My Calgary Dream Vacation Getaway

Calgary from Prince's Island Park

"Let's take an exotic vacation, to Calgary." Signed, "things no one has ever said."

But the firm was paying for me to travel there to attend a conference, conveniently held on a Friday morning. I decided to stick around the rest of the weekend. Here's the story of my Calgarian Adventure.

I'd been through Calgary before. Many of you may remember that I spent a few days in Banff many years ago. I flew into Calgary, rented a car, and drove the couple of hours to Banff. I didn't stop in Calgary at the time, and just saw it through my car windows. Back then, it reminded me of Lubbock, without the feedlot aroma. Flat, barren, basically on a grid street system. And so I expected not that much on this trip. Maybe a chance to get away from Texas summer temperatures, and snicker at the Canadian hoser accents.

But either my memory failed me, or Calgary has really come up through the years. Maybe some of both. It boasts a nice downtown with lots of greenery, numerous parks, several shopping/pedestrian areas, and a lot of outdoor activity. Its not exactly Paris, but neither is it the Lubbock of Canada.

Friday afternoon, I explored the downtown area. It features a surprising number of modern skyscrapers. Later, while walking along the Bay River's "Riverwalk," I would see 15-20 cranes, all putting up new downtown towers.  Piecing it together, Calgary is basically Canada's energy capital, and Canadian energy production is booming these days. Indeed, the reason the conference organizers selected Calgary is because one of the main sponsors, AltaLink, headquarters in Calgary. But beyond the skyscrapers, the city has somehow preserved many older 1800s and early 1900s buildings. Hudson's Bay department store represents a prime example. I was disappointed not to find an animal pelt section there.

Stephens Avenue
 

Downtown attractions include the Stephens Avenue pedestrian mall, a four or five block row of restaurants, bars, and trendy shops. Good people watching. The "mall" includes several old bank buildings, such as the old Bank of Montreal building. Calgary Tower also sits just one block south of Stephens Avenue. This private tower fulfills the same purpose as San Antonio's Tower of the Americas or Seattle's Space Needle: its for sightseeing. Its base houses a couple of shops and a Ruth's Chris Steak House, but otherwise, its for observation. I didn't go up. Turns out they only take reservations, and you have to call a day ahead, and blah blah blah. I wasn't in the mood to be that organized. So, pass. I checked out some other areas, including the Olympic Plaza, which sat next to the Theater Calgary (currently showing The Philadelphia Story), the Glenbow Museum, and the Telus Convention Center. A friend had recommended I check out the Glenbow, but I didn't have time. The large Plaza featured an natural amphitheater, with flowers and greenery throughout.

I walked further south, down to the 17th Avenue District. You can think of this as Calgary's Montrose area. Sort of. A lot more boho, with coffee shops, tattoo parlors, Chinese medicine places, kitsch stores, hemp stores, restaurants, and the like. No chains. The crowds here (yes, they had definitely jammed the bar patios by 3 p.m.--does any one actually work around here?) seemed much younger than back downtown. And grungier. Back in town, they were hitting happy hour early too, but that crowd looked like it was saving up for the new Audi. This crowd looked like it wondered if anyone would notice the rust build up on the old Forerunner. I stopped for a bit at the Waves Coffee House to rest, and enjoyed a iced red tea, of all things. I know, I know, that's really precious, right? But hey, it beats the Seattle Brand, you know? Hardwood floors and walls, dingy furniture, semi-suspicious employees...its like being on South Congress without the smug. 

Walking around Calgary, it didn't appear like that many tourists were on the prowl. Or they were Canadian tourists. Geez, what kind of crappy life do you live when you set out to take your vacation somewhere like Calgary? That's kind of like living in Conroe and taking your vacation in...The Woodlands. Which people actually do. Yet another reason why the Chinese are beating us, people. Anyway, I got the feeling I was catching typical Calgary on a Friday afternoon. The people looked sort of, not like models. I'm sure the winters really beat up the old complexion around here. But unlike say Wisconsin or Minnesota or the Dakotas, I didn't see any obese people. By sheer coincidence, I didn't see any Taco Bells or Burger Kings either. In fact, other than one McDonalds and one KFC, I can't remember seeing any fast food places. A couple of Subway sandwich places. These people must eat something other than brats, cheese, and beer. Or they ride their bikes. Or something. These Canadians also look really content. Really, very content. Kind of catatonic actually. Like they're all living in that Landru episode on Star Trek, where everyone spent the day aimlessly walking around like they'd had about 12 phenobarbital that morning, only to have the world turn into Charlie Sheen's New Year's party at night when the bell rang. Only the bell didn't ring here.

