Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Peter Gross Is In A Pickle: Toronto Mike'd #1450

Episode Date: March 14, 2024

In this 1450th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike and Peter Gross discuss why the FOTM hall of famer might be up shit's creek without a paddle. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada, The Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball Team and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Welcome to Episode 1450 of Toronto Miked, proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta, enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. The Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team. The best baseball in the city outside the dome

with eight championships since 1967. RecycleMyElectronics.ca, committing to our planet's future, means properly recycling our electronics of the past. The Advantage'd Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada, valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed and focused on long-term success and Ridley Funeral Home pillars of the community since 1921. Today returning to Toronto Mike to explain why he's in such a pickle, it's FOTM Hall of Famer Peter Gross.

Welcome back Peter. Hey, Jack Dominico sponsors your podcast. Well, shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. Jack is no longer with us. Well, there you go. And the family sold the team, and there's new ownership and a whole new vibe, a lot of excitement.

I want to see you, Peter Gross, at Christie Pitts for some Toronto Maple Leafs baseball this summer. I had some interesting interaction with Jack Dominico over the years. Well, anything you can share? Well, I hosted his annual banquet every year when he brought in these great baseball players. Really? Yeah. Remember Bill Buckner who blew that ground ball? Do I remember Bill Buckner? Peter, come on.

The counselor of the World Series. He was that one. I remember interviewing him and he was very dignified and good with it. Yeah he accepted it he even did a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode. You know he's no longer with us either. Oh did he pass? Yeah shout out to Ridley Funeral Home and just to tell the listenership you literally just met Brad Jones you've met him at a TMLx event but you're here for a recording I was just recording Life's Undertaking which is Ridley Funeral Home's podcast. We just kicked

out the most popular funeral songs. It's a fascinating episode. I'll post it right after I post this episode, but you and Brad were chatting a little bit about what we're gonna chat about right now. Please, if you take a moment here before we talk about why you're up Schitt's Creek without a paddle, and we're gonna get into the details. I've got the receipts. We're going to cover a lot of ground. Since you were last here, we lost a speedy speedy funeral home.

We lost Gord Pinsent. Oh really? Didn't you have some kind of a connection with Gord? Oh, it's really vague. There was a CBC drama in the seventies in which, uh, you know, was it a CBC? No, it was only God knows. He, he was one of the lead actors in only God knows. And I had one scene with an actor named John Beck.

I wasn't in a scene with, with Gordon Pinson. But you're so you were in the same, uh, television movie. In a movie called only God Knows that Gordon Pinson started. Did you meet Gordon? No I never did. Okay okay so that was your way it's a mild connection but I just remember like I take these notes in as I like come across things in the zeitgeist and I had a note that you were connected to Gordon Pinson but I didn't have any more detail than that but you were in the same movie. Yeah.

Okay. Uh, and also since we last talked, have you won or been nominated for any sovereign awards? Negative. I didn't, I didn't make the cut this year. How does that so like how do they overlook the, uh, great and powerful host of down the stretch the definitive Ontario horse racing podcast? Um, I submitted a story I wrote that I thought was pretty good, but there were some better submissions made.

And um, I submitted a podcast to for two years in a row. I, I was nominated, but the podcast is audio and it goes in the category of audio visual. So Woodbine entertainment always gets nominated every year because they have a multi-million dollar cameras and editing and stuff. And somebody else submitted a better video than my podcast. So negative on that. Okay. Negative on that. Now, hopefully positive on this. How old is your mother now? She had a birthday. Was it yesterday?

Yeah. She was 101 yesterday. Okay. Please, while you tell me, I'll be listening as I grab a gift to have for you that ties in nicely with the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team. But please tell us all, how is your mom doing? 101 is amazing. Congratulations to her. Tell us a bit about your mom. She's sensational. She's in perfect physical health. I think she's got some slight hearing problems. Sometimes I have to shout on the phone to her. And part of the story that I'm going to tell you involves her. She decided a year ago, wasn't that lovely? She decided a year ago that she shouldn't drive anymore. So she gifted me her car. We're celebrating her birthday on Saturday with

Chinese food. Amazing. Okay. So happy birthday to your, uh, your mom, Marilyn Gross. Was that what last name did she use? Gross? Marilyn Gross, Marilyn Gross. And only two days different than my daughter's birthday. Cause tomorrow, my daughter, my youngest turns eight. So that's exciting that 101 year old and an eight year old. Like, isn't that amazing? Yeah. She's your daughter's got 93 years ago. Now, what did I go get for you? I have for you, Peter Gross, a wonderful book. It's hard cover. It's got great pictures and it's the history of

Toronto Maple Leafs baseball. I just think you would love that. So that's a gift I'm giving you now. Thank you. I will enjoy that. Looks great. The Toronto Maple Leafs history. And of course, Peter, every time you visit, you don't leave without a frozen lasagna from Palma pasta. Are you still a big fan of Palma pasta? The Palma pasta lasagna gets the vote as the best lasagna I've ever eaten. I've made my own garnet.

