Montreal: A Tale of Heartache and Lust

So now that i've returned from the city of my ancestors, I feel you're all dying to know about the weekend that was. Did I find the girl of my dreams from the photos i posted? How close did the actual weekend resemble my prediction? Well sit back, grab a coffee, while I spin you a tale of a trip for the ages.

Friday:

Well we had a bit of a later start than we had hoped for. There was confusion amongst the participaters which resulted in myself Julien and my bro not getting out of Toronto until around 6, and heading to the airport to pick up Dave who was returning from his week away in California hobknobbing with rich folks. By the time the airport pickup was complete it was inching closer to 7 and the outlook for a night out in Montreal was looking bleak. I should have known better. Mark "Leadfoot" Grimes got us to Kingston in record time before passing the reins to his younger less accomplished brother (ME!). Feeling the heat of expectation and the energy from an A&W hamburger I pushed the envelope, and spoke softly to the steering wheel of our old Dodge Caravan. "Just you and me girl....we can do this....i love you so much." She didn't disappoint. To our delight we arrived in Montreal shortly after midnight, and slammed a couple of Red Caps back in the room before hitting the streets.

St. Laurent has changed, that much is true. I didn't recognize half the new bars or restaurants, but the old faithful was still there, Bifteck. We cruised upstairs, grabbed 4 beauty spots at the bar, eyed up the bartender who was a looker no doubt, and ordered up 4 jagerbombs and two pitchers. What's that? No redbull? But it's 5 shots for 15 bucks? Done, 5 shots of jager, I manned up and took the extra one. So we sat there amongst the young University kids, feeling our age for sure but having a hell of a time, when all of a sudden i had a 2 year psyche student all up in my grill. I wish i could say the rest of this story was R-rated. But i clearly must be getting old cause goddamn was she annoying. So wasted she couldn't even speak properly, and she spent the whole time just eyeing up my extra shot of Jager. Ummm.....HELL NO! Through that one back but she stuck around either way. With encouraging looks and gestures from my 3 compatriots i struck up some light conversation, which was clearly all she was capable of. But my heart was not in it. Probably wouldnt' have amounted to anything anyways. Random fact however is that she lived in 900 Sherbrooke, the very same building that old Ramy Rashad used to inhabitate! Soon we had some more pressing issues, Mark's stomach woes that had started the day before reared their ugly head and he had some violent vometing issues, not once but twice in the bathroom of Bifteck, and although i didn't see, from the sounds of it he coated most of that bathroom in upchuck. So we eventually took our leave and of course went straight to "La Belle Province" for some late night poutines that didn't disappoint, then passed out in our hotel suite. I snored.

Saturday:

We woke up feeling not too worse for wear. Lazed around the room a bit, showered and prettied ourselves up since we knew we wouldn't be returning til the early hours of the morning the next day. First stop...."Eggspectations" for breakfast/lunch/brunch. Why are french canadian girls so hot? After a good fill up of sustenance we headed to Peel Pub. Myself and Julien made the mistake of not properly checking the drinks menu before ordering a pitcher. It was a mistake we wouldn't make twice however, because we noticed bottles of Bud Lite were 2 bucks. Done and done. For the next 3.5 hours we watched afternoon hockey games on the oddly yellow projection screen in front of us, and downed bottle after bottle of Bud Lite. We even had an incredible cameo from one of my bro's best friends Bryan Vaughan and his lovely fiancee Sharene (spelling?). The place filled up, there were chants of Go Leafs Go, return chants of Go Habs Go, i got steadily drunker and booed every person in a Leafs Jersey thinking that it was just hilarious. I also met my future wife. I have a picture with her. She was doing promotions for Molson Ex, and she......well she.....she's my everything. I'm blowing that shit up to poster size and putting it on my wall.

GAMETIME! Paid our tab, and walked down to the holyland. I got a chill, not from the cold, but from seeing the Bell Centre lit up in all it's glory. Our seats were in the 200 level, the Desjardins Club, which means free coat check, and free food all game. Yes you walk up to the concession stands just like you normally would, but when it comes time to pay....you don't. Except beer....that's not free. So the game is blurry, but from the text messages i received from a few of you dickheads i'm sure you know what happened. 5-2 Leafs win. Devastating. Horrifying. Possibly night ruining? Fuck that, i come to Montreal for a game once a year, i love this city, i'll fight through the pain. I'm feeling a little tired, all that beer plus 2 slices of 'za, a hot dog and nachos will do that to ya.

