The crowd at the Molson Amphitheatre was eagerly anticipating performances by Nas and Ms. Lauryn Hill, who were to perform tracks from each of their landmark albums (Illmatic and The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, respectfully).

My friend and I reached the venue at around 7pm. We weren’t totally upset when Nas didn’t hit the stage until well after 8 (he had a 7:30 call time), because he nailed his performance. I swear this guy is Benjamin Button or something, because at almost 38, Nas is looking as good as ever. I had the pleasure of seeing him perform the last time he was in Toronto, and he did live up to expectations this time around. Backed by DJ Premier and Pete Rock, Nas was full of energy, rapped with passion, used up a lot of the stage, and genuinely looked as though he was happy to be here.

Then comes Ms. Lauryn Hill. I admit, it was Lauryn that I really bought my ticket for, as I missed the chance to see her when she was in town earlier this year at Sound Academy (no complaints though, I heard she was 3 hours late for that one).

The first thing I noticed, besides the fact that she kept the audience waiting an hour and a half (she had a 9:45 start time, Nas was done his set around  9:20), was that the acoustics at the Molson Amphitheatre were terrible when she was performing. I’ve went to a few concerts at the same venue and had no complaints about the sound, so I’m stumped at to what the problem was. Lots of echoing going on.

And then she abruptly left the stage after the third song. I have no idea why, but she came back with a new hat.

Practically each of her tracks were virtually indistinguishable renditions of the original. I almost didn’t recognize them until a few bars into the song.

Now I’m not opposed to an artist re-working their own songs, but when a concert bills you for performing tracks from an award-winning album, it would be nice to hear some of it the way it sounded way back when.

And I don’t know if it was me, but Ms. Hill sounded like she was singing really, really fast. When she wasn’t singing in fast-forward she kept on gesturing with her hands to her band or the stage crew, nothing seemed too rehearsed. It was distracting and I personally couldn’t concentrate on the value of the music.

You would think that for a multi Grammy award winner things would go more smoothly. Especially since the reaction from her last show  in Toronto garnered mixed reviews.

Halfway through her performance I noticed people leaving… in droves actually (thankfully those included the row of drunken, loud, smokers behind us). I’m there thinking, ‘This is Lauryn Hill. You can’t just leave a Lauryn Hill concert mid-set!’ Needless to say, I actually left before the concert was over. It was going on 12:30am and my friend and I had to catch the streetcar to get the last subway home.

I was worried I would miss something good. We left just before she broke out with some old Fugees tracks (like “Ready or Not”), and it turns out Nas came back out and performed “If I Ruled The World” with Ms. Hill (dammit!). Oh, well… at least I still have the tracks on my iPod.

I think Lauryn Hill is a very talented artist. But I guess fame gets the best of some people. Time management would be a skill to work on, esp. if headlining a concert on a Thursday night, in a city with a noise curfew of 11pm, and not living up to the expectations of fans who were wishing it was worth the wait.

So another Labour Day has passed and so has another successful season of the Canadian National Exibition. I usually go every year, this time it was particulary to test my palette with this year’s artery-clogging, edible fad: deep-fried butter.

Yes, you read correctly. If you didn’t already hear all the hype surrounding these battered concoctions, you’ll probably have to wait until next year to try it again at the EX (unless you want to attempt whipping up a batch yourself).

When I first heard of the deep-fried butter concept, I tried to invision how it would look, and also how it would taste (the thought of eating straight butter is a bit of a turn-off). But basically the batches are made with a butter-mix (from the taste I’m assuming it’s a butter-creamed cheese ratio) scooped up with a melon baller and frozen. After the bite-sized balls are taken out of the freezer it’s dipped into a batter (think along the same lines as funnel cake), then deep-fried for several moments. Afterwards, they’re topped off with swirls of chocolate, rasberry, vanilla and caramel. Sounds delicous doesn’t it?

Was it worth the hour I waited in line to purchase one? Probably not, because I could’ve just spread some butter on my funnel cake from the kiosk next door and kill some time. As I bit in it was definitely rather tasty-delicious, but then that squirt of butter hits you and you’re kind of taken aback. It definitely wasn’t bad though. But I don’t think I’ll fork over $5 for 4 tiny butter-balls any time soon. My friend ate hers whole, and found it very appetizing.