Barnesdale has made lasagna for that is terrific, but even he agrees that the Palma pasta is the best. Garnet that is terrific, but even he agrees that the palma pasta is the best. If you come to TMLX 15 on June 27 from six to nine PM at Great Lakes Brewery in South and Tobacco, you'll be fed more palma pasta. We'd love to see you there. Well, I'll come for the pasta and I'll enjoy it. I'll ignore all the conversation. I'll just eat the pasta. All right. I feel like let's get to the fireworks factory. I'm eager to get straight there. So

where do we begin? So Peter, how do you set the table on this? I do have audio when it comes time for the audio. I have four clips, but please tell us, start at the beginning. Does it relate to your mom no longer driving? You tell me only vaguely. I just to tell you that I'm somewhat mentally unhinged right now because of all of these circumstances, essentially, uh, my insurance lapse today. Well, holy, you're sorry. Isn't that you're sort of coming in strong there. So we're talking, let's get very specific.

You and I are speaking right now at almost 6 PM Eastern time on a Thursday, March 14th. This is Pi Day 314. So March 14 2024. We're talking right now and you're telling me your driver's insurance is about to lapse. Yeah, and all of my efforts to renew insurance or get insurance have failed and this is the story that we're going to unwrap as we go along. Okay, so what date, when specifically will you no longer be insured to drive? On Friday, March the 15th. My daughter's eighth birthday.

Okay, so, okay, this is something we need to uncover this and we need to walk through this, how this happened and why you're like again, up shits creek about a paddle. Walk me through it, Peter. You know, we all love you. If anyone out there can do anything, they will, but we need to find out exactly what's going on here. Okay. Much as I'd like to use this platform to generate sympathy for me over the story of how badly I've been screwed by an insurance company.

The real important thing is that this is all should be truthful. So we'll start with this. Well, I should just tell people though, I've known you for years now, your greatest flaw, if you have one, is that you cannot tell a lie. Like I mean this sincerely, you are honest to a fault. Okay. This is my observation. Now continue. Hold that thought. Yeah, I know. I know. February the 27th. Now I've told you that for the last year and a half, I've, I started

driving for DoorDash and now I'm driving for Uber. I just need to make money. You're making some extra money. Yeah. Okay. So I'm driving for DoorDash dash February the 27th. I had an at fault accident. 2024 2023. Okay. So over a year ago, a year and change ago. I'll just briefly tell you the circumstances. I had just completed a delivery to one Oh five, the Queens way. If anyone knows that apartment building, I was driving in a southeasterly direction. It was,

I was turning right sort of on a circular part, and there was a slight incline. And from the time that I went in the building to the time I came out, there was this almost violent snowstorm. So when the snow immediately lands on the pavement, there's kind of a silicone effect. It doesn't integrate with the pavement.

And I was going about 10 kilometers an hour and a car was coming north on the street and I braked and I slid into him. Okay. And I did, uh, I ripped the grill off the front of my car and did some damage to this guy's car. So I phone RBC insurance, which you're insured at this point in the story, you're insured by RBC insurance. So I, I phone and having a great conversation with the guy. I tell him exactly what happened because as you pointed out I tell the truth. I slid into a fault. Yeah He's telling me don't worry you're covered blah blah blah blah blah, and I said well

It's good thing I'm covered because I'm driving for door dash. So you volunteer this information You disclose that you're driving for door dash and at you volunteer this information. You disclose that you're driving for door dash. And at that point he says, oh, well, we don't cover you if you're driving for door dash. And the conversation basically came to an end. So now- Now let me ask some questions. People are gonna be yelling at their iPhones and stuff.

So did he ask you if you were driving for door dash? No. So you just felt like volunteering you just felt like volunteering this information. I think at one point he said, uh, based on your, uh, your contract with us, we will provide you with a substitute vehicle. And I said, well, that's good because I'm driving for door. So you're having like chit chat with this guy as if he's a buddy. Okay. We'll talk

about this later. Okay. Keep going. So now, uh, I need to find a company that will ensure for door dash and, and quite frankly, no, no insurance company. I have some clips that might tell. So, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no But we're coming close to that. Okay. Um, a side story is that all the door dash guys are driving without insurance. Okay. But I don't want to, and one of these clips does kind of references. So it will, yeah, we won't come back to this point. So I find out that Intact, which is a company, uh,

