The other side of the world

And just in case you didn't believe we were actually in Australia (you know, down under), here are a couple of pictures to prove it...

(Sunnier) Sydney

OK, so it snowed in Melbourne, but at least it was outside and didn't actually affect us as we left, to go straight into the bloody coldest November day in Sydney for a 100 years. This certainly was not in the brochure, and Tina had to go and buy a fleece from the chinese market around the corner to keep warm!!!!!

To its credit, it did get a bit warmer (so much so I could wear shorts on the last day), but waiting a week for the warm weather was not what we wanted.

We were a bit keen on the first day, as we actually got to the visitor information shop before it opened (stupid lazy Australians not getting to work before 9:30).

So anyway, we're in Sydney so we visit all the places you might possibly expect, Hyde Park, Kings Cross, Oxford Street, Liverpool Street etc., and also some you might not, Opera House, Harbour Bridge, Bondi Beach. Here's some pictures from the latter three, note Tina looking not too warm at the beach.






We went on a tour around the opera house (something to do I suppose), and went in most of the theatres. One had some ballet types doing a warm up, they are so stretchy. The only real bit of info I remember from the tour guide was that the largest crowd was for Crowded House's farewell concert, about 110,000 people, and he seemed quite put out that the record was for a 'rock concert', and that kind of thing would never happen again. Also he was the first person I have met in many years to use the word 'Negro'.

We also went into the Aquarium (mostly because it was inside, but also so Tina could 'find Nemo', she even bought a t-shirt that pretty much says as much). We saw some usual fish type things, and also some tropical fish type things. Here's some interesting(?) fish type pictures.








We also went into a small Animal type place, although Tina rushed through the first section as it was filled by bugs, which she didn't really want to look at. She was a bit better with the reptiles, but not so much.

To keep up the tall tower theme started in Melbourne, we went up Sydney's version too (no song to accompany us this time though).





We also went to the Australian museum. We saw lots of Aboriginal stuff, and lots of skeletons of various animals. I think that's it, it didn't really leave a big impression......ooooh, except they were excavating a Dinosaur in Canada (Dinosaur Park or something) and had brought bits of it back in a special display which you could touch.

On one of the days I wanted to eat here (for reasons obvious to some), but it was a bit pricey so I settled for a photo instead.



One of the best bits of Sydney, though, was walking along the street in my Spurs shirt, and having a cyclist shout 'Come on you Spurs' as he cycled past.

Party time

T'was the work Christmas party yesterday.

It wasn't as good as last year, but it was good all the same. We went to OL for lunch (it is a steak bar, no steak on the lunch menu though), and I didn't actually find the food as good as it normally is, although the warm bread was just as good.

We then went to (Vodka) Bar Revolution around the corner for about 6 hours, played some games, did some dancing, talked to lots of people, you know, the usual things. Only had a few vodkas though, which I think was very sensible of me. One good thing was that they had a promotion on where you could pay a pound to the bar staff when buying your drinks, and then, if you win a toss of a coin, you get your whole round again for free (well, for the pound you've already paid). I saw at least two thirty pounds plus rounds being doubled for us.

Afterwards we went to Baraka (at Mel's suggestion) which was playing hard house music (very Christmassy, Mel seemed to like it though), so I didn't last long at went home about 12.

It's funny, I was pacing myself to drink all day, and when I left I really didn't feel that drunk, just tired, unlike some of the other people who had got that far, and today I feel tired, and my head and stomach aren't right, but I'm well enough. Tina told me not to get toooooooooo drunk (she described an act that would constitute toooooooooo drunk) so I was good(ish).

I thought this would be it with regards to work for me this Christmas, but I have to go in on 1 day next week to support our offshore partners in India, hopefully they won't bother me much.

Don't Shoot!!!!!

Still no pictures, and I don't know what to do about it really, maybe I'll copy them and take them into work and upload them from there.

On Wednesday Tina (yes, you heard correctly) came with me to see the Rifles at the Electric Ballroom. The ticket said doors at 7, when in reality they opened at 7:50, which is fine in the summer months, but not in cold December, and particularly when we weren't dressed for standing outside (although we did see a couple of touts having an argument, which lightened the mood albeit briefly).

We were still one of the first in, and obviously everybody was too cool to pick a position to watch the gig as the whole 'dance floor' area was pretty empty, save for us and another couple, until the first band came on.

We had two support bands to see, the first being Speed Circus, who I thought were very good, entertaining on stage (they had santa introduce them), good rapport with each other, a bassist who needed to pull his trousers up, and some toe-tappingly good music.

The second support act was the On-offs, who, with a lead singer who looked like he was on drugs, knocking over the guitar player after about 30 seconds, and basically being a tad erratic through the set, didn't really have the tunes to pull it off.

The main act were very, very good. I might be biased as I really like the album, but all the songs they played were great, and I really liked Local Boy, Peace & Quiet and Narrow Minded Social Club. The crowd was a bit more jumpy than I expected, and being at the front we got squashed and covered in beer, but it was good. Also I was impressed with the guitarist's outfit of a frilly shirt (still with its out-of-the-box creases), sunglasses and top hat. It actually looked pretty cool.

