Our Lady of Perpetual Hell

I hardly know what to say about the Leafs’ last-minute surge this season. I’m one of those fans who’d written their post-season chances off loooooooong before the humiliating pair of games in Montreal last month. And I still don’t think they’ll make the post-season. Hell, after the way they’ve played this season, I don’t think they deserve to make the post-season.

Last summer, after watching rookie GM John Ferguson Jr’s moves, I concluded that, for Leafs fans, this would be a short season that just felt like a long one.

And, as it turns out, for me, it has, indeed, seemed like a long season… one that I will be glad to see end.

Frankly, I think the NHL lockout did a real number on me. I can remember, in pre-lockout years, the excitement of game days, racing home after work (see, when you live in the Mountain time zone, like I did for 6 seasons, most Leafs games start at 5 or 5:30pm)–swearing loudly at anyone who had the temerity to drive the speed limit in front of me on the 10 miles of freeway between the office and my apartment. If I wasn’t home to see the puck drop, I was livid. On game days, my concentration was focussed (not on my work, but) on the game ahead. Plans were laid around the Leafs’ schedule.

Then came the (non-) season I’d been dreading–the season of the lockout. I had had plenty of time to imagine the misery I would experience with no Leafs games to watch… But you know what? I discovered very quickly that with my newly-minted Netflix membership I didn’t miss the NHL all that much. I was just pissed off enough with both sides–players and owners–that I didn’t give a damn who “won” the fight. All I knew was that it was the fans who were getting screwed over. And I don’t take kindly to that kinda treatment…

So I watched movies. Lotsa movies. All kinds. Quite happily. And, eventually, I didn’t even notice that “Hockey Night in Canada” wasn’t on at 5pm every Saturday.

Then the lockout ended.

And during the summer I watched my team’s GM make a series of questionable (to me) moves. When he was finished, it was my conclusion that he’d simply written off the coming season. He’d re-signed some mooks who could’ve (should’ve, IMO) been cut loose, he overpaid some, he undervalued (and tried to undercut) others and watched them sign elsewhere, he watched the big names traded between other teams while he frittered the Leafs’ cap space away on the aforementioned mooks. Ultimately, he signed some UFAs, but they were all “leftovers”–like meatloaf from a few nights ago–on the downslopes of their careers. I don’t think I could’ve furrowed my brow deeper as I watched his moves, both perplexed and pissed.

I didn’t look forward to the start of the season like I normally would. The sense of excitement was missing.

And, as expected, once the season started the on-ice product wasn’t exactly awe-inspiring… Surely the frightening eye injury to our captain in the first period of the first game of the season shoulda been a bad sign we could all read. (Well, all of us ‘cept Sundin, I guess. His eye was filled with blood.)

With the nasty taste of the lockout still in my mouth and a team that just didn’t grab my imagination like past teams had, I found that, meh, I didn’t care if I missed the puck drop… The excitement of game day just wasn’t there. And I didn’t read the Toronto online newspapers’ sports sections as religiously as I once had, either. But when I did, I found that I even agreed with Damien Cox from time to time (*gasp*). (Fellow Leafs fans will know what I mean when I suggest that that was an unusual state of affairs…)

So. What am I to make of what the team has been doing lately? They are finally playing with some heart, some guts, and they’re getting good results. Most of the players that Fergie signed last summer are on the shelf, injured, and the team is filled with youngsters, rookies, and some Marlies who are playing their asses off to earn roster spots with the big boys next year. I think it’s fun to watch but it’s way too little, far too late.

For me, next year can’t come soon enough.

Got a call from my parents last night. Mom said “We’re in Dayton.” I’m thinking, “Wha’?? How could you get from Lakeland to Dayton in one day?” See, last I heard, they were leaving their winter nest Saturday morning (ie. yesterday morning) and expected to get home sometime on Monday (ie. tomorrow). The thought of how fast they’d've had to have driven to get all the way to Dayton, OH in one day boggled my mind (and, let’s admit it, impressed me, heh-heh-heh–go, Dad!). But it seems they decided to leave Florida a day early to get home a day early. And I found this out the evening before the afternoon when they’d be here.

Is this some kinda dirty trick? Coming home a day early?? Isn’t this the sorta stunt you pull on a teenager who’s been left alone in charge of the house for the first time?!

This was alarming news, indeed, for somebody like me, who tends to leave personal stuff ’til the last minute to do… (Fortunately I’m not like this at my job, where my anal tendencies kick in. It’s easier to prioritize at work, I find.) I mean, back in school, essays were left ’til the last minute–and then I pulled all-nighters, sucking back turbocharged coffee (or, equally likely, rum & cola, which also fueled a good number of essays) to get them done by morning. And I always did get them done by morning. The essays went in on time (and they even got good marks, so nyah to you keeners who wrote yours days or weeks in advance–yes, I’m talking to you, Roseanne).

