June 17th

This weekend was really hot. We went up to the cottage on Friday night, and just got home right now (8pm on Sunday).

I have a sunburn.

Jan 18th

Hello Tubers!

I just ordered a Domino's pizza, and am waiting for the little fella to get here...so I figured it was a good time to write a blog entry.

Things that are new with me:
-I had a great christmas, it was a little hectic with plenty of driving, but a good time none the less
-Farva put together one hell of a New Year's party at his place, and I learned about a new drink: Champagne with Grapes!
-Jacko and Skate came up to Ottawa last weekend for some good times on the town. We waited in line at Ottawa's hottest nightclub, then decided to go to Ottawa's 8th hottest night club so we didnt have to wait in any lines...it was much better.
-I am planning a trip to Quebec City for Carnival, that should be a great time! Currently I am looking for a good restaurant to grace with my presence, if anyone out there knows of one, let me know!

Here are some pics!

Jacko and Skate Visit Ottawa

Tonight my boy Mike Comrie and the Sens are taking on the Vancouver Canucks...I cant wait to settle down with my grease wheel and watch myself some hockey!

Take it easy inter-web!

December 10

Hello Everyone,

On friday night, my boy Wes had the team *yawn* Christmas party! This was a long awaited event, and it was nice to finally see the day arrive. My favourite part of playing volleyball is the part where you get to leave the gym and go for beers, so Friday was even better since we got to have some drinks without even playing volleyball first!

The party was a huge success, I think Uhblick or Purdy took some pictures of it, but I havent gotten my hands on them yet...so you will just have to take my word for it! The party had a bit of everything, there was door prizes, hot dogs, singing, humming, games, Will Ferrell dvd's....and thats about all I can remember. Thanks to Wes for hosting, I hope he doesnt get written up by the building manager for that party!

On saturday, my parents and I headed up to the lake to check out the cottage. We havent been up there since Thanksgiving so we wanted to make sure it was still there and that a family of beavers hadn't moved in or anything. There was good news all around, the cottage was still there, and everything seemed to be in fine order. We cranked up the ol' woodstove and electric heater and soon had the temperature up to a balmy 22 degrees.

I checked out the ice on the lake as I am planning on having the World Pond Hockey Championships up there in January. The good news is it was frozen solid...but it wasnt exactly smooth. So, hopefully we get a good rain this week and maybe it will re-freeze better.

Today I went to Cozy's for breakfast, and as usual, it was incredible. I treated my parents to a wholesome breakfast and they agreed, it is the best breakfast in Ottawa.

Here are some pictures from the cottage, click on the one below and you will be whisked away to Picassa.

Lac Champagne In Winter

Recruit Love Xmas

Well, another Xmas season is upon us, and the unofficial kick-off for the season is the annual Recruit party at The Urban Well located in Sandy Hill, Ottawa.

This year, since T-bone has moved out into the suburbs, I decided to host the pre-party. The annual T-Boniums were legendary and I was nervous about the pressure that would be placed upon me to recreate the same level of adequateness.

The secret to throwing a good recruit party, is to invite as many non-recruits as possible. This year was no exception as Erin G. invited her friends Jill and Sara M. to come up to enjoy possibly the finest party in the Nation's Capital.

The pre-party officially kicked off at 5pm. Purdy and Wes came over somewhat earlier, and Uhrback and Heidi were the first non-mechanicsville guests to arrive! They brought some cheese sticks for us to eat later in the evening...a stellar choice!

I think the official numbers for the party peaked at 21 people, so things were pretty tight in my tiny apartment but everyone seemed to get along pretty well and no fist fights broke out. The only fight was between Uhrbach and some dishes in my sink...but I think he came out on top of that one.

We had a great time, but at 9pm the taxis were called to whisk us away to the Urban Well. That was also fun, except the DJ was rags. I dont really know much about DJing, but the ladies I roll with seemed to think he was no good, so I will stand by that opinion.

Well, that is enough typing for me...I will include the link to the pictures...so you can re-live the fun!

Recruit Love Xmas

Milagro

Hello Mechanicsvillians, Hintonburgers and Westborians! (I am now including people from Westboro since this article is about one of their restaurants)

Last Saturday, Erin G and I headed to Milagro with Heidi and Mark. None of us had been there before, so we figured it was an excellent occasion to check out the 2nd hottest new restaurant in the Westboro area!

My first impression of the restaurant from the outside was disappointment, but that was only because the cool car that appears on their web page was not parked out front this particular evening. Once we got inside however, the place was buzzing with action.

