It Gives Me Great Pleasure To Announce:

How many of you have fallen victim to the above comic? It’s a great laugh, “Heh, you got me, I do play a lot of video games” “Yeah, I prefer to influence the images I see on the TV or computer as opposed to just sitting and watching”. It’s all in good fun and fortunately the novelty eventually wears off, but behind every fun poke lays a grain of truth. The comic will disappear for a couple of years until someone clever comes across it and connects the dots. Thank-you Gary Larson.

Being a product of the Super Nintendo Age – before playing video games was cool among the sorts of asshats that used to pick on me for playing them – this comic was pointed out to me several times during my youth. I’m sure others experienced the same fate.

So on behalf of everyone who has ever fallen victim to that comic, it gives me great pleasure to send out the following .gif :

2009 NHL Stanley Cup Finals Prediction: Penguins have Wings.

I don’t hate Sidney Crosby. I know I’ve mentioned him a few times and if you’ve ever talked to me in person, you’d know I don’t always paint him with the nicest brush. Allow me to clarify my position. He’s a good hockey player, playing with Geurin seems to have lightened him up a little, I’m sure off the ice he’s one hell of a stand up guy! Or at least that’s what Tim Horton’s would have you think. What I’m not a fan of is how he’s shoved down our throats by the NHL and all the associated marketing brands. That’s where the irritation lies. He’s the poster child and new face of a younger faster NHL. Just let the kid play hockey and enjoy his impending Stanley Cup win.

So I’m sitting at .500 with my predictions this spring. A few surprises, a few obvious calls. My prediction for the finals should be as easy as calling Mike Keenan’s firing from Calgary. The real prediction will be where he ends up next. Minnesota? Maybe. Who knows. Maybe Colorado, if they chuck Tony Granato.

Flash, all the way back in time to the year 2008. The Pittsburgh Penguins had just beaten the Flyers in 5 and the Wings took it to Dallas in 6. The victors were set to meet each other in the finals.

Last time, it was Red Wings in 6. This time? The great conspiracy will come true, Penguins in 6.

~J

Short post this time. I’ve been busy. If things go well today, I’ll have a longer, better written, non-hockey post up shortly.

And Now For Something Completely Different

“It was only by going to Princeton that I realized that no one understands The Wasteland. That James Joyce was unintelligible, even to my professors. And, that graduates like Donald Rumsfeld, don’t know how to fight a war. So –”

“No, no, no no, sir. They don’t know how to *win* a war. There’s a difference.”

“You’re right, you’re right.”

“We wouldn’t have the war without that man.”

“A lot of my classmates were on the board of Lehman Brothers too. I wouldn’t consider them overeducated. Loaning money too people who don’t have any. It’s very possible to be undereducated.”

– An exchange between Walter Kirn and Stephen Colbert on May 19th. Kirn, promoting his new book “Lost in the Meritocracy: The Undereducation of an Overachiever”

Back when I was young, spry, full of piss and vinegar. I wanted to go here: University of Beppu, the plan was eventually to go for a Masters in Marketing, come back home, fully cultured and ready to use my education to manipulate the masses into buying whatever product my employer hired me to push on my fellow man.

The school was exotic and renown on the Asian side of the Pacific rim, at the time I had a keen interest in Japanese culture and was learning to speak the language. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) my interest in Japanese culture was horribly thrashed by little Otaku Fan Girls who overused the term “Kawaii”, wore over-whored schoolgirl uniforms, feverishly loved horrible versions of the Final Fantasy series and had an unhealthy addiction for Bubble Tea. I have a theory that Bubble Tea is prepping young women for lives of sexual deviance, but this isn’t the place or time. And I couldn’t reasonably afford to go to this illustrious school without a boat load of scholarships and student loans to cover tuition. Oh yeah, not to mention the Passport requirements, Student Visa and balancing of overall living costs. I don’t think a few of my grades were high enough either. I was a great Arts/English/Computer student, but force me to do complex mathematics and I’ll fail quicker than the Maginot Line. I realize that’s odd to hear from a person who has worked a bank and has an interest in finance, but for some reason financial numbers make sense to me. All and all, not going made a lot more sense than going.

Since, what could be dubbed, “the good old days” I’ve taken an interest in marketing and how products are sold to the general public. There are people who have built careers around peddling products to a society who doesn’t necessarily need ’em. I find that fascinating, if only because of the wild divide between quality advertising and absolute crap.

