A 'touristy' night

Well last night was another dinner club evening. It was full of laughter, giggles and full blown guffaws!!!

The night of giggles started at the Marriott. We all came directly from work and met at the Marriott first since our reso's weren't until after 6. As such we were still dressed in our dress clothes from the office and bundled up in our winter gear including scarfs as it was not promising to be a balmy day and Brenda and I walk to and from work every day. We enjoyed some lessons on the animal kingdom from Sarah (apparently Lee is a wealth of knowledge in that area!) and soon found ourselves crossing the street to meet Nicole and Kari for dinner.

A large bus pulled up in front of the calgary tower and started to unload at the base of the tower as Sarah, Brenda and I arrived. Lucky for us we found ourselves in the middle of a group of people that were heading up to the observation deck for a private party. We weren't too sure what was going on but noticed a variety of accents around us and were assuming somebody was hosting a conference for members from around the world.

As we reached the entrance to the elevator lobby we were greeted by a lady who commented 'you are not with the delegation, are you'. Since it was a party, we responded with 'unfortunately no, but we could be.' The next words that came out of her mouth shocked us all: 'I knew you weren't, you all look touristy'.

What exactly does touristy look like. Of course, all three of us had the following mental image.

And not one of us had a camera around our neck, white socks and running shoes nor a fanny pack. So of course, for those who know me, you will know that there was no way I was going to be told we were 'touristy'!!!

'Touristy?' I queried indignantly. Between the three of us, we certainly let the girl know that we did not feel we looked touristy. In an attempt to recover she replied 'Well you are wearing scarfs'. Really? Scarfs? Since when are scarfs touristy???

First of all I would like to point out it is Canada in October and this is our weather for this week:





Yes - we see negative temperatures and might I add snow.


Secondly - since when are scarfs touristy. You will notice by the top photos from 2009 fall fashion week that scarfs are certainly in style:

So how does she conclude that scarfs are touristy?

She obviously noticed our stunned faces and embarassed laughs as we turned to each other commenting that we didn't realize that scarfs were touristy. So again she dug herself deeper as she tried to recover by saying that we didn't look 'businessy'.

What???

What is businessy? And how does dress shoes, dress pants, wool dress coats and eyes weary from staring at computer screens all day not look businessy.

By now I am totally offended. Not too sure why it bothered me other than the fact that she obviously had no clue what she was talking about and didn't know when to stop.

However what she did provide us with was some awesome material for the rest of the night. All the way up the elevator we discussed our 'businessy' outfits. And then the elevators opened up to an absolutely beautiful view of the city.

If you haven't been to the Calgary tower in the last couple of years, you really must plan a dinner there. It was absolutely fantastic!

And as mentioned earlier, it certainly wasn't like the laughs stopped there. Before long Kari and Nicole joined us at the table and quickly joined in. We learned important Calgary tidbits, like the fact that Calgary downtown buildings cannot cast a shadow on the river, that you can see my deck from the table, that it takes an hour to do a full rotation and of course that no fantastic dinner is complete without some dessert.