I've seen their ads. Yeah. Out of a broker link. I'm always confused about what is broker link. What is in the broker link is, is a broker that directs you to the current correct insurance. So I phone broker link and like that's an, like you said, an insurance broker. So they will try to find you. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I, I, I phone intact. I'm talking this directly to intact these recordings that we have is, is with this agent from intact. Okay. Okay. So you can play this first clip because I'm basically a little intro here until we get a taste of, this is what I tell the guy off the beginning. And before I play, uh, how is it that we have

this audio? Did you record the call? They recorded the call and as I got into this argument with them over what they've done to me, I asked for it and they were good enough to send it to me. Oh, maybe there's a law that they have to. I'm glad that they sent it to you. And here is. So this is the first clip I want you to hear. And from what I remember yesterday, Peter, you're looking for Uber coverage, right?

Uber or DoorDash? All right, sir. So from my knowledge of the industry, right now nobody offers DoorDash coverage. Everybody doing DoorDash is kind of doing it under the radar. And if they had a claim, they wouldn't be covered. Industry-wide, there is coverage for Uber and Uber East with specific companies. And I have access to two of the most popular ones that cover you for that. Okay, I see it as if you're getting a quote for that. Okay, so this agent for Intact is revealing that there is nobody who will cover a driver for DoorDash.

They're all doing it under the radar, he says. But they do have some, a couple of places that will cover you for UberEats. Yeah, it's important to note, he's telling me that he can get me coverage for driving for UberEats. And subsequently, I applied to Uber Eats and, and quite frankly, they're far more careful than, than DoorDash. However, I want you to play, play the next clip because this is relevant to, to your notation that I'm an honest guy. So listen to what I said, honest to a fault, what I told the guy.

And Peter, can you tell me a bit about the car and your driving history? I have a net full of driving history. I've been on 72 years old by the driving since I was 17. I have never been at fault in an accident. I don't drink. I don't use drugs. I've never driven high, I've never driven stoned. It is a 2019 Nissan Micra. Okay, so you're telling him the truth, which is you're a sober driver in character. I'm telling him that I've never been at fault, but I was at fault. The distinction here is this is just a few days

after the at fault accident, and I believed at the time that I wasn't at fault. The distinction here is this is just a few days after the at-fault accident, and I believed at the time that I wasn't at fault and was subsequently... Okay, like George Costanza, it's not a lie if you believe it to be true. Okay, so when you're just saying there that you have never had an... because you're saying there... can I play it again? And I noticed the way they recorded it is one of, I guess, one of you is in the left channel and one of you is in the right. So it's a little interesting. Yeah, play it again.

Peter, can you tell me a bit about the car and your driving history? I have an excellent driving history. I've been on 72 years old. I've been driving since I was 17. I have never been asphalt in an accident. I don't drink. I don't use drugs. I've never driven high. I've never been at fault in an accident. I don't drink I don't use rods. I've never driven high I've never driven stone It is

2019 Nissan Micra, okay your exact words were I've never been at fault in an accident because when you said that You believe that to be true because nobody had told you otherwise. And the distinction here is that at fault is an insurance term. Okay. If you and I run into each other, we don't, we don't sort of sit on the sidewalk and say, well, who's at fault because we're both going to say neither one of us at fault. The driver doesn't determine who's at fault. The industry does. And to this day, to this day, 54, 55 weeks after that incident, RBC has not contacted me to say you were at fault. They put it on an industry term, right? So you don't speak that way. So, so, and in fact, intact has accepted, uh, that argument that I, I believed at the time

that, yeah. And again, as far as you're concerned, it was mother nature was at fault for that accident. Yeah. I thought as it turns out, it doesn't matter. And that's fine. Okay. So, okay. So now this conversation with the intact, and when is this conversation from that we're listening to? So the accident was February 27th. That might've been March the first, March the second. We're talking 2023? 2023. Okay.

One year ago. And from that conversation, I did get insurance. In fact, the guy gives me a spectacular quote, which never went through my bank account. It was always much more, but that's either here or there. But that is interesting. Why the hell aren't you playing with the quote? Why aren't you? Oh, I got it.

Okay. So they quoted you with an insurance. But that is interesting. Why the hell aren't you playing with the quote? Why aren't you? So they quoted you with an insurance whistle intact insured you for Uber eat. Yes. Because nobody insures you for door dash. Yeah. Can't be true for door dash. Interesting. So now I want you to play that because here's the crux of this argument. It's did the guy ever ask because what I'm getting in response to my argument that they shouldn't have lapsed my insurance is that they never asked me the correct question. It's like true detective over here start asking the right question. They had an obligation to ask me have you recently had any accidents? Have you had any accidents?

