Toronto, Part 1

Our trip to Toronto was fantastic.

How could it not be when your Canadian border patrolman was:

Ok, so maybe not really but he was the spitting image of Joey Gladstone. And we die hard Full House fans all know that Dave Coulier is Canadian, so I found this to be utterly delightful. As he was looking at our passports, I was torn as to what to say to him: "Wow, so Alanis was REALLY mad, huh?" or "Cut! It! Out!"

Go had to be at a plastic surgery conference every day, all day (hence the reason for the trip) so that left me and the girls to hit up the town. They are good little travelers and the Toronto public transit system is nice and not too confusing. There was a low point, though, when I led us to the opposite side of town with no buses going back to where we needed to be, leaving me dragging two whining girls and holding a sleeping, limp, deadweight toddler for 3 miles in my already-worn-out Toms. "This is an adventure! This is an adventure! This is an adventure!" The only other complaint I have about the entire trip is that I checked a book on CD out from the library for our drive, which I thought was going to be a mystery/thriller but it ended up being Christian fiction. Ugh. I have a really hard time stomaching that particular genre.

The first day, the girls and I went to Riverdale Farm--I fell in love with this place. It's a fully functioning 7-acre farm in the middle of downtown Toronto and is free to the public. It's nestled in the middle of Cabbagetown, a totally rad area with charming old houses with awesome architecture and lots of trees and parks. I loved it. The girls had a blast at the farm and we couldn't have asked for a prettier day.

For more pictures from the day (Mom), you can see them HERE.

While in Toronto, whether it was in line for the street car or while lugging my stroller up the subway steps ("This is an adventure!") or just walking downtown, everywhere we went, people kept stopping me and asked for directions, to which I would always answer "Oh, I am SO the last person you want to ask." It was so weird! Is it because no woman in her right mind would take three small children out in a busy city where she didn't know exactly where she was going? Did they think they overheard me say "sore-ry" or "owt" or "eh?" or "hewse" ? Do I look Canadian?

The next day was rainy, so we spent most of the day inside at the Royal Ontario Museum.

I love a good museum.

And this was one was AWESOME. The girls and I spent all day long there we still didn't see it all.

We really, really enjoyed our time in Toronto. It's like a clean New York city with a European flair. I highly recommend it.

Choose Your Own Adventure: The Self Breast Examination Exhibit

It's been awhile since my last Choose Your Own Adventure post. Shall we?

You are at the science museum as a chaperone with your daughter's first grade class. Your daughter's substitute teacher who is a tall, young, good looking man walks over to you and your group of students you're tending to. He starts to speak to you, something business-related, pertaining to a change in the time line of the field trip. While he speaks, he absent-mindedly reaches down to an exhibit you happen to be standing next to but have yet to explore. Hanging from a white box is a grapefruit sized sack filled with rice. He takes the sack in his hand and starts to squeeze it and shmooshes it around with his fingers. Interrupting him, your daughter points to the sack he is handling and asks loudly "Mom, what's that?" Both you and the substitute teacher look up at the sign and read aloud at the exact same time: "SELF BREAST EXAMINATION EXHIBIT." Your daughter then points to the sack that is now hanging lifeless in the man's hand and says "When Mr. ____ is done, can I have a turn?"

Choose your own adventure. Do you:

a. Bite your lip and stifle laughter.
b. Say something wildly inappropriate like "It's ok. Her Dad's a plastic surgeon. We're all about the boobies at our house."
c. Once the guy drops the fake breast, you reach over and give it a squeeze.
d. An awkward and weird mixture of a, b and c.