Lougheed House and Beaulieu Gardens

Walking back through the neighborhood between 17th Avenue and Downtown, I observed a dowdy mix of 1950s and 60s ranch houses, probably designed by Mike Brady as architecture school homework projects, and Leningrad-style block flats and towers. Remember all those scenes from the Kosovo and Bosnian Wars, with depressing Communist-era buildings getting shelled? That's kind of what this neighborhood resembled. Without the artillery shelling, of course. Or maybe just not as much. In short, if this is how real Canadians live, no thanks. Keep your socialized medicine and relatively scarce homelessness. It'd be nice to see something pretty every now and then, instead of this relentless shabbiness. I encountered one slight bright spot: Lougheed House. An 1890s homestead with nice gardens. Some real British fancy pants lived there (I don't have the patience to write the story) about 100 years ago. They kept up the gardens, and it looked like someone had rented the place for a wedding later that evening. I saw plenty of guys with three day beard growth in morning dress (ugh-appropriate only for an afternoon occasion guys, has no one ever watched a Fred Astaire movie up here, c'mon!). But nary a bride or bridesmaid were en scene. Soooooo...I guess that's how it is in their family. I also crossed through Memorial Park, a nicely laid out block-wide park originally honoring Calgary's "Great War" dead, and later the World War II and Korean soldiers who fell. Despite the shabby surroundings, the Park itself was quite lovely.

Calgary vs. Hamilton

That night, a client treated me and one of my partners to tickets to the CFL game between the Calgary Stampeders and the Hamilton Tiger Cats. CFL football may look like the American version, but they play with 12 men on the field, the field is about 10 yards wider and 10 yards longer, the end zone is 20 yards deep, and you only get three downs to make a first down. That means if you don't convert on 2nd down, you punt. This translates to much less rushing, and for me, makes CFL football almost seem like intramural rules. The offenses pass on nearly every play. I like watching more rushing than this. We arrived a couple hours early, and had a nice buffet dinner in the "Red and White Club," along with what turned out to be about half the stadium attendance. The Club was huge! They had some ridiculous cross-promotional program for awhile, then had the Ottawa vs. Montreal game on the big screen. The stadium itself, though apparently somewhat recently renovated, resembled a mid-level college stadium. Or one of the Texas high school superstadiums. Put it this way, the Odessa Permian stadium was bigger and nicer than this place. Still, the announced crowd of roughly 25,000 had an incredible time. They cheered loudly, everyone seemed to wear Stampeder jerseys and jackets, and they focused on every play. The game itself was a snoozefest. No one could move the ball. It went down to nearly the end. The Hamilton kicker hesitated on a bad hold, and aborted on the field goal try that would have won the game. But it was an incredible night out-perfect temperature. Basically it was like watching a Rice Owls game in late October. But with more people.

The next day I would start by paying devotion to a treasured Canadian institution: Tim Horton's. Its like a Dunkin' Donuts, only a little larger and more pervasive. Its their answer to Starbucks, though they have a more extensive menu. Its a donut store that expanded to other items. I had the oatmeal with "berries," or more accurately, artificial berry product. Because, #TeamHealth. 

I would devote the rest of the day to exploring the city further. Prince's Island Park occupies a spit of land in the Bay River running through town, just north of and bordering downtown. Home to walking paths, gardens, an outdoor theater (showing performances of Shakespeare's A Comedy of Errors), Calgarians were walking their dogs, enjoying picnics, feeding the ducks, jogging, bicycling...basically enjoying the fact that the Polar Vortex had gone away. Though I kept expecting the blizzard any minute the whole time I was there, because, the Great White North eh. The Park abuts right up against downtown, but you don't feel like you're in the middle of town because trees obscure much of the view and you can't hear a lot of city noise. All in all, the Park provides a really peaceful oasis. I imagine many office workers come here for lunch. Except, you know, when its not 10 degrees below zero. Like I imagine it is nine months out of the year.

