Author: Dan Dickinson

Wrapping up the trip

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The fruits (ha ha) of our labours
The fruits (ha ha) of our labours

In the twenty-four hours since my last blog post we:

  • Watched Taken (imdb | rotten tomatoes) which was both highly entertaining and patently absurd;
  • Had dinner at Seven Wine Bar with many Halifax friends, followed by drinks at Durty Nelly’s and yet another stop at Pizza Corner;
  • Awoke, arose and had breakfast with T-Bone and The Sof (who had an earlier flight) and were joined briefly by Marney and Amy;
  • Got to the airport early so we could catch a bite, where our friends were still waiting (their incoming flight was diverted) and who eventually took off after us, despite being on a flight meant to leave three hours earlier;
  • Arrived home to find some happy, happy cats.

By the way, here’re the wineries we visited Thursday. I couldn’t be bothered to find all the sites before:

None of the samples really blew us away, but we found enough interesting ones to buy nine bottles. I think the one we’re looking forward to the most is the Alchemy from L’Acadie, which we couldn’t sample but has drawn some fanfare.

Back where it all began

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I haven’t had an internet connection the past couple of days, and I have far too much to type to bother using this silly little keyboard, so I’ll keep the events bullet-point form for now:

  • Wednesday: drove to the Annapolis Valley, checked in to a nice little bed and breakfast, visited Nellie’s mom for dinner…massive, massive dinner
  • Thursday: visited five (!) local wineries, tasted a lot, bought nine (!!) bottles, had excellent dinner at the winery and a nice drink and dessert on their patio
  • Friday: drove to Halifax, saw some tall ships, watched KISS arrive at the Lord Nelson. In about an hour we’ll head out to dinner, our last of the trip.

The locals don't go there. Which, in this case, is a good sign.

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The coma continued yesterday. Mainly just sitting around and reading and napping. We did go for a bit of a drive up into the sugar woods and then around the farm a bit, but nothing serious. Last night we piled everybody up and went to the Bare Bones cafe in Parrsboro.

I’ve never been to a restaurant in Parrsboro with actual edible food, so this actually felt a little weird. My buffalo and warm rocket starter was quite tasty, my chicken wasn’t bad and my warm chocolate cake & white russian milk shake dessert was interesting. Certainly not going to knock Splendido or Canoe out of my mental top ten list or anything, but just miles ahead of anything else I’ve ever eaten in that town. The service was a little slow, perhaps because our table of eleven might’ve been throwing them off their game, and one of the servers seemed quite young and fairly new. One person’s appetizer arrived minutes after the rest, and then we all waited while another person’s entree showed up several minutes after the others.

I showed T-Bone and The Sof a little more of the town, including the site of my perpetual agony (the school) and the theatre and the pier to see the tides. We got home, chilled, beat my dad at crib (at least, I did) and were about 3/4 through The Princess Bride when the power went out. That’s pretty weird…I’ve only known that to happen in the winter. Anyway, we decided to just go to bed. So now we’re up, getting packed, finding some breakfast and getting ready to hit the road.

Next stop: the Annapolis Valley.

In which we enter a near-vegetative state

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Yesterday we began phase two of our vacation: the farm. We got up, checked out, had lunch at the Economy Shoe Shop with some friends, picked up the rental car, bumped into the bride and groom one last time, and pointed ourselves north.

We drove with beautiful weather and good music for just over two hours and hit the farm at 4pm on the nose. A little playtime with the kids, lots of barbecue, a short walk around the farm and a drink with the brother and sister-in-law at theirs and we were ready for sleep. It actually took me a long time to nod off as pitch blackness and absolute quiet are so far from what I’m used to now, living in downtown Toronto, but I managed it. Eight solid hours of sleep later and I got up, hours before everyone else. That’s ok, they like to have a lie-in, so they’re welcome to it. Me, on the other hand, this is the time of day on the farm that I love the most. Just me, Stryder (who can barely get around now, poor old guy) and the tin of chocolate chip cookies mom just baked.

It's dangerous to be this close

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Mmmmmmmmm. We’ve only been here 12 hours and it’s already been a pretty sweet trip. Our flight was on time, our cab driver (limo driver, really) was very friendly and helpful (try Crystal Limousine if you’re ever coming from the airport), we got some great food and Garrison beer at the Economy Shoe Shop, one of the few places still serving food. Wiped, we crashed hard in our king bed.

We woke up to a beautiful morning, a welcome respite from what we’ve heard is weeks of gray and rainy weather. We didn’t have too much time before prepping for the wedding, but we did manage to have breakfast, do some emergency sock-shopping at Dugger’s and pick up some wine at Bishop’s Cellar. With all the usual festivals and activities that happen here in the summer, and with Paul McCartney playing here today, the city’s jumping right now.

OK, gotta get ready.

It's a freaking mall, people.

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BlogTO yesterday raised an interesting topic: the differences in travel styles. Emphasis is mine.