Choose Your Own Adventure #4

You are walking across your college campus, wearing your Dad's 20 year old church ball jersey and bell bottomed jeans that are stained with cadmium yellow oil paint. You're lugging your huge portfolio which is roughly the size of a billboard and wearing your oh-so-scandalous messenger book bag with it's oh-so scandalous shoulder strap you wear across your chest because a) it's a messenger bag and that's the way it's supposed to be worn and b) you want to give dirty thoughts to whomever wrote a letter to the editor stating that girls on campus shouldn't be allowed to wear messenger bags because "it separates the boobs." You're running a little late to class, so you choose to cut through the library instead of walking around the building. Upon entering, you bump into an old family friend--a guy you haven't seen in years. You always had a thing for this kid when you were younger. You knew he now went to the same school as you and had always wondered if you'd ever run into him and wow, you really couldn't be happier about the way you are looking right now: yellow paint not only all over your jeans, but in your hair, most likely smeared across your face and definitely all over your hands and underneath your fingernails. You feel the heat rise to your face and you know from experience that it's also turning bright red. You both loudly exclaim an "Oh my gosh!" and engage in a hug that's kind of weird, partly because you want to hug him but you don't want him to know you want to hug him and partly because you're both worried that he'll be covered with yellow paint afterwards. In a few sentences you both explain the last several years of you and your families' happenings in a nutshell. He's smiling at you and you're smiling at him and you say you're running late and have to go and now it's the part when he's supposed to say "Wait, let me get your phone number" or "We should catch up more later" or something to that effect, when he says "Hey, do you still have that really hot friend? You should totally hook us up."

Choose your own adventure. Do you:

a) Kick him in the shins.

b) Wipe some paint on his shirt.

c) Whack him with your portfolio.

Choose Your Own Adventure #3

You and a friend take a jet ski out in the ocean. You are having a good time when all of a sudden, the jet ski stops running and you are no where near the shore. In fact, if you squint your eyes, you can see the shoreline with rows of beach houses which look like tiny colored specks. You look around for anyone, anything but find nothing, just water in every direction. Because you have seen Jaws one too many times, you opt to stay up on the jet ski and let your friend, who is dumber but nicer than you are, swim alongside of it and try to pull the jet ski inland. This proves futile as even after two hours of doing this, the tide seems to have taken you both farther out to sea. So there you are, shivering and scared, wondering how in the world you're ever going to touch dry land again when off in the distance, you see a shape moving towards you. It gets closer and closer and closer until you realize IT'S A SAIL BOAT. You both start waving your arms like crazy people and yelling like you just won the lottery, which in essence, you kind of just did--the I-get-to-continue-living lottery. As the boat approaches, you are filled with a great sense of relief. As the sail boat approaches even closer, you are filled with a great sense of disgust, as every single person on board is completely naked.

Choose your own adventure. Do you:

a) Say "No thanks, we'll catch the next one," and let the party animals sail on by. Four hours later a rescue chopper finds you. Up in the air, flying above Newport Harbor, you and your friend hit it off with the air-EMTs and form an all-girl travelling breakdancing team, wearing matching red Kangol hats and white track suits. You gain a small following and earn a name for yourself in the underground b-girl circle.

b) Hey, when in Rome...

c) Grab the rope they throw and tie it to your jet ski. Say "Thank you!" while you bury your face into your life jacket until you hear someone call your name from the boat. Reluctantly, you look up and realize it's your fourth grade teacher. Thankfully, she has put on at least a pair of shorts, but you'll still waiting on that shirt or bikini top or strategically wrapped beach towel--anything. Seeing x-teachers outside of school has always been awkward for you but this definitely takes the cake. As they are dropping you off at the dock, she winks at you and says "You were always my favorite student," which is really nice of her to say but you wish she had been fully dressed when she relayed that information because it kind of ruined the moment.

d) Grab the rope they throw and tie it to your jet ski. Say "Thank you!" and bury your face into your life jacket until you hear your friend call out "Hey, would you mind putting some clothes on?" Try as you might to completely avert your eyes, a face amongst the tan-lineless crowd catches your eye. You believe it is your fourth grade teacher but you never find out if it was really your fourth grade teacher or not because you never actually make eye contact with any of your rescuers, which is kind of unfortunate since you owe your life to them but dude, they're naked.

