Weekend in the City
This weekend the weather forecast was looking rather craptastic and my sister Amanda is moments away from popping out my Nephew so we decided to stay in the city for the weekend At the start of the day it was looking like any other weekend in the city: Laze around, clear out the TiVo, commit random acts of computing and get some time in the backyard or park across the street for Paige.
The thought of another weekend lost to routine was too much to bare and I suggested we grab a nice dinner downtown and maybe go for a walk along the waterfront. We decided to hit up The Old Spaghetti Factory and end our evening taking a walk along the boardwalk at Woodbine Beach.
The Spaghetti Factory was great as always. I decided since we were on a bit of an adventure I would order something different; I ended up going with the Spicy Chorizo Sausage Penne and I was not disappointed. Tammy had the boring ol’ Spaghetti with Meat Sauce. When it came time to get the parmesan cheese on her spaghetti however things got interesting:
That’s right… the lid popped off the dispenser! After some laughter a new serving was quickly delivered.
You never know how Paige is going to handle a new restaurant and she loved it too. Her favorite item was the minestrone soup.
It was a great meal and we had a lot of fun there. After dinner we were off to the beach
My usual waterfront hang out in Toronto is usually a bit further to the west in Marilyn Bell park. My years working at Exhibition Place, particularly during the CNE were made a little more sane when I could take a relaxing hour or two and sit and watch the boats go by.
So this was my first time in “the beaches” proper (I refuse to call it The Beach) probably since my grade school days. I must admit that I was impressed. There were signs of the ongoing city workers strike (the beach clearly hadn’t been cleaned in a bit so there was some obvious litter but it was very minimal in a city that hasn’t seen garbage clean up in nearly three weeks) but all and all it a was a beautiful place to spend the evening.
Paige certainly had a lot of fun
As someone who spends as much time as possible in the summer in cottage country I must admit that I was pleasantly surprised by just how much Toronto had to offer. It is very easy to forget and take for granted all the stuff there is to do in your back yard – I know for sure I won’t let another weekend in the city go by without considering my options for what we can do as a family to make things more interesting.
And speaking of interesting – a funny story before I conclude. We decided to leave our stroller by a park bench while we all sat out by the water. We had been very passively keeping our eye on it and just as we were starting to leave it vanished! We quickly scanned the board walk and saw our stroller being pushed away by a group of people! I’ve never seen my asthmatic wife run so hard in my life. She bolted and started hollering at the people and in the end managed to get our stroller back. Their explanation? “We thought someone left it”. Uh huh. So another thing to remember if you do a weekend in the city – you are still in the city and need to be mindful of that 
I wouldn’t have changed a thing – it was a perfect evening.
For a full look at pictures from the day check out my related flickr photoset here.