Myself, Mark, and Julien leave the game without Dave, he's off with Vaughany celebrating the Leafs win on the streets with all the other obnoxious fucks. So what to do now? Easy.......rippers here we come! Straight to Wanda's, the home of the 8 dollar lap dance. We pay our 2 dollar cover and get some nice seats right in front of stage 2. Dave eventually shows up and joins us and we hunker down for some good old fashioned male entertainment. Now i'm not one of those people that consistently attends strip clubs. But once in a while in the company of your buddies, they're a damn good time. So we had some drinks and watched the entertainment which was great. Julien had left to go to the bathroom at one point and i remarked to Mark and Dave when he hadn't returned for a while, "is Ju actually taking a shit at a strip club?" Nope....turns out he was buying me my first lap dance ever. Yup....never had one....something stupid i brag about similar to never running a marathon and never having had a Starbucks coffee. 2 out of 3 are still intact. It's a little strange having a girl dance buck naked just for you, when there are several people all around you watching both her, and your reaction to her. That being said.....thankyou Julien.....thankyou so much.

We left Wanda's after a little while. So where to next now that we'd satisfied our urge for adult entertainment? Super Sexe. Montreal's most well renowned....strip club. DON'T JUDGE ME! Super Sexe rules, cause it's always got a good crowd, and a ton of girls. Seriously they have so many strippers on any given night and they're just milling about hanging out with each other, giving dances at tables. Good atmosphere for sure. Also they cater to pretty much every person's taste, no matter what you're into, you can probably find it there, as evidenced by the largest stripper i've ever seen wearing just a bra and thong. So we rode out the rest of the night there. Hilight of the night was probably when some guy who was getting married got pulled up on stage by two strippers. Poor guy. They played around with him a bit, rubbed their boobs in his face. Then took his clothes off leaving him in just his underwear. Then he lay face down on the ground, they ripped his underwear off, and strapped him as hard as they could across the ass with belts numerous times. Gotta admit he took it real well! From there it was off to "La Belle Province" again, for late night poutines, followed by hockey hilights in the hotel room and passing out.

Sunday:

The least exciting day by far. Woke up feeling good and shitty. Headed to Champs, had a lunchtime meal while watching the Pens vs. Red Wings game. Julien headed to Shwartz's and picked up the essential smoked meat to bring home. Then we were off with Julien and Dave sharing the drive home.

I had an awesome weekend, i always do in Montreal, it's still my favorite city in the world, a summer trip needs to happen, so we can do the things we missed, the casino, the biodome, Tam Tam's. Let's make it happen.

Montreal Timeline

First off i must apologize, i've been part timing really hard this week and letting my counterpart Mr. Kitz pick up the slack for me, which he always seems to do in miraculous fashion. Truth is believe it or not that i've been busy as fuck over here so i haven't really been able to get around to posting anything of merit. However i've got a bit of a lull right now, so i figured i might as well try and spit some drivel out for the masses. So without further ado, I present to you, my weekend in Montreal as i envision it right now.

Friday

7:12 a.m.- Alarm goes off, tired as fuck, hit snooze.

7:57 a.m. - After hitting snooze 5 times i finally roll my ass out of bed and into the shower, dress for success, and show up for work 10 minutes late.

8:40 a.m. to 12:40 p.m. - Try to get shit done between fantasizing about returning to La Belle Province. Not Quebec, but the restaurant, i defy you to find a better poutine in the world, not possible.

12:45 p.m. - Getting frustrated waiting for Colin to show up, you'd think that meeting him about 3 times a week, and him always being late, would maybe teach me to show up a little late myself? Nope, i'm not that smart, Colin finally shows up 6 minutes late looking at the time with a guilty smile on his face. Douchebag.

1:45 p.m. to 4 p.m. - Try to coast through the rest of the day and then leave an hour early cause we have to pick Dave up from the airport as he is returning from a trip to California. While waiting for Dave, strongly consider pushing Julien in front of a taxi, urge eventually fades.

5 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. - On the road, traffic's a bitch getting out of Toronto, but eventually the 401 clears and it's smooth sailing. Julien doesn't pee once the whole way cause he's a human dromaderie (camel). I pee 16 times, most of which are in bottles in the car which i try to swap with people's drinks, they aren't amused. Julien falls asleep with ease. Dave regails us with golf stories. I play with myself a little bit hoping no one will notice....they do notice.....silence til we arrive.

11:30 p.m. to 4 a.m. - Quickly check into our hotel on Rene Levesque. Holy fuck i forgot how cold Montreal is. Get our shit in order, straight to St. Laurent, and over to Bifteque. Order 5 shots of whisky for 11 bucks. Dave has to take 2 cause there's only 4 of us. Get trashed unusually quick. Look at hot girls and talk about how we would love to hook it up! When one accidentally looks over, we all quickly cast our eyes downward and giggle to ourselves. Stumble to La Belle Province around 3:30 a.m., get poutines to go, eat them in our hotel rooms, 3 out of 4 of us snore.

Saturday

11:00 a.m. - Wake up.....hungover....ugh.....take our sweet ass time getting ready, good lord it looks cold outside!

12:15 p.m. - Decide it's time to make a move, it's only so often you get to come to Montreal.

12:45 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. - Finally actually make a move, and walk our asses through the downtown en route to Peel Pub, occasionally popping into a store here and there to check some merchandise we probably won't buy, but more importantly to warm up. Several times i try to grab Julien's hand and hold it as a fun little joke, he doesn't like it. Dave nuts me. He is unsuccessful however because my balls have retreated inside my body for survival. Finally arrive at the holyland.....Peel Pub.....time to get sloppy.

2:00 p.m. to 6:15 p.m. - Peel Pub is pretty uncrowded when we arrive, Dave gets a couple scattered boos due to his Leafs Jersey. We are delighted to find out they still offer their "5 Bud Lights for 9 Dollars" deal from the previous year. Julien is especially happy since he's already switched to light beer for good....pansy. Over the course of just over 4 hours, we go through 11 buckets of 5 Bud Lights, some regrettable food choices, numerous high fives with strangers due to our Habs Jersey's, fleeting moments of wondering if we're too hammered to be in public, and finally pay our tab and take to the streets for the walk to the Bell Centre.

6:35 p.m. - There she is. My Jerusalem. The temple. The Bell Centre. Can you feel that? Can you feel that energy? It doesn't matter in a given season whether one team is good and one team sucks, whenever the Habs and Leafs square off, the energy in the building is electric, this is going to be awesome.

7:12 p.m. to 9:55 p.m. - The game. Clearly the Habs win in a 5-1 drubbing of the blue shirts. Grabovski and Kostitsyn make good on their promise to scrap. I scream "YEEEEAAAAAHHHHH!!!! PUT HIM IN A BODY BAG!!!" I get some odd looks. Clearly some people need to rewatch Karate Kid. I feel bad when Grabovski is actually taken out in a body bag. Kovalev scores twice on the power play, and Higgins, Markov, and Lapierre all add goals of their own. Price is only beaten once on the power play when a puck deflects off a skate in front. Chants of OLE OLE OLE OLE! rain down from the stands. Insults from French Canadiens are hurled at anyone sporting a Leafs Jersey. Dave takes it all in stride. Oh and i failed to mention....our seats at the game are in the Air Canada Section, which means free food all game. Awesome. I walk out of the game feeling like a million bucks. Then proceed to puke on the sidewalk.

10:05 p.m. - Trying to decide what to do, where to go, Crescent Street? Back to St. Laurent? Strip Joint?

10:20 p.m. to 12:13 a.m. - Take a wild guess. Emily's strip club. 8 dollar lap dances, sure i've never had a lap dance before, but i can brag about knowing the prices. Instead we are cheap bastards and just watch as old french dudes get lap dances at the tables close to ours. Nurse a couple of beers and enjoy the show. I tell one stripper, "You.....youuu......you.....youlooksogood.....youlooksogood." Her lips say thanks but her eyes say fuck off. So we do.

12:30 p.m. to 3 a.m. - Bar hopping along Crescent Street until we find something off the hook. We've been drinking for over 12 hours by this point so things are getting a little fuzzy and energy is wearing thin, but how often do you actually come to Montreal? Once a year maybe twice, so gotta keep it going. I try to chat up a bartender, she tells me i'm a great friend and that i should add her on Facebook. Eventually we all admit that we're pretty much cashed. Head to Boustan for some shawarma's and garlic potatoes and then bring that shit back to the hotel room. Mark opts for another poutine from "La Belle Province" instead. We all are kind of jealous we didnt' do the same. One by one we pass out with the Tv on.

11:30 a.m. - Phone is ringing, it's the front desk, check out was half an hour ago could we please vacate the room?

12:30 p.m. - Another phone call, "yeah ok we're leaving man relax."

12:45 p.m. to 6 p.m.- Check out, grab the van, quick chat about what we should do. Stick around for another couple of hours? Head back now? Julien suggests we find a rink and play some outdoor hockey cause he's obsessed and rightly so. The rest of us shoot him down immediately because it's -50 Celsius. We decide to make the drive back. Conversation is not as lively as it was on the way to Montreal. Someone suffers from Big D. We eventually make it back to Toronto feeling like sacks of dirt, but overall agree that was one hell of a weekend.

So that's what i envision is going to happen this weekend. I'd imagine i'll be pretty damn accurate but i suppose we will see. Either way i'm pumped, GO HABS GO!