Great gear on offer at AutoShow

Subscribe to the Star to receive an Amazon Echo

One of the neat things about going to events like the Canadian International AutoShow, which opens today at the downtown Metro Toronto Convention Centre, is the opportunity to collect stuff.

You know, pamphlets, brochures, magazines, souvenir newspapers, toaster ovens — stuff like that.

Toaster ovens? I can hear a lot of you saying, “Is he nuts? Toaster ovens? Who gives away toaster ovens at the AutoShow?”

Actually, now that I think about it, maybe you could get toaster ovens at the Toronto Golf Show and not at the AutoShow. Whatever, I’m here today to tell you about something really great that you can get at the AutoShow. And you can get it at the Toronto Star booth, too.

The Star, in case you don’t know, is the media sponsor of the AutoShow and has been for years. We have a terrific booth on the main floor of the AutoShow in the North Building, right between the Kia and Subaru displays.

You won’t be able to miss us because we’re going to have a Lamborghini Huracán front-and-centre in our booth. Plus, you will find a little seating area for tuckered-out showgoers. Yes, you can rest your weary tootsies at our booth.

But here comes the good part: it’s at the Star booth where you can enter to win $50,000 toward the purchase of a new car from any dealer belonging to the Trillium Automobile Dealers Association. The Star and the TADA team up every year to give away that fabulous amount of moolah.

And on top of all that — on top of being able to look at that gorgeous Lamborghini, rest up after walking around the AutoShow for hours (there is so much to see) and entering to win $50,000 toward a new car — you can sign up to subscribe to the Star and when you do that, we will give you an Amazon Echo Dot.

Now, didn’t I tell you that you could get some great stuff at the AutoShow?

For those of you not familiar with an Echo Dot, it’s a virtual assistant. It’s a hands-free, voice-controlled device about the size of a hockey puck that uses Alexa (as distinct from Apple’s Siri) to play music, control smart home devices, make phone calls, send and receive text messages, look up information, read the news (from thestar.com, natch), set home alarms and alarm clocks, and so on.

I don’t know if it can cook your dinner, but probably.

You get this servant if you sign up to receive the Star. Team members from our circulation department will be at the booth to explain all the ins-and-outs of this deal but if I was you, I would consider it a no-brainer.

First, you get the Star delivered to your door every day. Second, you get this thing that you put in your house and you can order it around and it never argues and it does what it’s told. How can you beat that? From my perspective, the best part of this deal is the newspaper. Every day, it tells you everything you should know, from what’s happening at city hall (actually, now that I think about it, I should have written what’s not happening at city hall, like downtown relief lines, subways to Scarborough, Gardiner Expressway realignment and on and on), to how the Leafs are really doing this season, to where to get the best tandoori chicken, to Ellie’s advice column that we all read and why the stock market really isn’t crashing.

Now, I know you can read those same Toronto Star stories on your laptop, tablet and smartphone, but it’s just not the same. I mean, the idea of using the toilet and reading your phone is just not on. But there is a more serious reason why you should subscribe to the Star.

You can read a newspaper all day and the worst thing that can happen is you get a little ink on your hands. Try reading your smartphone all day and your eyes will automatically adjust to reading the smaller type and when you decide to do something else, like peel potatoes or mow the lawn, you’ll swear you’re going blind because everything will be blurry and it’ll take an hour for your peepers to return to normal.

So reading the paper is better for your vision.

Plus, there are coupons in the paper that save you money. And advertising that directs you to the best deals in the shops. I guarantee if you read the paper faithfully for a week, you will save so much that you will actually make money.

Which means you can’t afford not to subscribe to the Star.

See you at the AutoShow, everybody! Speaker series: Motorists and the legalization of marijuana

A new feature at the Canadian International AutoShow this year is the Automotive Intelligence Series, a series of panel discussions on pressing issues facing the automobile industry and consumers.

On Saturday, a panel of experts will discuss and debate the upcoming legalization of marijuana in Canada as it applies to motorists and lawenforcement agencies.

The session, “Cannabis and Cars: Are We Ready?,” will be held in Room 801on the 800 level of the South Building at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, starting at 1 p.m.

The moderator will be Barb DiGiulio, host of The Night Side on Newstalk 1010. Panellists will include a representative of the Colorado Department of Transportation, where the drug has been legal for several years, and members of the OPP, as well as others.

To register to attend this session, which is free to anyone who buys a ticket to attend the AutoShow, go to autoshow.ca and click on Features and Promotions. Seating is limited.