It looked like Florida at spring break on Sunday as hundreds took to the water or basked in the sun at Woodbine Beach Sunday, enjoying record-breaking fall temperatures. The eastern Toronto beach was crowded with people and umbrellas and on the boardwalk, to entertain them all, was soprano sax player Bernie Blue, who said he was enjoying the weather despite being a bit overdressed for the day, in a shirt and long pants held up by red suspenders. “I love being by the lake,” said Blue, a semi-professional musician. “It’s the most pleasant place to play.” By 3 p.m., the mercury hit 32C at Pearson airport, beating the record high for September 24 of 30.8 C set in 2010. (Further north at Buttonville Airport the temperature had already reached 33C.) The normal high for this time of the year is 19 or 20C, but a slow-moving high-pressure system over Southern Ontario is causing the warmth, says Weiqing Zhang, a severe weather meteorologist with Environment Canada. A heat warning was in effect for a swath of Ontario from Ottawa across the GTA and down to Windsor thanks to the system, which is expected to move out by Thursday and be replaced by more seasonal temperatures. And while the heat can be oppressive or even dangerous for some, on the waterfront downtown, it wasn’t deterring book lovers from attending the annual Word on the Street festival at Harbourfront Centre.All the chairs were filled in the Toronto Star tent, where Linda Barnard and Peter Howell were dishing on what can happen at TIFF, with Barnard recalling Nick Nolte walking down Bay St. in his bathrobe. Author and restaurateur Jen Agg, who wrote the autobiography I Hear She’s a Real Bitch, was addressing a full audience in the Toronto Book Awards tent. “There seems to be a lot more people out today than in the last two years,” said Rupert McNally, who was sweating in the shade of the tent for Ben McNally Books, the Yonge St. bookstore founded by his fath ...
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