Choose Your Own Adventure #2

(Again, the following may or may not have really happened)

You are on a group date--an outside concert featuring a local band set above a new housing development in the hills of Provo. The music is ok, not great but this is Provo and you will take what you can get. It's about halfway through the show when you realize you have to use the restroom NOW, in fact, you probably had to 10 minutes ago but you were too busy trying to dazzle your date in effort to score many more dates in the future and in essence, lower your grocery bill. You look around and all you can see is dirt and rocks and some low lying bushes, definitely not big enough to hide behind. You turn around and peer downhill, and see the town of Provo aglow with righteous do-gooding. You remember the model homes you passed on your trek up. "Hey, I have to find a bathroom," you whisper to your date. "Can you wait?" your date asks you, like you are four years old. "Noooooo!" you say as you stamp your foot like a four year old. The two of you make your way down the mountain, a 10-15 minute climb at least. You come upon a showing of a model home. Bingo. "I'll be right back," you tell him and he grabs a realtor's flyer and makes himself comfy on the front porch. Inside it is a typical model home, warm, bright and over-decorated. You duck into the downstair's bathroom, praying you don't get snatched on the way in by an agent, but you are successful and find sweet relief in the pristine half-bath...until you realize that this pristine half-bath is without toilet paper. In fact, it's even without a toilet paper roll holder. (You would have wondered if the Bluth family often ran into this problem but Arrested Development doesn't exist yet.) There is a knock on the door. "Yes?" you answer. "Can I help you with something?" an irritated voice asks.

Choose your own adventure. Do you:

a) say "Yes, actually. I am in dire need of some toilet paper." From under the door, the buyer's agent slides several kleenexes and you are ever so grateful. You strike up a conversation with her afterwards and she hires you for part time work at her office, which means you won't have to try nearly as hard to win your date over, as some extra cash is now coming your way.

b) Make your date wait and drip dry.

c) say "No thanks!" and use a washcloth that is nestled in the corner of the counter and has been expertly folded to look like a swan. Throw the washcloth under the sink, flush, and dash out of that bathroom as fast as your exactly-to-the-knee length shorts can take you.

The Following May or May Not Have Really Happened

That day, you had actually tried. You tried because it was Thursday; the day you would see him. And by tried, I mean actually blew dried your hair, put on make up, a little perfume, wore something besides your Dad’s 20 year old church ball jersey.

You had walked up to campus feeling pre-tty good about yourself.

It was during finals week. All semester long in your sculpture class, you and he had exchanged witty banter that you had interpreted as mild flirtation. You had got along well, yet everything had been confined to class and he had never pursued otherwise. He was warm and friendly, yet oddly and frustratingly stand offish, which should go without saying, made him that much more attractive.

Class had ended and you were packing up to leave when you decided to make an extremely uncharacteristically bold move.

“Hey, what are you doing right now?” you asked.

“I was going to go get some food,” he said.

“Me, too. Do you want to come with me?” you said oh so casually, though mightily fighting the urge to vomit from nervousness all over his pretty-boy face.

“Sure," he asnwered as he looked at his watch. "I’m meeting up with my wife in about 20 minutes. She’d love to meet you.”

Yes. His wife. His wife you had no idea existed. The wife that gave him the wedding band, you went on to learn, that he’d take off and stick in his pocket before class because it was "easier to just take it off than to wash the clay off every time.” The wife that might have been a tad upset to learn that you had been infatuated with her husband for the past 4 months. Yah, that wife.

Choose your own adventure. Do you:

a) Stammer and bumble around like an idiot, claiming you don’t want to intrude. Do not mention that you thought he was single in hopes that maybe he didn’t realize you had just tried to make an ever so small move on him.

b) Start laughing uncontrollably. In between wheezes, you convey that you had no clue that he was married and why on earth did not wear his wedding ring, especially around young, eager, single girls, you dummy.

c) Shrug, say “Why not?” and go eat dinner with your wanna-be boyfriend and his wife. You might gain some valuable knowledge, like what kind of girl a guy like him would bag. You refrain from taking notes but learn you must be incredibly smart, incredibly skinny, incredibly pretty, and incredibly likable.

d) All of the above, pretty much all at the same time.

e) Grab a shovel and just start digging.