LISTEN LISTEN NEVER TURTLE/IF YOU DO THAT THEY’LL CALL YOU MYRTLE! LET’S GO! *never ending BKS techno fury*
It’s an all new Aw NHL Naw. Let’s go.
Let the countdown to the Wild coming onto the ice to The Girl Who Lives On Heaven Hill begin: I’m not fond of the Vancouver Canucks. I have my reasons. Some are fandom-based (I’m still mad about Mike Peca’s cheap shot on Teemu Selanne), some are rooted in visceral dislike (Vancouver is a fan parody heavy market) and a lot of my dislike is tied to a fear of Orcas in top hats (LADY BYNG FIN WILL GOBBLE US ALL UP IN HIS TERRIFYING ONE 1%ER TEETH). Plus the team’s like good and shit, which makes any club insufferable. That said, all sorts o’ kudos to Canucks fans on voting in “The House That Heaven Built” as the club’s intro song. NONE MORE KUDOS! BRING YOUR KUDOS TO THE PRIZE WINDOW!
“The House That Heaven Built” is a song that makes a guy/lady/cyborg want to flip a fucking tank. Or blow up a spaceship with an electro-bazooka. Or riot in a fashion that doesn’t ruin everything for everyone. (Full Disclosure: If Japandroids are played at the right volume, I just start sobbing uncontrollably and begin swinging a flaming sword around my apartment.) Of course, the Canucks are 0-1 since the song’s debut (they got doubled up by an okayish Coyotes squad) and it’s by no means a permanent arrangement (the tune gets one more tour of intro duty against the Kings on Saturday), but it’s still nice to know that nice things happen sometimes. We can all grow up to be Prime Minister or a panda bear or an adult contemporary recording artist or something!
Canada and the ice hockey clubs in it: The playoffs aren’t for a while, but I figure I can address this in advance: You do not have to root for a hockey team just because they’re “from Canada”. This shit happens every year where you’re supposed to root for the Canucks or the Senators or the Leafs or the Canadiens just because they’re a “Canadian team” and Canadians root for Canadian teams because…patriotism? It makes no sense. It’s like a Colorado Rocies fan rooting for all the AL/NL West teams because they’re vaguely from the same region. Balls to that. Besides, all these franchises are in cities that have fans. Lots of them. Plus loads of people that equate local sports success with going whole hog on topless dumbassery, throwing cinderblocks at nerds and picking fights of police horses. (HORSES GONNA WIN EVERYTIME, DUDEZ! THEY HAVE SPECIAL HORSE-BASED COMBAT TRAINING!) Remember the Red Mile? That was a fucking nightmare. Just bros and bro-ettes broing shit up until shit reached maximum broverdrive. Gah.
Canadian franchises are easy to hate. Embrace the spite, pettiness and occasional jealousy you feel when they get too much coverage on SportsCentre. Roll around in it for a while. Rub it into your screen. Teach your children to irrationally hate cities based on the hockey costume you associate with it. You’ve earned it and we as Canadians have earned
Phil Hartman related ad break: My favourite bit is the shouting of “RUTHLESS TRIPPING”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0fU7dYQD28
Joy (of new) Division(s): Realignment looks like a go. I’m excited for it, even if I don’t really understand how the new divisional setup is going to work. It’s one of those things that’s been explained to me hundreds of times, but I still can’t quite grasp it. (I have the same problem with understanding how math, mutual funds and the rules of the Double Cross game on The Price Is Right.)
I’m an old man with an old man skeleton made up of moldy old man bones, so I get all swoony over the return of the four division format. Maybe they’ll even bring back the old division names.(ALSO BRING BACK HILL STREET BLUES!) They won’t though. Instead we’ll get division names based on regions, which isn’t the worst thing in the world. I imagine if the NHL could, they’d rename each division in a way they imagine makes the league more relevant to casual fans:
Kiefer Sutherland Mentioned Us In US Weekly Once Division
Extreme Neon A/S/L Dirt Bikes AOL Keyword: IceBoyz69 Youth Culture Division
Football Division
Bridgestone Presents: Hot Labor Dispute Action Division
“Do you kids still like Five For Fighting? We could name the conferences after some of their sweet album cuts!” etc.
Have a fun hockel this week.
Hang out with Dan on Twitter or in the comments. It’s a TV Party tonight.
