Winter touring in Canada

Ah, the joys of touring in Canada, in winter.
Most countries, touring involves at most, a two hour drive between shows. So one can rise whenever they are so inlined, get in a vehicle (which doesn't necessarily need to be road worthy due to the shortness of the trip) arrive at their venue, soundcheck and still have time for a meal before they take to the stage.
This is NOT the case in Canada. With the exception of Southern Ontario, most of Canada's major towns of 50,000 or more are separated by at least 6 hours. Now, when you factor in the fact that you are 5-6 people traveling in a van, with various needs for bathroom breaks or junk food or simply the fact that the mysterious van "odour" is just too much, a 6 hour drive can easily stretch to become 8 hours. We, in the James Murdoch Band, lovingly refer to this wasted time as "Clown Time".
Now, in order to make your 4pm soundcheck, you need to leave at 8 am. Now assuming that your vehicle didn't break down, you woke up on time and you went the right way, 8 hours later and $200 in gas later, you arrive at your destination.
Now you get to wait for 2 hours before the sound guy arrives because "the bands never arrive on time". After an hour long soundcheck you are free to check in to the one hotel room, to be shared by the 5 of you. But don't take more than 40 min. because you need to get back to the club for your gig. Now you play your set, get off the stage and hopefully there are fans there to socialize with. You don't want to snub anyone and go back to the shared accommodations too early as you might offend or bore them and they might not show up to the gig the next time you play there.
So, you'll probably get to bed around 2am, with a few too many drinks in your belly only to wake up 5 hours later, hungover, off to do it all again. Only this time, it's Thunder Bay and its a 12 hour drive... And there's a snow storm....Awesome.