Have you had any accidents that you should tell us about? Play the clip. This is the question and the only question in this 13 minute recording regarding any accidents that I've had. Do you have any unfortunate circumstances where you were not at fault, someone crashed into you yet like in the and i really did people

okay uh... or not for the first thing you know there's no off the record right was a little bit but what did you hear in that question? Did you, did you ever have any accidents that were not your fault? Is that what they asked? Here, I'm going to play the first part.

Then I'll break it down. Play it again. Do you have any unfortunate circumstances where you were not at fault? Someone crashed into you? Did you have, did you have any unfortunate circumstances where you were not at fault, somebody crashed into you? That's what, and my response has to do with, he's cueing me. And the only time anyone ever crashed into me.

Was in the seventies. Yeah. Okay. So you were, you answered the question, honestly, the questions he's asking you very specifically, cause I'm, you know, as much as I'm your friend, I'm trying to be objective here. But that question to me is very clear. Have you ever had an accident that was not your fault where somebody crashed into you? And I'm thinking a Mazzy star fade into you. But the answer was yeah, in the 70s. And he laughs. He literally laughed. I want you to read this line here. Peter, Peter, I'm almost 50 years old.

You read it. I'll trust that you're going to write it. This. Oh my, Peter, Peter, I'm almost 50 years old. That font is in the back. You read it, I'll trust that you're ready to write it. This is in court, okay, Peter? This is, this matters because this is how the insurance company is responding to me. Okay. And this is a letter from a woman in the customer experience team who essentially.

At intact? At intact, yeah. Essentially turning down my request. Oh, I sort of left out. Well, do you want to read that? Let me play the last clip and then you can tell us basically what, no, don't play the Latin next week because it's, it's a different subject. I need to tell you that in October last year,

okay. October, 2023 intact sent me a letter saying, we're going to cancel your insurance effective March 14th, 2024 because you failed to tell us about this incident. Okay. And the incident that you, that they say you failed to tell them about was the one from February 2023 that you were telling me about with those. And I, I'm arguing you never asked me properly. Yeah. You didn't ask me about that. So finally you're not,

finally you Peter Gross are only answering questions you're asked. Cause my biggest concern is you like to volunteer and disclose things that are not being asked. Cause they said, did anybody run into you? The answer was no, because you ran into this guy in February, 2023 in this ongoing argument where I've asked them to remove because they, they've got this term called misrepresented. Yeah, you lied. Because I misrepresented.

Yeah, I lied because I didn't tell them about this incident. So they turned down my request to remove the misrepresentation. And part of the reason is this, she, the woman writes me back. This was a, this was a week ago. Okay. You were asked if there were any other unfortunate incidents in your driving history that should be reported. So this this woman from intact is saying you were asked if there was any other unfortunate incidents. But in

fact, the only question to that nature is this one again, we're going to play it again. If you have any unfortunate circumstances where you were not at fault, someone crashed into you. Yeah, they, the question she says was asked of you is different than the question that was actually asked of you. If you were asked that question, knowing you as well as I know you, if you were asked the question that this woman wrote about a week ago, you would have said in February, 2023, there was a snowy day and I slid into this. And it wasn't my fault. And it wasn't my fault. And by the way, uh, whatever happened for that accident in February, 2023, did RBC pay for that damage? They did not. So just so, cause this came up with bride Jones,

just when you got here, but you paid out of pocket, how much did you pay out of pocket for that? 3,300. So $3,300 in the damage that was caused by that. So can this is Brad's point and something to investigate, but if you paid, if you did not receive any money for the insurance company, is that actually a claim? I don't know. Like, you know, anybody can just pay out of pocket and not put in a claim. And a lot of people don't put in claims because it's not worth the trouble. If it's like, Oh, I can fix this from 1500 bucks, I'll cough up 1500 bucks and not even deal with putting in a claim. But you put in a claim, they never gave you a penny.

They never gave you a penny because it was DoorDash. Is that right? Yeah. Did I put in a claim? I just phoned and said, this happened. Okay, so if there was a claim created and it was rejected because of DoorDash, but they don't give you any money,

can you like retroactively remove the claim? Interesting questions for somebody listening who knows more about car insurance than we do, right? I went at it with RBC and they were not helpful. I went at it with DoorDash. DoorDash refused to cover me because I was not in the midst of making a delivery. I had completed my delivery. Uber's much better, by the way.