Originally, this blog was going to be a place to sit all those horrible little advertisements down and ask them a few questions, for example:

Dear Apple,

Why do you feel the need to blast Windows Vista for being unreliable? Do you really need to depict a PC user transporting himself ahead in time to see if they’ve fixed Vista’s freezing problems? Or show legal text every time a PC user claims that a PC is flawless. Yes, they made a bad operating system. Move on. Apple, do you even remember the 90’s? You know, that decade of fuck up after fuck up? Remember the iMac G3? The computer without a fan. Remember every operating system before Mac OSX?

The continual attack ads against windows, no matter how simple and cute, comes across as horribly smug. Yes, at the moment you make a wonderful product. You have your chief competition on its heels and failing to copy your products. But what’s going to happen when Windows 7 comes charging through the door and kicks the hell out of your Operating System? Is the marketing strategy going to become all about the history of perseverance and loyalty? Are you going to continue comparing apples and oranges until you no longer feel you have this fictitious upper hand?

Suggestion; let Justin Long go back to his acting career and bring out a new ad campaign that highlights the superior features of the computer, instead of trying to mindlessly shit on the competition.

– Jack.

Basically open ended letters to companies picking apart their commercials and questioning the message they’re paying top dollar to push on the consumer. I actually have a load of companies I want to write letters too. I might end up doing that for a while. Who knows, I may even mail off a couple of them and hope for a reply.

Why mention this now? I received a piece of feedback that talking hockey all the time was a little boring. Or, ‘dry’. (Thanks Dad) Plus, with the NHL off-season on its way, I’m going to need to focus on blogging about something else between Free Agency and The Draft.

Not to mention it’ll be good practice to break free from the sports mould and write about other things.

~J

Advice Content: Apple Inc, stop with the “I’m a Mac” ads, before something horrible happens and suddenly the ‘smug middle class market’ finds something else to be smug about and forgets your product.

2009 NHL Conference Finals: The Great Penguin Conspiracy

This is turning into the playoffs I can’t win. Or lose. So far, I’m 50.50 on my bets. I was one overtime glove save away from being ahead, but alas, you can’t stop them all. I could lament the fantastic breakdown that was Vancouver, but I’ll cut right to the chase.

The East:

4. Pittsburgh Penguins vs. 6. Carolina Hurricanes

I have this theory. Partly based around the fact that I believe Gary Bettman is decidedly Anti-Canadian. Before anyone comes to his defense and cries that he didn’t move Ottawa, Edmonton or Vancouver during their rough times, I’d like to point out that there’s a large difference between being Anti-Canadian and a stupid businessman. Gary is not a stupid businessman. The Canadian hockey market is a lock, we spawned the sport, we love the sport. The six teams we have in the NHL at the moment distribute our NHL exposure evenly enough to ensure that every Canadian is within some decent shot of a franchise. Exceptions being Atlantic Canada and the Territories. Maybe Manitoba and Saskatchewan. He did also move franchises from Winnipeg and Quebec, with what now looks like very little thought – when you compare their relocation against the controversy generated by a possible Coyote relocation.

No Canadian team has won a Stanley Cup while under Gary’s tenure as commissioner. He started his job in February of 1993 – midway through the last season a Canadian team took home lord Stanley. Montreal. Since then, every Canadian team has had a decent crack, exception being Toronto, and has lost to an American team in a weak hockey market. Carolina a team notorious for attendance problems, has had those problems taken care of ever since they beat Edmonton a few years back. The same goes for Tampa and Anaheim when they won their respective cups. All of those teams experienced large jumps in attendance season after they won the cup. Only New York had a solid attendance base when they beat Vancouver in 1994.

Gary Bettman has gone on record stating several times over that the Penguins are the model franchise. They have rebounded from their lowest attendance average 11,877 in ’03-’04 (the year Malkin was drafted) and clawed back from bankruptcy. With the addition of Sid the you-see-him-everywhere Kid and a bunch of other youth, the Penguins were due for the same pop they received when they drafted Jaromir back 1990. A new arena with 2,000+ extra seats to fill due in 2010. It only seems logical that there’s going to be a push in the direction of the Penguins. Penguin merchandise, Penguin commercials, Penguin pride, Penguin hype.

I’ll put it this way, skill alone didn’t push the Penguins past the Capitals. There was something about game six and seven that was a major tell in favour of Pittsburgh. The Capitals star players didn’t play like themselves. Ovie was listless and he’s a guy who rarely takes a shift off. Varlamov let in goals that were completely uncharacteristic for him, even for a bad game. Washington played without the energy of knowing they were potentially one game away from the Conference Finals and anything is possible. Sure it’s crushing for Capitals fans, but a game seven loss was the only way to ensure that the series ended on a win/win. Gary gets to watch his prized franchise march to the conference finals, while still showcasing the grit and flash of a series against the new number 2 franchise in the East. Washington gets to end their season on a positive note, tinker with the roster a little and lose to the Penguins in the conference finals 2010. In the meantime, smart gamblers have a nice lock for the next few seasons.

