Walking Tours, My Strong Suit - June 23
Right, I woke up nice and early-ish to find Sean had once again beaten me out of the condo. Oh well. I again played a bit of a video game before anything. I know I wasn’t going to make a habit of it but I does allow you to blank out for a while which is nice. Though that’s what sleeping does sometimes. Whatever. I headed out in the car to the Saddletown LRT stop and parked the car in a clearly safe stop to leave my car for the day. I got on the first train that came up and got off at City Hall. And so began my lengthy walk of a day. Good thing I chose my non-running shoes to do it.
First thing was first. Since I had already eaten my breakfast I was in the sweet spot of the day where you can get away with eating anything even though it was still before noon. With that in mind I went to an ice cream shop recommended to me. It was a little weird to find because it’s kind of out of the way and not around any other stores that you would expect. For an illustration of that, the building adjacent to it is an engineering firm of some sort. Of course, the ice cream place is right next to that. I got myself an earl grey cone of deliciousness and sat down in a pseudo park near city hall to finish it, listening to Can’t Stop the Feeling by Justin Timberlake because I felt like it. After that I made my way west where I would eventually end up at the bakery/cafe/restaurant that the same friend recommended, keeping in mind that I was super early for that and should make some detours on the way.
Detours were most definitely made. I arrived at 8th Ave, also know as Stephen Ave, and found a make of the surrounding area. Although it was tempting to go down the walking-only street I decided I’d go check out the Calgary Stampede grounds to see what I’d be missing since I’m leaving before it starts. The grounds have a feel of possible coolness. I tried to picture the place packed with people, food and beverage vendors, and drunken idiots getting hauled out by security and/or police. I bet it’s a cool vibe when everything is going down. I walked back to Stephen Avenue and took in the last minute of a song and then the farewell speech of the band. Great timing on my part. I continued my walk down the pedestrian street and came to the end, lining myself up almost perfectly with Alforno, the bakery thing I mentioned earlier. I went in, order a pizza as it was on special and sat down to enjoy some HP in the outdoor patio. No sooner that I had finished my pizza and James and his mom show up. Apparently neither of them had been there before so it was a genuine coincidence. After a good chat, some job opportunities that James told me about, a few Calgary suggestions, and a quick run-through of my exploits during my entire trip, I decided to leave to get some more reading done in the “chill”, as the recommendation put it, park Prince’s Island.
After arriving at what I thought was the island I decided that I would instead go to the second cafe suggested to me in Kensington to have a tea and get my read on some more. And so it was. I enjoy not one but two pots of tea while taking in the brilliance that is J. K. Rowling. After filling my mind with sufficient teen angst and goals of somehow becoming a wizard in the future I resolved to see a bit more of what my friend told me is the best neighbourhood in the city. I took a walk and decided to get myself up to SAIT and check out the grounds. It seems like an alright place to do some learning I suppose. Though it does lock the doors that go up to the towers that I wanted to get to in order to have a better view of the Calgary Sklyine. See towers here:
And the skyline itself:
On my walk back I saw a guy surfing the river! So neat. I then did the river walk on my way to one of the first Sled Island events I’ve gone to. The walk was long but I managed it, even seeing some cowboy-hat-wearing policemen which I thought was, well, laughable? Funny? Silly? One of those. The Sled Island event was terrible, I’m not one for odd crowds of awkward dancing strangers, dancing to bad electronic music, especially alone. Right then, time to go to the music jam that James told me about on the other side of town. Since Pizza Bob’s was far enough away from the event, I took the LRT and then did a 40 minute walk to the bar. The pizza was not that good but the music was pretty decent. James and I had a good time singing Lake Street Dive outside while waiting for the actual good music to begin and then I spent some time listening to him and others play various musical instruments.
After realizing the time of day and the time it would take me to get home, I decided to head out and catch the train. Everything after this went smoothly, but I’ll tell you, don’t wear TOMS shoes and expect to walk away unscathed after a full day of walking. Just don’t.
