After watching the rest of Domino (which sucked, by the way) and having a little wine & chocolate, we set out for the Bell Centre. It was only a 10 or 15 minute walk, and once we got onto Rue de la Gauchetiere we just followed the crowds right in. Our tickets put us on the Desjardins club level, so we got some free food (teeny, tasty hot dogs) and some pretty decent seats at the top of the lower bowl, toward the visitor end.

Despite winning eight straight game before last night, the Canadiens just couldn’t beat New Jersey, making them 0-2 in games I’ve traveled to see. Jersey just trapped them into a hole, and capitalized on the few defensive breakdowns that the Habs made. After missing a pile of close-in chances and falling behind 3-0 in the third the Canadiens scored with about ten minutes left, and then again with about twelve seconds left to get within a goal. With a power play and a faceoff in the Devils’ end, Koivu won the draw and got it to Kovalev for a wrister with three seconds left, but Brodeur played it perfectly and the game was over one faceoff later. Too bad; had they tied it up the place would’ve gone cuckoo bananas.

Still, it was pretty cool. The Bell Centre is much more comfortable than I remember the Forum being, and the electricity in a Montreal hockey crowd is hard to describe.

.:.

Next on the list of things we felt the need to do in Montreal was to sample some Quebec beer. We walked up Crescent to Brutopia, a nearby brewpub; it turned out to be less of a brewpub than a live music venue who happened to brew their own beer, so we soon realized that we were way above the average age demographic. However, the beer was so good that we didn’t much care. We just plunked ourselves down at the bar and ordered a few pints (the nut brown and honey brown were very good; Nellie liked her raspberry blonde, maple beer and honey beer as well) before escaping the student throngs.

.:.

Finally, we decided to sample another Montreal institution: the strip club. Nellie’s been talking about taking me to one for a while, only half-jokingly, so I figured where better to try it out than here, a city famous for them. I didn’t want to take her to a place like Club Supersexe, which I hear is a neon dive, so we went to Wanda’s, because it’s meant to be the classiest in the city (partly because it’s “non-contact”; they dance for you, not on you) and because it was just up the street from the pub. I, of course, enjoyed it. So did Nellie, a little bit to her surprise; I think, after two of her own, that she now understands guys’ mindsets when they get a table dance…that (unless the guy’s creepy) it’s just a show, not a paid come-on. And, of course, the girls thought the two of us were just the cutest, so we made some friends. Nellie and the second girl both ended up doffing their shoes to see who was shorter…it was both weird and adorable. Anyway, fun was had by all, and as we walked home at three in the morning we were amazed by how active the streets still were. Our activity last just long enough for us to walk back to the hotel, brush our teeth, drink some water, put the clothes out on the balcony to air out the smoke and fall fast asleep.

.:.

Speaking of sleep, Nellie’s gone back to bed after we had room service breakfast. I guess five hours of sleep wasn’t enough for her, so I’ll let her snooze until noon when we need to start packing. Not sure yet what we’re going to do this afternoon; maybe look around Vieux Montreal some more, maybe walk up Mont Royal. We’ll see how herself is feeling later…