RIVER PLATE VS TORONTO AND THE GARBAGE STRIKE

The day of the River Plate game we decided to make an adventure out of it and drove to the stadium rather than take the commuter train. It was a nice day, one of the few in a so-far rain-from-hell summer, so we thought we'd revisit an old haunt from when we both lived in Toronto city - the Beaches. The Beaches is home to Kew Gardens, Eddie's old baseball stadium, as well as the Balmy Beach Canoe Club where his family were members. The Kew Beach area has a nice long boardwalk along the lake's edge, some parks, gardens, and is not far from a very funky, kitschy area of Queen Street. Queen Street in Toronto is home to an artistic culture that includes actors and others in the film industry, musicians and music industry workers, artists, writers and other creative types. It has lots of cute & unusual shops and restaurants. Eddie and I walked for two hours after having a nice lunch in a Chinese restaurant. We live in Whitby, a small town to the east of Toronto proper, so this was our first experience with the City workers' strike that has resulted in parks and stadium areas being piled with tons of garbage that has not been picked up. The strike is in its 31st day today, and we were in Toronto just 3 days ago. During our walk in the Beaches we noticed that the area was pretty well deserted. There were a few people surf-gliding and a few kids practicing beach soccer at the Canoe Club, but all of the washrooms were closed along the boardwalk and we were told we'd have to walk up to Queen Street and use facilities in one of the restaurants there. I took some pictures.

( PHOTOS OF BEACHES AREA HERE )

We drove to the stadium which is in the Exhibition grounds, home to the CNE, or the Canadian National Exhibition, an annual fair. We got super parking, right outside Gate 2 of the BMO Fields soccer stadium. Upon walking inside we could see how different it was from last year when we were there. It was very 'open concept', with fans able to sit at umbrella-protected tables where the visitors' end stands would normally have been. I imagine the stands will be replaced for the Real Madrid game coming up in a couple of weeks.

( RIVER PLATE VS TFC PICSPAM HERE )

TODAY I AM A COUCH POTATO

Despite the fact that I have a backlog of picspams to do, the games today are wonderful! GOLTV just showed the Celtic vs Al-Ahly game from the Peace Cup and now they have the Spurs vs Barca game! Then they are showing Lyon vs Besiktas and Malaga vs Aston Villa before the Colombian league games start. However, instead of showing these on TV they are having live streams. Which is okay, I don't mind. Atletico Huila vs Santa Fe is at 7:15 PM followed by Deportivo Cali (MY team!) vs Pereira at 9:15. I got my copy of the movie 'Coraline' from Amazon.com yesterday but I haven't had time to watch it! I will have to try to fit it in! My husband asked me if I wanted to go shopping and I said "No way, Jose! Not today!" LOL.

In other news, I was supposed to be in Boston this weekend for the Milan exhibition derby, having bought tickets and reserved a hotel room. However, at the time I bought the tickets I did not know that Toronto would be getting both River Plate and Real Madrid for exhibition friendlies! Also, Olivia and I were going to go together but she ended up going back to Vancouver and is unable to get back here at this time. That would have been okay because Jamie would have gone with me, but my husband convinced me that enough was enough and to cancel my hotel reservation in Boston and try to sell my tickets on ebay. I ordered tickets to both Toronto games and they were quite expensive. The River Plate tickets were $110.00 each. The Real Madrid ones were $150.00 each! The AC Milan-Inter Milan tickets were $125.00 each! The hotel - the Royal Sonesta - would have cost $250.00 per night for two people and I would have had to get it for two nights. The game tickets included the training session today so we would have had to be in Boston last night. And then the airfare would have been another big whack of money.

My experience with ebay has never been good. I did manage to sell the tickets to the highest bidder, a guy from the Boston area, for $102.50 US (which is about $120.00 Canadian). So I lost $130.00 on the deal. I am a bit bummed because I can't go now (and see Jose Mourinho) but also, I never thought to check with my flist and see if anyone lives near Boston. I would rather have given them away for nothing to someone I 'know' than to sell them for a $130.00 loss. And yet I guess it's better than nothing. :(

Some good news - Toronto is offering tickets to the Real Madrid training session on Thursday night, August 6, for $10.00!!! It will be a bit of a hike into the city for that, but WTF. I might just do it! Also, Jamie will be going with me to the Madrid game so I can do anything I want and act as crazy as possible! LOL.

Okay, on to my next picspam!