Yet another great weekend in ever-so-slowly-warming-up Toronto. After another long week at the office (hark: no weekend work! well, a couple of conference calls, but that was it…) we decided to celebrate our friend CBJ’s return to Toronto with a few brews at Smokeless Joe. Somehow that devolved into drinking a Tripel out of a football-sized glass, and from there it decayed further into hot wings and seeing an Asian kid puke outside of a Pizza Pizza. But overall, quite a good night.

Saturday morning we got up early in the hopes of scoring a table, sans lineup, at Lady Marmalade over in Leslieville. We succeeded, and just barely, since we got the very last table (at 9AM!) before the lineups began. And lining up would have sucked since it was pouring rain outside. Anyway, we were here because T-Bone wanted to try it, and because one of our co-workers said it was good. And it was: my brunch/breakfast was quite tasty (apple chai french toast + sausage) and everyone else seemed to enjoy theirs, though Nellie’s left something to be desired. And by that I mean that her plate looked like more an accidental spill site than breakfast. However.

The rest of Saturday was quite lazy indeed — Nellie had a nap while I shot XBox Nazis. We could do little else as the thunderstorm outside kept us hemmed in. Eventually we snuck out for groceries in order to supplement the goodies Nellie had obtained super-early that morning, in preparation for a meal that night to continue the celebration of the return of the CBJness. We had lemon/asparagus/shrimp pasta with a bottle of NOVA7 (which didn’t really work…we just really wanted to try the NOVA7) and then grilled sausages along with a bottle of 2008 Ravine Cab Franc, followed by a bottle of 2006 Little Yering Cab/Shiraz to go with some salted chocolate. Nom. Nom hard.

Fortunately the weather was significantly better on Sunday, because we had plans for a 3-hour cruise around Toronto harbour with friends. We did something similar last year…same guy, same boat, roughly same group of friends. We laid our asses down in the sun and drank beer and enjoyed the alternate view of Toronto and chatted happily in perfect early summer weather. No one wanted to get off at the end of the three hours.

Of course, this view — taken from our balcony when we got home — isn’t so bad either.