We flew back to Ontario and landed in Toronto where we had a night off. Did we party? Of course not. We just slept.

Then next day, we headed off to Stouffville, which is a little north-east of Toronto. We got in the rental car and drove as fast as we could!

Sometimes we were going as fast as 15km an hour! Man, there’s a lot of people in Toronto. Slowly, ever so slowly, we inched our way towards our destination. As we got out of the city, traffic finally picked up–which was obviously too much for some people to handle.

“Is this where we park?”

We finally made it to the theatre and gave the show of our lives! Or, at least the show of our day. There were even fans who came all the way from Sarnia (which rhymes with Narnia for obvious reasons) who sat up front and had their own choreography for almost all of our songs.

The End (of the tour)

We woke up bright eyed and bushy-tailed at 5am so we could catch the ferry to the mainland. Excited to be up so early and grateful to see a part of the day few seldom witness we drove to the ferry dock singing jolly, happy tunes and smiling vigorously.

Once again we waited at the ferry dock. Only this time in the dark!

What fun!

Then it was on to the ferry, off to the airport, returning the rental car, checking in, going through security, waiting for the plane, boarding the plane, sitting on the plane–and finally!–getting off the plane. Touring is exciting! Here is Chris excitedly waiting for his luggage.

We got a new rental car (with a bigger trunk!) and drove off to Camrose. I bet you’re wondering what that looked like. Well, turn off your imagination because here’s a picture:

Notice something different from BC? Snow! Lots and lots of snow. In Alberta they still think it’s winter. Silly Alberta.

After our thrilling day of travel we finally did our show at the Augustana Campus of the U of Alberta. It went swell, and we made jokes about talking books, the winter Olympics, and all sorts of other funny stuff. Because we were in a centre of higher learning Trevor even mentioned Plato in a joke (that wasn’t all that funny as it turned out.)

Tomorrow is a day off, and then we end our western tour in Stouffville, Ontario… which is actually pretty far to the east.

After the great success of Maple Ridge it was once again time to wait for the ferry. And wait we did! We waited like no one has ever waited before!

Then, next thing you know, we were on the ferry making our way to the Sunshine Coast. Here is a picture of Trevor on the ferry with the hideous BC landscape behind him.

Man, who’d want to live there. Especially because it’s February and green and sunny and nice. Real Canadians are freezing, covered in snow, and cursing while they shovel. It is unthinkable why anyone would ever give that up.

We got off the ferry, went to the motel and checked in. Here is the sign in case you would like to stay there yourself.

Yes, one day we’ll have to upgrade from this cellphone camera…

We went to the Raven’s Cry theatre where we were greeted, once again, by Matt Laundrie of High Tide Entertainment. He was in a more subdued mood than before as you can tell by his shirt.

The show was delightful and the audience was well-behaved for a change. The highlight occurred at the encore when some children requested the “Pressure Washer” song—because all children love pressure washers. As soon as the song started they got up and danced, other children joined them, and soon there was the most adorable mosh pit you ever saw at the front of the stage. And, yes, Pressure Washer will be on the next mini-pops album.

After the show we signed cds and met the cute children who requested the song.

Tomorrow we conquer another province as we go to Camrose, Alberta.

We left Campbell River and made our way to Maple Ridge. After a close vote we decided to take the ferry instead of attempting to jump over the water separating Vancouver Island from the mainland.  Of course, the best thing about ferries is waiting to get on them.  Here is Chris doing just that.

Once the waiting was over, we boarded the ferry, disembarked on the mainland, and drove all the way to Maple Ridge where we were staying at the lovely Penelope B&B.

Before the show we were lucky enough to have dinner with our good friend Tim Readman.  Here is Chris talking to him.

Actually, Chris is shoving food in his mouth. But there was much conversation.

Then it was time for the show! And this show was all Mike… at least as far as the audience was concerned. They shouted out things like “Mike!” and “Hey, Mike!” and “Mike! Mike! Mike!” Then one guy shouted, “I want your babies, Mike!”which, it must be said, was a rather awkward moment.

After the show we went out to sign cd’s, but little did we know that to get there we would have to go through the corridor of doom that led from backstage.

Ooooohhh!

What will tomorrow bring? Another ferry ride and a show in Sechelt on the sunshine coast.

We drove up the coast to Campbell River. We had played there before… but we couldn’t remember when. We pulled into the hotel and checked in. It’s then we noticed it: the captain’s wheel! The hotel was on the waterfront and, apparently, in emergencies it has the ability to sail. Chris quickly took the wheel in his hands.

“Aye, Aye, Captain Chris!”

Unfortunately, the wheel did nothing. And besides, all Chris could see out the window was a parking lot.

We went to the theatre for the big show. Fortunately it was easy to find as it is painted a noticeable colour.

Yup, you can’t miss that.

We went backstage to get ready. There was a piano there, and Mike began to play.

The music was deep and haunting… much like the look on his face.