To paraphrase the late Hunter S. Thompson: “The Kentucky Derby is fixed, Boxing is fixed, The NFL is fixed, why not the NBA?” and I’m positive the same could be said for the NHL.

Penguins in 7.

As depressing as it is to admit, with Boston out, the Penguins are now my logical favourite to win the Cup. If they face the Red Wings in a rematch of last years playoffs, a Penguin win will signal a changing of the guard from the ‘Old NHL’ to the ‘New NHL’ – and a horrible screw job for Marian Hossa. A Blackhawks/Penguins final will be a rematch of 1991-92. Pittsburgh took that one in four. The media probably wouldn’t attack it like that, instead they’ll comment that in the ‘New NHL’ every team has a chance regardless of experience level. Everything has been opened up.

Chicago/Pittsburgh is possibly the best finals match up the NHL can hope for. The Red Wing era can end when they’re beaten by Chicago, leaving two franchises that were dealing with low attendance and possible bankruptcy to battle it out for the Stanley Cup and further the NHL’s march into the USA sports market.

The West:

2. Detroit Red Wings vs. 4. Chicago Blackhawks.

I telegraphed my prediction for this one already. Chicago in six. Osgood will be blamed for the loss, prompting a rebuilding process in Detroit.

This is one of the first times I hope my predictions are wrong. I hope everything that lines up perfectly in my head is nothing more than a mental flash bang; and Gary Bettman doesn’t have his finger on the trigger, telegraphing the playoffs for financial and market gain.

All I’m sure of is that Canadians will have to wait yet another year, while we have this Steel City franchise unfairly shoved down our throats for. In the off season, Sid and Malkin will sign a bunch of sponsorship deals that will ensure we see their faces and the Penguins logo plastered everywhere.

Canadian hockey is going to have to rely on looking forward to the Olympics and International Tournaments, because as far as the NHL is concerned, we have nothing to look forward to for a couple of years.

~J

Advice: When you’ve followed a sport your entire life, spice things up by connecting seemingly invisible dots and coming up with crazy conspiracies.

335 in 5 and Turn Off the Damn Blackberry!

So it was a real-time message. That meant it was either from Hal himself or someone aboard Leonov. There was no perceptible time lag; the origin had to be right here.

     Then who was speaking to me?

     I WAS DAVID BOWMAN.

Floyd stared at the screen for a long time before making his next move. The joke, which had never been funny in the first place, had now gone too far. It was in the worst possible taste. Well, this should fix whoever was at the other end of the line.

     I cannot accept that identification without some proof.

     I UNDERSTAND. IT IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU BELIEVE ME. LOOK BEHIND YOU.





A lot has happened since the last time I wrote in here. My prediction about Franzen rattling Hiller seems to have come true. The Bruins have fallen apart, but are showing late signs of life. The Canucks are on the brink of falling into another late season breakdown. Canada couldn’t solve Bryzgalov in Berne and had to settle for Silver. The wound on my ankle is healing up nicely. I’ve seen two ‘blockbuster’ summer movies. And I’ve read Arthur C. Clarke’s 2010: Odyssey two from cover to cover.

The last of which is the most remarkable of the bunch. Star Trek, a close second, Abrams is a genius. I’m not much of a reader. Wait, that’s a lie. I read a lot, daily, but I never read novels. I read blogs and other things I come across online. I rarely have the time to sit down and read a good old paperback. Wait I lie again, it’s not that I don’t have the time to read a paperback, its that I’ve surrounded myself by consistent stimulation. I’ve made it difficult for myself to take the time to focus on the printed word. Also, I rarely find something interesting enough to warrant shutting everything down and focusing solely on it. World War Z was successful. Hey Rube was moderately successful, the great thing about collections of articles is that they’re quick and don’t usually require a long term of focus. A lack of continuing storylines makes it easy to put them down. Other than that, it’s rare when a book actually steals enough focus to tear through 335 pages in 5 days. I know many of you must be thinking “I’ve read through books quicker.” Hell, so have I, but not in a long time and very rarely that enthusiastically. There’s something about the romance and mystery of space that made this book a page turner.

I won’t dare touch the movie. I don’t know if I could stomach watching a movie done in the mid 80’s by the same director who has brought us gems such as Time Cop and The Musketeer (2001). With 2001: A Space Odyssey being one of my favourite movies, I’m afraid that it might be spoiled by the non-Kubrick sequel. Fun fact: Kubrick’s professional directorial debut was the movie Flying Padre, financed by RKO, a company noted for the original King Kong and Citizen Kane another two movies I fancy quite a bit.