Oh, we also bumped into Tim Lovejoy, Tubes and Fenners off of Soccer AM (This is a fan site link, it is more interesting than the official one). Very brief conversation though as they were surrounded by people wanting pictures.

He's got no hair but we don't care

Martin, Martin Jol!

It seems if you google image search Martin Jol (current Spurs manager), the picture of him with me comes up as the 8th one found

It's only words

So I'm having problems with pictures, so until further notice this will be just words, which is quite annoying as I have some things to say about Australia that really need the pictures to accompany them.

Not a lot going on recently, I went to see the Levellers on Sunday, they were OK, despite the fact I only knew two songs. I liked the support acts too, Benji and Three Daft Monkeys. I'm not really sure I should be admitting to enjoying the concert as it was really folk music, and it could be a slippery slope from here. I was mostly enjoying the violins I think, I'm sure it never sounded like that when I played one. There wasn't as many old hippy types there as I expected, but there were still a few, face painted, drinking cider, but, you know, whatever makes you happy I guess.

We've also pretty much finished Christmas shopping, I hope everybody likes boomerangs!

Stupid pictures

I have a problem uploading pictures, they all end up like this, anyone got any ideas what is wrong?

Laid back Australians

Obviously nobody told the stewards and police at the cricket about the laid back Australian stereotype. Here are a few examples of the 'strict' rules put in place at the first test at the Gabba in Brisbane.

1) The official 'Barmy Army' trumpet player was evicted on the first morning for causing a disturbance.
2) Three guys were prevented from entering the ground as they had 'water melon' hats which apparently could have been used as weapons
3) Backpacks were a complete no-no due to terrorist fears
4) Anyone found singing too loudly were asked to sit down and be quiet, if not, eviction was the order of the day
5) And god forbid if you tried to start a mexican wave

Melbourne

I was going to start these Australia updates with an adjective describing the place, starting with the first letter (e.g. Magnificent Melbourne), except I couldn't think of one, hence the rather uninspiring title. Murky maybe could have come close.

So, you've probably gathered by now that Melbourne wasn't our most favourite place. I think what did it, really, was the awful, awful weather, which meant we both had to wear the jumper and coat we were each reserving for our return journey (knowing we would be landing here in December). As it turns out it is actually warmer here today that the day we landed there.

We met up with Brian, who is notionally on sabbatical there for a few months having failed miserably to find any work, and he showed us the, erm, sights I guess you can call them. We walked through the Casino (as it was inside), we went to the library (inside), travelled around on the tram (inside), went up a tall tower with an observation deck (guess where) and also visitied the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG, or 'The G' as locals call it). Here is a picture of me on the pitch



We weren't allowed in the changing rooms as there were players milling around from the match the day before or something (maybe it was just their dirty underwear that was milling around), which I was a bit disappointed with, but we did see all the other areas, it's a long way down from the top row of seats (The stadium holds 90-odd thousand or something, which is a ludicrous amount of people for a cricket match, though the ground does host other sports too).



We were also supposed to meet up with my step-cousin (that's correct isn't it, cousin sort of by marriage), but an ice-cream emergency at her workplace meant she was called in, or something.

We were only there two days really, and the second day jet-lag really hit and we basically slept during the day, missing out on the acquarium which we had saved. We went out and at at the docklands area which was quite trendy, if a bit empty (I blame the weather). It actually snowed just outside Melbourne on the day we left!!!

Oh, one more thing, at the Rialto tower, there was a 20 minute video thing afterwards, which I'm guessing was intended to show all the things to do in Melbourne (Grand Prix, Aussie Rules Football, fairground etc.). All I remember (and I say that loosely) is the accompanying song that went something like this: -

"Oh yeah, Melbourne, it's so great, ooooooooooooooooh, it's the neverending city, such a great place, Melbourne, there's so much to do, do, do, do, do, yeah, it's the best, get out there and do stuff, yeah, yeah, yeah, doobie, doobie, do, Melbourne, whoooaaaah, come on, did I tell you its neverending? Oh yeah"

or maybe it was worse than that, all I know is that Tina was pissing herself laughing after about 10 seconds of it.

Oh yeah, I also had a drunken argument with a Scot in a pub after he accused me of cheating at our pool game, I hate that, I m so honest (that isn't to say that I wasn't accidentally fouling the ball, who knows).

Parental Advisory

Now, I have actually tried not to swear much on these pages as maybe small children are reading, so, any small children that are reading this should turn away.......now.....

Good, now we're all adults, I just thought I would write and say how shocked I was to hear the following words on daytime radio here in Queensland, I'm such a prude....

Shit, Bastard, Prick, Twat, Dickhead.....and then to top it all off, preceded by a cursory "This song has bad words in it", Fucked........