Yesterday, the New York Times published yet another one of their great travel articles on a Toronto neighbourhood that doesn’t get much play from the powers that be who promote our city. Titled Skid Row to Hip in Toronto, the article isn’t a comprehensive look at the area, missing favourite spots like Crema Coffee, Smash and The Beet to name a few. Here are the ones they did mention:

…

Which is to say that it’s a good start and exactly the sort of story the city should be trying to get out instead of the crap about Ontario Place and Casa Loma.

I’m of the same opinion as BlogTO on this: for Toronto, or any tourist destination, the real soul of a place isn’t in the big tourist attractions, it’s between the lines of the Fodor’s guide. For many cities, and especially for Toronto, it’s in the neighbourhoods.  That you could wander from Chinatown to Kensington Market to Little Italy to the Annex to U of T (to take just one example) in less than an hour is fantastic because they’re all such different neighbourhoods. That’s what I want from a city, to get a real feel for it.

Obviously lots of people want to see the big attractions. When I lived at Dupont and Spadina I had tourists ask me every other summer day how to get to Casa Loma (which was always fun ’cause I could just point to the giant castle on top of the hill) and now that I live downtown I’m often asked where the Eaton Centre is. It always horrifies me that this is what tourists want to see, but that’s what’s in the guide books and, as BlogTO points out, the tourism promotions.

Should there maybe be two sets of promotion materials and guidebooks? Or is this the kind of thing that guidebooks just can’t keep up with, due to the rapid emergence and decline of neighbourhoods? Is this the role of the internet now? Until now a guidebook has just been an easier thing to carry around a city, but GPS-enabled devices could change that. I’m sure there’s already an iPhone app that points out cool insider tips about the neighbourhood you’re wandering through. If not, there should be. Damn, I wish I knew how to write those things…

I hope he remembered before he dropped the suit off at the cleaner's

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Did you hear about how Stephen Harper may have been wandering around with a piece of Jesus in his suit pocket? The Telegraph-Journal explains:

A senior New Brunswick Roman Catholic priest is demanding the Prime Minister’s Office explain what happened to the sacramental communion wafer Stephen Harper was given at Roméo LeBlanc’s funeral mass.

During communion at the solemn and dignified service held last Friday in Memramcook for the former governor general, the prime minister slipped the thin wafer that Catholics call “the host” into his jacket pocket.

In Catholic understanding, the host – once consecrated by a priest for the Eucharist – becomes the body and blood of Jesus Christ. It is crucial that the small wafer be consumed when it is received.

Monsignor Brian Henneberry, vicar general and chancellor in the Diocese of Saint John, wants to know whether the prime minister consumed the host and, if not, what happened to it.

If Harper accepted the host but did not consume it, “it’s worse than a faux pas, it’s a scandal from the Catholic point of view,” he said.

Here’s why this is so off-the-charts ridiculous: to be convinced that this is, in fact, scandalous behaviour on the Prime Minister’s part one has to literally believe the notion that a tiny wafer blessed by a priest becomes the actual body and blood of Jesus. This is absurd, of course, but let’s say you enjoy dogma and you accept this on its face. You then have to deem it an outrageous affront to put said wafer in your pocket, but eating it (and, uh, shitting it later) it is okay. I know, I know, Jesus said eat this blah, drink this blah. But if you actually spend fifteen seconds thinking rationally about this rather than reciting scripture, it’s painfully obvious that this is a non-issue.

Then again, expecting rational thought on a topic at the intersection of politics and religion might be asking too much. Isn’t that right, Diane Ablonczy?

No noose is good noose

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I hate neckties.

I own several, and will employ one on rare occasions, but generally I will do my very best to avoid wearing one. My reasons are three-fold:

  1. They’re uncomfortable. Not the ties themselves, I suppose, but the shirt collars which have to be buttoned tight in order to facilitate the tying of the tie. By hitching up my neck and then tying a knot (albeit a stylish one) around my adam’s apple I feel as if I’m trying to commit very languid suicide.
  2. They’re useless. I wear suits to work most days. I feel comfortable in them, but not just because I like how they look. A good suit and dress shirt both protect and breathe, so on -40 days I don’t feel cold and on +40 days I’m much cooler than I should be considered I’m wearing three layers. On top of all that, they’re functional (lots of pockets) and very easy to wrangle in the morning…just grab a bag out of the closet and presto. Ties, on the other hand, serve no useful purpose. They’re only for decoration. Combine with with my previous point about discomfort and they’re no better than the fancy-but-painful shoes that I tease Nellie for wearing sometimes.
  3. I like the no-tie look. I like the dress-up of a suit and the dress-down of no tie…suits can be casual, you know. And hey, it works for Clooney. Not that I’m fit to carry the man’s dress socks, style-wise, but if he does it I think I’m on pretty safe sartorial ground to take the same approach.

Nellie likes to give me a hard time about not wearing a tie with my suits. What does everyone else think? Is it okay to go tie-less with a suit?