Directing has been on my mind a lot lately after seeing two widely contrasting examples of how the movie making craft should be approached. I’m talking about X-men Origins: Wolverine and Star Trek. One of these two movies had the directorial due care and attention worthy of a summer epic. The other was trite with clichés and needless overhead shots of leading men screaming into the sky. Honestly, can anyone tell me they take a movie seriously when it uses the same set up and camera pans three times in the first two acts? I’m not a director, yet. And I’ll probably never have the task of presenting my take of a popular franchise to the masses. But I – the undereducated – acknowledge that there are certain things you need to avoid when directing a film. That’s why I respect Abrams so much, he trying to figure out new ways of storytelling and presenting it to an audience. Gavin Hood, not so much.

Holding two of the emotional high points of the movies against one another; the beginning of Star Trek against the end of the first act of Wolverine, it’s obvious which director looked at the script long and hard, then came up with a way to tug at the heart strings of the audience. Both movies attempted to showcase the emotional moment that is the driving force behind the character’s quest for revenge – or other motivations. The point is, I fucking hated Eric Bana’s character because of the emotional beginning to the story, I could empathize with Kirk’s disposition throughout the entire movie. Where as I could care less about the reasoning behind Wolverine’s rampaging quest to avenge a death. All because there was a poor emotional connection in the initial presentation.

I wonder what Zack Snyder would have done with Wolverine. I’ve gone on record lambasting his remake of Dawn of the Dead before settling that it was merely an interpretation, a poor one, but an interpretation of a classic. I’m of the mind that zombies can’t run, hearing George Romero debate on the subject during a 2004 Toronto ComiCon sealed that deal for me. But Snyder won me over with Watchmen , Wolverine could have stood as the tie breaker. On another plane of existence maybe. Now I’ll never know.

Of course, it could always come down to control. For all I know Fox could have pulled an Avi Arad and gone Spider-Man 3 on Mr. Hood.* Maybe Mr. Hood didn’t want to include those cliché’s, but was pushed into it by an executive number-cruncher who was completely and utterly convinced that the audience loves screaming-to-the-sky-overhead-pan-shots. The bean counter could have purchased marketing data from a information mining cellphone company and found that the scream-to-the-sky shot was the camera angle most texted about by the movie’s key demographic.

Of course if that key demographic could get off their phones, we might not have these problems. I don’t want to blame bad directing on in-theatre cellphone usage, but it certainly detracts from the experience. At very least, there’s a remote connection between using your cellphone during a movie and poor directing. I’m sure it’s funny to the parties involved to relay some of the witty thoughts about a movie, during the movie. But while that healthy little white glow that reflects off your face while you’re giggling in self satisfaction and documenting the clever commentary your brain has produced. The people who are trying to enjoy the movie behind you are being distracted and more importantly irritated. I’m sure that some of them might even be thinking of horrible the things they could do to you with the potential weapons they carry on them.

It’s Jim Balsillie’s fault. If the MO for Research in Motion hadn’t changed from securing the business market to reaching into the consumer market with what I can only imagine are amazing smartphones, we might not have this problem. If RIM didn’t push into the public marketplace with a superior product, none of the other companies would have had to pour money into R&D to catch up. The few kids who are hardcore enough to own a Blackberry wouldn’t be able to text their witty comments mid-movie to their friends sitting on MSN at home. They’d have to rely on their memory and wait until the end like the rest of us movie critics. (Don’t get me wrong, using a cellphone before a movie is fine, so long as it’s put away when the opening credits roll. Preferably during the previews.)

So Mr. Hood, you’re lucky. Balsillie will take the blame this time. As a reward for Balsillie’s foresight, Mr. Bettman give him a goddamn NHL franchise already. He sacrificed himself to give Gavin Hood the cinematic equivalent of a mulligan and an energetic new franchise owner in an already large hockey market might spice things up in the NHL a little.

~J



Advice: Turn off the Blackberry (or other smart-phone device) when in the midst of a movie. Whoever you’re texting can wait.



* – For those of you who don’t know the story behind that one. Raimi originally wanted to develop a Sandman film, but was convinced otherwise by the producer to introduce Venom as a marquee villain, citing his popularity. Which is why SP3 has a well developed sympathetic Sandman and a poorly done Venom who seems like he was added as an afterthought. Sadly, the movie did really well at the box office. Even sadder, Venom is dead, which cuts off Spider-man’s most memorable villain Carnage without some really clever writing, outright continuity breaking or a complete series restart.

