Weekend In A Windsor Wonderland

By Steve Sirk
Columbus Wired Columnist
June 13, 2003

Memorial Day weekend is a time for honoring the brave men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice and gave their lives in defense of the United States of America and its cherished ideals of liberty and freedom. To celebrate this solemn occasion, my mother, my 19-year-old brother Tom and I headed to Canada like a bunch of bong-fogged peaceniks withdrawing from the Selective Service Vietnam Sweepstakes. Perhaps, in hindsight, our trip to Windsor could have been better timed from a symbolic perspective. But with a suite awaiting us at Casino Windsor, our concern with symbols was narrowly focused on card suits, slot fruits, and dollars signs.

Windsor, located in southwest Ontario, is one of Canada’s prime tourist attractions, and not just because it’s competing against other Canadian “hotspots” such as Flin Flon, Manitoba and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. No, Windsor is a popular tourist destination because it is conveniently located next to Detroit-- and no metropolis awakens the primal urge to flee like Detroit. Bob Seger has his world tours. The Tigers have their west coast road trips. The remaining Motor City refugees have Windsor, an oasis for the elderly, who like gambling without gunfire, and a liberated haven for 19-year-olds, who are free from oppressive government prohibitions on ogling naked babes while getting blitzed beyond all comprehension. To Americans aged 19-20, the bridge to Windsor might as well be accompanied by its own Statue of Liberty-- a thong-clad stripper triumphantly hoisting 6-packs of Molson and Labatt’s.

The “ugly American” might expect to cross into Canada and be transported into a magical world where mullet-wearing men in Dudley Do-Right uniforms brandish hockey sticks while riding domesticated moose that blast Rush’s Greatest Hits from speakers affixed to their antlers. Nothing could be further from the truth. Downtown Windsor is just like downtown in any major American city, with bustling storefronts, seedy alleys, and kids playing roller hockey on a major avenue in the middle of the afternoon. I am not making this up. Shortly after arriving, Tom & I decided to go for a walk. Just a block from the casino, we encountered three youths in roller blades playing hockey on a one-way three-lane road in the heart of downtown, with an authentic hockey goal resting against the curb. Tom and I were already chuckling over the Canuckishness of it all when the coup de grace came in the form of the goalie, who barged out of the front door and ambled to the curb in full goalie pads and a mohawk consisting of red, foot-high spikes of hair. Patrick Roy meets the Sex Pistols. Welcome to Canada, eh?

****

Casino Windsor has all of the decadent opulence one might expect from a casino. The grand atrium is stunning, with several stories of faux forest, babbling brooks and majestic waterfalls. The domed ceiling is sky blue with billowy clouds painted upon it-- the Sistine Chapel if Michelangelo mellowed-out and daydreamed.

Our accommodations were embarrassingly posh. The “executive suite” introduces itself with a marble foyer, which gives way to a living room that is larger than a locker room. The west wall is window upon window, giving a panoramic view of the Detroit skyline, which makes one all the more grateful for the tastefully patterned curtains. The ceiling has artsy-fartsy bevels in it, the southern wall is all mirrors, the dining table could seat King Arthur’s knights, and there is a not-quite-big-screen-but-still-pretty-damn-big TV. If you get tired of the buffets, restaurants and room service, there’s also a kitchen that, as far as I can tell, primarily functions as a place to re-heat your leftovers from the buffets, restaurants and room service, which can be stored in the fridge with your beer.

To the north was my mom’s room, with a king-sized bed, one of those fat-chick-posing-for-Rubens day sofas, and another television. Off Mom’s room was a labyrinth of personal space, starting with a smallish, tastefully lighted room containing a desk/vanity. Then comes the entrance to the bathroom, which consists of dual sinks on each side of the room. Walking deeper, the toilet is in a closet to the left, complete with a crack-splashing bidet. Wandering deeper still, one finally encounters the full-sized Jacuzzi and porn-set shower that is all marble and glass and could comfortably accommodate three.

Tom and I stayed in a room adjoined to the opposite end of the living room. Our room was more along the lines of typical hotel fare. Except for the Jacuzzi tub. And some sort of pants-pressing apparatus that was a like a George Foreman grill for wrinkled-up Dockers.

As mind-blowing as our accommodations were, we didn’t come to Windsor to sit in our rooms. Twenty-one floors below, the casino offered 100,000 feet of wallet-hoovering games of chance. Like all casinos, the décor is “Christmas at the Griswolds” -- a stunning assault on the eyeballs, with enough blinking lights to make epileptics of the blind. Tables offer standard casino games such as blackjack, baccarat, craps and roulette. There was also a game called “Spanish 21”, which, if I remember correctly from high school, is “veintiuno.”

Mom was there for the slots, and every time Tom & I went to find her in the maze of machines, we were always stunned by the number of old people that flock to the slots like an 8:00am garage sale. When grandma kicks the bucket and there are only a few afghans left to bequeath in her estate, rest assured it’s because the septuagenarian slot-junkie bled her fortunes dry, one beaver-head nickel at a time.

