And now, some more photos of me and Quebecois accordionist extraordinaire Bob Fournier, jamming on our accordions on Quebec City’s rue du Petit Champlain last Thursday. My thanks to Bob for letting me jam with him and to Anitra for capturing the whole thing on her camera!
(In case you’re wondering what this is all about, the previous blog entry will explain everything.)
The passing of Labour Day means back to school for the kids, and back to work for me; my new job as CTO of Comprehensive Technology Services starts today.
Before the serious work of diving back into producing software, I decided to take my first proper vacation with the lovely lady pictured above. She came up to Toronto to catch the Fan Expo sci-fi/horror/gaming/all-round-geek conference…
…after which we spent a week in Montreal with a side trip to Quebec City.
While in Quebec City, we stayed at Chateau Frontenac…
…and had dinner at Le Lapin Sauté (“The Jumping Rabbit”), a restaurant located right on Le Petit Champlain that specializes in rabbit dishes:
Le Lapin Sauté is right beside a courtyard where buskers play. When we started dinner, a guitarist was providing the music:
…but partway through our meal, he left and accordionist Bob Fournier took over:
He played a combination of classical accordion numbers as well as some less-expected ones including Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire, all very well.
After dinner, I had to approach him and ask if he’d play a couple of numbers with me. He looked so delighted when he realized that I had an accordion with me, and so the jam session began:
He then sat me down and took me through a quick lesson on how to play La Vie en Rose:
He then asked me what sort of music I usually played, to which I replied “Le rock et le pop!”. Then I played a medley of Britney Spears’ Baby One More Time and Mitsou’s Bye Bye Mon Cowboy (a Quebec pop hit from the eighties):
We had a grand old time. I’ll post more photos from the jam session a little later today.
(And for old time’s sake, here’s the video for Bye Bye Mon Cowboy…)
It’s the day after Labour Day, which means it’s back to school for the younger set. Welcome back to school, kids, and here’s hoping they don’t assign too much homework on day one.
It’s Labour Day, and I’ve already gotten a few messages from friends, asking if they’d like to catch up and wondering what’s open today. Here’s what’s happening in Toronto today, Labour Day 2012.
There’s a chance that it might be an ironic t-shirt…
Yours Truly at Le Lapin Saute in Quebec City.
I’m having a wonderful time in Montreal and Quebec City, and I hope your Labour Day weekend is going just as smoothly. I’ll be back to my regular posting schedule after Monday — see you then!