Saturday: Good (Continued)

The conference was good on Saturday. Ok, enough about work. On to the fun stuff.

So after the conference, I hopped on the subway and headed downtown for my night out with my friend and his girlfriend. I got to Union station and grabbed a cab. My cabbie took a shortcut (yeah, right) but once we got to the major intersection near my friend's place, he didn't know where to go. I decided to get out and walk the rest of the way as my friend, BR, had said it wasn't far to his place.

As I'm walking to his place, I stopped to ask this elderly gentleman, who is walking his dog, for directions. He tells me I'm heading in the right direction, in an accent that I recognize but can't place. As I'm walking away, he coughs a few times and then hacks up a big loogie and which I hear him spit on the sidewalk. I kind of laughed to myself and didn't really think anything of it... until several other men on the street did the same. By the time I got to my friend's place I was worried that I had done something to offend them, or that there was some really rotten flu going around the neighbourhood and that I was going to fall down on this saliva-slick sidewalk. BR met me at the door and once I expressed my concern, he told me that the neighbourhood was predominantly Portuguese. That explained the spitting and why I recognized the accent!!!

I went into the apartment with BR and met his wonderful girlfriend, G, and their cat. G is super; she's from Newfoundland. She offered me a cup of tea within the first 3 minutes of my arrival. You can take the girl out of Newfoundland... You know the rest. D, the cat, is quite amusing and has a lot of spunk, personality and attitude. My allergies would allow me to appreciate him better if he were shaved bald, however, I'm sure he wouldn't tolerate a crew cut.

We left BR and G's apartment and went out for Ethiopian food. Two of their friends met us there. They were really sweet. The kind of people you would decide to like instantly. Turns out one of his friends was at Dal when I was. I think we even took an English class together.

I hadn't seen BR in 6 or 7 years. The last time we saw each other was sometime after my mom died and before I got married, I think. We've both done a lot of growing up since then. It was really good to see him. You always hope that your friends will turn out okay after the years of teenage angst, anger and rebellion. And you always hope that you'll still like them. As I said when I emailed BR yesterday, I realized that the things I liked about him when we were kids (his wit, his charm, his dashing good looks, his sense of humour) were still things that made me enjoy spending time with him.

He was the kid in our small town high school who started listening to Nirvana before anyone else; who was into indy rock when everyone else was into redneck rock; who wore a Doughboy's shirt all the time; and who drove around town with his best friend, J, with a naked Cabbage Patch Kid strapped to the hood of J's dad's large car, just for a lark. He was the kind of kid with whom I wish I had hung out with more often; instead of that moronic hockey player. When I think back to some of the guys I dated or hung out with, (D, S, and S) I remember I used to get really P. O.'d at them if the told me that they didn't like BR. I don't think they liked that he was smarter than them and they were threatened by his sense of humour. I know that Andrew will like him, though. I've already got that figured out. And I'm sure he'll like Andrew.

At supper BR, always on the job (he's a pop music critic), kept saying "Do you want to go hear some rock? You're up for some rock, right?" I laughed and told him that it seemed like he was challenging us. So we all piled into a cab and went to The Comfort Zone. Not really a knitters haven, but BR's friends were playing there that night. They were pretty good, for a bunch of music critics with instruments! After they played, this guy called Gentleman Reg (?) played. He was great. G kept saying "He's going to make you want to cry." It was true. Then BR pointed out that the bass player looked an awful lot like the bass player from The Weaker Thans, and the guy with the violin was possibly in The Constantines.

I headed back to my hotel around midnight. All in all not a bad evening. It's nice to hear an old friend say, "It was really good to see you. I'm really glad we had the chance to visit." and to know that he meant it. Awwwwwwww...

Next post: Why I'm in love with Shawn the painter-dude.