1 through 30 on my ankle

Everything I’ve read about running the beginning of a successful blog points to a three month trial. Three months to build a readership. Three months to build up blog posts. Three months to alter your appearance. Three months to get a feeling of impending absolute failure or long term moderate success. During these three months you’re generally encouraged to try everything to find your niche – though to quote a friend, “It’s all been covered.” You could be a virgin father of three with hairy palms the size of baseball gloves and you can be guaranteed that somewhere there is a blog entitled SLHPFCAB: Sexless Large-Hairy-Palmed Fathers Campaigning Against Baseball. The point is, whatever you choose to do, do it well and shamelessly self promote. While I may never achieve the high quality standards of SLHPFCAB I can certainly try.

So where does Zappity Zap sit after it’s first month of operation?



The first month numbers:

Posts: 10 – A wild swing of ups and downs, I’d say about three of them I’m really happy with.
Comments: 8 – I think four of em are from me, hah.
Tags: 56
Busiest Day: 28 views – Woo!
Slowest Day: 0 views – Boo!
Total views to date: 281



I have nothing to base this against, but it seems like a decent start. I’m sure about half of those 281 page views come from the same five or six people. I’m not entirely sure how WordPress tallies unique page views. If they do it in the same fashion as Deviant Art, than I’m sitting pretty. If they don’t, I have some work to do.

I haven’t done much for promotion, probably stems from not quite having my ‘niche’ figured out. Things look like they’ll be going down the ‘hockey blog’ direction, but the end of season is coming up in about a month. Coupled with a natural fear of shameless self promotion – I’ve only posted about this blog once on other ‘social networking’ sites. For someone who would love nothing more than to make a career for himself as a writer, I sure hate the attention that could potentially come with it.

Next month should be much better. I’ll probably start a little bit of promotion, at very least on Facebook and DeviantArt. A growing base of blog posts means that random search related hits are likely to increase. I should work on getting more photos up. I see the types of blog my better half likes to read, there are loads of photos and those blogs are generally popular. It’s also heading into summer, which means the I’ll need to fill the hockeyless void with something. I’ll figure something out eventually.

Much like the below picture – which is slightly graphic – it’s all a learning process.







Yeah, about that. Did you know that wearing brand new leather shoes over thin bamboo socks is a bad idea? I had my suspicions, but like any great space monkey, suspicions are nothing without a good old healthy dose ‘field exercise’. Lesson learned! I’ll take Kate’s advice and bring adhesive strips along with me next time I go to wear new shoes around the city. In the meantime, back to my trusty old Harley’s while my ankle mends itself.

Things could be worse. I could be standing in the skates of poor Simeon Varlamov, stopping nearly everything coming at me while the team in front of me works on getting their offense in order and taking unpunished crosschecks to the back of the head behind the play. Oh yeah, did I mention the Nazi’s? The black Waffen-SS jackets and Goose-Stepping were a dead give away. Nazi’s on the ice trying to shine laser pointers into poor Simeon’s eyes. Anything to throw the poor rookie off of his game. I had no idea that the members of the Third Reich were Penguins fans.

~J



Advice: Bamboo socks, while comfortable, should never ever be used to break in stiff leather shoes.

PS: Right now it’s hailing outside and there’s a scared class of school children huddling under a tree outside the apartment. Words can’t describe the joy seeing that has brought me. I’d invite them into the apartment for some shelter, but those kids need to learn the lessons of nature.

Taken from a Calendar – That just might taste like real beer.

Kate and I have possibly the most interesting calendar on the planet hanging on our wall in the kitchen. The Museum of Lost Wonder: 2009 Calendar by Jeff Hoke. If it’s not the most interesting calendar I’ve ever come across, it certainly ranks in the top three, nipping on the heels of The Museum of Lost Wonder: 2008 Calendar by Jeff Hoke. And his 2007 edition of the same calendar.

Every month there’s a written section that dances around a lovely monthly image and down the sides of the dates. Each month a varying subject, from “How to Have Visions” to “The Meaning of Life”.

