One Knight at the Waterloo Hotel

News that fire recently destroyed a plaza at 140 University Ave reminded me of something that happened when 132 still occupied that very space. One fine evening the group of us wandered down to the Waterloo Hotel for a few beers. This was probably in 1968 when beer was 15 or 20 cents a glass and I could tell the difference between ale and lager just by the colour. It was a slow night, nobody else in the place except us and after a couple of hours the bartender said that's it, he was closing the bar for the night and told us to leave. Now this sort of thing never happened. I mean who ever heard of a bar closing before 10 o'clock? In those days, things were just starting to happen at 10:00. Anyway, we left the hotel and went back home – to a house full of smoke! Seems one of us had left a cigarette burning in an ashtray perched on the arm of the couch and it had slipped into the cushions where it had been smouldering since we'd gone out. We rushed inside, grabbed the burning couch and quickly tossed it out onto the front lawn. It was a close call but other than the couch, the smoke and a couple of very frightened pets hiding in the basement, there wasn't any serious damage. It may have been a coincidence but I still have to thank that bartender who had better things to do than watch a bunch of careless hippies drink themselves silly.