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2006

Toronto

I’ve really only mentioned it twice, but my tooth had been getting a little worse for several days, and it peaked Monday night with me sitting up in bed at about 3AM almost reduced to tears. I decided that I had to do something about it, and that’s how we spent our Tuesday morning.

It was really pretty easy. We found an emergency dental clinic across from a graveyard on Yonge Street, and I got x-rays and a prescription for Vicodin and antibiotics within minutes. Canadian dentistry works much better than Canadian medical care, apparently, and my guess is that it’s cheaper primarily because most Canadians don’t have dental plans, making the field rather competitive since people have to pay out of pocket.

Everyone I’ve heard from says that the whole “single payer” health plan in Canada leaves a lot to be desired. Ditto for the drug plan, which doesn’t even exist unless you purchase a private plan or get one through your employer. As I found at the pharmacy, the drugs may be cheap, but the pharmacist’s fee for dispensing them can be rather steep. My two presciptions were about four bucks each for the pills and ten bucks each for the “service charge”.

Anyhow, I decided the pain was manageable and that I wasn’t going to let my tooth ruin our trip. Unfortunately, Mark was pretty much feeling like death at this point as well. His stomach was a nightmare, he was feverish, and he had chills. We had lunch at a Harvey’s in a rather bleak shopping center, took a short drive, and went back to the motel. With both of us in a sort of nether region of hell, we pretty much spent the rest of the day in our room, with him sleeping through most of it.

We did escape long enough to keep a dinner engagement with David and Jeremy, though. We must’ve seemed pretty pitiful, but we somehow managed to scarf down lots of Indian buffet before returning to the room to die.

Toronto

  

Things were better today. We’d originally planned more of a pedestrian day, but we were both a little iffy about that now, so we did another long drive instead, around the periphery of the city and then back down the west side and along the lakeshore, having lunch at a Subway because we both needed a piss and it was handy.

  

Eventually, we made our way downtown to the CN Tower.

  

After descending from the 147th story (or “storey” as the Canadians type), we went back to the room before having one more nighttime drive followed by pizza from Pizza Pizza, because we couldn’t get 967-1111 out of our heads after seeing it painted on every surface, building, and bench in town.

 

We both rather liked Toronto, especially knowing we were on sacred ground where Jane Jacobs had recently trod (trodden?).

Toronto to Pittsburgh

 

We took the long way out of Toronto before eventually getting on the QEW somewhere in the vicinity of Mississauga. It was the start of a very long drive that took us through Niagara Falls, across the border into Buffalo, and down to Pittsburgh, where we spent the night.

Along the way, Mark was impressed by how simple the border crossing was. I got to visit my first Wegman’s. We both got to see Buffalo and decided that it was worthy of a later visit.

This being the fifth anniversary of the night we met, we also had our obligatory dinner at Denny’s. This year is was at the location on the New York State Thruway service plaza just south of Buffalo. And if that doesn’t sound romantic to you, then you don’t know us very well.

Pittsburgh and Home

  

After a quick drive through Pittsburgh and a quick breakfast at my favorite diner there, we hit the road for home. As is the case on most days like this, the excitement was largely gone and was replaced by the drudgery of driving. To make things more fun, it was pouring down rain all the way from Pittsburgh to Winston-Salem. We had dinner at a diner and Beckley, and we went home.

Drama aside, it was a great trip.

Etiquette Question

So is there any delicate or easy way to tell someone whose identity you don’t know — and who apparently bought you something from your wish list a few months back — that you never received it?

What exactly is the etiquette here?

Randomly Monday

Random thoughts for a Monday morning:

  • Any Tornotoans out there? On vacation, I discovered that SunTV (channel 52) is airing King of Kensington reruns at 11:30 AM on weekdays. I remember this show from when I was a kid, and I was apparently the only person in the entire country who watched it during its brief American syndication run. Anyway, I’m dying to hear the theme song again (the vocal version from the early seasons) and would be really excited if someone could record it for me.
  • Circulating hot water baseboard heat is the coolest thing in the world. There’s no blower spewing dust all over the place and drying out your skin, plus the baseboard units aren’t even hot to the touch, so it’s safe to put furniture next to them. It’s so warm and toasty.
  • Road trip stats: ten states, one province, 446 still pictures, eight hours of video, $650 in car repairs, $71 in dental triage fees, $50 in Canadian antibiotics and pain pills, $30 in assorted over the counter medications at Loblaw’s, six bucks worth of Kosher Hungarian Hallowe’en candy for the neighborhood kiddies, two reunions with old friends, and a tons more fun, despite the occasional bits of drama to which I have just alluded.
  • I missed the K&W, though.

Five Years of Gooeyness

Because we were on vacation and all, I never got to mention that Mark and I celebrated the fifth anniversary of the night we met Thursday night. The milestone was marked at a Denny’s overlooking the New York State Thruway. We always do Denny’s on our anniversary because we went there that first night back in 2001, the night my life changed so dramatically.

I’ll try not to get too mushy and make everyone start retching. I just wanted to thank the most wonderful boy in the world:

  • For putting up with my snoring and mumbling, my other assorted quirks, and my constant need for food.
  • For coping with my moods when I quit smoking, when my thyroid went out of whack, and when I occasionally lapse into midlife crisis mode.
  • For always offering to turn around at the next intersection so I can snap a picture of that vintage supermarket we just passed (and maybe even go inside).
  • For understanding me so thorughly and completely, and for supporting me in so many ways.
  • For helping me to drag myself out of San Francisco.
  • For having the ambition, drive, and motivation I too often lack.
  • For standing out in the rain that night in February 2004.
  • For loving cafeterias and dumpy old diners as much as I do.
  • For being able to converse intelligently on subjects that interest me.
  • For taking me to Disneyland. And across state (and national) borders for immoral purposes.
  • For maintaining the assorted databases around which our lives revolve, even when I slack off on my end.
  • For being a perfect fit, physically and intellectually.
  • For giving me a wonderful home in a beautuful city.
  • For making me realize that, even though I might have been quite happy spending my life alone, I could be even happier spending it with someone else.

I love you, baby. Happy anniversary. Happy Hallowe’en too.

Trick or Treat

As a new homeowner and a fairly new adult (despite being 42 years old), this whole switch from end user to service provider in the “trick or treat” game is so new and confusing to me. Since I never really see kids much in my neighborhood, I didn’t know how much candy to have on hand. And I’m still not sure what an appropriate disbursement per goblin actually would be.

It’s 7:22, and the doorbell has only rung three times. I may be stuck with lots of candy. That’s probably not good either.

Randomly Wednesday

Yeah, it’s Wednesday:

  • It was catastrophic carnage befitting the day after Hallowe’en. I walked into the Tiki Room this morning, and there were dozens of dead (or dying) ladybugs all over the floor right by the outside door. It was very sad when I had to vacuum up the cute little buggers.
  • Speaking of seasonal carnage, why does anyone go to The Castro for Hallowe’en anymore?
  • Again speakng of seasonal carnage, I, like thousands of children across the country, am having candy for breakfast this morning.
  • This afternoon: a doctor’s appointment in Charlotte, preceded by lunch at Gus’ Sir Beef, where the beef tips, collard greens, and fried squash make my eyes roll back in my head in a way that few other meals can.