Leaf Smack v1.2

Just a thought. Why won’t the NHL let Hamilton have a team?

Because Toronto will get jealous and want one too.

Interdum vos ut volvo ferrus six.

Leafs Smack 1.1

Welcome to Toronto…

Home of the Leafs, and birthplace of Osama bin Laden AND his twin brother Jason Blake. Is there any wonder Mats Sundin wanted to leave?

Go Canucks Go!

Interdum vos ut volvo ferrus six.

Leaf Smack 1.0

Welcome to Toronto…

The WORST place on Earth.

Go Canucks Go!

Interdum vos ut volvo ferrus six.

What gives more indigestion… Maple Leaf Meat products, or the Maple Leafs?

I think it’s fortuitous that I’m off this week. Ironic that it still took me over twenty four hours to pull my ass off of the sofa with a thought long enough to poke at some keys and make this post, but meh, I need the break from the physical grind of slavery otherwise known as work. Fortuitous in the sense that when I’m at work, for convenience sake, I have sandwiches with deli meat. Gods, when will they ever devise a microwave for a five-ton so I can reheat my meals dammit! Still, for us ‘deli meat’ eaters, we’ve had to deal with this. Mmmm. Sweet Listeria monocytogenes. Well, I can handle pasta all week. Even with crappy store bought sauce.

The initial plan was to be away. Then $1.50 per litre happened. Not really feasible with my not-so reliable car. Bah. And with a potentially very rainy week, the idiot box is the main source of entertainment. But in all reality, I hate television in the summer. Everything’s a repeat (not that the vast majority of programs are shit). And if it weren’t for the Olympics, the only sporting fare for most of the summer is Baseball. I used to be more passionate about Baseball. Now I just follow the standings until September, and then start watching, so long as it doesn’t interfere with anything else. But to watch a regular season game now is the equivalent for me to watching Darts or Competitive Snooker.

But we did have the Olympics. Just finished in time for it to NOT be on for the week off. Rather, in terms of the Olympics, I got to hear Jim Rome slam the Canadian Olympians for having an 0 for in the first week of Olympic competition. How we’re the embarassment of the G8 by being the only nation uncompetitive in the games. It was good to see the local personalities on Team 1040 comment back and stick up for the Great White North. Though with the call ins, the defense of our great nation turned into a dick fight about how to fix the problem.

And it’s the solutions the proletariat come up with that start to identify the problem. People will call in constantly and call for more money. We just need to pump more money into better facilities and the problem will just go away. And in that answer, the problem is inherent. We just don’t care. Put it in perspective. An Olympic champion just doesn’t all of a sudden wake up at age 18 and say ‘I want to be a 100m track champion.’ Those who succeed start young. Very young. Building a world class facility does not make up for that 13 year gap.

And to boot, let’s look at this. To be a runner, does one really need that world class facility? We have roads. We have tracks at schools. Weight machines all over. To be a swimmer, can’t we start in our local pools? Other athletics? Football? Diving? Cycling? Obviously what is missing here is passion and leadership, not facility. We need to give a shit about more than just hockey. Fuck me, do we ever care about hockey. The attitude is right there. Gold or bust. It is a slam against our national character if we can’t beat every other country at the game WE made. We need to care. We need a system that grooms athletes for other sports at an earlier age.

Still, having said that, we got 18 medals, finishing 19^th by Gold medal count, and tied for 14^th by overall medal count. As a whole, our best showing since 1996. And if you look at it this way, if we did as well in the first week of competition, we’d have shown 36 medals, for 8^th place overall in medal count. What was really funny though was Rome just happened to be on vacation the week Canada did well. Coincidence?

Still, all of this gave us something to talk about for two weeks. For the six weeks prior to it, all we heard was Sundin, Sundin, Sundin. Where will he go? The ‘Nucks offered $20 million for two seasons, which he balked at. Nearly two months later, and nothing. The latest rumour is that the New York Rangers are the front runner, though they can’t offer him even close to Vancouver’s money.

