The problem with miracles is that they are pretty hard to come by.

Montreal is currently hosting the FINA aquatic world championship and one pleasant surprise has been the performance of the women water polo team which has managed to eliminate Italy (the Athens gold medalist) and Greece (the Athens silver medalist). They also showed a remarkable amount of resiliency in the quarter-final game against Greece, coming back from a 5-1 deficit to snatch an 8-6 victory.

The stage was all set for the semi-final match against Hungary. There wasn’t an empty seat to be found, a gorgeous sunset was illuminating the sky and Radio-Canada had decided to forgo its usual prime-time schedule to carry the game live. This was my first introduction to water-polo and I really liked what I saw. It’s a fast-paced, high-scoring, game and the four 7 min quarters are the perfect length for my diminished attention span.

Unfortunately, victory was elusive but there is still hope for bronze tomorrow afternoon against Russia. I just checked and there are tickets available…we’d go but we used up a lot of of our vacation days this month.

Non-Canadians may not understand the meaning of this entry title. Both the women and men Canadian hockey teams returned from Salt Lake City with gold medals around their necks. It turns out that a Loonie (a gold-colored $1 coin) had been placed under the ice by the Canadian ice maker. This precious piece of Canadian sports history now sits in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

old main gate of an administrative building in lachine (is lachine in montreal now?).

After reading a really funny entry in the Vienna MetroBlog, I decided to check out the search terms that led new readers to the Montreal MetroBlog this month.

1- montreal orgy
Eight different searches used a combination of those two words. If Google needs another revenue stream, maybe they should develop a way for people who do similar searches to find each other.

2- karla homolka address montreal (under many variations)
Google, the favorite tool of the vigilante.

3- alexandre despatie naked
Like his Speedo is not tight enough?

4- objet anal
How many results pages did they have to go through before getting to us? I am certainly not interested in finding out.

5- montreal jazz festival bomb squad
In light of recent events, that one is a bit scary.

6- drugs are bad mmmkay
That someone would do such a search is understandable, that they would click on one of our entry as a result is not.

7- fat free ding dongs
see #6. Can anybody guess which old entry provided that result?

8- free stuff to do in your apartment in montreal
see #1

9- how to take out bra?
Again, see #1 but somehow this one might be Vila’s fault.

Other than the High Lights Festival, few events in Montreal bring out the photographers like the annual Divers/Cit

Howdy!

I’ve been looking for the person(s) responsible for these painted bits of wood that have been placed all over the city.

I’ve seen them on Sherbrooke around Saint Laurent. Notre Dame around Saint Francois Xavier. Saint Denis from Roy until Laurier. I’ve heard of them being on Bellechase, Laurier and elsewhere around the city.

Unless the city has become really cheap and sloppy, they aren’t made by the city. And while the city has become cheap, I’m not certain that I believe they would get this sloppy.

And then if you look at the lower right hand corner of the sandwich type of sign, you can see what appears to be a signature - and it sure as shootin’ doesn’t look like anything city-like.

If you’ve seen ‘em elsewhere, or know who is responsible, or have other pictures, please post or let me know, I am extremely intrigued by this.

It appear to me that some private citizen is taking it into their own hands the responsibilty of trying to get rid of some cars.

Selling articles outside in front of stores is not something that happends a lot in Montreal. When it does happen, the street is often closed to cars like on Mont-Royal or Saint-Hubert.
Last week, this store on Saint-Denis was going on the street along with many others. This particular store had all kinds of colorful items.

The Divers/Cit

Dai Tong Lam is a Buddhist monastery way up north of Montreal. Every summer there’s a bunch people coming up there visiting, enjoying the free air. Some people like to live off-shore Montreal to be away of the city, but unless you’ve been to a place like Dai Tong Lam, you have no idea what fresh air is.

It’s a really fun drive up there and pretty much like a video game, except that staying on the road is a very good idea.

People all over Canada and USA come there to visit and have a good time. The place rents about 60 yellow school buses every year and drives people up there. Add the people driving in their own cars and you can get a number close to 10 000 people. In addition, there’s free food, good air and nice walk all over the place. If you need meat to survive, you should pack up your own meal, Buddhism doesn’t serve meat. Free food for 10 000 people. That’s something.

Kids, teenagers, adults, everybody can go there. Everything up there was built by the monks that live there. To me, there’s a personal reason to be there, because that’s where my grand mother’s ashes are kept and the whole family goes to pay our respects.

Yesterday, we were blessed with a beautiful sun and a cozy temperature adding up to a wonderful weather. Look at all that extremely well cut grass and the surace is really big. That’s some damn good work.

This doesn’t bode well, my first morning back to work is marked by thunder and lightning. The payback for a long vacation has always been the festering pile of sh*% waiting for you on your desk.

Translated from Anne-Marie. I really liked 1, 8, 11 and 12.

1. Take a bunch of boxes of condoms (ribbed for her pleasure) and put them in people’s carts when they are not looking.

2. Set-up all of the alarm clocks of the electronics department to ring at 1 min intervals.

3. Leave a trail of tomato juice from the kitchen knives all the way to the washroom.

4. Go to one of the “associate” and tell him/her, with an official sounding voice, that there is a code 3 in household items. Repeat with different code numbers until you get an amusing reaction.

5. Go to the service desk and ask them to set-up a payment plan for a bag of M&M.

6. Put one of their “Caution Wet Surface” yellow sign on a carpet.

7. Stand next to the tents in the camping department and invite clients to spend the night if they bring some of the store’s pillows.

8. Hide in one of the circular clothing rack and whisper “Take me! Take me!”

9. While checking out the hunting rifles, ask one of the “associates” if their pharmacy carries anti-depressants.

10. Go to the car care section and use the oil funnels to practice your Madonna imitation.

11. Following every announcement on the intercom, fall to the floor, take a fetal position and scream “No! Not the voices!”

12. Go in a dressing room and scream “You’re out of toilet paper!”