I'm pretty sure if I'd listened long enough a Bitch, Cock or Arse would have slipped in there too...

OK, I think the shock was actually hearing the words on radio rather than the words themselves, but anyway

By popular demand

For the millions that read this and have been eagerly awaiting news about our holiday in Australia, please note that the reason this blog (short for weblog) hasn't really been updated is not because I am too busy or lazy (well the first one at least), but because we have little to no internet connection worth speaking about (note I am in a library writing this).

Rest assured that Tina will be sending a SPAM email when she gets home with details, and these pages will also be updated to include wonderful pictures and stories to amuse you, maybe.

As a side note, the two unidentified players in the previous post were Mike Hussey and Stuart Clark, and all five players made significant impact on the test defeat, so if I could have injured them somehow it would have been much better.

We're all the same

Unfortunately, Internet access is at a premium so all my stories that have pictures attached will have to wait until I get back home.

Here's one that doesn't though. On our flight from Sydney to Brisbane we were sat in row 7. In row 6 were Glenn McGrath, Ricky Ponting, Justin Langer, John Buchanan and two unidentifiable (by me anyway) other players. There isn't really another class of seats on the plane but it was still strange to see them up so close. The bad news is that Glenn Mcgrath said he was feeling fit which is always a bad sign for the English, we'll see on Thursday at the first test match though.

Oh, and Justin Langer seemed a moody git.

From a land down under

Yep, the men at work song was the first thing we heard when we got into our taxi at Melbourne airport, very amusing. Less so is the weather which is, in a word, awful. It is cold, wet and windy, and we didn't really pack many cold weather clothes....oh well, we'll have to huddle together for warmth (although Sydney where we are headed in about an hour is supposed to be warmer, but still wet).

More details to follow.....

Fireworks are dangerous

OK, so it was bonfire night last Sunday, and we went to Wendy and David's house for a do it yourself display. The garden isn't the biggest, though the fact they have one in London is something, but we figured we would be OK. The fireworks were bog standard quality (from Tescos I think) and all was going swimmingly until one didn't go up but actually headed straight towards David. Luckily he turned away, it bounced off him at us but eventually exploded in front of us in a bush, very loud, bright and scary. David was OK, except he had a hole burnt in his jacket.

So maybe we'll go to an organised display next year.

What I want to know, however, is what actually inspires people into thinking that this is a good idea????

Is that supposed to be scary....

Just to reiterate the fact that it takes ages after an event to actually post on here about it, I have a quick comment about Halloween last week....

Now, I always think of traditional trick or treaters being small groups of small childen (possibly cute, I don't know, I don't think I'm the best person to comment on these things) with a bucket and nothing threatening.

It seems in Watford though, trick or treaters are really either small groups of threatening looking teenage boys, possibly with one mask between them, or small groups of girls, who appear to believe that halloween means dressing in as little as possible (as opposed to every other weekend, when they, er, OK, it's just the same as any other weekend).

Suffice to say neither got anything from me, cos I don't answer the door!

Watch your step!

I pretty much know that, as I am sure about most other blogs out there, that only people who know me will be reading this. As people who know me would know, I am a very honest person and quite likely to have told you any story I would put on here, which means that it could also prove less interesting reading this. On this theme, I would never put anything on here that I wouldn't tell somebody in person. This isn't a forum for me to air my views, to get anything off my chest or to reveal any deep, dark secrets (do I have any of those, they must be very deep as I can't think of any), it is just for fun.

I do have some things that I don't think I have ever told anybody, sometimes for no particular reason other than that the subject has never come up, and so I thought I would share one of them...

For as long as I can remember, whenever I have been walking alone, I always try to avoid stepping on cracks where possible (obviously if the pavement is little crazy paving or something then it is unavoidable, unless I walk in the road, which I would do if possible). Not only this, I also take an odd number of steps on each segment inbetween each crack. Normally this will be one step, or sometimes three. This means I am always planning my next steps, taking long or short strides accordingly, maybe using an adjoining segment to take one step in. I don't know if anybody has ever noticed me doing this, obviously I'm too busy planning my steps to notice people's reactions.

I am not crazy, it is just a habit...

Studying....

is tiring work it seems. Tina has just started at the Open University to finish off her degree. Here is a picture of her studying hard.

The Horror Show?

For some reason I always seem to be behind on my posts (I still have another Oot and Aboot one to do....) and here is no exception....I suppose it doesn't matter, as if you post immediately then you might not have time to reflect, but if you don't then you might forget things

About two weeks ago now I went to the NME Rock n Roll Riot tour at the Astoria. Normally on these things you would see three or four upcoming bands with decent reputations, although my main reason for attending was to see the Fratellis. I like the Astoria as it has unreserved seating, which means if we get there early enough we can sit down (which to old people like me is important). We did have some tube issues so ended up walking down Tottenham Court Road from Euston, which did mean walking past Spearmint Rhinos, which was interesting as I didn't know where it was really.