But the Rangers effectively lost Jagr to get Naslund. Gave up a two cup captain for a zero cup captain. If this is Mats’ team of choice, I wonder. Wonder if he’s going there to win a cup. Avery-less, I don’t see the Rangers doing much more than making the playoffs, as the roads will this year once again in the east probably will go through Montreal and Pittsburgh. Has Mats played for the Leafs long enough to suffer permanent brain damage?

Or have Canuck fans, some of whom still believe Mats is coming here, believe a Leaf will not only come here, but will take a mediocre at best Canucks squad and lead them to the promised land? Here’s a hint. No matter what Mats decides, come April ‘09, his hockey desires will take a back seat to hitting the links, whether or not his team of choice is in the post season.

Leaf Damage, or Maple Leaf listeriosis, you decide.

Interdum vos ut volvo ferrus six.

The return of Twisted Filler and other observations in the dawn of great change…

One thing came up in the twisted filler.

From Paul. Big shock there. Good ol’ Pastehead keeps finding these rarities. As such…

The Nietzsche Family Circus.

Feel free to email any humourous oddities to me at neolithicfilms@gmail.com.

I’m going to need a lot of them these days as our dear Vancouver Canucks are flirting with cellar dwelling this season in the Western Conference. Out are Naslund and Morrison. In come Steve Bernier, Ryan Johnson, Darcy Hordichuk, and Kyle Wellwood. And in all honesty, I do think the Canucks need to go to the drawing board, and definitely start from scratch. If the ‘Nucks do make a consistent commitment to the draft and developing young talent, they can be a force to reckon with in several years time. In the meantime, it makes for very boring hockey. However, there is a wild card. Is Luongo, our star goalie, willing to put up with a carbon copy of the dogma fed to him in Florida, a team that sucks so much balls? Though the direction is in the future, towards the youth, maybe getting a good name player to stand tall with the Sedin twins might give ol’ Bobby Lu enough motivation to stick around until the Canucks rise as a potent force once again.

I’ve been mulling it over, and there is one player I do have in mind. Not a free agent though, so it would have to be a trade…

So how about…

Kevin Bieksa to Philadelphia for Daniel Briere?

Briere’s probably not available, and the Flyers might not jump at this idea, but I do love the way Briere plays. Even if he beat the beloved Habs in the spring playoff dance (fucker).

Though in all sincerity, this isn’t the worst deal I’ve seen in the last 24 hours. Telus and Bell will start charging for incoming text messages starting in August. Revamping costs, or making a quick buck on the spam text message market that’s becoming as obnoxious as it has on the email front.

Thank fuck I’m with Rogers.

Interdum vos ut volvo ferrus six.

Just when we were getting to know you

They say only the good die young. The same is true of talented Canucks prospect Luc Bourdon, who died in a motorcycling accident today in New Brunswick.

I just can’t even equate how this has hit me yet. My condolences go out to his family, friends and teammates, past and present.

Say, Roberto, can you score 30 goals in less than thirty games?

As the ‘Nucks enter the stretch toward the trade deadline, we’ve been subject to many trade rumours. Marian Hossa. Martin Havlat. Even Mats Sundin, the harbinger of the hockey apocalypse (hell, the fucker plays for the Leafs, need I say any more?) has been named in trades. But with all this talk, I remember words from Jay Janower, something to the effect of are we a trade or two away from the Cup?

My thought? Hell fucking no! Until Morrison returns, really all we can muster is one solid line of offence. Naslund and two Sedins. Frankly, we need size with skill more than we need a rental player at the cost of our future. So unless Nonis can swing the proverbial ‘Courtnall for Kordic’ trade. Maybe Brian Burke will suffer major brain damage and we can pawn off Sami Salo for Ryan Getzlaf.

And maybe Stewie Griffin will truly want to live in harmony with Lois.