Anyhow, while I’d gotten a lot of stuff ready for my parents’ return from their winter vacation, I still had things to do. So then comes the whole “prioritizing” thang that I have never really mastered in my personal life… And so the car got gassed up and washed, but the bar fridge remained an unplugged and sticky mess. Some neighbours had been keeping an eye on the house until I got home and apparently something exploded in the bar fridge a few weeks ago–there were pop and beer cans that had been shredded into shrapnel–and the neighbours just left the unperishable contents of the fridge in a washtub. The fridge had been unplugged and wiped down, but it needed to be thoroughly cleaned. I washed the car instead.

I mean well, but I think I might’ve been dropped on my head as a baby.

There have been times in my life when I’ve tried to use the “What would [insert name here] do?” trick to help me prioritize things. But it is useless to me because I hafta already know how to prioritize to do that. Besides, the people I tend to look up to (the “[insert name here]” people) are not necessarily folks who have displayed excellent judgement throughout their lives. I suppose that’s a topic for another day, though…

Hey, I think I just prioritized. Right? Today’s subject would be the inability to prioritize and some future day’s subject would be my odd choices for heros. There. I feel like I have accomplished something, now.

I suppose I could’ve used this time to clean out the bar fridge, instead, though…

And, okay, I know you’re all dying to know the Week Two music that soured milk in Southwestern Ontario:

Sloan, “Smeared”

Warren Zevon, “Excitable Boy”

X, “See How We Are”

The White Stripes, “Elephant”

New Order, “Power, Corruption & Lies”

Bobby Darin, “The Capitol Years” box set

The Knitters, “The Modern Sounds Of…”

Mission of Burma, “Vs”

Husker Du, “Zen Arcade”

Flesh Eaters, “Miss Muerte”

Lastly, my own mix of iTunes downloads and scrapings from the shared music folder at my former place of employment… I call it “Big Hits From Planet Cool”:
Common People, William Shatner & Joe Jackson
Psychotic Reaction, Count Five
No Myth - Michael Penn
Dony - Big Star
Don’t Fear the Reaper - Blue Oyster Cult
Heat of the Moment - Asia
Ballroom Blitz - Sweet
5 songs by Dwight Yoakam
Brick House - Earth, Wind & Fire
I Am A Man Of Constant Sorrow - Soggy Bottom Boys
We Got the Beat - Go Go’s
(Get Your Kicks) On Route 66 - Nat King Cole
Anarchy in the UK - Sex Pistols
Low Rider - War
2 songs by The Violent Femmes

I don’t know what made me think of this tonight, but… Can I persuade you to watch the film INCIDENT AT LOCH NESS without knowing anything in advance about it? Are you willing to do that? That’s how I watched it and, based solely on my own experience with it, I think that’s the best way to approach it.

I stumbled across it in the video store prolly over a year ago, now–saw the words “Werner Herzog” and “Loch Ness”, yelped with glee, and grabbed it. Didn’t even look at the box again. Just marched up to the counter, paid, and went home with it.

I’d never even heard of it before, and it turned out to be one of my favourite finds of the past few years.

If you’re gonna watch it, don’t Google it. Don’t IMDb it. Don’t even read the box at the video store. Just take it home and watch it. Then I’d love to hear what you thought of it. You don’t hafta know much about Werner Herzog before you watch it. Really, all you need to know about his work and his reputation as a filmmaker is addressed within the film.

And d’ya want a Dream Double-Bill? Add Burden of Dreams–Les Blank’s fascinating documentary about the making of Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo. (Friends in Sarnia or Chatham are welcome to borrow any or all of these films from me. It would be my pleasure to share them!) Bonus on the BURDEN disk: Blank’s short film, Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe, in which, umm, Werner Herzog eats his shoe.

Well, technically, his boot. A desert boot. Yum.

This is a charming and surprisingly moving story about redemption.  Arthur “Killer” Kane was bassist for the seminal ’70s glam protopunk band The New York Dolls.  When the band imploded early in its career due to clashing egos and drug and alcohol abuse, Kane tried comebacks with a few minor bands, but never really got anywhere.  While watching a movie on tv one night, he spotted his more successful bandmate David Johansen with a role in the movie Scrooged, and that sent him over the edge (where, granted, he’d been teetering alcoholically for awhile), and he attempted suicide by jumping out his 3rd story kitchen window.

Well, he only managed to injure himself.  But it shook him up enough that he grasped the straw held out to him by a tv commercial for The Book of Mormon.

The documentary brings us up-to-date with Arthur Kane, happily working in the LDS geneological library in Los Angeles in 2004.  In answer to a very specific prayer, he hears through the grapevine that the remaining members of his former band (Kane and vocalist Johansen, along with guitarist Sylvain Sylvain) have been invited to play at the 2004 Meltdown Festival in London, curated by Morrissey.

Director Greg Whiteley gets interviews with some pretty big names in rock–like Morrissey, Bob Geldof, Chrissy Hynde, Iggy  Pop, Mick Jones, and a coupla guys from Blondie–and all of them cite the incredible influence that the Dolls had on rock music and on their own careers specifically.