The first band on were quite clearly the most memorable. They've even been on the front of NME which is some feat, they are The Horrors. I'd love to tell you what their music was like, but I can't because it was simply the loudest thing I've ever heard at a concert. It was dark on stage so you couldn't really make out what the band were doing, except the keyboard player who was kind of hunched down, knees bent swaying from side to side. The lead singer (if 'sing' is the right word) stalked the stage, shouting incomprehensible lyrics, and at one point joined the mosh pit (if that is the right word, seemed like a lot of kids swaying to be honest). At the end hey smashed a guitar, which I thought for a reletively young band might prove expensive. The kids seemed to love them, my ears didn't, and Susie complained of hers ringing the next day. I did see the singer milling around the bar later (he had a distinictive white checked waistcoat on, you can see him in it here), and asked him whether they smashed a guitar every day, and even then he was hard to understand. I got the fact that the guitar cost £90, but it was either a 'spare' or a 'spur' and it was the first time they had done that. I heard a song of theirs on XFM the other day, could still only make out some of the words!!!!!

Bands two and three, The Dykeenies and The Maccabees passed me by, can't even remember anything specific about them, although the former are Scottish.

The Fratellis were good I thought, played all their album plus some other songs, and I think they have a fairly strong album. They also ended on a cover of Goldfrapp's Ooh La La, which sounded pretty good too.

Back to the loudness though, do you think this means I'm getting too old to go to young people's concerts, and should maybe start attending, I don't know, James Blunt, or maybe Daniel O'Donnell shows?

My laptop is kinda broken....

It fell of the table, and now it won't charge, think the pin or something is broken....anyway, seems it is going to cost a minimum of £130 (that appears to be the charge just to pick the thing up and look at it, not even to fix it) which is scandelous as, apparently, this kind of thing isn't covered under the accidental damage warrenty, cheeky bastards.....maybe my father in law can help (hope so, need my cash for Australia in two weeks or so)

I fell out of bed this morning...

the 'other' side of the bed too, don't know what I was doing all the way over there. Luckily I wasn't hurt at all (physically anyway)...

Celebrity spotting

not that I ever partake in it, I could probably walk past even the most famous person on the street and not recognise them, but I managed to recognise a familiar face at Little Britain last week. The show was very good, by the way. It was the first time I'd been to that kind of thing (you know, a sketch show in stage format) but it was pretty funny (obviously all the same characters, in slightly different sketches, with a bit of ad-libbing here and there).

Anyway, I was on my way back from the toilet during the break when I walked past a shortish woman with short, curly, blonde hair. I had a few more sneaky looks and then asked Tina whether she thought it looked like Kylie Minogue, which she did. Woo! During the second half I was distracted a bit by her being there (whe was a couple of rows behind us). She definitely enjoyed herself, and confirmed it was her by waving frantically at David Walliams at the end of the show and the hurrying off backstage after the show....how exciting.

I told Amelia (a real celebrity spotter, she recognised the cast of Chicago outside the theatre) she would have wet herself with excitement had she been there...

Room with a view

In case anybody is interested, my rooms in Toronto looked a bit like this: -







I was going to take a picture of my washing machine and tumble dryer to assist with this story, but forgot, so you'll just have to use your imagination.

Now, the setup was that the top loading washer was below the front loading dryer. I wasn't exactly sure what to do, so I asked Albert and he said to basically just stick the washing in and pour the washing powder over it, and he also told me the settings and buttons to press, which seems easy enough.....except I didn't actually know which one was the washer (having never seen a top loading washing machine before, I think you can see where this is going) so I put the clothes in, poured the powder over the clothes, closed the door, pushed the buttons and then looked down to where the washing machine had started......all well and good you might say, except my clothes were actually in the dryer. So, this basically left me with washing powder all over the dryer (and floor) once I got the clothes out, but I never did it again, so I did learn something, stupid top loading washine machines.

Nobody loves me

or at least my blog, as I've only had two visitors this week.....of course there is nothing new to read, but that's not the point.....I'm very tired from all the driving I've done to day....Victoria and back (1hr each way) and then Manchester and back (4 1/2 hrs there, 2 1/2 hrs back), and I had to put up with 90 minutes of tedium as England couldn't get past Macedonia's defence, oh well, hopefully Wembley will be ready soon and I won't have to do that drive any more

Dirty stop-out

Did you know that Tina didn't come home on Tuesday?

She went to some seminar/presentation thing with work, which apparently had free drinks.......add in a pretty bad day at work and no dinner and I think you can guess what kind of state she was in....I knew something might have to happen when she called me at 12:15, saying she was in a cab to Victoria, which is pretty much the wrong direction, and she told me about 10 times she was "shit-faced". Anyway, after I pointed out she probably wouldn't be able to get a tube back to Euston she said she would get a cab back there and call me once you knew what she was doing.....

About 15 minutes later I got a call from some girl (Irish I am led to believe, and apparently I've met her, I don't remember that) saying that she thought Tina was too sick to get a train home and she should stay with her, which was fine by me. It seems that Tina threw up immediately they got out of the cab at Euston, and then also once they got to her house, good girl kept it in during the cab ride though.