Rest Day? Rest Day. - June 24
This Friday I decided that nothing would be my goal for the day. The weather was unfavourable and I had not a ton of energy after getting back to the condo at 1am and only being able to sleep much because of construction. So, I basically played video games until noon. Old habits don’t die hard, they just resurface if you give in again after an absense. Be warned. Just around the time I was going to stop the game, Sean showed up to grab his wallet that he left behind that morning. We had a quick chat and I realized that I wouldn’t achieve anything in the day except buy groceries because I need to actually stop buying things to avoid real and complete bankrupcy. So I did that. Sobey’s down the way provided me with enough groceries what should last about five or six days for just over $60. With that in mind, if I eat three meals a day for $10, that would have been $30 a day, totalling $150 for five days. So I’m saving $90 by doing this. That was a good feeling. Math.
I continued on my binge when I got back, breaking briefly to read and finally watch a movie when Sean came back with his friend Dana to watch the NHL draft. The draft itself was interesting for about 10 minutes or so but the rest of it was fine because we, as a group, were able to make enough jokes to keep it entertaining. After a point, however, I decided it was time to make my huge mess of a pasta that I would be eating for the next week. The night continued on this way, pasta making, NHL, and eventually video games until all parties had had enough. I was a decent day. I used basically zero brain power today. We’ll see what the weekend has in store for me.
Dude, Chill - June 25
Sean and I spent a good portion of the movie just shooting the shit and playing video games. It was pretty good. Soon enough, however, you have to make something of your day or at least do something. So we did. We picked up Dana at his place and headed for an indoor mini golf place. Turns out that the place is packed full of kids on the weekend, which is understandable because it was basically a kids’ arcade with mini golf. We tried an escape room place, something I was kind of stoked for, but they were fully booked. Again, weekends. After much debate and a few more closed and busy places we wound up at a bar which also has mini golf. Who knew?
We had a beer each and got through the nine-hole course twice. We then spent some time in a mall near the bar for some sweet cookies. After cookies it was time for some real food so we went to a place call Hose & Hounds. Clever, as the building used to be a firehall. It was a place, that’s about it. We then headed to meet up with a friend, David, after a quick stop for a Redbull as Dave had been going hard for Half Christmas basically the entire day. Dave’s the man. No doubt. We met his friends and we all went to one of the Local bars. Yes, the capitalization is correct, it’s a chain, and a popular one at that. Pretty nice vibes going on there. Dana, tapped out just before we went in but the rest of us spent about two beers worth of time before Sean and I decided it was time to leave.
It was a good day hanging with old friends and new.
Oh My God, Thrones - June 26
I’ll keep this one extra brief. My only accomplishments for the day were discovering that the National Museum of Canadian Music doesn’t open until July 1st and walking through some of the Skywalk in downtown Calgary. After that, I found myself back at Sean’s place with Dana, Dana’s fiance Frankie and Sean, making popcorn and watching episodes of American Ninja Warrior, Game of Thrones (great season finale), and Preacher, a new show I haven’t heard of before. It looks like it has some potential. I also snuck in Silicon Valley after everyone had left or gone to bed.
Like I Never Left - June 27
Today I spent a lot of time wasting time. I was feeling a lot like I did about a month after having graduated university but still hadn’t tried hard to get a job. I had nothing specific that I wanted to accomplish, but for some reason I couldn’t get over the, frankly, quite tiny wall of procrastination that was keeping me from doing basically anything productive. They’re interesting things, habits. From my experience and from a book or two I’ve read either having to do with habits specifically or touching on them in some way, I realize that you either need to replace a habit with something or something how transform the bad habit into something you can leverage. Turns out I wasn’t rid of my procrastination or I haven’t done enough to get over it.
At any rate, I managed to leave Sean’s place at about 2pm and spent the rest of the day at Prince’s Island reading Harry Potter, eavesdropping on a surprisingly large amount of Spanish speaking families, and learning the lyrics to a song by a new favourite band of mine, Monsieur Perine, called Dejame Vivir. It’s a good one. I then returned to Sean who had purchased both a ladle and knife sharpener as I had pointed out that he had neither. The cat’s out of the bag Sean.