I wanted to call to attention the section for the month of April:

What is Reality?
What is reality? You’ve probably asked yourself this question at least once in your life only to dismiss the question for lack of real meaningful conclusions. Is it a dumb question? Sure, but that’s what the museum is all about. Most everyone would concede that reality is what we can see, hear, taste, smell, feel and agree upon.
Many people would perceive this image (an image of a pint of beer is show) as a cold foamy glass of beer. But they might not agree upon what it means. Some would say it signifies the birth of civilization as we know it.* Others would say it heralds the end of civilization. Both sides would say it can alter reality but might disagree that that altered reality exists. Reality seems to be an agreement we make about the physical sensations we perceive. The interpretation and meaning of those perceptions is what gets us into all sorts of trouble – uncomfortable disagreements, nagging self-doubt, and those terrible sleepless nights. What we know for sure is that civilization has been tormenting itself with the question of reality since before the beginning of beer.
Where do these ideas about reality really come from? As always there are two sides of the argument. One side stresses that reality is a product of the mind and the physical world is an illusion. The other side proposes that the physical world we know though sensations is the only reality, and that the mind is an illusion. What started folks crying in their beers was the realization that nothing stays the same, How could something be real if it’s always changing?
When is a beer really a beer? We know that beer is made up of a bunch of separate elements: water, grain, hops, ect. Sometime during the brewing process it becomes something drinkable, and it’s put into a vessel. Before we drink the stuff in that vessel, how can we assume it’s really beer? At this point it’s just potentially beer. Even if we drink that stuff, how can we be sure it’s not some imitation? Our senses can be fooled. If someone else has a taste and agrees that it’s beer, is it then real, or just an agreement among beer sops? Is reality a matter of taste? Maybe that’s as real as it gets.
Even though our perception of a thing can change, we can still hold the idea of the thing in our heads. We can still salivate at the thought of a cold frosty glass of beer even though our perception of each beer we taste changes. The idea (a product of mind) seems to have a more changeless quality than the physical beer itself.
This is the basis of the concept of duality, and that is where all the fun begins.

* – Some say the fermenting of beer from grain signified the birth of a settled agrarian lifestyle that preceded a communal political organization and a lot of free time for folks to pickle themselves with useless questions like these.

That sure beats looking at a monthly image of a cute cat, pretty lady, flowers, comics, cars, horses, TV stars or anything else that might grace the monthly page of a calendar.

~J

The Lost Wonder website where the calendar and other goodies can be found: http://www.lostwonder.org/

The Mongolian Comedian

Hello. I’m Anthony St. George on location here in Washington.

On behalf of Canadians everywhere I’d like to offer an apology to the United States of America. We haven’t been getting along very well recently and for that, I am truly sorry. I’m sorry we called George Bush a moron. He is a moron, but it wasn’t nice of us to point it out. If it’s any consolation, the fact that he’s a moron shouldn’t reflect poorly on the people of America. After all, it’s not like you actually elected him.

I’m sorry about our softwood lumber. Just because we have more trees than you, doesn’t give us the right to sell you lumber that’s cheaper and better than your own. It would be like if, well, say you had ten times the television audience we did and you flood our market with great shows, cheaper than we could produce. I know you’d never do that.

I’m sorry we beat you in Olympic hockey. In our defense I guess our excuse would be that our team was much, much, much, much better than yours. As word of apology, please accept all of our NHL teams which, one by one, are going out of business and moving to your fine country.

I’m sorry about our waffling on Iraq. I mean, when you’re going up against a crazed dictator, you want to have your friends by your side. I realize it took more than two years before you guys pitched in against Hitler, but that was different. Everyone knew he had weapons.

I’m sorry we burnt down your White House during the War of 1812. I see you’ve rebuilt it! It’s very nice.

I’m sorry for Alan Thicke, Shania Twain, Celine Dion, Loverboy, that song from Sheriff that ends with a really high-pitched long note. Your beer. I know we had nothing to do with your beer, but we feel your pain.

And finally on behalf of all Canadians, I’m sorry that we’re constantly apologizing for things in a passive-aggressive way which is really a thinly veiled criticism. I sincerely hope that you’re not upset over this. Because we’ve seen what you do to countries you get upset with.

For 22 minutes, I’m Anthony St. George, and I’m sorry.




I’ve always maintained that Mongolia lacks comedy. The loneliest man on the planet is probably a Mongolian Comedian. Of course I base that on absolutely nothing, just the assumption that the funniest Mongolian culture gets is the reference is at the beginning of the Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy.



The reality of it is that Mongolia suffers from complete cultural dominance by a neighboring superpower. An affliction Canadians should know very well.



I’ve spent a lot of time recently studying television. Paying attention to how shows are put together and written. Of course my motivation behind all of this is that some day, I’d like to create, write and maintain a sitcom.



I even have the pilot written and season one storylines drafted out, in all reality I need to write a one page summary of the pilot episode, do the final copywriting and mail it off. I’ve done all the research and I know what I need to do in order to get the pilot at least looked at. There’s a huge wall of fear and lack of confidence standing in my way. Typically that’d sound unreasonable since there’s one possible negative outcome, “No” amongst a plethora of possible positive ones. It’s pretty easy to vault past that, if there were options. But that’s something that’s sorely lacking in Canada. Options. Options for the unknown inspiring writer who believes he can tell an entertaining story worthy enough of filming. After doing extensive research, there are two production companies in Canada that will accept unsolicited show ideas. One in Ontario. The other? Montreal. The one in Quebec is in French, guess which language I don’t speak.