But again, we have one more clip to go and I have more questions, but effective tomorrow, you can't drive a car. No. Peter, I'm feeling sick for you, man. Like you, you need to, for your livelihood, you need to drive around so you could feed your family and pay your rent. You got it. I'm getting it, man. So the, the, the punishment is extreme. And I've tried to convince them that the line of questioning was,

was vague and not fully competent. By the way, one of the reasons that I'm feeling very unhinged right now is about an hour and a half ago, I had a 40-minute conversation with a woman from BrokerLink, the woman who actually sent me the letter on October the 13th telling me that my insurance is going to lapse and I had this conversation with her and she was very stern with me. And she kept telling me this is my fault and it's my fault because she said,

we read you a disclaimer. This fellow Sean in this conversation read me a disclaimer and in the disclaimer he says to me, please be advised that if you fail to reveal any claims or disqualifications or convictions, your insurance could be terminated. So I, and, and when she's saying this to me, I'm saying, oh shit, because I've had conversations with insurance people and they say,

we're obliged to read this to you. Have you ever had that circumstance? And they, they read it in this robotic way and I tuned out and I, as, as I'm having this fine print in a contract, please be advised. And we ran with them the information. And, and so she says to me very specifically, we told you that if you fail to reveal any claims or convictions, you're, and I, and I, and so I, at the time of this conversation,

a couple hours ago, I went, well, I wasn't really paying attention and I wasn't listening. However, I went back to the audio, the 13 minute audio conversation with Sean, he never read that disclaimer. That's significant. Yes, it is, I would think. So is there any like, any channels where you can go to any kind of,

what are your options at this point? And when can I play this final clip I have, the clarification, maybe I can play it right now. No don't play it now because it refers to something else that I'm going to get into. Okay Peter. You asked me. You asked me about Jane and the Channels. Like is there an ombudsman or ombuds person that you can because it sounds like they didn't

read that bullshit caveat which is basically a lawyer wrote to cover their ass right and again again this is the question you were asked if you have any unfortunate circumstances where you were not at fault someone crashed into you crashed into you and then you started going on about something in the 70s that's how honest you are you're disclosing something that happened during the nixon administration okay and then i'm not a crook i am not a bad bad driver. Okay. But, oh my goodness, you were never asked about any incident that happened beyond. If he'd worded it, like just say, have you had any accident whatsoever? Has there been

any collision? It's just an interesting thing. Knowing your personality is that in the RBC call, nobody asked you, were you delivering food for any food company delivery services? And then you're like obliged to say, yeah, I was doing a door dash delivery, but they didn't even ask that. And you decided to just share them. Like, this is what I had for lunch. I just did door dash. I'm doing this, that, the other, but here you're only answering the questions you're asked now. Like, it's just interesting how that worked. But okay. So Peter, is there the ombuds person or something you can well? Yes and no, because I, the ombuds person

is a group called customer experience and I ran it by them and I've read you the quote in which they've declined to remove the, the, the term misrepresentation. It's worse to have that on your driver's record than the fact that you smoked a pound of crack cocaine and were hopelessly drunk and ran through a school zone of 90 miles an hour and ran over six kids. The misrepresentation has basically deemed that as of today, I can't get insurance and I can't work. So-

And for the record, you haven't done any of those things. You didn't run over the six kids and- No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no You didn't run over the six kids. No, no, no. And I don't drink and I don't. No, I know you don't drink. I didn't even give you Great Lakes beer. So just full disclosure, last Friday I went to the Brampton Court and filed a small claims against Intact. Okay.

At least you had that channel of you could explore. You know, Lauren Honigman is just a call away if he needs some legal advice. Well, I like to play amateur lawyer. Quite frankly, I've used the small claims strategy three or four times in my life and each time against a big monolithic party and each time I've won. Okay, but in the meantime, tomorrow, Friday, March 15th, the Ides of March, my daughter's eighth birthday, how do you make deliveries for Uber Eats? Well, I'm not.

A bicycle? No, I won't be working. Rollerblades? I've you know, I've got the the Down the Stretch podcast and the Down the Stretch newspaper that I can pay more attention to. In the short in the short term, I can deal with that. We don't know how long this will go on for. I'm just thinking about your livelihood, right? Because there's a reason you started doing the door dashing and even you know, you you

had some success and I'll make up numbers. But even if it was an extra thousand dollars a month, let's make it up numbers with the rounds. Okay, it's more than that. To me, that's the difference between going to bed with an empty tummy and, uh, you know, taking care of the family. No, no, it's, it's, it's been incredibly important to me. Um, I, I guess I kind of enjoy it. It's, it's frustrating and it pays crap, but you wouldn't do it for free. No. And, and the fact that I've got some income from, uh, from pensions and from the newspaper and from the podcast

and it just, it augments it. Of course, it's a big economy. And you know, when I have an important interview, I pull over, I log off of Uber and I do the interview for my podcast. But how are you gonna, like how do you get your grandkid to the birthday party? Like are you gonna just be,

you're gonna be the Uber guy now? You're gonna be the roller blader? In the short term, I'm not driving. You know, I don't mean, I meant you calling an Uber so they can drive you like using Uber because Uber is not just for you to drive, right? It's, are you asking what I'm going to do now that I can't drive? Um, like how do you get, if you're going to do an interview at woodbine, how are you getting to woodbine this weekend? Well, I can do that. Not a big issue because, cause I do most of my interviews on the phone.

