A Night with Me, Nancy, Bill Gates & U2

Irish rockers U2 wrapped up the second leg of the 360° Tour in Vancouver last night. It was the last full concert show for 2009 and brought out many emotions from a hugging U2 to a grateful Black Eyed Peas. The emotions became evident when Bono, who actually looked touched, paused to speak to the crowd about the end of the 2009 leg of the tour. It was certainly an evening of hysteria and excitement for the massive audience of 55,000, including Nancy, myself and some guy called Bill Gates. Turned out he was in the audience and it was his birthday - Bono sang Happy Birthday to him with crowd participation.

The band worked its way through more than two hours of songs from eight of their albums on a magnificent stage that can only be described as a claw-shaped. Nancy described it as something that looked like it was out of the District 9 film, but the carousel HD screen provided a perfect view of the concert. The majority of the tracks were from their latest No Line On The Horizon. Although the crowd noise was strong on the newer tracks, it was the classics, like Sunday Bloody Sunday, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For and With or Without You that really got everyone on their feet. My personal favourites and highlights were Stuck in a Moment, Beautiful Day and Elevation.

Opening act Black Eyed Peas were exciting to watch. Their short set had all their top hits, the performance was fun and it got the crowd pumped for U2. Fergie’s performance of her solo hit Big Girls Don’t Cry was a standout, as it was obviously heartfelt. I have to say best warm-up act I have seen at a concert.

Was it the best concert ever.... U2 definitely went out with a bang with the place coming alive and everyone sharing this band's amazing music together. Bono at one point took a moment to describe his own feelings about this particular tour and expressed that no tour had ever quite given him this feeling and that he was literally in awe of the support that had been given back to the band. We definitely won't be forgetting this show anytime soon.

Light the Night Charity 5km Walk

On Saturday evening, the "We're with Bob" Team completed the 5KM walk to celebrate the fantastic fund raising effort. The team raised $11,000 (with more pledges still to be included), which meant that we were the number one sponsored team at the Victoria Light the Night event. Nancy, as team captain, raised $1,150, however Wendy achieved the highest amount at $2,860. Great effort all round! The team was supported by over thirty people completing the walk and as the photos show everyone signed the team banner. Bob achieved the complete distance and enjoyed the post-walk party with a cheeky glass of wine.

Light The Night is an annual walk and event hosted by The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Canada (LLSC). The Society’s mission is to cure leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease and myeloma, and improve the quality of life of patients and their families.

Thank you to everyone that donated, provided support and came on the walk.

U2 in Vancouver - Best Concert ever?

Nancy and I are seeing U2 in concert next Wednesday in Vancouver! Some might say it will be the best concert ever.....

Nothing to Report!

The low cloud cover outside my window and the recent heavy rain, in addition to Nancy being away in Northern Ireland is about all the news that I have from Vancouver. The past week has seen me travel to Calgary and experience my first snow of the season - about three inches was covering the city. Also I have meetings planned at the MB head office next week in Toronto for a few days.

So all there is for me to do is get outside and complete a Sunday morning run. Especially, as I have seen from the blog that Anthony (aka ex smoker or Marlboro Man) has been stepping up the pace and getting a number of runs on the board.

DON'T FORGET TO SPONSOR NANCY or MYSELF THIS WEEK!! Bob's charity walk is NEXT Saturday (24th Oct) and so get your sponsorship in NOW! Thank you for your support.

Canadian Thanksgiving

This weekend was my first Canadian Thanksgiving in Canada, which we spent enjoying the company of Bob, Wendy and Scott Marks on Vancouver Island. We had a turkey dinner with local neighbours, the Player family and Abi the dog, on Saturday night. Sunday was the Marks thanksgiving dinner which as an alternative was roast beef. Both were great events and good times.

However, what are Canadians thankful for???? The American thanksgiving holiday is famous for the celebration of the Pilgrim Fathers and the Mayflower ship landing on the East coast of the USA. This was the much discussed question at the dinner table from the only Brit and the less than convincing answer seemed to be linked to harvest festival. On further research, i.e. a search on Wikipedia, I discovered that The history of Thanksgiving in Canada goes back to an explorer, Martin Frobisher, who had been trying to find a northern passage to the Pacific Ocean. Frobisher's Thanksgiving was not for harvest but homecoming. He had safely returned from a search for the Northwest Passage, avoiding the later fate of Henry Hudson and Sir John Franklin who died.

Hey, whatever.... the important thing to me was that I get an extra day-off work! Here's to Canada Thanksgiving.

Highway Fire and Quad Bikes

A busy week at work involved me taking a long drive to a place called Kamloops for a grand opening of a new Mercedes Dealer. The four-hour drive through the mountains is usually scenic, but pretty dull, except this time, there was FIRE! We came across a logging-truck that was ablaze, surrounded by emergency services, who were all standing around watching the fire. It would seem the truck driver was smoking, threw his cigarette butt out the window, onto the wood and created the fire. DOH!

On Wednesday, we had a team "bonding" session with senior management at Whistler mountain and the main activity was quad biking. I have done quad biking before in the UK, but certainly not up the side of a mountain and through dense forests. A great laugh and experience had by all, plus as a bonus we got to see the new bobsleigh track for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.

Nancy singing at the Seattle Baseball game

Last weekend was my first trip to Seattle. Although Nancy has been there many times in the past it was a trip we both enjoyed as a shared experience, in the remaining Autumn sunshine. We stayed with friends, who live in White Rock, on the Friday night as there are only minutes from the border crossing. On Saturday morning we headed for the USA border and due to my British passport, had to wait about 45 minutes and pay my six bucks.

Once in the US, it was an easy highway drive down to Seattle, stopping off only for the premium outlet malls - very similar to Potomac Mills or Bicester village. After a couple of bargain buys, we reached Seattle itself and on the Saturday evening we watched the flicking city lights from the top of the Space Needle. As the photos show it was an impressive vista across the ocean and city. The next morning we wandered around the area, including the local market where the world famous Pike Place Fish Market is situated. This involved watching the guys throwing fish and shouting at each other - very theatrical indeed. Following brunch we heading for the baseball stadium, called Safeco Field, and enjoyed the Seattle Mariners beat the Texas Rangers 4-3, in their last game of the season. Great enjoyment and good seats in the sunshine, near third base. A baseball was hit into the stands a few rows in front of us and so watched a big crowd scramble. However, the main highlight was Nancy's singing in the seventh inning - check out the video! She reminds me of the finger-pointing girl in some wedding video I've seen somewhere!!??!

Mr Smiley Face! Golfing Fundamentals

Just to show how serious I am about learning the golfing fundamentals, I even allowed myself to be videoed for training purposes! Check out the enclosed video clips for a bit of a laugh. These are now available for your viewing pleasure on YouTube as well!

These videos were taken in the early days of my golf coaching from my coach Brett and Mr Smiley Face is helping to establish my golf swing.

1. Mr Smiley Face..... "Don't move your head!"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hw6_czGHYOw
2. Elvis has left the building.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agsE4gnOozo