Day 16
Vancouver Almost Exhausted
Our last full day in Vancouver, and by now, we'd settled into a blissful routine of not doing much in particular.
This day worked out pretty much the same as the day before: We slept in too late to the sound of the room's compressor finally kicking in. We got up, got dressed, went out and found lunch, then caught a movie. This movie was all about finding new and exciting ways to push blunt objects through people's heads. From the looks of the crowds and the amount of violence in the movie, I could tell that this one would be the summer's big blockbuster.
Too bad about the theater, because it wasn't a Cineplex Odeon. It was one of the other big Canadian chains, which did have a lot in common with General Cinema. Actually, it was still a cut above the US spread, because there still wasn't any Cinemuck or broken seats, and the picture and sound worked pretty well.
After the movie, we went back to the hotel room for a nap. I'd also picked up a book of SciFi shorts that I read, so I started on it, since I was fresh out of Len Deighton books.
For dinner, I had a real strong craving for some "mommie food". Robert can't handle that sort of thing, nor is it the sort of restaurant you'd find recommended in "A Guide to Canada's Finest Restaurants and Fictitious Business Hours." We had to be a bit more inventive here, since we didn't want to go to a dive for our mommie food. What Robert came up with was to try a Ukrainian place, which was nothing short of a stroke of genius.
This took us to the south end of Vancouver, down by the airport. We hadn't been down that way before, and it struck me as being just a little less glitzy, and perhaps a little less decadent than Vancouver proper. Or maybe I just saw fewer cellular phones on that end of town. Too bad we didn't have more opportunity to investigate that area of town a little more.
The Ukrainian food was great. I had some smoked sausage and sauerkraut, with stuffed cabbage rolls. Robert had the goulash and assorted pyrohys. They were both pretty wonderful, even if the place did look like it'd gone a bit downhill since the three star 1986 review they had framed next to the front door.
The dessert was even better. We both had a slice of pie with ice cream - those old rectangular slabs of ice cream I remember having on my pie in greasy spoon joints back in my college months. The pies themselves (I had apple and Robert had blackberry) were definitely up to Twin Peaks standards.
After a pleasant drive back to the hotel (pleasant in that it looked like everyone else was home for the evening), we found that our motel TV couldn't get the Fox channel, so no Simpsons or Married With Children for us that week. I mean, what's the point of a vacation if you have to miss all your favorite TV shows? I want my money back.
Instead, we went back to the motel bar for a couple of sissy drinks. Unlike the other times we'd been to this bar, though, there was a piano player there, making a lot of noise.
Maybe I should be a little more kind. He wasn't just playing the piano, which he was doing otherwise reasonably, and he wasn't just playing the piano and singing, which still wouldn't have been so bad. No, he also had a drum machine going alone with the rest of the mess. A very monotonous drum machine with that characteristic freeze-dried sound of any drum machine that says "Mattel" on it, and it seemed to be stuck on one setting. This sort of constrained him to boogie-woogie, so he sat there playing boogie-woogie versions of all the Country & Western greats (if I can say that) that I'd been trying to forget all along.
We left before the boogie-woogie version of "Stand By Your Man." Nice day, otherwise.
On to Day 17. Get Outta Town!
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