Soon it was showtime! It was a good-sized crowd (and by that we mean there were a lot of people, not that they were big people) and, as with all our B.C. shows, they were very interested in talking–not as much as in Duncan, mind you.  One thing we learned from them was that Campbell River is where they first invented cows… or something like that… it didn’t make sense then and it still doesn’t now.

We have discovered much on our tour so far, and hope to discover even more tomorrow when we perform in Maple Ridge.

After getting our beauty sleep, it was time to move on. Unfortunately, once we added our baggage to the overly optomistic amount of merch we’d just got, it was hard to see how it would all fit in the car. At times like this, Chris and Trevor step back and let Mike do what he does best: make stuff fit.

If trunk-stuffing was an Olympic sport (which it should be) Mike would get a gold. Own the Podium, Mike! I Believe!

The previous night, a nice young man with a mohawk haircut asked us to sign his head. He also invited us to have FREE FOOD at his parents’ restaurant that was on the way to Duncan. Not wanting to be rude (and always hungry) we pulled up to the Village Chippery in Shawnigan and proceeded to stuff ourselves with light, nutritious food.

“Yum, Yum!” says Trevor.

“I am certainly enjoying this delicious meal!” says Mike.

With stomachs working overtime we returned to the car and drove on to Duncan. We were very excited because the theatre we were playing at was part of the complex that has the world’s largest hockey stick on it! Just look at it!

Okay, so it looks small in the picture, but if you were right there you’d see that it’s super-big!

How did the show go? We’re glad you asked. The people of Duncan were very communicative, often asking us questions before, after, and during songs. At times it felt a bit like an Oprah show (or maybe Jerry Springer). We aswered all the questions we could and forwarded the rest to our lawyer.

What’s up next?  Campbell River!

After a few short flights we were in Victoria. It was sunny and warm and, as we drove into town from the airport, we passed a convertible with its top down.  We all agreed that out of respect for other Canadians—who have to go through something called “winter” – people in B.C. shouldn’t be allowed to engage in this sort of behaviour until at least April.

We got to the venue and met Matt Laundrie, the best-dressed promoter in the business.

A dapper man, if ever there was. Matt likes Hawaii… could you guess?

Matt helped us bring in all the cds we send ahead. Here is Trevor sitting amongst the boxes balancing  a water bottle on his head. This is how he prepares for the show.

So many talents!

Oh, and the  show went super-well. We even sang “Proud to Be Canadian”(which we haven’t performed in about seven years)and remembered almost all the words! Good for us.

Next up: Duncan.

We landed in Fort St. John excited and ready to work. This was not surprising because Fort St. John, as everyone knows, is the Energetic City. Not convinced? Well look at this lovely picture I found on the internet.

See? Now, of course it didn’t look like that, being winter and all, and we never did see the beautiful golden rainbow, but everything was really energetic, let us tell you.

Anyway, because Fort St. John is very far from Ontario with a shocking lack of direct flights, we made it to the theatre just before show, and to didn’t even have time to eat. But did we let this stop us? No! The show must go on, even if we are slightly peckish! Oh, the sacrifices we make for our art.

The audience was, of course, extremely energetic and enjoyed talking to us during the show, often shouting out words seemingly at random. After a successful first set, we took a very energetic break.

Wow! Just look at that action shot. (Chris often counts his feet, just to be sure he still has the right number.)

Near the end of the show we performed “The Mounted Animal Nature Trail” which was going quite well until one audience member shouted out “EMBOLISM” instead of an animal noise. We figure he was trying to use a new word every day, and was running out of time. Or maybe it was a cry for help…

Next stop: Victoria!

It happened like this: Trevor wrote a song (as part of his custom song business) for a Finnish fan who thought it’d be fun to have a tune in honour of the Finnish Olympic hockey team.  He got some information from the guy on Finnish hockey, recorded the song, sent off the mp3, and went back to his boring and tedious life thinking no more of it…  until, all of a sudden, he started getting all sorts of messages on his website from Finland.

It turns out that “Finland, Finland, Greatest Hockey Power” was posted on YouTube and had amassed 20 000 hits in under a week. Then an article was written about it in Finland’s largest newspaper! (You can click here to see the article, but unless you can read Finnish you might be a little lost.)

It’s a strange world out there.

The Christmas spirit was high as we drove into Ottawa to play at Centrepointe Theatre. Singing happy carols and slugging back egg nog we pulled into the beautiful parking lot, entered the theatre, and made short work of the soundcheck.  It was time for food!

A lovely bunch of volunteers made us dinner: salmon with asparagus au gratin to be exact. It was delightful.  Here is a picture of Mike being delighted:

Yes, it’s not the right way up, but we are busy people and don’t have time to rotate pictures before uploading them. Just tilt your head!

But, there was more. For dessert there was a Jell-o cake!

Three different types of Jell-o in it! A day without Jell-o is a day without life, as Confucius so rightly pointed out.

The show itself was a veritable Christmas Miracle of fun. The audience seemed to especially enjoy our repeated jolly shouting of “Suck it up, it’s Christmas!”  Many were so swept up in the Christmas Spirit that they bought our cds and associated products.

And isn’t that what Christmas is all about?