Did I feel sick after eating it? Not really… but then again, I also had a bit of my sister’s funnel cake, a dozen Tiny Tom Donuts, and of course I had to pick up a deep fried Mars bar because I haven’t had one of those before either (don’t worry… I shared all those treats with my sister and friend who were there with me… I’m not that greedy!). Hmmm… I forgot to mention I also had some Mexican-ized poutine earlier on that day from the Food Building.

I thought our deep-fried binge was a good ending to a long day shopping at the EX. That’s right, we didn’t really see any of the attractions, go to the casino, see the super-pets, or play the midway games–we shopped. And that’s only because there were such great deals in the warehouse (Direct Energy Centre). French Connection UK, Stitches, Costa Blanca, Bluenotes, Sirens… I don’t think I’ll need to pick up any more clothes for the rest of the year. I only spent about $80 in total and picked up four sweaters, a nice pair of dress pants from French Connection, three dressy tops,  a couple of nice shirts, two cute skirts, three tanks.

Now to pay that Visa bill…

Open:

• All family-friendly tourist attractions (incl. movie theatres, Toronto Zoo, CN Tower, Casa Loma, ROM, Ontario Science Centre, skating rinks and arenas)
• Eaton Centre
• Vaughan Mills
• Pacific Mall
• Woodbine Centre

Closed:

• Banks
• Schools
• Public libraries
• LCBO and Beer Stores
• Post offices
• Most malls and grocery stores

TTC is running on holiday schedule and GO Transit is running on Saturday schedule. Have a happy family day, everyone!

Now I don’t know if it was a press release error, but when I read Metro newspaper this morning they said that the seat sale for the $1 tickets will start on August 19th. I decided to check out the coachcanada.com website today myself and lo and behold $1 tickets were released up to November 24th! Had I checked a little earlier I might have scooped up some of those high demand weekend tickets for less that it would cost me to buy a happy meal. But I did manage to secure some super-cheap seats for the upcoming months (makes my LDR a lot easier!).

The majority (if not all) of the $1 tickets for weekend departures/returns are pretty much sold out. But I just seen a bunch for mid-week travel on sale for $1. Once the 10,000 $1 seats are sold out, you’ll still be able to find decent prices on Toronto to Montreal travel, between $10 and $60. Don’t fret about not getting a deal, try to make your travel plans as flexible as possible (I myself will have to endure some 3am arrival times, but it’s worth my loonie!).

$16 million dollars has been invested by Coach Canada for the 15 new Megabus buses that will depart/arrive at the following cities: Whitby, Mississauga, Toronto, Scarborough, Kingston, Kirkland and Montreal, at up to 8 daily departure times.

The 81-passenger, 3.99 metres (13.1 feet) high, two-level coaches have front and rear staircases and offer free Wi-Fi, power outlets and DVD video capabilities, as well as a panoramic view, two folding card tables, comfortable reclining seats, restroom, safety belts and mobility impaired accessibility.

I’ve taken Coach Canada buses before, but have never been on a Megabus. Head over on to coachcanada.com and book your dollar tickets before they’re all sold out! Good luck on finding the good ones!

After a tentative deal was reached, striking City of Toronto workers will be back on the job soon. And it can’t be soon enough. I didn’t even realize how much garbage was piling up during the month-long strike until I passed a giant park-turned-landfill the other day. Sure the overflowing garbage bins gave me an inkling, but a month with no garbage pick-up is just a tad ridiculous.

No wonder tourists aren’t visiting our “lovely” city as much as they used to. It seems the only tourists we had were an influx of mice and other vermon who have been digging through bags of trash lining city streets and parks. Personally, I think they should’ve been legislated back to work weeks ago.  Especially when there are so many city workers dependant on the income from jobs they had to suspend,  parents out there relying on child care and children eager to spend part of their summer in community centres and pools.

Seems like everyone’s going on strike these days. Just the other day Via Rail engineers headed to the picket lines. The two-day strike ended up with a 60% off promotion to compensate customers for the inconvenience. The promotion ends Wednesday night has been extended until Friday, July 31st if you’re thinking about purchasing train tickets… but it seems that their website is on strike now by how slow it’s running (probably the reason for the extension).

Hopefully it won’t be too long ’til Toronto is squeaky clean and running smoothly again.