Fair play though, she didn't look too bad when I saw her the next day.

Look....

Here's a picture of me in a tie, it doesn't happen often (I had to buy new ties to take to Canada)...



Also here's one of me, er, well it's self explanatory I think...

Festival of virgins....

OK, maybe not (although that might be interesting....), but on my last day in Toronto we went to the 1st annual (bit presumptious I think) Virgin Music Festival on Centre Island. Obviously being the 1st there was a slow take-up on the tickets (they were still on sale on the day) which maybe never happens in this country any more, but the line-up was pretty good.

The queuing system to get on the boat was pretty funny. Basically we were all bunched up together and then walked slowly in 10 metre blocks until we were about 20 meteres away from the security checking bags etc. We were then allowed to go 5 people at a time, but was based on trust, and everyone was so civilised. Once we got to the security though they weren't exactly the most thorough in checking the bags. In fact, my check went something like this: -

Me : "Do you want to look in my bag"
Security : "Have you got any recording equipment in there?"
Me : "Nope"
Security : "Off you go"

We got there for kick-off (which was around 12) although obviously the organisation wasn't quite honed as they were still setting up. We found out later that three of the crew boats had capsized on the way, which is quite scary really. The weather had been quite wet and the grass was quite damp, but it was nothing compared the state I've seen Glastonbury.

The first band on the main stage was Obijou, who looked like they were petrified. They were also the kind of soft spoken jangly music I wouldn't normally bother listening to let alone seeing in concert, but they passed the time, and Chris seemed to like them.



Following these were MeanRedSpiders. Now we could stand about two songs of this lot, as the lead singer was neither pretty or could sing, and her wailing was pretty unbearable. We left, grabbed some pizza, and wandered over to the other stage. Grabbing the pizza was a bit of an effort as, in order to get any food or drinks, you had to pre buy tokens at one of two stands. In fact, I think they could possibly have had a few more stalls and stands with stuff to do, but maybe as it was the 1st one it was difficult to get sposorship.

On the other stage was some band just finishing, and then we got David Ford. Now this guy was from England, and played 5 or 6 instruments on stage, using recording equipment to tie them all together. He reminded me of David Gray a bit, not his voice but it was similar music. However, it was very dull, and he annoyed me a lot by constantly slagging off England, and saying things like "This song is about the death of the coal industry"* when it quite clearly was about him breaking up with some girl. Also, all his songs sounded the same, so we left halfway through him too.

Back at the mian stage and we had possibly the best band we saw, Phoenix. They were from France so obviously had something about them to be there, and all the songs they played, even though I hadn't heard any of them (although it turned out later I had heard one) were good to bounce along to. When I get round to it I'll listen to some more of their stuff.

Next up were the Hidden Cameras and The Dears. We didn't really catch much of either, although the former had a good tune to start with, as we frequented the Bacardi B~Live tent for some cocktail type things. We had 7 each I believe. Also there were girls in gold bikinis serving.

Next up were Starsailor on the other stage. Now the last time I saw Starsailor at Glastonbury I was about a mile back. This time I just wandered up a minute before they were due on and got to the front row, very weird feeling that for a bad who are pretty popular in this country. They were very good as well, and as we knew the next act on the main stage would be delayed we stayed for most of the set, with only one song I knew not being played which was great. Lead singer bloke also kept lookng in my direction as I knew a lot of the words (actually I reckon he was checking out the girl to my left, but whatever).



At the main stage we had some more Brits with Muse. Now when I saw them before at Glastonbury I reckon I was halfway home I was so far back. Also it was very cold and I was tired an didn't enjoy them much. This time I was much more into it, and the singer's red jump suit looked good. They played mostly singles which is what I'd expect from a festival, but they cut their set short by about 20 minutes as they were running late.

Gnarls Barkley followed with a set that was quite dull, except for the obvious sing-a-long single Crazy. Lead singer bloke kept spouting rubbish between songs as a build up but it wasn't good. They looked nice in their red and white gospel costumes though.

Everything was about 30 minutes late now and we thought that the DJ set of Kid Koala might have been canned. But he still same out and played for about 20 minutes, and he was superb, especially his scratch mixing of Moon River.

He was supposed to be playing whilst the stage was being set for the Flaming Lips (here is a picture of the singer bloke watching Ohbijou)



but even after he finished they spent another 20 minutes or so setting up. This brought us to 10:40, with the show supposedly finishing at 11 there was a problem, and at 11:10 the show was abruptly brought to an end less than halfway through their alloted time. I've seen them before so it was OK for me, but I felt sorry for the people who had gone there just to see them play.

