big & long

Happy Easter! I had a BIG, LONG weekend, kind of hard too, HA. :D My SB came to town and we played downtown the entire time. I'd tell you ALL about it but I can't, I'll tell you about the food and the touristy things.

Thursday:
Midnight snack: chicken shawarma sandwich--it was pretty good, could be more hardcore. I wanted to try this watery milky/yogurty drink, but I didn't. I suspect it's like yoduly. Anyway, I never had lebanese in Toronto so I have nothing to compare to, but I'd give it 3/5.

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Friday:
Breakfast: poutine and hot dog from fries truck--poutine was good! This one had shredded mozarella instead of curds so it melted soo good, on very fresh fat fries, mmm so good. (lost points for not using curds because I do enjoy them). Hot dog was disappointing, the bun was cold and stale. lots of condiments tho, that's always a must! 4/52/5. Toronto can do better.

Shopping: Eaton Center--it was okay, it's Eaton Center. I bought my boyfriend his brithday gift part one--a very sexy Puma/Ducati hoodie. It's a present for myself too, super eye candy. And, after much deliberation I bought a carrot-apple juice--my favourite drink lately. I love it, and I love that other people hate it. HA! Not so worth it tho, not at all, it's always expensive.

Walking tour: Yonge > Queen > Spadina > Dundas--it was a much shorter walk than I had anticipated, and it was great that we got to see a lot of things that I haven't seen in a long time, and get a better sense of where it is in the city (because I suck at directions). Also saw some things that I have never seen, like the AGO (art gallery) with the cool facade, and discovering the mall thing across from the Yonge & Dundas Square with the AMC theatre inside. And then favourites that I always like to see, like CHIPOTLE and... CHIPOTLE. It's strange but I have finally warmed up to the Yonge & Dundas Square, and accept/enjoy it as a legit landmark, although the square itself is still deserted.

Lunch: drinks, steak fajita, smokey burger at Jack Astors--I had some blue curaco-lime slush drink and it was very good! 5/5. The food was so-so, disappointing for Jack Astors since I was on a streak of ordering good things there. Steak fajitas was a LOT smaller than I remember, we had to ration our filling, when we used to always run out of tortillas first. The burger was overcooked, otherwise it was fine. Food deserves 3/5, disappointing at first but later it was okay satisfying. That was also a good place to get some rest after the long walk.

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Dinner: beef burrito at Burrito Boyz--This was recommended to me by a foodie friend, I'm sorry but CHIPOTLE IS BETTER. WAY BETTER. The burrito was made with good ingredients, and it was toasted. Sound good, right? They toasted it for a little too long, the tomatoes and lettuce was cooked and the whole thing was a big indistinguishable mush, which was good in its own way but that's not how I like my burrito. 3/5. There were exotic juices there that I wanted to try but I skipped. I have a hangup about ordering drinks, seems frivolous.

Comedy show at YukYuk's--5/5! First time at a comedy club, definitely exceeded my expectations. I like to watch stand up on TV and I didn't expect regular live shows to have comedians that are up to par with the ones on TV. We learned some very funny jokes that we kept repeating to ourselves throughout the weekend. It was great. And BONUS: surprise appearance by Russel Peters! Exciting. But he wasn't the best of the show. We also drank beer at the show, I'm not gonna rate the beer but I will say that the service was slow.

Midnight snack: waffle with icecream--2/5. The waffle was dry and dense, it left a weird aftertaste in my mouth. The icecream was very good. Still, I didn't finish it. I got it because I had eyed that place each time I passed by, now I don't have wonder anymore.

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Saturday:

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Brunch: paella and ruben at Pickle Barrel--4/5! Paella was great. It was very clean, flavourful, good ingredients with tender chicken, crunchy shrimp, lots of good veggies, good rice. It didn't have that dirty goodness of real paella (or what I imagine real paella to be, clearly I have not been to Spain), but I'd still eat it again. The Ruben was good too, I usually don't like Rubens but I thought that was pretty good. The fries that came with it sucked, especially since fries truck was right outside on the street. tsk tsk.