Or maybe it was 45 beaver-head nickels at a time. Slot machines have become incredibly complex nowadays. None of this pull-the-lever-and-hope-for-three-cherries nonsense. Now you can bet up to five lines and bet up to nine credits per line. There are only three lines on the video slots, so lines four and five are diagonals. Bet 45 nickels and get some weirdo random combination of a cherry, a firecracker, a blueberry, a gold coin and a pot of honey, and have them align in some sort of corporate earnings report line graph pattern, and then you are suddenly the proud winner of….36 nickels! Wow! You won 36 nickels! And all it cost was…45 nickels! And thus is the true genius of slot machines-- winning is losing and losing feels like winning. It’s this psychological slight of hand that makes slots more appealing than a “heads I win / tails you lose” coin toss table, although the differences are purely cosmetic.

When your coin cup is empty, you can fill your gullet at one of Casino Windsor’s eateries. There’s the ever-popular Garden Buffet, where everyone’s a glutton for what seems like only $3 Canadian, plus $20 tax. The Riverside Grille offers room service fare, but the service is in their room, not yours, so it’s cheaper. There is also a food court, which is located in the midst (and mist) of the waterfalls and streams of the atrium. Tom & I took a seat there when our legs were weary from wandering amongst the card sharks, dice-chuckers and lever-monkeys. Although not eating, we grabbed a table with a view and hung out for a bit. After several minutes, we were approached by a casino employee who asked if we needed anything. We explained that we were merely relaxing for a few minutes. “If you need anything, just let me know,” he said as he reached into his apron. “Here are some breath mints and wet naps.” He then walked away, as if these were perfectly standard items to offer strangers minding their own business.

The episode reminded me of my very first Canadian encounter a decade ago in Toronto. My dad and I made the trek to see my beloved Maple Leafs play in venerable Maple Leafs Gardens. Upon arriving in Toronto, I needed to call my ticket connection. I hopped out of the car and went to a pay phone, but, oops, I hadn’t converted any money yet. A pedestrian was passing by, so I offered him my American quarter for a Canadian quarter so I could make my call. The passerby gave me a Canadian quarter and then delayed my return to the phone by insisting he also give me a Canadian dime, so we’d be even. I explained that I was prepared to spend my quarter on the phone call anyway, so just forget about it, but he insisted on fishing through his pockets until he produced the proper exchange rate.

Canadians are friendly in the strangest of ways.

***

Now for a word about culture. It is a rare group of men, least of all a 19-year-old and his big brother, that goes to Windsor and fails to visit what shall be euphemistically referred to as the “Windsor Ballet.” The city has several renowned ballet theaters, and many of them seem to be named after spotted animals. For instance, there’s “Cheetah’s” and “The Leopard’s Lounge.” Tom & I began to speculate on other possible establishments, such as “The Spotted Owl’s Nest”, “Ladybug’s Lair” and “The Dalmation’s Den.” Maybe even “Chicken Poxxx.”

Saturday night, Tom & I visited the “Legends” ballet company. Windsor ballet is so much better than American ballet because it has more of a neighborhood bar feel. Legends wasn’t at all as seedy and creepy as American ballet theaters. People chatted, the ballerinas were friendly, and everything seemed downright casual. Best of all, since the $1 and $2 denominations in Canada are coins (which are seriously known as the “loonie” and the “toonie”), the ballerinas never hassle the patrons for tips like America’s Panhandlers of Pretend Passion. Apparently a cold coin tucked in the tutu doesn’t feel pleasant.

If one spends even the briefest of evenings at the ballet, one senses that certain luxury car manufacturers really make out in free cross-promotion at the ballet theaters. Many ballerinas name themselves after luxury automobiles, since they evoke feelings of wealth and prestige -- prohibitive in cost, but well worth it. Some auto manufacturers are as golden as the poles their namesakes slither around. Lexus, Mercedes, Infiniti, and Porsche have good names for this sort of thing. Others don’t fare so well. “Caddie” is a crusty golf advisor, “Lincoln” is an ugly man in a stovetop hat, and “BMW” evokes bad personal ad abbreviations for something along the lines of “Burly Mustached Woman.” And although not technically luxury -- but still expensive with a large amount of urban cachet -- "Hummer" doesn't work as it would attract undue attention from the authorities.

In the future, I fully expect new luxury automobile manufacturers to take advantage of this built-in marketing opportunity. There’s no good reason not to name the next great luxury car the "Sabrina" or the "Savannah." It doesn’t take a marketing wiz to figure out the winner of a focus group battle pitting the “Cadillac Seville”, “Lincoln Town Car” and “BMW 745i” against the “Destiny 36D”, “Tiffany TNA” and “Jasmine BJ69.”