As a side note, during the lips set the singer comes out in a big bubble and surfs the crowd. A girl just behind me was cought off balance and would have fallen over had I not steadied her. As thanks she invited me to the Eagles of Death Metal (who had been playing elsewhere) afte show party at some hotel somewhere. I was a bit dubious when she said we should meet at the first tree on the left after the show, and so, suffice to say I wasn't partying with any eagles later that night (although I did stay out until 5, which probably wasn't the best idea as it meant I got up late on the Sunday and had 10 minutes to pack to come home).

All in all though, it was well worth the ludicrously cheap ticket (70 dollars maybe).

* Note he never actually said this, I just can't remember exactly what he did say as it was all rather boring

Guess what time I got up yesterday?

If you said 6 o'clock PM you would have been correct. It wasn't beause I was tired, it's just because I didn't want to (although I got up about 3 to make myself a sandwich to eat in bed).......today was a much more civilised 3 o'clock PM...

Oot and Aboot in Canadia (part II)

Now for another of the things that I did whilst in Toronto. I guess the most distinctive landmark is the CN tower, which is allegedly the tallest free standing building in the world, or something. It is pretty tall, and I know that taking the lift up made me feel a little queasy (only a little). Once at the top it did give pretty impressive views of Toronto, although the city side was only averagely interesting. Here's some pictures (note the building in front of the tower in the first picture is where I was working): -





Whilst I was waiting in the queue to go from the main area to the sky-pod....



I was subjected to the following stupid American conversation: -

American Mum - "Why do we need to go up to the sky-pod"
American kid (about 17) - "Because it's quite a long way up and we'll get a better view"
Mum - "How far up?"
Kid - "There's a thing on the wall behind, let's look"
Mum - "OK, it says we are at 1100ft, and the sky-pod is at 1400ft. Wow, that's an extra 500ft, we should definitely go"

At least the kid knew how to handle a camera, this is me sat on the glass floor which you can basically look straight down at the floor from: -



here's a couple more pictures from Niagara too, one of me on the maid in the mist and one looking down on it

Look at my horizons, they're so broad

As I was in Toronto for 6 weeks or so, I felt the need to be a bit creative with my diet, so I went to the following different types of restaurant (obviously with regular trips to regular ones too): -

• Japanese
• Korean
• Vietnamese
• Chinese
• Italian (a few of these)
• Greek
• Moroccan
• French

And also ate the following food for the first time (of which I liked them all)

• Oysters
• Lobster
• Bison
• Ostrich
• Frog (well the legs anyway)

I know that these aren't particular to Canada, but it's not as if I go out to eat much here so it was a good opportunity, and Chris was always up for anything.

My alcohol experimentation didn't quite stretch so far, mostly sticking to local beers (which were pretty good, I very rarely felt ill after even the heaviest sessions).

Just in case.....

you were sat there worried whether I had got my luggage yet, it arrived safe and sound yesterday at 9:30pm. I had forgotten to lock it though so I had a quick check that nobody had made off with my dirty clothes......surprisingly they hadn't.

10 Things...

5 Things I liked about Canada

• People - mostly very friendly, although I couldn't understand it when people said my accent was cute, it quite clearly isn't
• Toronto - very clean, pretty by the lakes, enough nightlife (although it might be liable to get a bit dull doing the same stuff every week). Also there seems to be plenty to do at weekends (during the summer at least)
• My hotel (Soho Metropolitan) - Very good location downtown, within walking distance to work and also to a lot of restaurants and bars.
• Roads and Drivers - all drivers mostly considerate to pedestrians, and don't drive too fast around town (save for cabs who could be as mental as anywhere).
• Bars - or more to the point, the fact that they all had waitresses. Much better lark than having to queue up for 15 minutes to get your own drinks. Yes you had to tip them but it was worth it (except when I was told off for not tipping one, she was from England as well, cheeky cow didn't get a tip after that either)

5 Things I disliked about Canada

• Taxes - Maybe it's just me, but I like the price I see on the price list to be the price I pay, and not have to worry about adding on extra taxes at the time of the bill. This becomes particularly important when you are on a budget for food.
• Weather - This is what suprised me. I thought it would be nice but instead I get humidity, thunderstorms, thick fog (possibly smog), cold evenings, hot days, cold days, wet days.....yes we got some good days, but it just wasn't what I expected.
• "I was like, Oh my god!!! That was awesome, and then she was like, no way, that totally sucked"
• Beer - Nice but very expensive. Also, a pain that there are so few shops that sell it, and that at events you still have to drink it in a pen. Also the fact we were ID'd everywhere meant that, as Chris forgot his a couple of times (not having a driving licence meant he needed his passport) meant we were disallowed entry.
• TV - Too many advert breaks, and most of them awful. Infomercials for weight loss or some other such miracle cure were abundant, and most programming worth avoiding. Also the sports coverage left a lot to be desired.

OI!

Not too happy at the moment, stupid BA have 'misplaced' my suitcase so I'm waiting to hear from them about it (at least it got me out of having to do my washing). Seems that quite a few bags from my flight went missing as there were other people in the same boat.

