The above was the scene from our roof. Our hearts sank. We couldn’t tell for sure which house it was, but the street is filled with young families and with elderly people. And it was too close for comfort. After snapping a few pictures I headed downstairs to join the growing crowd.

It seems there was some sort of bbq mishap on the roof. After the owner finished with the bbq in the backyard – not sure if it was all shut off - he flicked a cigarette under the porch and the embers lit up the porch (CityTV), spreading upward and to the neighbouring house (CP24 story). At some point I do believe that the propane tank blew up as well. Fortunately, everybody got out of the house in short order, nobody was hurt. The damage to the house was extensive. As of this writing it still stood, the fire was out, but the work continues. Fire Command isn’t going anywhere yet. One neighbouring house apparently has notable damage, although I don’t know how notable. Not super serious, it would seem. The other neighbouring house seems to have minimal damage; fortunately that couple had moved into an apartment to make renovations easier – work that was supposed to start very soon.

It was wild to see the firefighters and police at work. They are a calm, cool and collected bunch. For them it’s probably just another fire. They know their jobs and they do them very well. For us it’s the story of the day, month, perhaps year.

And just to be absolutely clear, we’re all fine. We were never in any danger.

Well the meal was amazing, from beginning to end. The conversation, the service, and oh, the food, it was top notch. Well it became clear pretty early on I should do a review, so I took lots of pictures. Then we met the chef, Rocco Agostino, who is actually from the neighbouring village to rIAm’s dad, and in his own right is a very cool guy.

So I had the idea, why not do a profile of Rocco, which can serve to introduce the review of Silver Spoon? They could all launch together on blogTO.

And so they did. Check out the profile and review. And hop over to my author page to see recent articles that I didn’t mention in this space, including the Obama speech watching party in town.