Prince's Island Park

The Bow River contains the bluest water I've ever seen. It resembled beach photos from places like the Caymans or Fiji, with stunningly blue water. Guess that's what happens when you don't have paper plants or refineries up stream, huh? The city has installed bike and walking pathways on both banks, though they're paved (and accordingly inferior to the Lady Bird Lake Trail in every way). Not that many people had ventured out, despite the great weather. It was a sunny day, with a nice breeze. I spent at least a couple of hours out on the trail.

Kensington

At the farthest end, it leads to the Kensington neighborhood. In London, Kensington is where the richey rich live. Here, that's probably also the case. But Calgary's Kensington residents would probably be arrested on vagrancy charges if they showed up in the London Kensington district. Its that part of town where the (used) Volvo drivers live. Somewhat nicer homes. Gated streets. Tree canopy. Natural food grocery stores. Drive-thru banks. I stopped at a little place, Higher Ground Café, for an iced tea. Which they had to make by first brewing a small pot of tea, and then pouring it over ice. Because they're savages, lets just be blunt, k? But hey, shop local, amiright?  And there were more interesting looking people here than at the Starbuck's two doors down. Really, it was literally two doors down from another coffee shop. And thankfully, Starbucks didn't seem to be winning the local Coffee War.

Headed back the other way and back on the south bank, the "Riverwalk" provided some great river views. It passed alongside several construction projects and ultimately gave way to a makeshift faux "farmer's market/craft market" installation. Replete with luxury portable toilets and food trucks. Which for me is roughly the same thing, but I know no one else agrees so I'll let it go.

Fiestaval

As I headed back into town, I stumbled upon the "Latin Fiestaval" in the Olympic Plaza. This was a jumping party. The Plaza was packed, and one Latin act after another took the stage. Food trucks, vendors, and others crowded the Plaza. Lots of people danced, while others enjoyed the scene. It went on through the night. Who knew this many Latinos lived in Calgary?

From there, I went to Glenmore Park, south of town. Reputedly it had a great trail looping around Glenmore Reservoir, starting at a small marina. And for a few yards, the paved trail does provide a fantastic view of the city. Then, trees and other vegetation obscure the view. So it wound up being a trudge through a neighborhood park. Oh, and with signs everywhere that they had just applied pesticides so don't contact any plants or grasses. Nice.

Dinner was kind of non-descript. Ruth's Chris. Blah. Chain food.

NEXT-I spend the day in Banff

50th Birthday

I turn 50 on August 11th. Shudder. I'd love to hide in a shallow ditch somewhere and deny the reality. But people seem insistent that I do something fun or otherwise nonsensical. 

I'm at a loss. 

Ideas? 

I figure anyone who's reading is bound to be extremely unsettled, err, creative. 

What say you, Affirmers?

If anyone is still reading this.   

Happy Fourth: change and the Great College Football Uniform Disaster

New Oklahoma uniforms

Hope everyone has a great Fourth. Enjoy the fireworks. Watch some baseball. Eat WAY too much. Wallow. Basically celebrate the way of life that is #merica. Because unlike France or Germany or China or most other places, our country is more of an idea or shared belief set than a racial or ethnic grouping. We're like the Borg: we take from every other culture and make our own.

But that's not exactly what I want to talk about. I want to talk about...Change. Actually I want to talk about football uniforms. But first...Change. 

The older I get the more difficult I find it to change. Not the nickels and dimes variety (though that too). But in the nothing staying like the way its supposed to kind of change. Seems like just when you get used to something or finally understand or master something, its obsolete, or no longer supported, or passé, or a relic of a bygone age.

For a country that by design imports people from other places, a certain level of change was always intended. The Pilgrims brought the uptight. The Africans brought music and foods and expressions. Most immigrants bring industriousness and risk taking. The Irish brought the St. Patrick's Day drunken brawl. So our country has always been evolving. 