Also, I get back to find my favourite music channel (VH2) has been replaced by MTV Flux. The same thing happened last year when the Amp was replaced by some fluffy chart channel, stupid NTL!!!

still at work, what's that all about?

I was going to update my blog this evening with more pictures and chat about what I have done in Toronto, but it looks like it's going to be a late one at work so I won't get the chance......I probably shouldn't have had those beers and shots at lunchtime though (the shots were on the house at Alice Fazoolis, which was nice), I'm feeling very sleepy........

Sport, Sport, Sport, Sport

As I've previously stated, I went to a baseball game featuring the Blue Jays and the White Sox a few weeks ago. It wasn't the most interesting game I've been to, but there was always something happening. Maybe I just didn't get the nuances and subtleties but it all seemed very samey. Also the crowd didn't seem that interested to be honest.



I've also been to see some Tennis (Rogers Cup) for the first time too. We were hoping to see Andy Murray, but he played in the afternoon session, but instead we did get Roger Federer, who was amazing, particularly in the first set. We got two matches, Federer's was first and then we had a double match to watch between Martin Damm/Leander Paes and two other guys. I only remember those names because there was a very annoying guy sat near us who was almost constantly chanting.....

*slap* *slap* *clap* *clap* *slap* *slap* *clap* *clap* Let's go Martin, Let's go Pai-es, Let's Go *clap* *clap* Let's Go!! *clap* *clap*




Going to the Tennis the cab driver had no idea where to go, and coming back the cab driver took us the long route (which Chris was none too happy about as he has a pretty good idea about which direction we were going).

Another sport I've seen whilst here was the World Dragon Boat Championships, which was cool for about half an hour, but again got a bit samey, but it was quite a good spectacle watching the twenty strong crew paddling in unison, and we also saw a british team (they didn't win).



I like sport...now, everybody join in.....*slap* *slap* *clap* *clap*

Imagine if I lived alone

This half full glass of water has been sat on the coffee table since Wednesday, man I'm such a slob.....

Oot and Aboot in Canadia (part I)

There's still lots I haven't told you about, so these are going to be a brief selection of some of the other things I've been up to here, starting with my weekend cottaging.

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My first weekend, after having only been here two days, was spent at some guy, called Asmatali, from RBC's cottage in Muskoka (which is about a 2-3 hour drive away). I'd never even talked to the guy before but he was very friendly. On the way we stopped off at what was allegedly the most famous and popular burger place on the way. Admittedly it was very busy (possibly because it was in a good place to stop on the main road) but I thought the burger was decidely average (albert also agreed), but you know, it did, and even though we got there about 11 the queues were getting bigger.

The cottage was situated on a lake (Asmatali had built it himself over a large number of years) which, combined with the gorgeous weather, meant it was going to be a good weekend.









Being on the lake meant that Asmatali owned his own pedal boat and canoe, of which we tried both. The pedal boat was ludicrously slow, whilst we couldn't quite get the hang of the canoe and kept going round in circles, but you know, we can handle these things.




Now, apparently, when you are out on the lake you are supposed to have some standard safetly equipment, a lifejacket, a rope (45ft minimum), a whistle and flares. Also, you aren't supposed to use them under the influence of alcohol. When we went out on the peddleboat, we can't have got more than 100 yards away from the platform where we left from, when we were pulled over by the police in a speedboat (which was the last thing I expected). They pulled up beside us (thankfully not asking us to step out of the vehicle) saying they were spot checking for safetly equipment. Now, we had our lifejackets on, but no rope, whistle or flares. Asmatali had seen them as well, and was a bit worried, as being the owner of the craft meant he was liable to a $120 fine per missing equipment. Luckily they worked out we weren't Canadian (not sure how) and let us off with a warning. Probably a good job they hadn't seen us necking beers all day.

That evening we had curry for dinner. Asmatali had aksed his wife to make it the least amount of spicy she could, which, as you've probably already guessed, was still too spicy for me. Luckily I had had plenty of beers to dull the taste a bit.

Day two was spent most of the same, sitting in the sun, drinking beer, cooking on a barbeque and generally chilling out. It was great. What I hadn't thought about was the fact that I was slowly burning in the sun, and I had ludicrous sun burnt and peeling skin for days after that. My pass to get into the building here has a picture of me sunburnt on it. We didn't have burgers on the way home. The ones I'd cooked on the bbq were miles better.

By the pool

C'est What is Andre's favourite pool place here in Toronto, even though there are others within walking distance, such as Rivoli (which I prefer as the pool tables are more of a challenge, and sometimes they play british music), he does always prefer to go to there.... I think it's mainly for the range of drinks they provide but who knows....

Doesn't matter, here's some pictures of us enjoying it there...




We are playing English rules here, although I have had a few (drunken) games against some Canadian guys. One time I could just about make out the balls, let alone get the rules. I don't think there are many differences.....the big ones I've noticed is that you have to call every shot (although normally only if it isn't obvious), you only ever have one shot and any foul whilst on the black means you lose the game....Anyway, I've won 3 and lost 3 in these games so I must be doing something alright and local knowledge doesn't rule....