Roger's going to drive me when I have to be driven. I will take the public transit. I will roller blade to the grocery store. Like, you know, it can be done. You remember, you know, that something like three years ago I had that stroke. Of course. And it was a well documented on Toronto. Yeah. And the stroke affected my eyesight. So because of that, the department of transportation or the driver, they took my license away until I had my eyes checked.

So there was several weeks in which I couldn't drive. Okay. What was the detail you wanted to share before? Okay. Okay. So I'm being accused of misrepresentation, okay? Because I failed to disclose that I had this accident. Play this clip now because the guy's assuring me that I'm insured for driving Uber Eats. Yes sir, is there any other questions I can help answer for you before we go?

Just to be clear clear for that way. I get complete coverage while I'm delivering for Uber. Yes. Uber, not door dash, but yes, Uber. Clear to me. Like that is crystal clear. That'd be more specific. Okay. So clarification September, I had a incredibly minor incident in which my car touched another car. September,

2023 was it September 20? Are you looking at the year? 2023 to September, 2023. I think it was September 11th. I think it was nine 11. Quite funny. Okay.

Anyways, my cup, my car, which is, this is the worst thing that's ever happened on nine 11. My car touched another car. So I phone intact and I tell them, there was this, it was,

I don't even know if it qualifies as a collision, but I say to them, there's no damage to my car. And the woman at intact says that's good because you were driving for Uber at the time and we wouldn't have covered you. Wow. Now, so one of those sentences must be wrong. Either you're completely covered for driving Uber Eats or because you're driving for Uber Eats, you're not covered.

You know, you're just uncovering this whole new gig economy with the Uber Eats and the door dasher and how many of these drivers are uninsured? And what happens when you get in an accident when you're delivering food from McDonald's to somebody who... Well, I can't speak for the DoorDash, but I think most of the DoorDash guys are uninsured.

Well, it sounds like they're all uninsured, and it sounds like even the Uber Eats people who think they're insured are not actually insured. Now, let me clarify. I subsequently contacted Uber Eats, and they were very good. They do cover me. Well Uber Eats is covering you, but I mean,

you were told by, I have it here on the record here. Play it again, play it again. Intact is telling you. Yes sir, is there any other questions I can help answer for you before we go? Just to be clear, for that way, I get complete coverage while I'm delivering for uber yes uber not door dash but yes uber

Peter wow this is a needs further investigation like I think you're just pulling at the threads and you're unraveling the whole crooked infrastructure I think that you're like the new Peter Silverman. Watch it, buddy! Yeah, watch it. I just, anyways, I've included the transcript of that in my action against intact. So what are you seeking from intact

in this civil matter that you filed? Well, the main thing is I need them to remove the definition that I misrepresented. Because you can't get insurance. Yeah, because it's killing me. And you're 72. Your mom just gave up driving at 100. I'm 73 actually.

Are you? Okay, you don't look a day over 72, but your mom gave up driving at 100. Is that correct? Yeah. Okay, so just a little math tells me you have 28 more years of, 27 more years of driving ahead of you. I could be. So someone's gonna. Because, you know, I'm just giving people a little context that you're not winding down here.

You're just ramping up, man. 27 more years of Peter grows behind the wheel. We got to get you insured. Yeah. That's my number one priority. I'm good for a few weeks. I can relax. You're being very generous. This sucks. Okay. Help. Just roll with me. I think this sucks for you. It's going to affect your livelihood. It's going to affect the quality of your life, your family's life. Peter, we got to get you back behind the wheel where you can make more money. So is there a call to action? Like I've taken all this in. I think you got hosed here. I would like to know, are we seeking, maybe there's somebody out there who works in the automotive insurance industry and can shed some light. Like, can I give a call to

action that if anybody has listened to this story and has any good advice or any way to help you, Peter Gross, they can write me, Mike at torontomike.com and I will absolutely bring this to Peter gross, the effort hall of fame, frankly, at one point I got a quote, $6,000 a year, which would be pricey, $500 a month. But being that I can make five, six, $700 a week, I could deal with that. And then perhaps in my in my actions say there's no reason for me to have paid that much, give me some of it back, whatever. And then I was subsequently told A, you'd have to pay that $6,000 upfront, which I could

do and then B, because this quote does not include collision and because you're leasing your car, the people you're leasing your car from would need to see that you have collision. So we can't give you the quote. Yeah. You're up, you're up shits Creek without a paddle. Okay. You've, uh, use that one. Yeah. You've reached your maximum usage. Well, you know, when I was writing the description, I said you were in a pickle, but what the hell does that mean? Like I'm like, Peter Gross is in a pickle. And then I'm like, there's a lot of vinegar in that pickle.

