Weekend Recap: A Whole Lotta Somethin’ Goin’ Down

Friday

I had plans to go bar-hopping with Bob and Janet. She had missed my birthday thing earlier in the month and wanted to make up for it.

Earlier in the day, through email, I had a conversation with Bob:

WIGSF: How much you wanna bet Janet cancels tonight?
Bob: Chicken wings.
WIGSF: Loser buys. You’re on.

The bet was made. Now to find out if Janet would actually show.

Bob and I got down to Gate 403 and shortly after, Janet arrived with a gift, some book about The Simpsons. So Bob won the bet. Good for Bob.

At the bar, a small jazz combo was playing and a large contingent of the patrons were air trumpeting or something. Janet remarked how she thought that was weird. In actuality, I don’t it is that weird. Figure this, a younger guy would air guitar or air drum to a rock song. (Hell, I’m air drumming in between sentences right now. I can’t help it. I like the fills in the song that’s currently playing.) I don’t think it is much of a stretch for jazz fans to air instrument during some drawn out improved jazzy jam.

But the guy by the bar doing a little white man’s overbite by himself did seem a bit weird.

This bar had a wait service so the empty glasses weren’t piling up. I didn’t realize how much I had to drink until the bill came. Long story short, either the drinks were watered down or I’ve built up a tolerance. I shouldn’t be able to drink that much.

The next place we went was the Inter Steer. Its a tiny bar with no wait staff and jukebox for entertainment. The TV screens were all playing some silent movie. Actually, movie would be a bit of a mis-nomer. Every shot was still with a bit of a Ken Burns effect. There wasn’t any actual motion. It was however, a vampire pic.

The crowd that night was generally into hard rock. In between trips to the bar to pick up a Jack & Coke for me and a vodka cranberry for Janet, I dropped a Loonie (one Canadian dollar, roughly the equivalent of 97 American cents) in the jukebox and picked some interesting stuff. Meanwhile, Bob and Janet started playing pool on the coin-op table.

Unlike Gate 403, this bar was making the drinks strong. And due to the fact there was no wait staff, the glasses kept piling up at our table.

Bob and Janet eventually started taking on challengers for the table. Three pairs of challengers, three pairs of people sent packing with their heads hanging low. Okay, Bob is a pretty good player, even though he’s got some unconventional techniques. But Janet is no better than so-so and that night, she was rusty. But after seven drinks or so, she really started to get on a nice little roll. She’s a prime example of wasted talent. Or maybe she was just lucky.

Getting home that night was kind of fun. Janet, who lives in that neighbourhood hoofed it home. Bob and I had rode the subway down from Yorkdale. We had to get back to the subway before the last train went by. Janet told us what corner to wait by for a streetcar to take us back up to Bloor. When the streetcar finally showed up it just zoomed past us. Apparently, the streetcars only stop at that corner on Sundays. (The TTC is horrible and I want it to just stop existing so another transit organization and rise up and take its place. It’ll never happen in that effed up city, but I’m getting off topic.) Bob and I decided to just run to Bloor and hopefully get the last train. We got to Bloor and from that train we transferred to the Spadina line and luckily made the last train.

All the while, I was scoping out possible urine receptacles. I really should have gone before leaving the bar. I knew of a restroom at Yorkdale station but I wasn’t sure that: a) I could make it there; and b) it would still be accessible after hearing Bob’s tale of getting stuck in the station after closing time because he and Boston stopped there once to take a tinkle after a similar night out on the town.

Well, issue ‘a’ turned out to not be a worry. I was able to make it there without any spontaneous leaking of liquids. As I shuffled towards the restroom, I started barking orders to Bob.

Okay, Bob. Use the book to prop open the first sets of doors and then keep the second set of doors open yourself.

Again, another issue was not a worry as all doors were still open. I guess getting stuck in Yorkdale Mall well after closing only happens to Bob and Boston. Sucks to be them, I guess.

Saturday

I got a call around 11:30AM from Bob.

Why did you have to keep feeding drinks to Janet last night? The two of us were supposed to go to see the Toronto FC game this afternoon and I just called her and she’s sick from last night.

I wasn’t my fault she kept drinking. I saw her with an empty glass so I got her a full one. At most, she had seven vodka cranberries. Really, who gets blasted from seven shots of vodka? I had at least nine Jack & Cokes and only had a bit of a headache the next morning.

Okay, to get to my point, Janet cancelled on Bob for Saturday. See, that shit is funny to me. Bob won the bet the previous night but I got to feel like a winner in my own little world. I had a feeling Janet would bail, I just got it wrong by a measily fourteen hours.

After talking to Bob, I called Janet.

So, how ya feeling?

She sounded near death.

After Bob got back from attending the game, by himself, I took him out for his victory dinner.

The two of us then headed down to Scarberia to see the Wonder Twins and go to a movie. But getting there was an adventure on its own. At one point, we were atop a hill and at the base was a car stalled in the middle of the intersection. Instead of waiting behind a long line of cars, I tried to find a way around it through the neighbourhood. It turns out there wasn’t a good way through the neighbourhood. Seriously folks, who the heck designs neighbourhoods? Grids people. They friggin’ work! If every road in town was a grid, every destination would only be two turns away. I’ve gotta find those civil engineers or whoever it is that plans out neighbourhood streets and kick the livin’ crap out of them. They do things to make my life more difficult when they have the opportunity to make it easier. Therefore, they suck and should be punished for sucking. We did eventually get to our destination. But still, the roads in this neighbourhood were very confusing. Unfortunetly an all to common characteristic in GTA neighbourhoods.

The movie we saw was Superbad. Bob and I had already seen that movie, but it was worth seeing again. Especially when the other movies (vampires in Alaska or some movie with Marky Mark) were pretty sad looking.

Recommended Listening: Only Time Will Tell by Asia.

Tags: Food, Gaming, General