Jeez, Life is Slowing Down - June 28
I had nothing to do with my day today. I realized that I wasn’t super into going to the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame so instead went out to the cafe that my friend recommended to finish up HP and maybe start another book on my borrowed Kobo. At this point I would like to point out that I realize that my posts are getting shorter and less interesting but, hey, that’s just a direct reflection of me settling back into every day life. When I’ve got nothing in particular that I want to do, the activities I do choose may not end up being overly exciting to the reader. That is, if you’re even reading this. The number of Facebook likes I’m getting on my posts has been dwindling lately. I don’t have analytics on my blog posts so I use that as my metric. That one of the following things is happening: posts are boring and no one wants to “like” them, less people are reading them and they’re still just as good, both of those. Or none of those actually. Facebook likes mean so little.
Anyway, I weathered out a bit of a thunderstorm in Higher Ground Cafe, finished up Goblet of Fire and decided to start on The Old Man and the Sea as I had finished waiting out the storm but had not yet reach a suitable hour after rush hour to head back to Sean’s. I ran out the night with Sean watching Edge of Tomorrow, a surprisingly decent war themed Ground Hog day staring Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. Then we made small plans for getting Sean’s keys back to him before I left. Back on the road tomorrow, Nelson bound. I excited for this because Nelson is the town that my favourite movie was filmed in, for the most part. Roxanne. Woo!
It’s Here, It’s All Here - June 29
I decided to sleep in a drive Sean’s keys to him at work after having stayed up a little too late the night before. I cleaned my stuff up, packed up, and tidied up, as a good house guest should. Sean was a great host. He didn’t mind too much that I cramped his style for an entire week, or least he didn’t show it. I’m lucky to have been able to stay with him for that time. Thanks Sean!
The trip was pretty standard. I got through the day with one minor stop in what was about a seven hour drive by eating my pre-made sandwiches on the go and only filling up on gas once. I do say, I’m getting pretty good at this solo road trip thing, once again owing most of my awakeness to dank Latin American music. Good looking out.
I got into Nelson with an hour to kill as my hosts for this town, an old high school/junior high school friend of my mom, was going to be back at her place an hour later. I managed to walk a good portion of the town in that hour, even finding the fire station that was used in Roxanne! So cool. I actually got a bit giddy when I was walking up to it. I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced something like this before but I didn’t expect to feel that way. At any rate, I was giddy and a took a photo. I even sent Steve Martin a message on Twitter, an app I rarely use, to see if he would help me out with finding the other places in the movie so I could get photos and maybe a selfi or two. What? Sometimes my shame takes a smoke break.
Then I went and met my mom’s friend and her husband. They are absolutely wonderful people. Just as you might expect from a small town in BC. They gave me a place to sit and chat, beer, dinner, and a movie. We talked for a few hours before tucking into a beer can chicken and it was great hearing about my mom’s recent reunion with all her friends, their children, and talking about my trip. It puts everything into perspective, recounting all that has happened to me in the last six months now. Almost. After dinner we all decided to do more research for my day tomorrow and watched Roxanne. Neither of them had seen it for years so I had a great time listening to their reactions and letting them in on little tid-bits of the movie that might go unnoticed on the first watch. They also helped me by pointing out Nelson locations in the movie. Turns out that some of the shots such as the interior bar scenes and Roxanne’s house were done in and around the Vancouver area. This is good news because that is between me and Victoria and not in some random place that I’ve already passed.
Tomorrow will be a fun day. I plan on walking and driving through town, visiting local shops and talking about the movie, finding spots to take photos, having lunch with my hosts, and heading to their lake cabin to keep myself refreshed in the, what I can only assume to be, freezing lake.
Don’t Put On The Red Light - June 30
I woke up, had my oatmeal, and got out the door before Kathy and Cal got up from there sleep so I could beat most of the heat of the day and get a good start on finding the buildings I promised I would find. I started by parking my car, and finding the house where the kid has run up to sulk about being bullied for being overweight. It was a house, to be honest, I wasn’t that interested. I then spent a lot of time walking around the town. I went to The Hume where the exterior bar shots were done, then to a place called Jackson’s Hole that was used for Dixie’s restaurant, and finally I found the place where they shot the opening scene of the movie where Steve Martin is singing down the stairs and beats up the two ski bums. It was cool to see all this stuff, each time getting a little giddy and excited to see the places that make up my favourite movie.
