1996 January 1

New Year's Eve in search of the ultimate Party. We took the TTC down to King and planned to check out the 390 King site. All the way along King, there were quite a number of people, mostly African-Canadians. Many women were all dressed up for the New Year. The problem was, they were all standing on the street looking annoyed. We realized not long after that 390 was refusing many ticket holders' entry. Sensing unrest, we swiftly walked up the street towards John. With all these annoyed loiterers and disgruntled ticket holders standing near the door, a riot might start any time. We reached John Street, checked the VIP room behind Oz, then walked up to Oxford at Kensington. Then we turned to College and glanced at the Latvian Hall but found no action. By that time, we could sense that mid-night must only be a tick away because the cars started to honk. We quickly turned down Oxford and walked along Spadina. Knowing we had missed the kissing & hugging, we thought we might as well stay at the Second Cup till 2:00a.m.. The crowded patio seemed to tell us that many party-goers were doing the same . These are not the usual Queen Street Second Cup young crowd, these are more mature people. A huge plastic/ make-shift tent was set-up at the patio to accommodate and warm up the New Year clientele. As we sat there enjoying our warm tea, we saw, through these wrinkled, plastic "curtain", kids walking by. Heard that there was some skating events at Nathan Phillips Square that brought all these young children and parents to Queen at this hour of the night. The traffic lights in bright red, yellow and green, distorted by the curvy plastic sheet, surrounded us like a life-size, modern, impressionistic polaroid wallpaper.

We finally walked up to Buzz since no other known after-hour party venue seemed to be operating. Most kids must have gone to the PBS (Pleasure Force/ Better Days/ Sycosis) rave out-of-town. As a result, not a single known soul until P. said Cln in a Destroy T-Shirt was deejaying - classic, progressive house & later lots of soul/ gospel. He was brill after a while. Upstairs someone span Hip Hop and it was not just the ordinary kind. There were quite a few well-dressed young boys. Menswear look-a-like, etc. Many were quite flirtatious.

It has been a pleasant night.