Shopping: purse hunt at Eaton Center. We failed. There just aren't many purses out there, and I don't like most of the styles of bigger purses. I really like the JUICY towelly purses, but it's expensive and incredibly impractical. The problem is I don't like most leather, and suede/towel is very hard to keep nice when you are rough with your shit like me. Even if I could afford it I bet I will only like it for the first month, after that it will be this brown soggy blob of dirt. Some girls fall in love with purses so easily but I haven't seen one that I absolutely love. I remember seeing a Burberry purse that I liked and needless to say I can't afford to have it. A big purse that can hold water is something that I've been looking for for a long time and I kind of need to have one. This is frustrating. I don't want to settle for an OKAY purse, I want to be excited when I see it on the shelf, and not have to convince myself that it's nice. It wasn't a great shopping experience, second day, crowded, just generally tired out. I thought of getting carrot juice again, but didn't in the end.

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Distillery District: We tried to eat at a restaurant, they were all super packed. Fuck. We ended up eating a little something at this little cafe/bakery place and it was just okay. Not filling.

Glengarry Glen Ross at Yonge Center: We had tickets for this play at the Distillery District, cool... Before we went in we decided we needed more food so we had a salad nicoise and tuna panini, both were surprisingly good. 5/5. I really liked it, it was good clean food and it did a lot of good in filling us up before the show, and giving us some much needed fresh vegetables. The play itself was pretty good, it's nice that we had the chance to do something out of the ordinary.

Drinks at Hoops Bar & Grill: After the show we went to this bar, which really wasn't my kind of bar but we ended up having a good time. Nice buzz from a couple beers. :D Okay maybe a little drunkie too.

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Sunday:

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Breakfast: breakfast sandwiches at Tim Hortons--bad experience... they didn't give us what we ordered. Fuckers. We got one thing fixed and then ate the rest, whatever. It was okay, like what that stuff normally taste like. 1/5 for bad service.

Lunch #1: salmon sliders and beer at BeerBistro--4/5! BeerBistro was one of the places we made a point to experience. We didn't eat a lot there, just a nibble with some beer. The 'quenching' beer is my thing, the other ontario beer was bitter in comparison. Overall it was a nice place to sit down and get a little happy in broad daylight.

Lunch #2: italian sausage and hot dog at hot dog stand, poutine (again) at fries truck--4/5. This is how hot dogs are supposed to be! Yay to good grilling, warm bread, and lots of condiments! Points lost for giving me italian sausage when I asked for polish, it's okay, I liked it still. Poutine needed an encore because it was so good. The only problem with eating street food is the seagulls and pigeons, they are agressive...

The ROM: We walked all the way from King Street to Bloor, that's a long ass walk. And what do you do at a museum? Walk. The museum was pretty nice, I liked looking at stuff with my sexy boyfriend wearing his new sexy hoodie. This trip ended quite miserably for me, because we failed looking for a subway station (should have looked harder, really) and walked back to college. So it turned into a super huge hike. I was tired with sore feet, and turned into a grumpy, almost teary little kid.. like that girl on Jon & Kate. Sorry...

Snack: Canadian Eh pizza at Pizza Pizza--I didn't eat it, so 0/5. I just needed to sit and be zoned out.

So that was the highlights of this weekend! I think we did a lot on this trip, and learned that we can walk almost everywhere downtown. Whoo! Power to little girls crying over tired feet! And, because we did so much our time together felt so much longer. I think we definitely made some very good memories in this City.

Overall:
Highlights: walking tour, comedy club, Ducati/Puma hoodie, and just plain spending time together is always the best.
Lowpoints: didn't find a purse, didn't eat Chipotle, cold/windy weather.

Pictures coming soon? MAYBE. Can't promise I'll still be this excited.