Beer Fest - woohoo

Now seems as good a time as any to tell you about the Beer Festival I went to a couple of weeks ago.

Now Chris and I had been up drinking until about 4 o'clock the previous day, so when we woke up (at about 2:30 for me) we weren't exactly in a beer drinking mood, but, having nothing else to do, we thought we would wander down anyway, maybe just stay for an hour or two and generally take it easy.

The first thing that struck me that this was going to be slightly different to the beer festivals back in England was that it was outside, and not in some big hall. Allied to the fact that it was a gorgeous day this meant I was a bit worried I might get suburnt (I probably only didn't because we got therelate afternoon). It cost $25 to get in (which I thought was a tad steep) and we got 5 beer tokens for that (all the beer was purchased with tokens).

The second and third big differences I noticed were that, rather than there being lots of older guys with beards and clipboards, the clientel was rather more young and pretty. Also, there was a stage with bands playing constantly throughout the day. This made it feel more like I was at a music festival, which was great.

After our initial hesitancy about coming, we soon got stuck in, sampling beer from Canada, Germany, Brazil and Scotland amongst other places, some of it nice, some of not so. I also had some Mead for the first time. Here I am next to the Kokanee picture



But this festival was not only about beer, there was a human table football set up in the Carlsberg tent (which we never played as we were busy elsewhere), and also an exhibition from the Toronto Argonauts. So, being the sporty type I was, I had a go and throwing and receiving. Throwing I was rubbish at as I couldn't get the spiral and the ball was spinning all over the place (even with the coaching), catching I was pretty good at though.




Apart from the sports, there was also a couple of poker tents in which the games were free to enter, so of course we played a couple of times. The first time the game was over pretty quick as there was a guy who was betting very aggresively and was also very lucky. The second time was much better though. I had trouble starting though and I got down to just 1 chip. This meant if I was to have any chance then I would have to get some good hands and keep doubling up, which I did. There were then three of us left, with Chris and some other guy making up the numbers. The bets were getting higher and so at one point, I was against Chris in a head to head to see who would stay in. We were playing texas hold-em, and when the 'flop' came I was in trouble. I could see that I needed a 4 or an 8 to win, and told everybody so. The 4th card didn't help, but the 5th came out a 4 and I was still in by the skin of my teeth. So it was just me against this guy, who was still ahead of me on chips, and we had a bit of a battle until it came to the last hand. Now I was in an even more precarious position this time, when only a 9 on the 5th card could have given me the win, so again I made everyone aware that was what I needed, and lo and behold, a 9 duly arrived, I was the champion, won a free CD and all was right in the world. It reminded me of Maverick, which, incidentally, was the film that Tina and I saw on our first date.

So we were having a good time, but then the announcement came that the bars would be shutting soon, which I thought was an nour early as it was supposed to be going on until 8 and it was before 7, but what did I know. As we were waiting to leave, we started chatting to some random guys and found they were actually living in Woodford as they had just finished uni at Queen Mary's. They had also just met a couple of guys and were going for more beer and invited us to join.

Now we were supposed to be meeting the other guys to go watch some comedy at Yuk Yuks at 8:30. Seeing as it was only 7:30 then I thought we could fit a quick drink in so we agreed. As we were leaving though, we saw some guy lying in the cycle lane of the road. Obviously we thought he was just drunk, but we thought we should check him out anyway. It turned out he had fallen and smashed his head on the ground and was covered in blood. One of the guys (from Birmingham I think) took it upon himself to try to stem the bleeding and help the guy until an ambulance arrived. I was surprised that everybody else had just left him there. The police and ambulance arrived within 15-20 minutes and we had to explain what had happened. By this point it was about 8 and I figured we would make the meeting so I tried calling Albert and Lindsay but neither were answering their phones, so I texted them both to let them know we weren't coming (which neither of them got until the next day).

Obviously the guy from Birmingham was covered in blood now so we had to wander to find some toilets so he could clean himself up, and it was getting pretty dark by now and we briefly lost two of the guys (only briefly). We went to a pub and ordered some beers, and then one guy asked if the kitchens were still open, but apparently they closed at 10. This surprised me a tad as I thought it was only about 8:30, but it seems my watch had lost about an hour and a half during the day, so the point I was phoning the others was after 9, and it is probably no wonder they didn't answer as they would have been mid comedy.

We were drinking beers, I got told off by a waitress from Nottingham for not tipping her, we then got a hotdog. The stand nearest the pub was $2.50, however, we were hanging around with students, so we actually went to the $1 stand. It was not nice, but at midnight when I had hardly eaten anything else it had to do. We then went to the Horseshoe tavern, and I played some pool against some guys. I won one game, and I don't know how because I could just about see the table, let alone the balls, and also some of the rules were a tad confusing.

It was all over at about 2 (which for a Sunday night probably wasn't the best idea) but a very enjoyable day seeing as I wasn't planning on going at the start.