GUILTY PLEASURE

It seems to me that the most extreme of joyous moments should only occur once a year, like on one'sbirthday. After all, if these delightful moments occurred all the time, then they may not seem so delightful. My past birthday was quite amazing and I figured that a day like that wouldn't happen again for another year. Just over a week later, I woke up early to pick up a friend and head down to Ashbridges Bay to help set up the Habitat For Humanity - Nicaragua Global Village Build Beach Volleyball Tournament. The weather was amazing as we set up the courts. During the set up, I thought to myself that only my friend Kevin was resourceful enough to think of using a strap ratchet system to tighten up the nets. It turns out that the other two nets that we set up also used a ratchet system! For some reason, I always felt guilty about this: perhaps it takes away from the "purity" of knowing how to tie a tightening knot by cheating with technology. One of those odd things that amuse me.

So, our last-minute-addition team, The St. Clair Spikers, ended up not being added to the schedule. With the ladder already set, it was difficult to make changes. Fortunately, there was another team that was short on players, who were called the Spirit Fingers (named after something in the movie Bring It On, I find out later). They welcomed the amalgamation of the two teams and everything was good to go. Actually, I was the only one from the SCS's who ended up playing as the other members opted to relax in the shade. Which was a good thing, because at the end of the tournament, our team was aptly renamed Sprained Fingers, Burnt Toes. The sand was so hot; right now, I'm sporting some nice blisters on the soles of my feet! In between games, I went with the rest of the SCS's to go geo caching. Clinton was sporting his new GPS handheld and he downloaded some cache coordinates. There was one located at the tip of the peninsula just 500 metres away. So, off we went, with visions of treasures in our mind. Once we found the treasure, we had nothing to leave behind except the Nalgene water bottles (including Tammy's Chinese knock off Nalgene) we were carrying and a Chinese coconut bun. I guess we were assuming that the cache would be easy to find. Well, we got to the coordinates and spread out to look for a box or container of some sort. We ended up finding lots of empty bottles and even a Tim Horton's coffee cup, but no cache. We realized that it would've been easier if we downloaded the clues as well. Doh! The Chinese coconut bun ended up being stored in my stomach.

As if it wasn't good enough to be outdoor on a beautiful day, diving in the sand and playing good volleyball (our team won every game except for the last one), but the SCS's and honorary team member Norm decided to have sushi and ice cream afterwards. We decided to patronize the first sushi restaurant (Aki Da) on our stroll down the Beaches stretch of Queen Street. What actually was the tipping point was that they served Black Cod which prompted Norm to immediately persuade us to rush this place (of course, after checking the prices on the menu to ensure that we wouldn't have to take a mortgage out on this meal). Not too many places have me wanting to go back as much as this place! It's a modest restaurant but they have an amazing selection of different dishes (more than your run-of-the-mill sushi/sashimi combos and bento boxes), but things that are (as attested to) authentic. Like a salmon sashimi salad. Or the benito topped Okonomiyaki. I had the Grilled Black Cod (which I learned from Norm isn't really cod, but butterfish) which just melted in my mouth. IT WAS AMAZING!! The conversation around the dinner table centred around food. I was intrigued by the collective knowledge of baking techniques and important factors when considering a cleaver (apparently there is a place at Pac Mall that specializes in "choy dows")! I just about choked on my food when we started talking about "food porn!" I wasn't super stuffed from this meal but comfortably satisfied, which is the feeling you want went enjoying a high quality meal. We had to make a b-line out of the place once the chef started the teppanyaki grill!

Then we ventured down a little further to character filled beaches Queen Street East until we arrived at Ed's Real Scoop for some homemade ice-cream. I went for Cookies'N'Cream in a waffle cone. I must say, if White Mountain in Kingston serves the ice cream for Kings and Queens, this place serves desserts to deities. It was a good thing that we had a long walk back to where we parked to work this off!

As we arrived back at our cars, our day concluded at nautical twilight (as opposed to civil twilight, as confirmed by Clinton's GPS unit). But what perfect day is complete without a good pee story. So, Norm proceeded to relay his first fishing experience with us. I'll spare the details because it's much more hilarious coming straight from him, but it had to do with lost anchors, fishing lure ear plugs, peeing into the lake and trashing the outboard motor because they didn't see the buoy marking shallow water.

IT WAS A REALLY GOOD DAY!