Every other production company in Canada that I researched requires an agent; an agent usually requires experience, Writer’s Guild Membership or a referral; The Writer’s Guild requires experience or the signing of a contract by an approved production company. I could chase my tail for hours on that paradox.



That’s why I might be a little nervous. It feels like you get one at bat, a strike and you’re out of the game.



Why not try the States? That’s what I’ve been trying to avoid. Remember that Mongolian comedian? A man so lonely and lacking colleagues. Canada is a lot like that. The idea that the USA is the entertainment and cultural promise land is sickening. You have to sell a good portion of your soul to make it down there and any Canadian culture you might have brought with you is lost or absorbed into the American mass media machine. Michael Cera is Canadian, Ellen Page is Canadian, Anna Paquin is Canadian. I could go on and on, but I’m sticking to famous people who are around my own age. The point being that they’re big in the USA and by proxy, are big in Canada. Not the other way around. You just happen to be a Canuck.



If I ever got anything produced I’d want to stay Canadian. Why? Because there’s very little new material representing us out there right now. With Corner Gas officially over – side note: I have nothing but the highest amount of respect for Brent Butt. He decided to end the show on his terms and while it was still good. Tip of the hat sir, tip of the hat. I cannot wait to see what you’ll do with Hiccups! – Ahem, with Corner Gas officially over, the Canadian sitcom landscape is probably the thinnest it’s been as far back as I can remember. We have; two political shows, RMR and This Hour Has 22 minutes, and Little Mosque that headline mainstream Canadian comedy. Two of those are funny.



And it’s not like we haven’t been trying to create good programming. Sophie and Being Erica… Good? Ha! I can’t even type that with a straight face. That’s vanilla comedy at its finest. In all fairness Being Erica does have an interesting concept behind it. Neither show was made for me so it’s easy to be critical. The point is that we’re trying!



The trend right now is leaning towards more American programming. Which it always has, because American programming is usually higher quality, they have the money to produce shows like Heros and Lost. America wouldn’t realize it, but with the right legislative pushes in Canada, they could be one step closer to a cultural manifest destiny. Trailer Park Boys is gone and it’s not like companies in the USA aren’t above stealing successful show concepts. I can see it now, a show about a small village in the middle of Nebraska, 40 miles from anywhere or a show about a group of derelicts in a Vermont trailer park. How dare they produce high quality programming like that! How dare they! But at least they get well funded television. It’s a functioning industry down there and because it is functioning, we’re envious.



What would I do? If I were in charge of a production company right now, instead of focusing on my own interests, I’d put out a casting call. Any aspiring writers, put forward a pilot and series outline. Character bios as well. I would read each submission and select the funniest and the best. I would interview the writers and get to work on developing the pilot for them. I would call it “The Creative Cure for the Depression Blues” catchy, I like that.



The conditions; no agents (no I wouldn’t attempt to screw over the poor creators and writers, I would offer contracts that follow to the Screenwriters Guild of Canada’s guidelines) and you have to be Canadian.



I’m sure there would have to be a few business decisions here and there, but the ultimate goal would be to produce and push Canadian content that does more than vaguely appeal to the vanilla comedy crowd. Bring something gritty to the table, or at very least memorable. Make Canadian broadcasting more than the exclusive ‘old boys’ club it’s turned into. Ontario is even in the perfect position with loads of tax breaks being recently announced for Television Producers and a couple of holes opening up on the big networks. Telefilm Canada even has sponsorship programs.



Alas, I’m not a director… what to do. What to do.



I could run away to the Gobi desert, become a monk and live out my days circling the base of Belukha mountain chanting hymns and begging for rice.



~J

2009 NHL Conference Semi Finals – Predictions.

The first round is over. A few lessons have been learned and half the teams who fought to secure playoff positions have now been sent home to think about what they’ve done. Or didn’t do.



Lets recap how I fared in the first round:



Predicted Boston over Montreal. It sucks to have watched this happen as fast as it did. The Canadiens didn’t stand a lick of a chance, Boston came to play for keeps and that was obvious from the opening faceoff. And all during the Habs’ centennial season too. For shame. Sava Mal. But look at it this way, while the franchise is 100 years old, they haven’t played 100 seasons. The NHL didn’t play in 1919 (influenza pandemic) and in 2005 (greed pandemic), so the Canadiens have only iced 98 rosters. So Gainey has until 2011 to win the cup. Barring a Swine Flu pandemic cancelling the next season.

