Surfergeeks

So as most of you know, Nikki & I went to Toronto for the day yesterday. Before I go into letting you all know how our day was, I want to say that I’m EXTREMELY proud of Nikki being able to leave Alex overnight for the very first time. I know it was tough for her, and I tease her about mercilessly, but she did it and I couldn’t be more proud!

Now, on to the report. We left London about 11:00am and got downtown about 1:20pm or so. Traffic was light the entire way. The purpose of our going to The Big City was to meet up with the operator of Talking Poker, the forum that we live in frequent. The plan was to meet up with Mark around 5:30 or 6 for dinner, then afterward play some poker with a couple other people from the forum. Since we were headed down anyway, we figured we’d make a day of it and play Joe & Josephine Tourist.

After we got parked (corner of Yonge & Dundas), we decided that we’d go up the CN Tower. Nikki couldn’t remember if she’d ever been up to the top or not and I hadn’t been up there in ages. So off we go, headed toward the CN Tower. For those not familiar with the downtown Toronto area, the CN tower is on Front St. at John St. That’s a pretty good hike. We went down Yonge to King, then along King to Bay, then down Bay to Front and over to the tower. The view was really good yesterday, not too hazy and not very cloudy. I took quite a few pics of the view and will post those up later today or tomorrow. After the trip up, we browsed through the gift shop and bought Alex a sippy cup that was cute. On our trip back downtown we decided to walk up John to Queen and across Queen to Yonge. This path took us past the CHUM-CITY building, home of CITY-TV, MUCHmusic, Bravo, and many other CHUM media properties. Unfortunately, nothing seemed to be happening and there were no big star sightings.

When we got back downtown we decided we would walk through the Eaton Centre (which is REALLY weird to call it that when there’s no Eaton’s in there anymore). Our feet were a little sore at this point so we chilled in the food court and split an order of New York Fries while we rested. After all, we didn’t want to spoil our supper. We checked out a few stores in the mall but didn’t actually buy anything. I tell you though, if I ever won a lottery, THAT would be the place I would head to shop for clothes…man…the bundle of dough I would drop there.

After going through the mall we headed out to Yonge to wander up it. We’d been in touch with Mark via text message and we were on track for a 5:30-5:45 meetup for supper. We headed up Yonge and stopped at the World’s Biggest Book Store. We browsed the science fiction section before deciding to head out. Our next (and last) stop was the HMV superstore on Yonge. I used to LOVE going to this place when I was younger. They had a section in the basement called, appropriately enough, The Bassment. It was where they sold all the 12″ vinyl and CDs for the dance club crowd. Sadly, The Bassment no longer exists. We browsed through their DVD selection. They were having a big 2 for $30 sale so we ended up picking up The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off: The Bueller Bueller Edition. At this point is was about ten after 5 so we headed back to the car to drop off the DVDs and pick up our laptops and poker chips to head for the meeting.

We walked up Yonge to Mark’s hotel at College & Yonge, the Courtyard Marriott. After figuring out how to get into the joint, we sat down in the lobby and I sent Mark a text letting him know we were there. Lemme tell you, carrying two laptops is pretty heavy. The poker chips weren’t very light either. A few minutes later, Mark comes down and introduces himself, as well as his friends that were joining us for dinner. Mark took us back up to his room so we could drop off the laptops and chips. Up in the room, he gave us some goodies that he brought up for us. Each of us were given 3 TalkingPoker.com poker chips, a TP.com pen, and a TP.com mousepad. VERY cool swag. We then headed across the street to Hoops, a sports bar and grill, for dinner. I ordered a burger, Nikki ordered a chicken sandwich, while the others split a pizza and some nachos. A couple of pitchers of beer were also polished off over dinner. Thanks again to Mark for picking up the tab for dinner. Whenever we make it to Florida next, it’s our turn to treat! Print it.

After dinner, we headed back to the hotel and chilled in the hotel’s lounge. We’d planned on sitting in the lounge and playing poker so we cleared that with them. They were cool about it. We were waiting for Kirsten (hope I spelled that right MB!) and Mike, her newlywed hubby, to join us for some poker. They showed up just after 8 and we said our hellos, chatted for a bit, then got down to playing some poker. The conditions weren’t exactly ideal: chairs were REALLY comfy, table was a little on the low side (it was a coffee table after all) and a little small, but we made do. We had decided on a $20 buyin with the top two places paying out $75 and $25 for first and second. We had the chips all ready to go and got down to some poker. Oh yeah, I should mention here that the drinks were flowing at the table too. I had a rum & coke then switched to 7-up as I had to drive back to London in a few hours.

The game started off fairly tight. Some chips moved back and forth until I looked down at my hole cards to see AA. I raised the pot pre-flop and Nikki calls. The flop was rags, all low cards, 4-x-x. Nikki bets out and I decided to raise her all-in. I had put her on something along the lines of a high pocket pair (KK, QQ, maybe AA as well) or AK. She quickly calls and turns over 44. Ugh. That gave her a set of fours over my pair o’ aces. Unfortunately the luckbox was empty and I didn’t catch an ace. She had me covered and I was now on the rail. Actually, I was now the dealer…

Mark was suprisingly the next to out to Kirsten in what had to be the bravest, or dumbest, move of the evening when she called Mark’s all-in with ten high and caught her flush, beating Mark’s nine-high flush. That put us down to three and Nikki still had a sizeable chip lead over the other two. Chips moved back and forth for a bit until Mike’s all-in or fold tactic finally succumbed to a better hand and he joined the men on the rail. Kirsten and Nikki then started battling it out for the win. Nikki finally took down Kirsten and walked away with the $75 prize.

By this time, the lounge had closed and they were essentially cleaning around us. We said our goodbyes and headed home. The drive home was uneventful. It was a long day though and I was VERY glad to get home. From the time I walked in the door to the time I was in bed was approx. one minute.

All in all, it was an AWESOME day and a big thank-you goes out to Mark for being a very generous host yesterday!