The Tea Makers party: A postmortem

What a forlorn douchebag like Joe Clark has a hard time understanding is that even online, promises are your word and bond and need to be honored at all costs. That and the fact that writing under your own name doesn’t automatically make you in possession of couth or instill respect.

So it goes that we write under pseudonyms or anonymously with hubris, style, grace, and honor.

These thoughts floated through my mind as I made my way home from the secret underwater lair in which the Tea Makers party was recently held.

Despite worries to the contrary, the party was exactly as advertised. CBCers and Tea Makers editors, authors, commenters and readers drinking and talking. It was a masquerade party in reverse. The masks came off. There was nary a laptop in sight.

Amazingly, no one was knifed.

There was a lot of ground to cover. Entire years’ worth. I’m not going to go into who was there or what was said. Initially we had a strict no-blogging no-tweeting no-photos policy but by the end of the evening we agreed to relax it. You can find snippets online if you look hard enough.

But as I went through those streets on my way home it became clear to me that what we have are the makings for some kind of Toronto Media salon, in the classic sense. Or maybe a Salon des Refusés? It was hard to tell. History is still unwritten.

Years ago, Jesse Brown and some of his friends started something they were calling Nonfiction. It was not perfect, but it was better than nothing.

What I experienced that night was something else entirely, and again, not perfect. But nothing like it exists in Toronto right now. Maybe it should?

What form this should take and how it should work is something that I still need to figure out. But there will be more of these parties and I encourage you to come. We won’t bite. You will be welcomed.

Conversations about The Tea Makers web site offered me clarity. Nights later I awoke soaked in sweat, in a strange bed in a strange land and in my mind’s eye I saw the path before me that I needed to take, laid out perfectly.

The Tea Makers will be changing again. I’m not going to openfile myself here and brag about how it will alter everything we’ve come to know and love and cherish, but it kind of will. We have a track record. Our wake is scattered with the bones of forlorn douchebags.

It should be finished by the time Do you think Jian Tweets because he is Lonely? reaches the unprecedented milestone of 1000 responses.

Depending on how fast we can work and how lonely Jian gets.

9 Comments

  • Allan says:

    I detect sarcasm.

  • Pranky Venom says:

    Nice day for a party, wasn’t it.

  • Kev says:

    There was a party?

    Sniff.

  • Fake Daniel Lanois says:

    Clard is the Würzel of Teamakers. A lesser player.

    “Still can’t believe it, can’t stand to leave it
    But I know the rules
    We were doomed babe, too much too soon babe
    Acting like fools

    Tried to fly and climbed too high
    We saw it all, we had to fall
    But I swear it’s true, was all for you
    I swear it’s true, was all for you”

    Mötörhead
    All for You

  • What kind of man names his blog "Fawny"? says:

    Which Joe Clark are you guys talking aboot?



  • Anonymous says:

    You misunderstand the point. The party should be taken on the road….just like The Hour (which is now in Vancouver). Come on over!

  • Sacsac says:

    It matters not. Joe Clark is a shattered human being, a stunted travesty of a man. His only delight is in the misfortune of others, and unless he is very careful not a single tear will be shed at his passing. You need not answer to the likes of him.

  • PoonGirl says:

    God, you’re bitter. The point was, the gathering was held in Toronto. Why don’t you just move to TORONTO and live a little ? You can go to a taping of The Hour !

  • Anonymous says:

    Not everyone who comments on this site lives in Toronto. There is life outside of Toronto…which is why some of the comments are funny, clear-eyed and controversial. Hate to burst your bubble. Not all of us can attend your parties.

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