The International Tourism and Travel Show is taking place this weekend at Place Bonaventure. It’s a place where you get to learn a whole lot of everything around the world, but that’s not even scratching the surface, because you actually have to travel.

Most people there speak French, so it’s better known as the Salon International Tourisme Voyages. Since I work with a travel agency, Tours Hai International, I had the opportunity today to go see what things look like before the show opens for the public. Basically, there were boxes of every sizes everywhere. Imagine yourself moving to a new place and you’ve just moved the boxes in. Well, the place was a hundred times that.

I think it costs $10 to get in. You will get information on pretty much every inch of this planet (of course i’m exagerating). Everybody has detailed brochures for you. You will be walking into fake forests. You will get to see the Eiffel Tower… and I think you can walk under it. And just like every year, there are shows with dances and songs, so you will definitely get to know a bit about different cultures.

So what’s your next destination?

On my way to metro Bonaventure, I saw some chairs placed in an unlikely location.

Looking to get your groove the Friday before Halloween but don’t know where to go? Got a set of rollerskates with pompoms and some satin tennis shorts you want to pull outta the closet. Or perhaps your inner Dirk Diggler is looking to escape…

Friends for Life are presenting “BOOBIE NIGHTS” - their 5th Annual Halloweeen Costume party to raise funds for the Quebec Breast Cancer Foundation. Go have a hedonistic night on Friday, October 27th from 9:30pm to 3am at Tokyo Bar - 3709 St Laurent Blvd.

There will be some pretty awesome prizes raffled off such as tickes to see the Habs, James Brown, Sam Roberts, a one year membership to the YMCA, gift certificates and more!

VIP tickets are $10 and available by calling 514-231-8949

Rumors are abound that Habs’ head coach Guy Carbonneau, will move Guillaume Latendresse to the 2nd line with Kovalev and Plekanec.

Journalists witnessed Latendresse practicing today with the 2nd line and the comments are ablaze as to what this means. A born and bred Quebecker is now moving up to the 2nd line where we all hope he will shine.

Up until this point, Latendresse hasn’t done much as a Canadien with a total of 3 shots on net. Truth be told however, he’s been relegated to the final line and this move to the 2nd line will shine light on Latendresse’s abilities.

The Habs play the Bruins tomorrow night where all eyes will be on Guillaume.

Howdy!

[oops, my bad, update an hour later: The most important and significant one, is our very own Metblog Montreal author Lisa Hunter will be launching her new book on November 2, at Indigo books 7pm. If you would like to buy your own copy of The Intrepid Art Collector online click away. And by all means come on by to meet and help celebrate the publication of the book].

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That are perfect for cold, gray and rainy days.

1. While the Festival du Nouveau Cinema is about the films, they have also decided to do some sort of art exhibit called OpenSource, I went to see it last week, and while it is a tad difficult to find, I was annoyed at myself for going alone, ‘cuz the video games looked interesting. It is at the Just For Laughs Museum and goes as long as the festival does. (2111 Saint-Laurent Boulevard, walk in between all the desks and to the elevators in the back, and take the one to the third floor).
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I keep hearing Harper harpers complaining that the Prime Minister’s politics will turn the country to the right. I doubt it. On my most recent trip to a government office, the receptionist — the first-line representative of the government — was wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt.

To be fair, I also see a lot of people wearing George Bush T-shirts in Montreal — especially here in the Old Port. But all these shirts seem to have a semi-obscene pun on them…

I’ve been following the saga that is the changing of Parc to Robert Bourassa. I don’t get the fuss. I really don’t. The Gazette in a recent editorial equated Montreal city council with Pyongyang. No, but seriously. There’s hyperbole, and then there’s just plain idiotic. I was suprised however, that the editorial writers of Winnipeg actually were aware of the name change.

It’s a street name people. That’s all. I’ve never seen so much protest over something so insignificant. If let’s say they had proposed in changing St-Urbain, I could see the fuss. St-Urbain has heritage, due in part to Richler’s novels. But Parc? It’s a street that describes a park that covers maybe 10% of its entire length.

But the problem isn’t that they want to change Parc. It’s that they want to change it to Robert Bourassa. Anglos especially despised this premier and his sign law. Remember the Equality Party? What a lark. That came from Bourassa’s sign law and some anglos have a long memory.

My personal favorite argument is that this will cost merchants money because they will have to change all their stationary. OH THE HORROR! THE DRAMA! Maybe the merchants on Parc will now stop buying 20yrs worth of stationary. No, seriously, they are going to have to buy some sooner or later.

Love him or hate him, Bourassa was a major influence on Quebec society. He was a major player.

Ms Fotopoulos, Mr Prescott, go head with your change. This will all blow over.. as so it should.

For a good part of the day, the area on St Laurent between Prince Arthur and Milton has been filled with police cruisers, orange safety tape and interviewers as there was a shooting last night at The Upper Club (sandwiched between American Apparel and the Shed Cafe). Word is that two men were found in the back of the outside of the club after being shot.

Is it just me or is 2006 turning into a particularily violent year?

With all of the hoopla, protests and news going on about renaming Parc Avenue to Robert Bourassa Avenue, the fact that another park with a potential problem came to my attention.

Westmount Park has been around since 1899 and there is now the possibility of a large section being redone in AstroTurf.

Enter Save The Park! Sauvons le parc!:

Save The Park! Sauvons le parc! is a citizens’ group formed to protect the integrity of Westmount Park which is endangered by The City of Westmount’s proposed replacement of grassland by artificial turf in the whole southern section of the park.

There’s a bit more info, a contact link and a petition available at their website, savewestmountpark.com.

Note: Edited for clarity.

I remember that last week CTV did a news story about how taking vitamin D can help keep the blues away during the winter. I may have to look into that because with all this dreary rain Montreal’s been getting, I’m already feeling the weather blahs.

Most of my day was spent getting my house and yard ready for winter. I really don’t mind the raking and mulching of leaves as well putting the garden furniture into the shed, but I also had to do this most disgusting of chores, cleaning the gutters. I have a slightly slanted roof that is covered with small gravel. Add a couple of big oak trees and my gutters were completely filled with an organically-rich mixture of gravel and humus. My own lazyness was apparent for all to see in the form of growing weeds, a suburban version of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Home maintenance doesn’t get any more unpleasant (and dangerous) than that. What was even more amazing was the presence of earthworms in the humus. I don’t need my Ph.D. in biology to know that earthworms can’t fly and they can’t climb trees. So how on earth did they get up there? Maybe they were picked up by a Robin who dropped them when it was startled by a squirrel. Alternatively, a baby earthworm might have hitched a ride on a small piece of dirt that was temporarily trapped under a racoon’s paw. The mystery remains.

At the end, nature had one more surprise in store for me. I climbed up with a garden hose so that I could wash off the rest of the dirt. That’s when I noticed that part of my roof gravel was covered with these adorable bulbs of moss, our very own green roof.