Yeah. But what do you, what do you mean you're in a pickle? Like at least I understand Schitt's Creek without a paddle. Like that sucks, man, but you're in a pickle. What does that mean? Wasn't Schitt's Creek one of the great comedies of all time? I haven't, I haven't yet got past the first episode. So I love, I love, I'm sure you've seen the, we're going off on a tangent here. Have you seen all the commercials the actors in Schitt's Creek have been doing lately?

I saw Dan, Dan Levy and Eugene, Eugene Levy and Dan Levy doing some ads. Yeah, absolutely. Maybe they can get you in banking. Yeah. So if, if I'm just gonna, I'm going to plow ahead and I'm going to make phone calls and screaming yell on the phone somewhere. Okay. I'm glad you came in. I'm glad we got to talk about this I worry about you you're an FOTM Hall of Famer and I just want to make sure you can drive and make money for your family. Something I held on to again I take these notes in real time I take notes on different people's that I don't forget when they come over I took a note because Gene Velitas how well do you know Gene Velitas?

Well I worked with him many years ago, terrific guy, a lot of fun. Okay, so Gene has a podcast he does with Jesse Dillon, Jesse and Gene podcast or something to that effect. And Gene has let me know that there's a whole whack of Peter Gross on these old clips. Can I just play a little of something? Really? Yeah. So let's listen to this. I think we should settle the bet. Remember kids, when Jesse and Jean make bets, we don't do it for money because that's so crazy. Remember, when you're making bets, do what Jesse and Jean do. The loser has to eat dog food now what was the bet Gloria

yesterday you were gonna call the Beverly Beverly and I mentioned to you that was closed for renovations of course you didn't believe me what is Gloria know so you called them anyway and they said hi we're close for renovations so you lost the bet and you have to eat dog food now I I being the nice person so no I feel that you brought the dog food I did but I'm such a nice person that I went and I got special gourmet Dog food for you and and Gina's taught me the presentation is everything so We should describe what we have we have lovely we have lovely dog food sitting on an elegantly decorated plate with a bed of lettuce.

We've got some, looks like kibbles and bits and we've got some... What do we have here? Gourmet dog cookies. I'll be honest with you. It looks very nice, it's a little pink cookie. A little red cookie. You know, if you go to one of Peter Oliver's restaurants, there's Oliver Beaufontage. Beaufontage.

Sounded good to me. Aubergre de pommier. No, but there's another, Beaufontage, it sounded good to me, Auberg de Pamier, no but there's another one, Bozo, oh Bozo, well you admire me like I'm a two-year-old, there's Auberg de Pamier, right, there's Oliver's, and there's Beaufondier, that's right, that's right that's what I said, you got your Beaufinger there, yeah, that's right. That's right. That's what I said. You got your bow finger there. Yeah, and That's right. Bow finger. Not that he serves dog food, but he's bow finger. He's a man a man with a mind So anyway, this looks like at Peter Oliver's restaurants. The presentation is incredible. Where's Peter Gross though? Oh, hey, no, no, no, no, no, I didn't tell him. I didn't tell him We'll take the pink cookies and the red cookies after and we'll know let's do it now Yeah, I'll tell you what I eat the dog food just a week ago, okay?

And I'm going to eat the dog food because I'm not going to be a vet sculpture. Now he's going to get out of the vet. I'm not going to be... But smell this stuff. It smells awful. Seriously, it would be worth getting Gross in here just to say we got some free samples. If we can get him in here, what do we call this stuff? What do we call it?

Say it's new gourmet diet food. Yeah, but take those little cookie things off the plate, though. What little cookies? The ones that look like dogs. Okay, just take those off. Take out a picnic. Yeah, just take those little cookie things off the plate though. What little cookie? The ones that look like dog food. Okay, just take those off. Take those off. Yeah, just give them those. I'll hide the rest.

Ask him if he'll try these. Say we got new gourmet cook. Okay. You know what you wanna do at parties? Pretend we're eating. Give me some beans. Pretend we're eating. What you wanna do at parties, two kids,

is to put dog food out for pate and serve it to your guests. I'm gonna take some beans, pretend we're eating it and serve it to you. Okay. Come on, Peter. New cookies. Is he coming? Is he coming? Good, okay. Try this. Here's the seagull. Try this, come here. Seriously.

These are diet sweet cookies. They're like unbelievable. Peter's got the red one. Oh, you tricked me. What is it? These are new diet cookies, loaded full of fiber. No salt and no fat. This is dog food. Take no fat. This is dog food.