Lately more so. If you thought the 60s or 70s saw a lot of change, these days must kill you. Everything sort of kind of looks the same, but its not, mainly because everything happens so quickly. Or, to those not approaching 50, things happen at a totally normal speed and its only old people who can't keep pace. Technology drives changes these days, not unlike how it has for hundreds of years. I'll bet there were Reeders slumped over in caves furious that everyone wants cooked meat over their fancy new "fire" invention, while we enjoyed our ever-tasty raw gazelle meat (or whatever we could track down...knowing the Reeders, it was probably a hedge hog or some near-inert beast incapable of putting up a fight).

Ideas and accepted norms change too, and quite rapidly. Only in the last 10 -15 years has a consensus emerged supporting not only legalizing homosexuality but gay marriage. As late as 1986, the US Supreme Court held that criminal "sodomy" laws were constitutional. Other examples abound. Acceptance of women executives and professional as something other than exceptions and curiosities. Of single, working mothers and other non-nuclear, traditional families. Of interracial marriage. Of non-traditional medicine. Of soccer. Disapproval of public smoking, drinking and driving, other risky activities. A greater affinity for government regulation. The waning of the dominant Christian Culture. The ascendance of minority cultural and social attributes into the mainstream. The rise of the "security state." More explicit violence, sex, and language in movies and TV shows. The "self-help" "self-improvement" ethic. And the Canadian migratory parasite known as "the Bieber." In general, the arc is towards greater permissiveness and acceptance, or as Cole Porter put it, "Anything Goes." To someone who gets upset if they move the break room utensils to a different drawer at work, its a lot to grasp. Fortunately for many of you, unrestrained face binging on artificial preservative-laden fat and sugar substances still tops the American charts.

People both resist and embrace change. I have to confess to a certain amount of Amishness. I'm of the "that shirt is just as good today as it was 25 years ago when I bought it" mentality. If its worked for 200 years, there's no reason to do anything different. Others, however, buy every new gadget that comes out, change cars every year, change their hair, their clothes, their address, their jobs, their friends. Nothing's ever good enough, and things get stale really quickly. Count me as not part of that group.

It's not so much that change itself is bad or good. It just is. It depends in the change. I'm sure there were plenty of freedom-loving Americans who thought eliminating slavery would ruin the country. (Among them my two Reeder ancestors who mustered in to the Confederate Army. Popular move then, now not so much). Just as there were millions who thought Prohibition would save the country. So nothing is "good" or "bad" just because it's new. That's why the whole "it's time for a change" political slogan makes no sense. I'm sure Hitler probably ran on "it's time for a change" too. 

[Jarring segue ahead.] 

So, like many others experiencing news fatigue, money fatigue, work fatigue, change fatigue...fatigue fatigue, I like to turn to sports. Sports doesn't change much. Does it? Sports are beautiful. Watching pure competition. They combine strategy and intelligence with physical ability. If you've played a sport you can appreciate the skill level and grasp the inner workings, enhancing your enjoyment. And sports shouldn't change, right? Baseball is baseball, football is football, basketball is basketball. You can always count on sports to provide that oasis amidst life's turbulence.

Uh, yeah, not so much.

You see, sports are businesses too. Even at the college level. Don't let that "student athlete" garbage fool you. The major college athletic programs in this country are major corporations trying to maximize profit just the same as any other huge organization. So they "respond" to consumer demands and try to appeal to their customers as much as possible. The game you grew up has changed so much, in all the major sports, that in some ways they're hard to recognize.

In some respects, the same forces that affect the rest of us have altered sports. As sports have grown in popularity, salaries have risen sharply and the "workers" have invested more to stay competitive. Unlike the old-timers who sold insurance during the off-season and who barely trained outside of practice, today's pro and college athletes have one job-preparing themselves to play their sport. They train year round. They consult nutritionists, sports doctors, acupuncturists, herbalists, psychologists, private coaches, and trainers. Today's athlete bears little resemblance to those of even 25 years ago. The vaunted '70s Pittsburgh Steelers defense would look puny compared to an average NFL team of today. And as sports teams become more profitable, they can devote more time and money to improve their operations, everything from coaching to training to travel and facilities. NFL Network occasionally shows old football games (old as in from the 70s and 80s). Even from old videotape on television, the players' smaller size and mobility jumps off the screen. Complex schemes then seem like high school operations today. Even the stadiums then look like shacks today. The same holds true in baseball and basketball. 1990s and 90s NBA basketball, during the Jordan/Thomas/Malone era looked more like a UFC brawl than today's basketball. 1970s NBA games looked like today's All-Star game-no defense whatsoever (and plenty of cocaine to spread around).