So, it leaves two possible scenarios come trade time. One, we lose potential long term talent in the likes of Ryan Kesler, Alex Edler, Luc Bourdon, and possible picks for 20 games with playoffs of the likes of the aforementioned non-Canuck talent. And without the possibility of signing Forsberg, there really is not a lot of options to bolster our inconsistent offence. Cripes, we do make the Mild of Minnesota look like an offensive juggernaut, don’t we?

Otherwise, we won’t make a big deal, and may very well have to rely on Luongo to help with the offence. At least it seems he’s returning back to form after a lull that spans to games prior to the All-Star Break. Thank the Gods. Now if the skaters could do something to help keep the pressure off of Canada’s goalie for 2010.

And, in semi-related news, after a week of searching, I finally, FINALLY found this (the initial run sold out in less than 4 hours):

That is all.

The Real Captain Canuck…

And no, it’s not Linden hanging behind the Franchise, Roberto Luongo either.

Love you babe

That is all.

One step back to go two steps forward…

Well, what can I say. Back on dial-up. But only for (at most) 10 days. And all because Telus are a bunch of fucking twats. And this happening just as Dawn and I hit GM Place today, with front row seats to see the Canucks Super Skills competition today.

My Canon Digital Rebel XT took 428 pictures at the bloody thing too. Well, when the high speed gets re-connected through Rogers, there might be one hell of a picture post coming up.

More to come soon.

That is all.

The week that wasn’t.

I need a new job. My SDO is officially slam dunking me with enough work for two drivers a day. I do like the overtime, though it’s beginning to take it’s toll on my body. What really takes the piss, however, is that in our deficit of drivers, there is one, with lower seniority, who still gets rediculously light days. Meh.

What really sucks is that I barely can find enough time to fiddle on my Mac. D’oh.

I’m sure Peter is eagerly awaiting my response to our ongoing blahrgument as to whether or not second hand smoke is in fact really carcinogenic. I’m still flabberghasted about this one. SHS, just as FHS inhaled by the fag sucker, contains

Benzo[a]pyrene found in coal tar, one of the most potent cancer-causing chemicals.
Formaldehyde used to preserve dead animals.
Hydrogen cyanide used in rat poison.
Ammonia used to clean floors and toilets.

amongst other harmful agents. Just because someone found a legal loophole in a study that highlighted worst-case scenarios, this does not alter the harmful effects of these agents. So I suppose the pro-smoking, science is full of shit movement going on with our differently brained southern neighbours, we can look forward to teachers smoking in unventilated classrooms, doctors smoking around ill patients, and loads of people lighting up in elevators. This just highlights YET ANOTHER REASON why I’m so happy to be Canadian. We have bans on smoking in indoor (and patios in Vancouver) public places, and hey, I don’t feel the pinch of Big Brother. That’s all I have to say about this. Well, until someone starts debating with me that the smoker actually yields health benefits from smoking.

Moving on, I’ve been seeing more of these bumper stickers around the lower mainland. I think they’re brilliant:

Though I do agree with the action (though it exists more as the lack thereof due to Iraq) to bring bin Laden to justice, we must ALL learn to co-exist to evolve as a species. Here’s a hint. Use Canada’s relationship with Quebec as a base model.

I can’t wait until the Habs and Canucks (my original home and current home) begin this current season’s quest for the Holy Grail.

Dawn has become mildly addicted to the forum on the Canucks site. I do find it highly amusing how ‘wannabe’ hockey fans are debating pre-season games like it’s game 7 of the Stanley Cup final. Here’s a hint. Strap on the blades and play a season. Then start talking. As for the fortunes this season, I think Vancouver has potential to make some noise, Montreal has depth in their prospects, and Detroit is the only team I’ll go on record as being a division champion, as they play in the weakest division in hockey. 32 games of their schedule include Chicago, St. Louis, Nashville, and Columbus. Talk about paving the road for someone.

And lastly, 24 November is highlighted in my mind. Razor gets aired. It’s been killer that we have to wait this long. Even worse that season 4 starts in January. I just hope Space actually carries it on the same day as SciFi.

That is all.