City life, cottage life and a forest full of bears

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Sorry we haven't written an entry in a while, for the few of you that are intently watching for any news! It is hard to find good opportunities to write long, worthwhile entries. A lot has happened since the last one.
We spent two more days in Owen Sound. Jon took us to the local waterfall which was beautiful, and only a ten minute walk away. We also ended up playing a few songs in a local cafe spontaneously, and had a generous round of applause and ended up with our photo on Facebook by the local Owen Sound music blogger that Jon had a meeting with. The music side of things also made progress. We recorded some overlapping melodies on some First Rate People tracks for Jon, and He and Edd helped by harmonising on a recording of a song that I had written that day. That was good fun, and felt productive.
On Thursday the 9th we drove back to Toronto with Jon and two of his friends as they were going on to tour for a few days in the states. We decided to take that opportunity to go back and see more of Toronto, so we organised that we were to go an stay back with Jimmy and Andrew until the end of the month for a small amount of money. The night that we returned to Toronto, things started to happen again! Jake, a friend of Jimmy's and the lead singer of their band 'Alphabot' told us he had a gig, but that he was tired and could we play a few songs at the end of his set. He played a really nice solo set, and we played a couple of songs at the end, to which the audience seemed to really like. It was so nice to have performed in Toronto- something we will definitely try to do more of.
At the weekend Jimmy and Andrew hosted a potluck party, something that is very Canadian. People cook their own dishes and bring them, so Edd and I spent that day baking cup cakes and big batch of Spaghetti bolognese! Perhaps we should have baked something more English... It was a really good night. We met lots of new people, and ate good food. We made good friends with other musicians, Daniel and Eric Woodhead (they are in a band called Spiral Beach who are pretty big, and have toured in England...) were really nice, and we ended up jamming and writing 'porn folk' with them- pretty hilarious.
The next big thing to mention, is that on Monday 13th we managed to go to a film at the Toronto International Film Festival that is going on at the moment. We queued up for last minute tickets to see the mist recent adaptation of Graeme Greene's 1938 novel 'Brighton Rock' by a new director, this being his first feature film. It was such an amazing atmosphere - paparazzi everywhere, and lots of fans queueing up to see the celebs (as there was more than one film going on). Anyway, we ended up sitting in an audience with the likes of David Cronenberg, Helen Mirren etc... Aside from the fact that the film was brilliant and beautifully shot, we stayed at the end for the questions and answers (two rows from the front), and ended up having a casual chat (almost) with the director and Helen Mirren, when we asked why they chose to set it in the 60's, not 38. A good night!
In between these exciting things, we tend to stroll around the city looking in book shops, clothes shops, eating at different places etc. We went to the eaton centre one day, which is Toronto's Bull Ring/Trafford Centre, and has lots of nice things to eat and posh shops. I decided to be vegan that day, and am still sticking to it, although I have down graded to just vegetarian now... Edd is still enjoying his meat!
Another one of the nights we finally got to see the band, that we essentially came all the way over seas for, play! First Rate People were really good, and it was great to see them live. Again, we had a great night of drinking, good music, and meeting new people - one of which being Liam Sannigan, another important member of FRP, who we are yet to jam with.
Then, this weekend, Jimmy took us up to his cottage in Eastern Ontario about two hours north of Belleville near Bon Echo provincial park, on Little Finch Lake (Belleville is Jimmy's hometown that we called in on, and stayed a night on the way back)- we had such an amazing weekend. It was the picturesque vision of Canada, that in the months leading up to the trip we had imagined. A beautiful wooden house overlooking a lake full of beaver dams and loons, surrounded by a forest full of bears and cougars and mushrooms of every colour. After arriving to a power cut - pretty exciting in the middle of no where surrounded by bears and cougars and mushrooms of every colour- we spent the weekend (cautiously) trekking through the forest, zipping up the roads on the ATV, boating around the lake on kayaks, pedal boats and canoes, and generally loving the log cabin experience. Jimmy's parents were lovely, and constantly kept us full of gorgeous food. We also saw two snakes! A garter snake, and an eastern milk snake, as well as a young buck up right close to the car. Exciting stuff. The loons make fantastic noises too.
Anyway, we are back in Toronto today. As this is our second time returning to this place, this house is really starting to feel like home. Well, the closest thing we have to home. Plans for this week are a trip to Ontario art gallery tomorrow, and maybe a cheeky trip to the zoo on Thursday which is supposed to be impressive.
We can't upload photos on the blog by the Ipad unfortunately, so if anyone is interested in photos, make sure you look on Facebook as we have added some, and intend to add more from the cottage weekend soon. Add either me or Edd as a friend if you cannot access them.
We hope you are all well and happy,
Speak soon. Ruby and Edd X  

 
 

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Comments

[shez]

porn folk!!
sounds intresting guys,lets try and imagine a mob dance to one of these tunes.keep on giging and enjoying .tea rules hugs and bug shez