We had a fun weekend.
On Friday night we met up with Jess and lots of her friends at a little place at King & Young called the Beer Bistro. John was in heaven, they had the biggest list of beer we've ever seen. And I got to try Kobe beef for the first time. Kobe beef comes from a certain part of Japan and is considered to be the best beef in the world, so I've always wanted to try it. However, the beef was in the form of delicious tacos (in blue shells!) so it was too spiced for me to really appreciate whether it tastes different from regular beef. Next time, maybe!
We had a really nice time, there were people there I hadn't seen since college. I was tired though, from the week of early mornings, so we didn't go with them when they went dancing afterwards, we came home instead and went to sleep.
We were supposed to move this weekend but the tenants in our new apartment never ended up turning in their keys so it was not to be. We'll be moving on Tuesday night instead. But on the bright side, it meant we got our weekend all to ourselves!
On Saturday we had a lazy morning. John made the most amazing steak and cheese omelettes with bacon, pepper and tomatoes. He spoils me. We walked down to the Metro for some groceries and puttered around Futureshop for a bit.
After that we headed down to Union Station and caught a street car to the Exhibition Grounds for the Canadian National Exhibition. What a big fair!!
I am a sucker for midway games. I love them so much! There had to be over 50 of them, probably closer to 75. We fired water guns, threw skeeballs, broke plates, tossed rings, whacked moles and threw darts. I loved it. John won me a big talking horse and a smaller plushie lion (he's very good at breaking plates and whacking moles). They're both super soft and squishy. I won a smaller lion and tiger by myself. And somewhere along the way, John won a little plushie penguin.
After we played our games, we headed over to the rides. John went on all of the scary ones, he's fearless. He went on the ones that go upside down, the ones that drop you from the sky and the ones that spin you around up in the air, and then his only comment afterwards is "I'm really impressed by how well these rides are made. The seats are ergonomic!" But between you and me *lowers voice*, when I took his hand afterwards, they were cold and clammy, so I think it was at least a little exciting for him. I stuck to the less scary rides.
By the time we did all that, it was almost 7:30 so we went into one of the huge buildings also filled with fair stuff. We walked through a huge trade show exhibition of consumer goods and electronics. We didn't have much time to walk through but I did manage to stop at the Konad kiosk and get one of my fingernails stamped. That stuff is so cool! We also checked out a houseplant competition (I'm a nerd) and a sand castle competition.
At the other end of the exhibition was the theatre, it turned out to be a big ice rink. We got great seats and waited for the show to start. At first it seemed kind of cheesy. There was a screen on one end that showed still frames from a movie and a singer singing a song from the movie's soundtrack. Then some ice skaters would come out and do a little act.
But then an aerial acrobat came out and she was amazing. She flipped around a bar way up in the air and tangeled herself up in ribbons that were attached to it. It was so beautiful to watch, but I was so worried she would fall.
After that it was easy to get lost in the magic. Elvis Stojko was there skating, he spun so fast I felt like what I was seeing wasn't real. John said it was the first time Elvis had skated in a show in years and he looked like he was having a good time. I was thinking where else can you go and pay $33 for a whole day of amazing fun and have a show starring an Olympian included in the price of admission?
But the star of the show in my opinion was the aerial acrobat on the ring. She spun so fast and at one point was only hanging from the ring by the back of her neck. I can't imagine how strong she must be. It was really an amazing show.
As we wandered out of the rink, we must have gone a different way from how we came in because we ended up in a huge warehouse filled with shopping. There were racks and racks and racks of cheap clothes from Stitches, Suzy Shier, Levis, French Connection, Urban Outfitters and more. And by cheap I mean $1 - $3 for a shirt. The catch was that there was nowhere to try them on. There were also bins and bins of drugstore cosmetics and nail polishes for $1 each, lots of CoverGirl, Maybelline and Sally Hansen. We didn't take much time to shop though, because there was still so much more that we wanted to do.
We headed back outside for a light show because by this time it was dark. We found a booth selling ice cream sandwiches made with waffles they were making on site. They were so yummy!
The light show was kind of neat. They were basically showing the history of evolution in images on the front of the Direct Energy building. We didn't stay for the whole thing though, just from first life on Earth up to sea turtles.
We headed back to the midway. I did some midway gambling, the kind with the big spinning wheels like crown and anchor. I played at five or six tables and came out up a dollar. Then we went and did a whole bunch of rides one after another; bumper cars twice, a haunted house, tilt-a-whirl (I forgot how much it is!) and a night time spin on the ferris wheel.
By the time we had done all that, we were tired and ready to go home. With queasy bellies from a day of junk food and jarring rides and a zoo's worth of stuffed animals, we got on the streetcar and headed back downtown. We stopped at the Metro to pick up some healthy food, went home and conked out for the rest of the evening. We didn't even have the energy to go down the street to watch the fights.
But I had a great day. It was definitely the most fun I've ever had at a fair and it was the first time a boy has ever won me a giant stuffed animal. And we didn't even see everything! There was a dog show, a horse show and a whole section of animals that we missed, not to mention a big food area and a beer tent. There were all kinds of shows going on that we didn't see, so there will be lots new to do if we go back next year.
Today we took it pretty easy. The only really interesting thing that we did was to go see Inglourious Basterds. I think it was probably the best movie I've seen by Quentin Tarintino. I didn't like it as much as District 9 though.
Tonight we will make perogies, do some of the packing and watch TV. Sounds good to me.
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