Mark had made us reservations earlier in the day, and the staff must have known we were going to be the best looking people at the joint that evening and sat us right up at the front by the huge window. I am sure dozens of passers-by saw us enjoying ourselves in there, and stopped in just because of it. Also, when Mark talked to the girl on the phone...she let us know that the kitchen would be informed that we were coming to eat. I am not sure if this is standard practice at Milagro, but if you are making a reservation, I would highly recommend making sure the kitchen staff is aware of it.

We started the evening off with a nice bottle of Wolf Blass. I think it was a Shiraz of some type, from the year 2004. I usually like my wines as fresh as possible, but 2004 will do. The waiter came out and opened the bottle, with Erin G. getting the honour of testing it out. She ended up giving him the thumbs up...he then filled up the rest of our glasses.

For dinner, I had the swordfish. It was incredible! I have never eaten it before, and from a young age I have always wanted to go to a restaurant and say "I'll have the swordfish!". Well, that dream has now been reached, and it was well worth the wait.

Everyone in our party seemed to enjoy their meal, I will leave them the opportunity to leave comments at the bottom of the article so they can say what they think. I do not like to put words in people's mouths, so they can say what they want!

After dinner, we headed over to the Bridgehead coffee on Wellington Street and had some after dinner coffees. My espresso was incredible, and it successfully kept me up for 18 hours afterwards.

Unfortunately I do not have any pictures of this event, I will try to take some at my next restaurant visit!.



COMING SOON: WESTBORO-OPOLY
----------------------------------------
Soon I will be ranking all the restaurants in the Westboro-Mechanicville-Hintonburg area with the theme of the popular Parker Brothers game. (Which will not be mentioned specifically due to copyright regulations.)

Sneak Peek: Annie's Irish Pub has been nominated to hold the "Baltic Avenue" spot of the ranking...check back soon for more updates!

Hallowe'en!

Hello Blog Fans,

Did you think I was dead? I have just been too busy lately to do a blog entry. But since today is the end of daylight savings season, I figure I have an extra hour in which to write some stuff.

This weekend Purdy's parents came to town. So on Friday, rather than do the usual thing (head down to the Market) we decided to check out this place in Westboro called "Trio Lounge." This place is incredible! It is very small, and it was pretty busy at 8pm on the Friday...but with some smooth talking from Roscoe, these two nice ladies shifted down and let us have their table.

After muchos vinos and a fine meal of a sicillian sangwich, we decided to do some shots of jagermeister. That really got the night amped up.

We stayed there until around 1am then headed down to Whispers to check out the band that was playing. Unfortunately, Whispers closes at 1am on Fridays...which is interesting....unless they took a good look at us and decided that we looked like trouble. Not to be deterred, we hailed down some cabs and went off to the place where everyone knows your name...that's right, the Carleton Tavern.

We had good luck, as Third Wave was on stage belting out such classics as "Highway to Hell". The place was pretty busy and we managed to get the last table in the main room. We had a great time, staying right up until the last waitress went home...and locked the doors behind us. The Carleton cemented itself as the best bar in Ottawa, bar none.

Purdy and I found out that there was a Hallowe'en party at the Carleton on Saturday night, and had big plans of dressing up like a ladybug and a pumpkin, but we did not make it out unfortunately.

Maybe next year!

Oct 1

Hello Mechanicsville, Hintonburg and our troops overseas!

It has been a pretty quiet week here. Last weekend was the first annual fishing derby up at my cottage in Denhom, PQ. The winner of the derby was Medium Farva as he caught 2 bass and stayed the minimum two nights. There were no prizes given out, as we want to keep our amateur status.

Yesterday I woke up early, and headed down to Cosy's Restaurant in Hintonburg. It was incredible! The cost was low, and the food was fantastic. I think I will be switching my regular breakfast to this place. I used to go to John's up in Wellington Village, but after I got ripped off there last weekend, I will not go back. Also, having John stare at you during the entire meal sort of takes the enjoyment out of eating there.

Rant of the Week:
------------------

This week's enemy: Telus Mobility.

I finally came to my senses and got a new phone plan through my work with Bell Mobility. It is a great deal that will probably cost me around $37 a month for quite a few features. I was using Telus, and was paying around $60 a month for less minutes than the new Bell plan. Anyway, I called up to cancel my plan with Telus (I had already signed in the dotted line with Bell), and they asked why I was leaving etc etc.

I said "I have a new plan that has way more benefits that what you offered me". She said, "Well, what are they offering?" I listed off what I was getting, and then she said "Well, we could have offered you all that stuff".

My rant to her was, if you 'could' have offered me all that stuff, then why didnt you? It is ridiculous...they just keep ripping you off from month to month until you threaten to leave I guess. So my advice is this: If you want a better rate on your phone plan, just tell them you want to leave them...and they'll give you whatever you want.