It’s a very sweet-natured film, and seemed to please the entire audience that watched it with me.  I was amused to see so many straight-looking older people there at the Broadway Theatre in downtown Salt Lake (the film was brought to town by the SL Film Society), and I think they were there for the “Mormon angle” rather than the “Dolls angle”.  I wonder how they liked the music…  Personally, I was delighted by this film.  And don’t assume you have to be a fan of the Dolls to enjoy this one.  You don’t.

It’s out on dvd now, and I can’t recommend it highly enough.  But be sure to sit through the entire end credits or else you’ll miss something great.

As a longtime fan of irony, I can’t help but be amused by the fact that now that I am back in The Land of the Leafs, since my parents don’t subscribe to LeafsTV and I am currently a squatter in their rec room, I can’t see as many Leafs games as I could when I was in Salt Lake.  Down there, of course, I had to pay for the "privilege" (and those of you who’ve watched their games this year will understand the quotation marks) of watching My Team play.  Hadda subscribe to NHL Centre Ice via DirecTV to see them.  But I did so without complaint, I must confess.  I didn’t even think of it as a luxury.  It was a necessity.  In fact, it was my babysitter…  I’d get home from work during the season, and the first thing I’d do would be to turn on the tv (hadn’t even taken my coat off yet), check out the night’s schedule and (if the Leafs weren’t playing) tune it to the game that looked like it would be the best matchup.  Whether or not I watched the whole game was irrelevant.  I could hear it wherever I was in the apartment, and the sounds of hockey kept me company.  It was a cozy feeling.

The availability of Centre Ice down there was actually a factor I considered when I was deciding about whether or not I really was willing to move to Utah for the job I’d been offered…  (I think I mentioned in an earlier post that my priorities are not necessarily the sorts of priorities that one might associate with an "adult".  *cough*)  And, honestly, I do think that being able to watch My Team play saved me a lot of homesickness.  See, I really felt like I was home when I heard the "Hockey Night in Canada" theme start at 5pm on Saturday nights out there.  When the Tim Horton’s and Canadian Tire commercials came on, it cheered me.  The sound of Bob Cole’s voice was proverbial music to my ears.  I’d've definitely been a (more?) miserable wretch without Centre Ice there.

So, will I subscribe to LeafsTV now that I’m back in its broadcast area?  Do I really wanna see those dozen or so games against unpopular teams that they carry?  Hrm.  This season, it wouldn’t've been hard to live without seeing those games.  Especially when Chris was live-texting a bunch of ‘em at The Star. 

But I suspect that LeafsTV will eat away more and more at the games that the CBC, TSN, and Sportsnet would normally carry.  Eventually, Leafs fans may find themselves in the position of having to pay to see each of the team’s games.  Old farts like me will whinge to the younger fans, "I remember when we used to be able to watch the Buds for free."  And they will roll their eyes.  And I will pay for the games.

Week One at the new job has wrapped up, and I can tell already that it was worth the cold, anxious night in Cheyenne.  It was worth the drear expanse of western Kansas.  It was even worth the short, curly, anonymous hair in Columbia.  The folks I’m working with are uber-friendly, helpful, and welcoming and they seem to really enjoy working there.  That’s a good sign.  Humour abounds in the office.  That’s an even better sign.  And we aren’t restricted to so-called "Casual Fridays" when it comes to wearing jeans.  Icing.

I’m even getting a handle on what, exactly, my new job is.  Previously, it had remained a bit murky in my mind.  (I just figgered that whatever it was, I could and would do it and I’d make sure I’d do it well because it meant getting my sorry ass back to Canada.)  But you don’t need to know what it is or where it is.  Let’s just say it has something to do with secret spy stuff, admit that that’s actually a lie, and move on.

The drive to and from work has been great.  I do love to drive and my parents’ Accord Coupe V6 has some real giddyap.  As someone I work with said to me last week, ‘Wasn’t that you in that black car that blew by me on the way out of town last night?’  (Hopefully, my parents aren’t going to be reading this…  *cough*) 

My only commute-related complaint (so far) is about the folks who insist on sticking to the posted speed limits and tend to form parades that are too long to pass on those two-lane country roads.  I feel like I need to decorate the car with Kleenex flowers (although Dad would not stand for Scotch tape on the car) or stand up through the sunroof and wave (at the cattle).  What are we celebrating, ppl?!?  Get a move on.

Impatient?  Me??

The car’s gotta nice sound system in it, to boot (my poor old ‘92 Accord, which I graciously gifted to my SLC cousins before I skipped town, giggling, only hadda tape deck–how retro!).  And the weather has been nice enough to drive with the windows down and my elbow out the window.  So I have been serenading the cattle and chickens along my route.  If the milk starts to taste funny in Southwestern Ontario, blame me.  I’ve probably scared the cattle; can’t sing my way out of a paper bag but, alas (as the livestock can attest), that doesn’t stop me from belting it out along with the stereo.

Week One Music That Soured Milk In Southwestern Ontario: