September 23, 2002
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Gallagher, Robin, Andy and I went to Toronto this weekend. It was fun. We went to a show and took in the sights a little. I took pictures. We left around noon on Friday and drove up through Michigan into Canada. We stopped to eat dinner and change our money just inside the border. The restaurant wasn't anything special, and we seemed to be at least half the age of most of the other diners. We got to Toronto late in the evening, and it was eleven by the time we spotted the bar we were looking for.

We parked at a lot a few blocks away, and walked back to the bar. The bands that Andy was interested in weren't playing until almost one, so we decided to walk around a little bit. Only a couple blocks away, past a furniture gallary and the Mini dealership, we walked right past a youth hostel. We had no particular plans for overnight lodgings yet, so we went in and got a few beds. It seemed like a nice place, but we didn't really spend much time there.

After we got everything worked out for the night, we headed back to the club. The kids taking admission were about our age, and one of them told Andy and I that we looked "totally Kraftwerk" or something like that. We were both wearing our ties. Die Roboter, the first group, was a Kraftwerk cover band. I enjoyed them, although Andy seemed to think it was a bit silly. He already knows Kraftwerk songs, though, and they were mostly new to me. After that, a DJ played records for a while. Then, Orgue Electronique and Legowelt performed. They are both electronic musicians, and essentially just stood at their synthesizers, turning knobs and pushing buttons. I didn't think much of Legowelt, but Orgue Electronique was good. As Andy said, it was a little more "strictly 8-bit," while Legowelt sounded, I thought, a lot less interesting.

Gallagher and Robin didn't dance at all, and left a couple hours before Andy and I. We got back late and I slept until eleven, when we had to check out. We ate a cheap breakfast at the hostel and walked around the city for a while. We went to the CN tower, and would have ridden to the top and seen all of Toronto, but there was a fee. It would have cost more, in fact, to take the CN tower tour than to spend a night at the youth hostel. Instead, we walked on to the harbor. Gallagher seemed well pleased with the harbor. We went to some sort of art installation there, where Andy was highly entertained by a film of a rhinocerous.

After the art, we walked back to the car and drove around for a little bit. I liked the architecture quite a lot. We went shopping a little, and Gallagher bought shoes. For me, though, not even the largest department store in Toronto had footwear to meet my needs. I did, however, buy the most inexpensive Rubik's Cube knock-off I've seen. Other than that purchase, the only products I bought in Canada were candy bars. Canadian candy bars. I bought one of those at every gas station and convenience store we went to.

In the afternoon, we ate dinner at a shellfish retaurant, where Gallagher ate every kind of shellfish they had on the menu. I had clam chowder. It was a very nice place. After eating, we started the drive back to America. The drive home was a little more interesting than the drive up. When Gallagher drove, we took turns reading aloud the novel that he had been reading. It was good entertainment for all of us, I think. We got back to school late, sometime after one in the morning. I never exchanged my leftover money, so I have more Canadian dollars than American in my wallet.