Friends, artists, bloggers etc.

Momus : Multi-talented Momus (aka Nicholas Currie) is truly a 21st century genius! Singer, songwriter, raconteur, linguist and brilliant satirist of all things past, present and future. He has a long running personal and professional site, which is well worth checking out, but his daily blog is even better, and it's updated constantly.

Mumbleboy : This Flash Animation artist, known only as Mumbleboy, has a mad little animation portfolio available to the viewing public. It's simple stuff but really fun to watch. Or, you can visit his main webpage (kinda ugly) and read blogs and all the other junk he has there.

Chromacide : Local Toronto music legend Dave Howard is one of the brains behind this commercial music and animation design company. They have a great Flash animation site, and an impressive portfolio online plus drum and bass music if that piques your interest.

Radio Alchemy : Need a little conspiracy theory in your life? My pal Bob Dobbs has regular contributions on this politically charged US site. For a chance to read/hear the suppressed news that you won't find on normal news networks, have a look here.

Lenni Jabour : One of Toronto's most beautiful and talented treasures (though she's since relocaed to Paris), and a personal friend of mine. Musician Lenni Jabour creates adorable cabaret style songs - some fun, some fragile - but all of them rewards with each repeat listen. You'll fall under her spell in no time.

Toriphoria : This is a fan site dedicated to Tori Amos (whom I happen to adore, myself), but the thing I love about this site is it's incredible obsessiveness. The guy (or is it a gal) who put this site together even puts all of Tori's answers, in the interviews transcribed, in a different colour than the regular text so you can see her words only if you care to. Bizzare what some people do with their time in cyberspace isn't it?....

Sean MacDonald : Another one of Toronto's treasures, and a personal friend of mine, musician Sean MacDonald creates bizzare little guitar-based tunes - some hard, some soft - but all of them are much deeper and more interesting with each listen. Go there if you dare. BTW the mini-video for "100 Pills" was me filming Sean at The SuperMarket Club in Kensington Market on my little digital camera. Very DIY.

useful sites

Craigslist Toronto : Does anyone NOT know about Craigslist these days? Well, in case you don't, and you live in Toronto, you can search high and low for all things weird and wonderful. And if you don't live in Toronto, but still wanna see what CL is all about, just find your nearest city on the Craigslist main page .

Universal Currency Exchange : I love this site but I'm not so crazy about it when the Canadian dollar is faltering. It's amazing how easy it is to work out currency exchanges from any denomination to another.

NewYorkology : Since everyone goes ot New York City sooner or later, here's agreat site to visit before your next trip. Tons of great tips about the city, and lots of information about things to do for free and/or for very cheap. And if you like that you'll love Cheapo New York, which lists tons of great restaurant bargains, a few of which I tried, and was pleasantly surprised by, on my last visit to the Big Apple (August 2006).

Google Image Search : We all know about Google of course but I still meet people who have never used Google Image Search. It's a blast! Type anything into the search bar and see what pops up on screen. It's also an invaluable tool for graphic designers I think. There's tons of images on this very site in fact lifted directly from GIS.

ridiculous time wasters

Daily Jumble : Who doesn't love the Jumble puzzle? Well now you can play it online. A good waste of at least a few minutes (although my record is just 21 seconds).

Big Waste of Space : A little misleading as far as the title goes, cuz there's some great stuff on this site, but in the end, yes, it is a big waste of time and space... but fun!

The Simpson Archive : This obsessive nerd site, dedicated to all things Simpsonian, would even put Comic Book Guy to shame. But what a treasure trove of unimportant information. My favourite is the list of everything Homer said "mmmmm..." about.

Musical sites

CKLN Radio : A local community radio station here in Toronto with a great deal of variety and just plain great music. My favourite shows are the Hooray For Tuesday program (every Tuesday from 2:30pm till 5 pm), with host Ian Danzig, and Victor Baines Marshall's show called the The Middle Passage (every Wednesday from 5pm till 7pm).

KCRW Los Angeles : An excellent public radio station operating out of LA, with a great deal of variety and just plain great music. My favourite show is the Morning Becomes Eclectic program (every morning from 9am till 12 pm - LA time), with host Nick Harcourt.

WFMU New Jersey : It would almost be worth moving to New Jersey just to listen to this amazing radio station. An incredible variety of on-air programming and a superb archive of recorded shows. The programming is all over the place, and some shows are better than others, but it's almost always worth a listen. And the Tuesday 6-7pm show with Dave Emory will make a conspiracy theorist out of anyone. It's mind-boggling!

Guitarre Tab : Play Guitar? This is a song title search engine that has a pretty expansive database of "how-to" chord & tab charts for anyone interested. Since the contributors are just members of the general cyberspace public, it's very interesting to not only see what's posted here, but how different some people's interpretations of the same song can be.

GRAPHICS, DESIGNS & other art stuff

Larabie Fonts : "Making fonts and giving them away since 1996" is what his website tagline says. And it's true! This Larabie guy is a font maestro almost all the stuff he comes up with is amazing. He's a Toronto local boy and everyone here has seen his designs on countless rave flyers, niteclub passes and groovy ads everywhere. You can also use this site to get to more font links.

Abstract Fonts : It's hard to find free fonts online anymore, especially for Mac, but this font site still gives 'em away for nothing. Usually the font names differ just slightly from the names of the fonts on the pay sites, so do some searching and you'll probably find what you need.

Brands of the World : Need a logo fast? Give a check on this site. Like the name implies, it has company logos from all over the world. Most listings are major brand names, but I have found some remarkably obscure logos which has helped out with some last minute ads i was making.

Designs By Mark : Although you have to register (it's free), this is a great designer's site with loads of helpful hints if you're designing for print or for the web. I love the tips and tricks and I'm sure I'll be using some of Mark's ideas in the months and years to come.

LearnFlash : If you need a bit of brushing up on your Flash skills then this site may have the answers you're looking for. You do have to sign up, but it's free (or else I wouldn't be there ya know), and there are lots of video tutorials. I also have learned a lot of good stuff from the Mac Lab site.

Lorem Ipsum : This is a terrific little text generating website if you need some dummy text for a layout or something. Simple, but very useful.

Pneumatic Press Corp : is a Toronto based website development company where I used to work part-time. They have a large number of clients, and I have worked on some of the sites in their portfolio. An excellent company to consider for professionally designed and maintained corporate websites.

Cool Homepages : The name says it all. Perfect design site for web monkeys like me who need a little inspiration and/or competition from time to time.