Toronto Outdoor Show

A few months ago, Gerry had seen an advertisement for The Toronto Outdoor show. We thought that it would be cool to check out the vendors of gear and just have a night out, so we agreed to go.

Well today was the first day of the show, so I had made plans to leave work a few hours early, grab the GO train to Union Station, north on the Young subway, then just a short walk to Gerry's office. Then we could hit the show and go out after without having to take separate vehicles. So far so good!

Everything was going fine until I was about to leave the office to catch my 2:50 train. I had just come back from the gym and getting dressed when I realized that when packing my bag I had forgotten one thing...my pants! After franticly checking my bag for the third time to no avail, I knew I had to go home to retrieve my trousers and time was not on my side. I rocketed home in record time and switched my stinky workout gear for the neatly pressed pants. In no time I was back on the highway speeding (literally) towards the train station. As I got off the highway, I could see my train was already in the station. I managed to nail both of the notoriously long lights when green, parked in the farthest/only parking space available and sprinted to the station. I bought my ticket and the race was on, as I now would have to run all out to make it. As I started to run, several people behind me started to laugh, I am sure I looked crazy, but I had to make this train! Just as I stepped through the doors of the train they closed and the started to pull away.

As I took my seat, I could see the 3 teens that were "too cool to run", throw their arms in the air as the stood on the platform. If this was the Olympics, my seat was the gold medal and the only reward for the 4th, bronze and silver place teens was a 45 minute wait in the cold. Sometimes it pays to be uncool.

Unfortunately the show was very disappointing. There were more travel agents then anything and it seemed that most of the vendors had the same things. I guess I was thinking that this was going to be a show of new products and that, it was not. One of the highlights of the show was when we were looking for a parking spot and Gerry had dismissed some of the available spaces as being " too far" from the entrance. After finding a satisfactory space and he pointed out how being to lazy to walk an extra 20 feet was "probably not in the spirit of the outdoor show."
To summarize : the most memorable part of the show was the parking lot.

After the disappointing show, we went for dinner at Dipamo's barbecue. I had never been there before and is was great. This is what we had and a brief description:

"Barbeque heaven

$45.00 "Put some south in yo’ mouth!" A heapin’ helpin’ of slow cooked heaven. St. Louis side ribs, pulled shoulder, brisket and chicken served with sides of French fries, Dipamo’s pit beans, mustard slaw and roasted corn."

I think this would be a place my dad would enjoy as well. The portions are best described as perfect. I give this restaurant my highest rating 5 Canoes out of 5!