawa. I'm not sure that it's the media's fault though... I mean, Oshawa won a highly publicized contest, and appeared to have been excluded from the tour list, right?

According to a report by The Education Quality and Accountability Office, Ontario school kids in grades 3 and 6 are still not performing to the provincial standard level in reading, writing, and mathematics. Although improvements in this area have been observed, some argue that the tests are being made easier.

And in addition to deep-fried Oreos and chocolate covered bacon (depicted above), the CNE also has a butter Yoda. It's been a few years since I attended the Canadian National Exhibition, but the opportunity to clog my arteries and drool over Star Wars characters made out of golden butter may get me there this year.