I wuv booberries

Ahhhhh......a lovely blueberry lager at my local pub. The first of many more that evening.

But come on, how much do those blueberries cost? It was like the bartender wasn't even listening when I uhhhhh.....gently commented...on the number of them.

Mom Always Liked Them Best

Hey?! How come I didn't get as many blueberries? Could it be that I'm not as popular with that no good, lazy bartender as I thought? Obviously I was right to give him a piece of my mind earlier in the evening.

But all in all, many blueberries were consumed that night. And, unfortunately, the many beers that went with them......

Decisions, Decisions......

Luckily not too many cars are paying attention to this sign on a one way street downtown. Although I'm sure it's tough - for what was likely a city road crew of five - to get all their signs right.

All the same, I'm glad I was walking, and not the driver pulling out of the parking lot, trying to decide which way to go........

I Don't Want To Know

I guess at this place you might finally get the answer to that age old question "What does a bear wear under his kilt?".

But you have to wonder how big of a target audience this guy is going after. Let's see, you and your buddy are talking,

"For the pub tonight, it has to have a kilt theme."
"And bears!"

Well, good news, boys.

Must Be Pretty Good Soup

Only authorized personnel get to sample this soup. Too bad, it looks so inviting.

Not On My Watch

Guess no one is going to be stealing this van. I wonder how many they lost before they had to resort to this?

Oh, So Close

Gee, high voltage and wet floors. Great place to work! At least they're upfront about it. But I'm going to keep looking for that perfect job.

Forgot One Thing

Found a neat little skating rink tucked into a corner of downtown. Of course, few of the people who frequent downtown will come to this place, as they forgot one thing; no needle exchange box anywhere in sight! Who designs these things?

Forgot One More Thing

This is a shot of Calgary's beautiful pedestrian mall on a warm (+8 Degree C) and sunny Saturday afternoon. They just forgot one thing; pedestrians! Nobody comes downtown here. Traffic and parking are so bad and expensive, respectively, people just stay in the 'burbs.

It's too bad, as they are trying to rejuvenate it, but it's just me and the bums.

Heaven

After the weather we've had this week, what glorious way to end it; with a beer sampler platter from the local brew pub. Five delightful samples - for $6.50! If I hadn't actually felt the cold nectar caressing my throat, I would have thought I'd died and, through some obvious celestical error, gone to heaven. Sweet Mama, I'll be back.

And to top it off, in this Calgary Flames mad city, they even put on the Leafs game for me! (Ed. note: one possible contributing factor - the bartender is an Oilers fan).

And hear this, those of you shackled by the jack booted domination of the Ontario government, virtually every bar has happy hour from 4-7pm, every day. And after 7pm, my new best bar has a featured beer on special the rest of the night! Did I mention they put the Leafs game on?

Brrrrrrr 2

Beautiful, but brrrrrrrr. Man, it was cold this week. Luckily that old Plus 15 system was available for us Urban Cowboys. This shot was taken once inside, from the safety of one of the avenue crossovers.

-25 doesn't sound like much, but you add in a little wind, some slushy ice and a couple of blocks walking outside and you get an eastern guy whining to all his office mates when he gets into work. "Hey Toronto Guy, why don't you get the army to take you to work? Ha ha ha". Funny office mates.

But between 5:30am (just slightly before this shot was taken) and 5:30pm, Calgary had 236 accidents. And I suspect at least 200 of them involved cracked windshields. No kidding, everyone I told about my windshield said, yeah, mine's cracked, but I'm waiting til spring.

My barber today, who also has a cracked windshield, called his repair guy while I was in the chair and got a quote for me. Who has their own windshield repair guy? What a funny little town.

Nice Neighborhood, eh?

Yeah, you see these in all the nice neighborhoods.

How many times have you been out, shooting up, and say, man this needle's dull, I need a new one. Well, if you are visting my neck of the woods, your problems are over.

Great fun for the kids, too, as these guys never get all their needles through the tiny little opening.

In Too Much Hurry

Looks like this guy was in too much of a hurry to exchange his needles. I hate it when that happens.

Brrrrr......

Well, Mother Nature finally caught up to us. Quelle mess. It was good while it lasted. Sure, it's no North Bay kind of snow. Or upstate New York. But at -20 it doesn't have to be.

It doesn't have to be because they don't plow the roads here. The radio traffic report took five minutes to go through all the accidents and black ice and pile ups. I guess there is a dark side to low taxes. Or white side, in this case.

Of course, a chinook is forecast for one day this week. Great. Everything will melt one day, then freeze again the next. And they don't salt. They just put gravel down. Some call it sand, but sand didn't just put a hole through my windshield.

Insurance? It happens so much that windshield insurance is as much again as your regular premium. I looked up a glass replacement company? They have pages and pages of them. I guess I can use my tax savings to get it fixed......

Thank Goodness!!

What did we ever do before?

What?!

Chris Farley Would Be Relieved

So when you're living in a van down by the river, what's a fella to do?

Except most of the fellas living down by the river in Calgary don't use these. They just go.....well....everywhere. It's so bad here, city council has just passed a "no pooping" law. No kidding. And, of course, the bleeding hearts are condemning it as an attack on our most vulnerable citizens.

Most vulnerable?

I wonder if any of them have tried walking through our downtown parks lately. Do they understand how intimidating it is to have dozens of these vulnerable citizens stare you up and down as their next meal ticket? It's too bad that many citizens have essentially abandoned our parks to the homeless.

To top it off, rather than dealing with this problem (other than passing the aforementioned "Don't Poop and Scoot" law) all through our parks we have these little blue porta potties everywhere. Nothing says picnic better than an aroma wafting from one of these blue babies.

And that concludes our regularly scheduled whining.

So That's How You Do It

After I got my MBA, I foolishly went to work for big business (one of only many foolish things I've done). But I see I should have opened up a noodle shop in Chinatown......down by the river. Couldn't have turned out any worse.

And I like noodles.....

Chris Farley Would Be Proud

Good to see that Jesus is now living in a van, down by the river. The Bow River, that is.......

Where Have You Been All My Life?

Okay, so why wasn't I told about this place before? I'm living clear on the other side of town.

And a Dozen for my Little Friend Here

Student discounts? Great idea! Inside, the promotion actually is "If you can prove you're under 17, 2-1 Whiskey!"

Jimmy Would Be Proud

Cool little New Orleans crawdad bar. Right in Calgary. Looks like Jinny Buffett would fit in nicely here.

Went to this place a while ago. Not a lot of eatin' in one of those crawdads. You have to have an entire bucket of those little dudes to get full.