Blue Rodeo

I first saw Blue Rodeo at a bar in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia in November 1987. As a hard core music fan I knew I had found something special. While they have never hit it big in the U.S. they have been hugely successful in our homeland of the Great White North, and indeed for me they are probably the band I would describe as having sung the soundtrack of my adult life. So, on  a night when our hometown was feeling particularly great,white & northerly and I was so missing riding, they delivered another joyful few hours of diversion from the cold, as they always do. (I can't count the number of shows I have been to in the subsequent 25+ years  since that first wintery night in Nova Scotia.)

Apart from the fantastic show in '87, the most memorable part of that trip was the 11 hour crossing coming back in a November storm on the gulf. I ended up missing a day's work because of it... good times!

So, it's Saturday morning here on the rock in early February. The winter has a stranglehold on us and it's a sunny but cold -6 outside. I'm on my third coffee and to quote Gord Lightfoot, another great Canadian musical icon, "...I still can't face the day". I know I have to, though, so it'll soon be bundle up, go shovel out the rest o fthe deck and path to the shed that I didn't get to on Thursday and then a walk downtown to work off some of last nights wings, chili and rum. That activity, along with a few errands, will take me to the evening of visiting friends, more eating and drinking and perhaps keeping an eye on the Leafs on "Hockey Night in Canada" If not for hockey to occupy three or four nights a week, this winter would be all the more dismal (though some nights dismal is how one might describe the Leafs...but I digress).

So, hope it's a good day for you Denise and anyone else who may happen across these musings.I will leave you today with a couple of pics of happier days. The first is from a road trip Sherry (wife, partner, best friend & riding buddy) took last summer.

 This second pic is a favourite of mine. It's taken with my 2000 V4 Magna at the Terry Fox Monument here in St. John's.I do a Terry Fox fundraising ride each year called 24 marathons in 24 hours, where I ride the equivalent mileage to 24 marathons (624 miles--slightly more than 1000 kms) in 24 hours. I love the open highway...thus my biker nickname. See ya Out There!