May 31

maman by louise bourgeios

Sometimes dead baby jokes are funny, sometimes they're not.

This is one of many lessons I learned during our first day bumming around Ottawa. I also learned that sometimes the National Gallery of Canada can be a scary place with ample opportunity for blood hungry axe murderers to hide in dark corners and wait for an unsuspecting art lover to kidnap and chop into a million pieces. But that's a whole other blog entry.

In any case, yesterday was a ton of fun. Matt and I started our days with long awaited showers. I won't lie that was probably the highlight of my day considering I hadn't showered in about four days. Once we were all squeaky clean like little rubber duckies, we (Matt, Ryan, Aaran and I) all headed out for lunch at the Atomic Rooster.

After we filled our bellies with greasy, eggy goodness we made our way to the National Gallery of Canada, which is quite possibly one of my most favorite places on earth. They have recently installed this amazing sculpture outside the gallery called Maman by Louise Bourgeois. It's a giant, iron spider with long lanky legs and a sac full of white eggs. Seeing this giant spider as you walk up to the gallery causes such a weird sense of doom, like at any minute she's going to come alive a wreak havoc on the poor citizens of Ottawa. I love art that scares you a little.

There was another instillation that gave me the same feeling of uncanniness, like that feeling when you know someone is watching you. It is called The Discourse of Elements by a contemperary art group called BGL. It was such a weird and creepy piece with all of these dark corners and hidden passage ways. Walking through it felt like one of those lucid dreams where everything feels so real and yet so impossible and crazy. It was amazing.

So once we were all feeling pretentious and artsy enough we all headed down to the Brigg for some beer to help dumb us back down. When we were all sufficiently stupid again we headed home to consume more liquor and get ready for dinner. Aaran made a reservation for us at Oz Kafe, a very busy and very delicious restaurant. It was such a nice evening of yummy, beautiful food, wine and beer and a lot of inappropriate conversations. Yes, this is where the dead baby jokes come in but I will spare you all the horrific sense of humor I have.

And well, that about wraps up our first day in Ottawa. I think today is going to be little more low key. I'm sure we'll probably hit up the market for bit and there was some talk about going to see Iron Man. Either way I'm looking forward to my second day in Ottawa.

I love this city.