Day 13

Day 13, unlucky for some, not really for me though. The sun was splitting the sky this morning and I had my guitar for company—proper order! As Fe was away to work, I had the house to myself so I could belt out the songs at the top of my voice, which always helps as you can get a real feel for how it would sound live. Moreover, I really hope it was some sort of payback for the killer driller next-door, shoe on the other foot so to speak! I was a little ropey but I knew I'd by fine by the time the gig came along. Setlist for the gig is as follows: Sister I'm A Prophet, I Just Need Your Love, Falling (Sister Seashore), I Love You But You're Blue, Oh My Darling Adeline followed by a few covers too, perhaps: Jesus Don't Want Me For A Sunbeam, The Outdoor Type and maybe Sally Cinnamon (pictured below).


Headed downtown for a bit just to get some fresh air and wander around prior to meeting my Uncle Eddie for the Toronto Maple Leafs game against the Ottawa Senators, which I was pretty excited about. I proved myself to be an absolute glutton again. Had a chicken shawarma for lunch and then promptly went a couple of doors down and had a mammoth pizza slice too! I realised that I'd lost my lottery ticket—the one that I won last week—so maybe the Day 13 bad luck was kicking in after all! I decided to buy another one but imagine the one I lost turned out to be a winner! I'd never know! Was planning on buying a Maple Leafs varsity jacket too but they didn't have it in my size dammit! I visited Sonic Boom records (pictured below) today also—located just near Bathurst subway station—which is my favourite record store in the entire world! I kid you not the selection is frightening, much better than the monolithic music stores everywhere else that have no character and a shite selection of music. April loves the place too. They always have hard to find music like The Blake Babies too so I usually pick up some of their CDs, saves having to go through the amazon rigmarole.


Met up with Uncle Eddie at the Real Sports Bar (pictured below), which is a giant edifice full of giant screens, hockey nuts and easy-on-the-eye barmaids—bit a positive discrimination there from the HR guy, and it's definitely a guy! The Champions League games were on too, which was great for two reasons: firstly it shows the growing popularity and availability of 'soccer' now in North America but also I could watch Rangers being slaughtered 3-0 by Valencia! To enhance the experience I had a pulled pork sandwich with fries, was pretty good too, no complaints from the ever-expanding me!


When we arrived in the Air Canada Centre I was pretty awestruck—it was a lot bigger than I had expected and although our seats were way up high, the view was still great. I was snap happy all night and mesmerised by the experience—I think some Canadians take ice hockey and the Maple Leafs (pictured below) for granted, possibly the same way we do with football and Celtic back home. I love all the razzmatazz associated with North American sports too, although it was a bit more sombre due to Remembrance Sunday coming up, so some veterans were paraded before the game. The only slightly annoying thing is that the game stops when a commercial break is coming up—capitalism in action! During one of these game breaks, we were introduced to two young ice hockey players, one of who said his favourite food was salad, the other said his favourite singer was Elton John! Surely to God they were lying, they were about nine for fuck sakes! Either that or Canadian kids are a bit weird. The game itself wasn't the greatest and the Senators ran out 3-2 winners, but I was just happy to say that I'd seen a Maple Leafs game in the home of ice hockey and seen them score a couple of goals too. At least the Canadian team won! I now understand what the guy from Detroit was prattling on about—even at the ice hockey, the fans were pretty quiet for the most part.