Bryan Adams and a Scottish Celebration!

Midweek update! I know it is rare but it has been an exciting couple of days so here we go. Monday I set up camp down at the SECC (Scotland Exhibition and Conference Center) to see Bryan Adams sing his heart out to a crowd for 50,000. I was originally a little worried about this event because I was going down with another Canadian who lives in this building who I am really not a big fan of, and I am not a die hard Bryan Adams fan. But none the less there we where, 4 hours ahead of time, sitting and waiting. We made the best of it and had a pizza delivered to us in line and made some friends with the family in line ahead of us. I was decked out in 100% Canadian garb, including a Team Canada jersey (courtesy of my big bro) and a Canadian bandanna.

Story of the night:
The band that opened for Bryan was called Black Daniels and they were a little rock, a little punk and something else I just can't put my finger on. Anyways, they were alright but really, 50 thousand people were waiting to see Mr. Adams, not these guys. Correction, 49,998 people were waiting for Adam. I made a decision to be the biggest Black Daniels fan that band had ever seen. So every time there was a split second where the crowd started to quite, I would start to yell "WE LOVE BLACK DANIEL!!!!!!!" or "CANADA LOVES YOU GUYS!!!" and the band responded very well. I managed to be so over the top excited I got the guy standing next to me in on it as well. So together we would learn the chorus of these songs and then belt it out at high volumes and/or respond to the lyrics any way we could. The band was happy and I had everyone around either crying from laughter, or jumping around with the band! It was great times, and if anyone has the opportunity to see Black Daniel live, I highly recommend it. As a side note, I also had two "friendly" women (one admitted she was 46 and the other claimed she was 34 - not bloody likely) ask me "How dedicated are you to your girlfriend?" Oh those Bryan Adam's fans, so crazy!

The show was amazing and Bryan put on one of the best live performances I have ever seen. I would throw it up there in my top three along with The Hip and The Stones. No particular order other than the Stones still hold number 1.

Tuesday morning I was awoken by my door getting kicked in and my entire corridor plus a few others from around the building parading into my room singing Happy Birthday and exploding confetti poppers everywhere. They then presented me with an arm load of gifts and showed me what they had done that morning. Which was decorate the hall from top to bottom, end to end with streamers, banners, balloons, confetti strings, and hand drawn pictures. It was incredible! I have no other word for it, absolutely incredible! The previously mentioned gifts included: a "Motor Mechanic Madness" game, "Fishing for Fun" game, "Table Top Air Hockey" game, a case of Glasgow brewed Tennents beer, and t-shirt which they had specially made for me that reads

TRY ME

LOVE ME

GUARANTEED

and on the back it has a peanut butter jar and the words ASDA PEANUT BUTTER. This spawned from a random comment I made about a month ago when I found a half decent jar of peanut butter and laughed at their guarantee. I noted that it would make a great line for a t-shirt. Fantastic neighbours I have!

To top off my b-day I received gifts from Lisa which arrived perfectly on time and have now supplied me with hours upon hours of procrastination material and gifts from family members across the globe. Thank you to all of you, it means a lot to be able to celebrate a birthday an oceans width away from home and still feel as though family and friends are here!

The celebrations continued into the night and although I didn't wind up in Mexico like Colin had hoped, there was talks of headed to Ireland. The booze ran fast and furiously and I even made it to work the next morning.

Which brings me to today and my first day of work. I got a job doing some marketing for a computer company downtown. It is not hard work and it mostly involves increasing foot traffic through the store, but I had a good time doing it and it pays pretty well, so no major complaints just yet. That took the majority of my day and I am going to spend the rest of tonight trying desperately to get some work done that I really want to have finished prior to the weekend.

I am heading to Lancaster England tomorrow and will be returning Sunday sometime. Looking forward to seeing another new part of the world and thinking I might try to make it out to the Isle of Mann on Sat. Always something new!