Im also a canadian pyro (victoria, bc) who was out of luck in the chemicals feild. Try northwest scientific, they only ship to companies and schools, but they really dont care what company (eg, bobs used book mart can order 3 kilos of Mg powder). So if your friend owns his own small buisness, just ask him to order it for you. It works remarkably well.
At the risk of sounding reaaaaallllllly dumb, i just use pine charcoal out of my fireplace, my family has three of them so its easier and cheaper for me then cutting down willow trees or buying BBQ bricks, and earier someone said that it had to be burned in a low oxygen environement, how much does this affect overall preformance, my BP burns without residue, not precisely a snap of a fingers but it works.