Hamilton, Day 1 and 2

This is my collected story of how I got to Hamilton and spent the first two days of my trip. It's not going to be particularly insightful or particularly exciting:

Packing and preparing my supplies took longer than expected, and I didn’t get to go to sleep until about 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday morning. I slept until about 11:30, and with my few morning chores (including an oil change) didn’t get on the road until 1:15 or so. The drive was easy, and nice, although there seems to be a problem with my fuel indicator, that is the fact that it hasn’t gone down beyond 4/5ths of a tank throughout the second half of the trip, and that it didn’t leave “F” for at least an hour and a half of driving. Otherwise, things were fine until (hour 5 or 6 when) I hit the Buffalo area and was suddenly driving though a snowstorm with very low visibility and high slipperiness, with (as I found out when I stopped to add only $4 worth of gas to top off my tank despite driving for 2+ hours previous) a frozen windshield washer fluid resevoir (apparently not the same as the bottle of ‘antifreeze/windshield cleaner’ that I was planning to refill with). Luckily the shitty conditions cleared up completely as I moved closer to Niagara Falls, and were fine the rest of the way to Hamilton. Crossing the border went very smoothly, and after stopping at Tim Horton’s (ahh, good old timmys) for a coffee and a bathroom break, I returned onto the QEW (thats a highway) to discover a few miles later that my car’s hood was not fixed down and was quavering as it tried to flip completely open. Was it like that since Buffalo, the only time I opened it? Shit. I pulled off the next exit to fix it, and eventually found my way back to the QEW with the help of some drunk types leaving a bar/restaurant.

Something you should know about Ontario is that the speed limit is 100. You notice this difference driving on the highway: the cars go a tiny bit slower. (that’s my little joke).

Arrived to Dennis’ house to warm hospitality and a home-cooked meal, got to check out his studio and spent hours talking about many things, like music and movies and TV shows, catching up. He told me of his struggles to get acknowledged by local promoters despite being a fixture in the local scene, and I learned of the status of some of our classmates at RAC which was very interesting to me. As I prepared to actually go to bed, the conversation turned to presidential politics, election systems (votes of no-confidence), Obama, racism, media, and more (Michael Moore, that is). That was all the spark I needed to stay awake, and we talked til a bit after 5 a.m.

Having not slept the night before, and up so late this night, I slept away the day until 3 p.m. on day Two. Both Dennis and I had apparently caught something 'going around', causing a scratchy, phlegmy throat and nasal congestioin. Fun! So for this second day neither of us felt like doin' shit so we sat around, watched TV, and talked some more. There were some highlights to this, however: an awesome show called "Art Attack!" which is a kids show demonstrating how to make cool art projects; "Face-Eating Tumor", a TLC special about a kid who had enormous tumors on his face and how the doctors saved him

Also, two new sports that I had never heard of: Beach Soccer (4 on 4! awesome!) and Kayak Polo (also sweet!) were shown and described on TV.

Having a cold is shitty, but it is getting better. Tonight or tomorrow I'll be heading out to Toronto for a couple days. Even though my time in Hamilton has been uneventful and I felt crappy, it was my own choice for it to be uneventful and it is still enjoyable to be here.