He got a good dog. So he takes another bite. Do you remember any of this, Peter? It came to me vaguely. That was a long time to get to the point. I should have listened to it before I played it. I would have edited it. But my apologies for all that. As it went along, I'm thinking... Jesse and Gene, by the way, were great, great radio hosts. Maybe ahead of their time. So what era did you work with them?

Like when abouts was this? Like for how long? Is this on Q107? What is this on? You're making a huge dog cookie in your mouth. Only you the human seagull. No, no, it was 680 news. 680.

I'm sorry, pre-680. Before, again, 1993 it goes on news. CFTR, 1990. Okay, good. Okay, so how long did you work with Jesse and Gene? I can't be sure, maybe a year, you know, because they, they, they always change the morning hosts. I think, I think Tom Rivers left and I think Jesse and Jean took over.

Cause I worked with them. And I think Jesse and Jean had it until they flipped to all news and then they literally went to 640. They could have been up to 1993. You're right. They, they, they gassed all of the radio hosts in 1993, everyone but the news team there with Dick Smythe and Evelyn Macco, wacko Macco and all, and Larry silver and all those cats. All right, Peter, I just thought I'd clear that out because I had it sitting, sitting around.

I'm like, I got to ask Peter gross. I didn't even know you worked on the Jesse and Jean show. Like I didn't know. There were some wonderful moments. I can tell you that. And they made you eat dog food, which by the way, kind of mean you, you're a good sport about it because they're trying to trick you and trick you into eating dog food. Apparently I'll eat anything. And you went back for seconds because you're a good sport. Okay. And Peter,

we're going to see if anybody reaches out and can help you. I've had some people down on their luck on this program and we've had some very good FOTM listening. I'm not down on my luck. I, everything's fine. You know, let me, let me give you a little anecdote. You're not down on your luck. You can't drive.

Can I give you an anecdote before we go? Of course. I had a delivery downtown Toronto, was it yesterday? And as I'm walking along, at random, this guy comes up to me, I don't know what his point was. He says, name two things you're happy about and the first thing I said was my mother just turned a hundred and one and I'm thrilled that she's still around and he said in the second thing I said I'm not a Palestinian so I mean everything is relative I got I got a

problem but I'm gonna getting heavy with me and I'll transcend it I'm gonna you're getting heavy with me in the theme song here. I'll transcend it I'm gonna get by I can I can go a few weeks without driving. You have perspective there are worse off people than Peter Gross right now and you might not be able to drive for a little bit but uh you'll figure that shit out and you'll you'll end up on your feet because you got a good attitude. Excellent. And that's why you're a FOTM hall of famer Peter Gross don't leave without your lasagna make sure we get a photo. It was great seeing you again. I can't wait to get you back here. Maybe with John Gallagher as a remote guest. Is that in the works?

I'm listening to the fan 590 morning show and thinking how sensational it would be if it was Gross and Gallagher save the world. You know what? You're preaching to the choir here, but I also know there's a Slim the Nun and Slim's on a go train heading out of the city right now, so that ain't gonna happen, but I agree with you. If I can get the great John Gallagher to join us remotely in You in the Basement, it would be a fun catch up and find out what's going on with him. So we're gonna try to make that happen. I'm up for it. And that brings us to the end of our 1450th show. You can follow me on Twitter and Blue Sky. I'm at Toronto Mike. Hey subscribe to a wonderful podcast called Down the

Stretch. Peter Gross hosts that show. it's wonderful, everything you ever wanted to know about Ontario horse racing, subscribe, tell your friends, down the stretch. Much love to all who made this episode possible, that's Great Lakes Brewery, a new episode of Between Two Fermenters just dropped this morning, check that out. Palma Pasta, I've got lasagna for Peter here. RecycleMyElectronics.ca. That's where you go Peter. If you have old electronics, old cables, old tech, old devices you need to get rid of, don't throw it in the garbage. Go to RecycleMyElectronics.ca. Raymond James Canada. They have a great podcast called the

Advantage Investor podcast hosted by Chris Cooksey. Subscribe and educate yourself. The Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team, their home opener at Christie Pitts is May 12th in the afternoon. Be there or be square. And of course Ridley Funeral Home, I'm going to drop a new episode of Life's Undertaking in about 10 minutes. Brad Jones kicks out the most popular funeral songs. See you all tomorrow when my special guest is Blair Packham. He's kicking out his 10 favorite protest songs. That should be fantastic and we might have a special appearance by somebody else but we'll see. That's tomorrow morning. See you all then. It's like mine, it won't go away Cause everything is rosy and gray

Well I've kissed you in France and I've kissed you in Spain