Predicted Washington over New York. I’ve frequently griped about this and I’ll do it once more. I wish I could have watched this series. ‘Cause it looked like the type of hockey I love to watch. I also wish I understood more about the broadcasting side of the NHL Playoffs, because it’s starting to look like one of two things is happening to Hockey Night in Canada. 1: The loss of Canada’s second national anthem has rattled them to the very core, so much in fact that they’ll assemble one of the best broadcast teams and elect a show a schedule that appeals only to Crosby and Canuck fans. Or. 2: Gary Bettman is controlling the programming and attempting to lull the rest of the hockey loving population into adoring his darling little franchise, The Penguins.

Predicted The Devils over The Hurricanes. I came close, dangerously close to predicting this one correctly. Damn you Staal, damn you! Oh I could never stay mad at the Hurricanes. Marty, you’ll have to look at next season to set any more playoff records, probably good to space ’em out anyways. On the bright side, at least one Jokinen is going to the second round.

Predicted Philadelphia over Pittsburgh. I overestimated The Flyers, but I should give credit where credit is due, the Penguins played well.



Predicted San Jose over Anaheim. What the hell happened San Jose?! A team that is consistently that good, should never be ousted in the first round like that. If I were the GM in charge, I wouldn’t know what to do. The pieces of a Stanley Cup winning franchise are there, but they consistently no show in the playoffs. I’d probably attempt at a quick shakeup, trade some of the top line players for proven top line players.

Predicted Detroit over Columbus. Mason, take your Calder trophy, this post-season experience and apply it to next season. Barring a sophomore slump, Columbus should be making their second post season appearance next year. If they finish better, they’ll even probably make it out of the first round alive.

Predicted The Canucks over St. Louis. St. Louis is an up and coming team. Hopefully they’ll start another 25 year playoff streak. Note: No cups in those 25 years.

Predicted Calgary over Chicago. Again, what the hell happened!? Jokinen has a year left on his contract and if this happens again, I doubt he’ll be Flame for more than two years.



.500, not bad. Not great. But not horrible. If I were gambling, I’d be sitting about even. Unacceptable! Lets hope I do better in round two:



The West:



2. The Detroit Red Wings vs. 8. Anaheim Ducks

Hiller, you’d better watch yourself in this series. You’re good, you’re the unexpected hero of the first round, but remember, the Sharks didn’t crash the net nearly often enough and were contained by your defense. Detroit comes to the playoffs to win, not float around waiting for someone else to do it. They will force themselves to the net and it’s going to take more than Pronger, Whitney, Beauchemin and Niedermayer to stop them. That Franzen line is going to get into your head, run around a little and make you cry in the corner, shaking and muttering, “I don’t understand it, how did this happen?”



I predict that the Wings are going to battle hard and take this in 6.



3. Vancouver Canucks vs. 4. Chicago Blackhawks

Dear Mats,



Thank-You for reading my letter. It’s good to know that Gastown won’t be going up in flames any time soon. You played really well in two games of the St. Louis series. I hope your groin is feeling well enough to suit up tonight. The Canucks could really use your 8.60 million dollars worth of experience against a young Blackhawks squad and I’d love to hear an announcer struggle with the wonderful line, “Sedin, Sundin and Sedin are on the ice for the Canucks!” It would be really expensive to have you hanging around the press box, walking stiffly. That being said, could you please send a message to Roberto for me? No? Fine then.



Jack



PS: Vancouver in Five. Chicago is a good squad and all, but the Canucks have the better squad this season.



The East:



1. Boston Bruins vs. 6. Carolina Hurricanes.

Bruins in five. Won’t be watching this series on CBC, which is a shame, since The Bruins are a wonderful mainstay on HNIC. Not much to say here, it’ll be a goaltending duel.



2. Washington Capitals vs. 4. Pittsburgh Penguins

CBC might actually show this one. I’ll go check. Yep, I do get to watch this series. It should be a humdinger. Crosby vs. Ovetchkin, Semin against Malkin, Gonchar and Green. Those will be some memorable matchups, but this series rests on the shoulders of Varlamov he’s in for a true test this time. I bet this one goes to seven and the Penguins march to the Semi’s. That’s the gambler in me talking. Just to clarify my position, the opinionated hockey fan in me wants to see the Capitals sweep this in four.



Interesting that each of my accurate predictions from the first round is going up against one of my horribly wrong predictions. My second round predictions – with the exception of the gamblers bet on the Penguins/Capitals series – stick with the same teams I picked and won on in the first round.



~J