Rules changes have affected the games significantly as well. The designated hitter fundamentally changed baseball, as managers no longer had to manage around having a pitcher's spot in the lineup. Football has drastically changed its rules to increase scoring; legendary defensive players like Jack Tatum or Deacon Jones would have been fined out of today's NFL. NBA rules such as the three point shot and greater enforcement of blocking rules likewise have "opened up the paint" and made the game higher scoring, with more passing and shots and transitions.

The game day experience has changed. Its become more like a Transformers movie. Players no longer just run out onto the field or the tunnel, or walk up to the plate. An entire ritual must take place before the action may commence, replete with lasers, fog, music amped up to 11, and some idiot PA announcer screaming at the top of his lungs.

Oregon State

And with that has come the change in uniforms. [I finally made it to the point. Hopefully no one was counting words to see how long that took]. as Peter Griffin would say, this really grinds my gears. The apparel companies are driving this. They're donating what I call "garish" and what kids probably call "cool" new uniforms. They feature multiple color combinations, prominent and contrasting stripes, disproportional designs, and crazy emblems. Colleges utilize them far more often than the professional leagues, though the latter seems to encourage changing designs every few years to encourage fans to run out and buy the "latest gear."  The new pro uniforms mostly keep it simple. I didn't much care for the "Iron Man" Rockets uniforms that signaled the beginning of the end of their '90s championship run. Those were cartoons. The '70s Astros "Rainbow" uniforms still take your breath away, but as children of the '70s can perhaps be viewed along with the Pet Rock, EST, and shag carpeting as relics of a bygone age.

But the colleges have really run with this, WAY past the Good Taste Boundary. Consider such atrocities as the Maryland Terrapins' "flag" uniforms, the Michigan "Killer Bees" unis, or the infamous Oregon "Tron" uniforms which change with every new game. The Oklahoma State orange highlighter pen unis. The Baylor basketball yellow highlighter unis. Joe Pesci's purple tails in My Cousin Vinny thinks those are all ugly. 



Maryland

Now Oklahoma, our Lenny-like neighbors to the North, wants in on this. Check out the mock ups. I guess it was either that or some sort of Bootsy Collins deal. 

I get that maybe 18 year old star athletes want to show their own style and not just wear two colors, one of which is white. And since the NCAA exploits these kids in every other way maybe it doesn't mind throwing them this crumb. I also get that just because a uniform has had a particular style since 1950 that's not a valid reason to keep it forever. Actually, some of those old unis were just awful. Anyone caught the Steelers' throwback unis? They look like some steelworker threw up on a Scrabble board.



Oregon 



But don't change to something so hideous it will send half the alumni section into convulsions just to get some 4-star linebacker from Muleshoe to play for you a couple of years (til he leaves campus with concussions and an ACL tear and functionally illiterate because your training schedule kept him from studying). Sucks is sucks. Who's to say the OU 1970s uniform design should remain unchanged forever? Well, me actually. It's a pretty classic look. And since most OU players come from Texas (oh snap!) it's like OU is Ishmael to our Isaac.



Baylor

Ok I don't know where I was going with that last bit.

The real reason colleges are going to these alternate unis is to drive product sales. All the face-painter fans will go buy jerseys, hats, t-shirts and the like sporting the new design. It's another revenue source. Because the schools are all in it for the student-athlete and education first. Right. For that we must watch games where the teams are dressed like a Rollerball match.

So can we stop with the neon, amped up me unis? Until you can top the traditional look just keep what you've got. USC, UCLA, Notre Dame, Alabama, Penn State...they seem to be doing just fine without neon streaks and when they take the field, they carry on a long tradition which the unis reinforce.  I'm sure Texas will one day succumb to thirst shenanigan. It'll be a shame when it does because that home uniform looks just as good now as when the 1963 team wore it and won the national championship. And the 1969 team. And 1970 and 2005. Because you see A&M, we've won actual real championships, not like your 100 years after the fact theoretical contrived championships you declared after everyone on the team died of old age.



Vince Young

And, after all, this is what a champion looks like...

That seems like a good note on which to end. Go America!