Tom and I were full of these and many other haphazard thoughts as we stumbled and weaved our way back to the casino. For example, Tom suddenly realized he gave the bartender an excessively generous $20 tip before we departed. “I’m pretty sure I left the bartender a twopper,” he said. “Stupid Canadian money…this (stuff)’s like Monopoly money to me.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Monopoly money with ducks and woodpeckers and (stuff).”

***

Okay, maybe we did come to Windsor to hang out in our suite after all. Tom and I spent Sunday grogging our way through the aftereffects of the previous night’s ballet outing. The bright side is that this gave us an opportunity to watch a fair sampling of Canadian television, which I conservatively estimate has 36 channels devoted strictly to Avril Lavigne.

Avril Lavigne is the newest teenaged sensation on the popular music front. I don’t know too terribly much about her, so I will quote from her press bio and state that she is “a skater punk, a dynamic spirit and a true wild child. Anything but ordinary.” Make that anything but a spell-checker, judging by her appallingly titled hit song “Sk8r Boi”, a tune not nearly as profound as the title would suggest, if that can be imagined.

Lavigne is a native of Napanee, Ontario, so Canadian television is all Avril, all the time. Avril’s videos are in constant rotation. There are Avril interviews, Avril features, and Avril documentaries. There was a show chronicling some sycophantic Avril fan’s grand prize of stalking Avril for a day, and another show documenting another sycophantic Avril fan’s starring role in a recreated Avril video. Avril Lavigne was such a focal point of Canadian television that I swear the Mad Cow Disease expert on the news was named Dr. Claude Lavigne, who is apparently Canada’s equivalent to America’s very own Dr. C. Everett Spears.

Canadian television devoted a considerable amount of time to the outbreaks of Mad Cow Disease and SARS within the country. Despite the claims that everything is under control, Werewolves of Windsor would be wise to stick to the pina coladas in these contagious times, for one tainted dish of beef chow mein could lead to the contraction of a hybrid Mad SARS Disease Syndrome. It ain’t that pretty at all.

Then Tom & I came across a Guinness Book of World Records program. What made us pause from Male Pattern Flipping was some dude sling-shotting dimes upwards of ten feet with his ear lobes. This misfit had some massively flaccid ear lobes that drooped and dangled like gummy-worm fishing lures. Needless to say, I doubt women find these long, limp and limber lobes attractive, which is why he tries to make up for it by flicking dimes with them, since, like, chicks dig guys who can, um…okay, it doesn't help. But at least he got on TV. And not free TV, but fancy cable TV.

The next feature was on a motorcycle racer who had previously attempted to set a land speed record. The host informed us that this daredevil had "cheated death twice, and lived to tell about it." Even in our dysfunctional state, Tom and I immediately burst out laughing at the stupidity of that comment. To make matters worse, when the segment ended, the host again reminded us that the racer had "cheated death twice, and lived to tell about it." A redundant redundancy. Fantastic.

The only way to cheat death twice and not live to tell about it would be to die, be zapped back to life by the paddles, die again immediately, be zapped back to life, and then instantly die a third and final time. This sort of rapid life/death cycle is extremely uncommon and is generally reserved for slasher flick villains and Dick Cheney.

Tom & I also checked out TSN, which is the Canadian ESPN, so it presumably airs shows like “So Buddy, Pardon The Interruption, Eh?” and “Curling 2Night”. When we flipped past, we were treated to a gripping match of “artistic pool”, which consisted of some old dudes squaring off in a battle of trick billiards shots like the kind of shots the guys who bring their own pool cues to crappy bars think they can pull off, but can't, and then blame it on the crappy bar table as if it were some new mysterious x-factor that they hadn't considered beforehand.

One of the old guys eventually won $25,000, which, let me tell you, buys a hell of a lot of that blue stuff you put on the pokey end of the stick. And he’ll still have money left over for one of those special brass-knuckle-stick things and, if he plays his cards right, maybe he can also convince his wife to get a new rack.

By nightfall, Tom and I were feeling rejuvenated. TV had lost its allure. The ballet beckoned once more.

* * *

Monday morning we packed our things and prepared to leave behind our life of luxury. As I stuffed my belongings into backpacks, I gazed out the window. Looking at downtown Detroit, I wondered if Canadians view the Detroit River in the same manner that visitors view moats at the zoo. I also noticed a dearth of U.S. Border Patrol on the water, which I didn’t feel was very practical or compassionate since exhausted alien swimmers run a substantial risk of drowning on the swim back to Canada.

Detroit may seem like the Gateway To Hell, but for us it was the gateway to home. After a brief interrogation at the border (“Do you have any alcohol, tobacco or cows you’d like to declare?”), we were on American soil once more.

And then, as penance for the patriotic faux pas of forsaking America for Canada on Memorial Day weekend, we punished ourselves in the worst, most “American” way we knew how:

Cleveland Indians at Detroit Tigers, 1:05pm.


Questions? Comments? Cheated death twice and lived to tell about it? Feel free to write at sirk@columbuswired.net