After all that I went to Oso Negro (Yay, Spanish!), a little cafe in town for a tea and some people watching. It’s a nice place for sure and a busy one as well. Lots of people went in and out while I sipped my tea and sat watching like it was TV. Once finished, I hopped in the car and drove around to try and find a good spot to take some shots of as much of the town as possible. I didn’t find any spectacular places but I did get a better feel for the layout of the city. That layout is hills. Hills everywhere. There are no fat people here. They are all too ripped from having to basically scale Everest everytime they come back from the grocery store. I arrived back at Kathy and Cal’s place, we had some lunch and then went out to their cabin a few kilometers away.
I met Kathy’s parents and sister there but also, I recognized the cabin within seconds. Once I saw the beach portion I knew I had been there when I was quite young. I had accidentally mixed it up with a place I went to in Vernon once but I knew this place for sure. I remember hopping over the rock walls to the other property to play with other kids and swimming in the cold lake water during summer. It was a surprisingly vivid experience for me. And a welcome one as well. We chatted for a while talking about my travel, my family, their family, and the like for a time before I decided that I would head out to surprise my family in the Okanagan.
The drive was pretty easy, I stopped once, then managed to remember, as always, where my aunt and uncle’s place is located in town and got a great reaction out of my Uncle Jason, from my Mom’s side of the family, when I tried to quietly sneak around back, forgetting that I couldn’t because the garage is closed off now. Anyway, he caught me in the front lawn but I still got what I wanted out of him. It was so great to surprise him, my Aunt Myleen, and my cousins Denzer and Zoe. Zoe, of course, was having a girls night sleepover that night so I didn’t get too much time with her but that’s OK. Turns out they’re all going camping for Canada Day so that’s what I’ll be doing for the holiday!
Canada Day - July 01
I slept in Denzer’s room for the night and got up around 8:30am to help out with arrangements for leaving to Peachland for our camping trip. We spent the morning puttering around and getting stuff together. Myleen and Zoe did a bit of volunteer work while the lads did lunch and stuff. Then we set out, the kids with me in my car and the adults in the other with all of their stuff. So much stuff. We arrived in Peachland and met up with Pat, the husband of Myleen’s best friend, Sheri, in his boat, loaded up, and set sail to the campsite. On arrival I was introduced to the whole family. There is Sheri, her husband Pat, their son Taylor, Taylor’s wife Taylor (yup), and their son Tristan. They also have dog’s named Baby, Guinevere, and Nixie. It was a happy family affair indeed.
I think I can keep this part short because camping is as camping does. We had beer, fire, marshmallows, food, family, good times, and a lake. It was awesome and it’s probably the best way I could think of to spend my Canada Day. Surrounded by family and friends. Duh, that’s how that works.
Chill - July 02
The day after Canada was a slow go. There was swimming in the still quite cold lake, paddleboarding, dingy rowing, boating, Yahtzee, cards, sitting, chatting; everything you need while you’re camping. I don’t think I’ll go into much detail here because, well, I don’t need to. It was great. I enjoyed every second I got to spend with my aunt, uncle, and awesome cousins. Those kids are still, as always, becoming cooler as they grow. I’m super proud of my aunt and uncle for that. They sure know how to raise some awesome young people.
Sketchy Boating and Movies - July 03
The morning of Sunday, the day we were to leave the island, we were hit with a lot of high winds. Enough to make leaving on the boat quite a difficult affair. What we had to do was drive Taylor’s (the husband) boat from the beach to Pat’s boat, load it with stuff and people, make one more trip for stuff and people, and then take it back to our parked cars. This was a tough task as the lake was incredibly choppy. Then guys managed, however, to get it all done with minimal damage. There were some bumps and scraps on both boats and guys alike but we eventually made it back to the other side to the cars. After loading up, Uncle Jay had to stay behind to help our with the next load for the rest of people we left behind so I got to drive back to the house with my cousins.
When we got back, we spent all our time watching movies. This includes the time after the parents got home. We watched four movies tonight. Insane. I know they’re a movie buff family but wow. I enjoyed it thoroughly.