{"id":8775,"date":"2010-01-15T02:44:14","date_gmt":"2010-01-15T07:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=8775"},"modified":"2010-01-15T13:14:02","modified_gmt":"2010-01-15T18:14:02","slug":"fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/01\/15\/fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok\/","title":{"rendered":"Fire at Honest Ed&#8217;s (Honest Ed&#8217;s OK)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"Fire at Eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4041\/4275385517_6fb4553e33.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n<p>A little after midnight we were walking south on Bathurst, rounded the Bloor Pizza Pizza corner and saw a glow from the window of Honest Ed&#8217;s. My first thought (for a split second) was &#8220;art installation&#8221; because it was calm and quiet (and Ed&#8217;s has given their <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thestar.com\/article\/235984\">windows<\/a> over to art before) but it was quickly evident it was real and inside the window display. Walking over, people were already on the phone to 911, so I took photos. The pictures that follow occur over only about 3 minutes. That time frame includes: when the fire was small and a handful of people were around -&gt; a police car showing up telling them to move back -&gt; the the glass popping, exploding and shattering (Mike Smith, who writes for Now Magazine, was also walking by and just suggested to me via Facebook it may have been the sound of exploding wine bottles from the Wine Rack store inside) -&gt; the fire licking up at the vernacular signage (&#8230;ONCE IN A LIFETIME\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 SOMETIMES NEVER!!! and HONEST ED&#8217;S A FREAK HE HAS BARGAINS COMING OUT OF HIS EARS were affected) -&gt; to the first fire truck arriving and dousing it (the1st\u00a0 picture with the thick black smoke). Both the speed at which the fire grew and Toronto Fire&#8217;s arrival were remarkable. Or maybe it was just routine, but seeing TOFD in action like this, from beginning to end makes Toronto seem safe and that its various systems, when they need to, will work like clockwork. <a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/tofireS\/status\/7777346967\">Eventually at least 8 pumpers showed up<\/a>, Bloor was shut down, and we walked east to try to find a nightcap but as has been widely reported, you can&#8217;t find a reasonably civilized drink in the Annex anymore.<\/p>\n<p>Though there were many &#8220;oh no&#8221; responses to <a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/shawnmicallef\" target=\"_blank\">my tweeting<\/a> of the event at the thought of losing a Toronto landmark, the rumour around town (up until the recession, that is) is that Honest Ed&#8217;s, the only big box store one could call lovable, will become a condo complex one day soon now that the late Ed himself isn&#8217;t around to fuss over his D.I.Y. K-mart retail creation. As unique as it is, intensification of this site seems inevitable (even if those rumours have quieted down), and it makes those signs telling you to get inside seem even more urgent because one of these days it&#8217;ll disappear in much less dramatic fashion than it almost did tonight.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2685\/4276131904_60610b297f.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2642\/4276132026_f99f294084.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4013\/4275385971_ce63cfd586.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2772\/4275386089_10ec9089d2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4032\/4276132674_6ee8614865.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"375\" height=\"500\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2773\/4275386467_e44a4e99ed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"375\" height=\"500\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2768\/4275386561_e22c6a672c.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"375\" height=\"500\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2741\/4276133046_b481ba2829.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"eds\" src=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4058\/4276133136_d972966614.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A little after midnight we were walking south on Bathurst, rounded the Bloor Pizza Pizza corner and saw a glow from the window of Honest Ed&#8217;s. My first thought (for a split second) was &#8220;art installation&#8221; because it was calm and quiet (and Ed&#8217;s has given their windows over to art before) but it was<a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/01\/15\/fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"sr-only\">&#8220;Fire at Honest Ed&#8217;s (Honest Ed&#8217;s OK)&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[3045,4657,14052,1771,1039,14050,14051,19,14053],"class_list":["post-8775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-architecture","tag-3045","tag-facebook","tag-honest-ed","tag-mike-smith","tag-now-magazine","tag-police-car-showing","tag-retail-creation","tag-toronto","tag-wine-rack-store"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Fire at Honest Ed&#039;s (Honest Ed&#039;s OK) - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/01\/15\/fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Fire at Honest Ed&#039;s (Honest Ed&#039;s OK) - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A little after midnight we were walking south on Bathurst, rounded the Bloor Pizza Pizza corner and saw a glow from the window of Honest Ed&#8217;s. My first thought (for a split second) was &#8220;art installation&#8221; because it was calm and quiet (and Ed&#8217;s has given their windows over to art before) but it wasContinue reading &quot;Fire at Honest Ed&#8217;s (Honest Ed&#8217;s OK)&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/01\/15\/fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-01-15T07:44:14+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2010-01-15T18:14:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/farm5.static.flickr.com\/4041\/4275385517_6fb4553e33.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Shawn Micallef\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Shawn Micallef\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/01\/15\/fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/01\/15\/fire-at-honest-eds-honest-eds-ok\/\",\"name\":\"Fire at Honest Ed's (Honest Ed's OK) - 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