In which New River Academy Students experience the best of Ottawa City Culture….

I am looking after study hall this evening. It’s clear but cold out, we just wrapped up dinner of rice, veggies, chicken and a cream sauce cooked and concocted by Tracy d’Arbeloff and Alex Shallhorn. The only sounds are someone turning the page of a text book, the heater going on every few minutes, and a few students quietly discussing the square root of something or other. For some reason, my mind keeps wandering back to last Friday evening, when I experienced The Works for the first time.

Have you ever heard of “The Works?” I had not, until we arrived at Ottawa City last Thursday evening and I started to hear rumors. Hundreds of types of burgers, endless milkshakes, onion rings raining down from the ceiling…

We spent a very happy day on Friday in the beautiful warm sunshine, surfing for hours on the competition wave. There was no school and practically no time limit on the wave as we had all day to play and relax. We put out a cooler of food at the picnic area so the students were free to come and go and snack as they pleased. When not in our boats, we mostly hung out on the dock, cheered for those in the water, talked to the people in the eddy waiting their turn, and just chilled out. That’s when the rumors really began of The Works, as an entire day of sun and freestyle makes for 13 very hungry teenagers.

I was new to Ottawa City and had no idea how to navigate our gang to this fabled hamburger mecca. Thank goodness for the initiation of one Stephen Forster, who called and made a reservation for us, and got directions. If he hadn’t made reservations there is no way we would have made it into the restaurant that Saturday Night….it was a busy place! And for GOOD reason. The rumors that had been circulating around our group turned out to be true. There were at least 75 unique hamburgers to choose from, thick milkshakes (Stephen Forster: mocha Oreo, me: banana chocolate peanut butter, Palmer Miller: just plain chocolate, Isaac Holden: pina colada) served in gigantic measuring cups,and spears of Onion rings that were gone in about 2 seconds. The hamburgers were magnificent, with just about everything you can imagine, including braised pork (on Stephen’s…as you can see, he is a true veteran of The Works.) Our two tables were loud, rowdy, and full of energy, which completely fit the mood of the whole cheerful, frenetic restaurant. Afterward, we hung out for a while, roughhoused and ate gelato (yes, some still had room for gelato….) Finally, back to our three star hotel with just enough time to go swimming and get the last of the day’s energy out before getting to bed for nine hours of pre-competition rest.

It was a pretty awesome Friday.