Ontario Girl, or Hurtin' Albertan?

I had so many titles in mind for this post, but decided to stick with this one. So, you'll never guess who we went to see the other night...but, if by some stroke of genius you guessed Corb Lund and the Hurtin' Albertans, you guessed right! (if that was indeed your guess you must know the vicar's wife very well.) After being in Windsor for a month now, I was beginning to feel a little homesick. Early one morning (after CityLine but before the View) I chanced to open my e-mail and find a schedule of tour dates for my favourite boys. Yes, I have in fact signed up for the online newsletter - get off my back, bintches. Lo and behold, there was a concert scheduled for Sunday, September 17 in London (a 2 hour drive away, but what kind of fan would I be if my favourite band drove all this way and I didn't even make the effort.) The nice thing is that we rarely have anything scheduled on Sunday afternoons/evenings, and Monday is Murray's day off so it proved to be perfect timing. As fate would have it, there were still tickets available - hey, it's not Alberta! I once again suckered my loving husband into taking in the show by reminding him that he is, in fact, a Corb Lund fan himself. Not in Corb his present Alt-Country form, but in his grungier, underground, Alt-Rock era when he was with the smalls. Anyway, we hopped in the car much like we had so many times this summer, and headed up the 401 to London. London is actually quite nice. Lots of trees and old houses - I guess one of the first settlements in upper Canada. You may think I'm smart for knowing that, but I'm actually racking my brain to remember what was on the "Historical Point of Interest" sign we passed by the river. They really milk the "English connection" what with the River Thames and "Covent Garden Market" and all that jazz. A nice college town nonetheless. We arrived at the Cowboys-esque bar an hour early, hoping to be able to get a table and have some dinner before the show. No such luck - all we found were 3 desperate city girls hoping to look trashy in their cowboy hats that came free with the Budweiser case. After deciding that Taquitos from the neighbouring 7-11 wouldn't be sufficient nourishment for the evening, we headed off down the strip to look for some supper. Murray made a crack that those 3 girls had probably bought the only other tickets for the show. After all, it's not Alberta! When we got back to the club there was a lineup - nothing major, but I'm glad we got there when we did because when we got inside, we actually managed to get a table with chairs up on the balcony. Sweet seats, if I do say so... The opening act was actually pretty good for a change! They're called Elliott Brood, and we bought their CD. Then was the moment of magic...I guess that's a little dramatic, but it was an awesome show. You will notice the yahoos near the front waving their Copenhagen snoose cans in one hand, and in the other, their disgusting chew-spit-cups (sorry, I don't know the slang for that one...beer cup spitoons?) Ick. Glad I wasn't standing beside them in case of chew-spit-cup-spillage.

We both quite enjoyed the show the chew guys put on, and the actual concert was the best one I've seen.
The cool part is, once the show was over and lots of people left, we looked over our balcony railing and there was Corby! Murray, being the super sport that he is, helped me elbow through the crowd of Budweiser-cowboy-hat-wearing, shirt-cut-waaaaaay-too-low-for-a-woman-of-your-age-sportin', beer-spilling, chew-cup-carrying crowd so I could meet my country music hero.

And I did.

And, of course, stupid blogger won't let me post the photograpic evidence of this momentous occasion! Bah!