MONTREAL, CANADA

Best Western Annual Conference in Montreal Canada

Each year I travel to the Annual Best Western Conference for work. This year it was in Montreal, Canada. Lila did some research and informed me earlier in the year that the drinking and gambling age is 18. Interesting how when this semester came up, Lila just happened to be taking all online classes. It is true that they have to meet one a week in person, but they are allowed to miss one week. Guess which week Lila missed. Lila was not only packed before any of us, I think she was actually packed several days ahead of us. You see, Carmen decided to come to Montreal as well. Unfortunately, they don't let high school kids take online classes, so Ceci had to stay home.

We arrived in Montreal, checked into our hotel and had dinner. I had a local beer with a Bear on the front of the bottle. I'm sorry, I don't remember the name of the beer. The town is very clean, very old and very nice. We settled down for a good nights sleep. Unfortunately at about 4:00am, we were woken by the fire alarm. I called down to the front desk to see what was up, but each time it was busy. We threw on some close and quickly made our way out of the room and to the stairwell. We were on the eleventh floor, but by the time we made our way to the seventh floor, we were met by billowing smoke making its way up and people coming up the stairs. They looked pretty scared.

We stopped, and turned back. I reached for the door of the closest exit from the stairwell and it was locked. I'm pretty concerned at this point and some terrible possibilities run through my mind. Carmen points out that Lila has her key and I make way so she can open the door. I lead my family and the rest of the people out of the stairwell. As we pass the elevator, I press the button just to see what would happen. The light blinked off almost immediately. I know you aren't supposed to use the elevator when there is a fire, but I wanted to know what all of our options were. We continued around to the other side of the building. There was only one more stairwell and we entered it and fortunately were able to make our way down to the first floor and out of the building to the street where there already fire trucks. We noticed there was a Days Inn across the street, where we checked in and stayed for the remainder to stay, on the fourth floor.



Tuesday evening we went out to the casino, where Lila ordered her first fancy drink. A pina colada.


Our friend Jan Misch taught Lila her method for working on the slot machines where Lila managed to win $2.75 Canadian (worth more than US dollars at the time of this writing). Lila's winnings naturally were enough to pay for her trip. Interesting thing about the casino. It is non-smoking and they do not serve alcohol to those gambling. They do stop by and offer drink such as soda, juice and coffee. Don't feel too bad. There is a lounge on every floor of this six story casino. The casino is owned by the government. All of the profits go to improving the roads. They sure have nice roads in Montreal.




Next morning we were eating that the lovely restaurant in our hotel. As you dined you could look out onto the street in front and see the fire truck and police. What? Yes, they where visiting again. No fire this time. Just past the restaurant where we could not see, a truck had missed it's address and backed up. Right over a pedestrian.



Our day in Montreal was October 17th, which just happens to be Lila's birthday. It was very nice of Best Western to hold their gala dinner in her honor. There we were with about 2000 of our closest friends.



One thing about Best Western is that I have been doing business with these people since before Lila was born, so there are many people that know her, but since she does not come every year, she doesn't necessarily remember everyone that knows her. This year Steve Wahrlich attended the conference. He has been to the last three, but hadn't attended in many years before that. Lila had missed the last three. He saw Lila, gave her a big hug and kiss as many who know here did and she freaked out a bit, since she forgot who he was and could not see his name tag. Once she saw it she remembered who he was.

The gala was wonderful, besides Lila, Carmen and myself, Jan Misch (her partner in crime with one armed bandits), Laurenne Douglas (We have a picture of her holding Lila when Lila is about an hour old), Betty (Laurenne's Mother, born and raised in France and is more French than France itself) and Carl Doughty who I have known since 1979 were all sitting together. There were lots of friends at the tables around us and everyone knew it was Lila's birthday.



The food was wonderful and was followed by entertainment. The first person was a comedian. I don't remember his name, but I will find out. I can't ever remember laughing so hard in my life. I was laughing so hard, not only did it hurt, but I decided it was better to just top breathing till I calmed down. He was so funny. "Salad is not a meal. It is the promise of a meal to follow." After the comedian, there was an impressionist that impersonated famous singers. That really didn't thrill Lila or myself that much, but at the very end he did Bill Clinton playing the saxophone. With his mouth, he made the sound of the sax and did an entire song. It was very impressive.



When that was all over, Laurenne took a white flower from the table setting and presented it to Lila. It was very sweet.


Next we went upstairs where they had a live disco band and we danced the night away. Above is a picture that Carmen took and Laurenne, Lila and myself on the dance floor.

The next morning, we flew home. Next year the Best Western conference is in Hawaii. Look out Hawaii. Ceci will be there too!