Our Lady of Perpetual Hell

I stumbled across Frightened Rabbit when I was just poking around some music blogs tonight in between periods of the Leafs game. I am a helpless sucker when it comes to men with Scottish accents, so my interest was immediately piqued. This is a Glaswegian band of three (2 of them brothers) and they have one album out already and another one coming soon. Here are a coupla tracks from the new one, The Midnight Organ Fight, due for release on April 15th: The Modern Leper and Head Rolls Off.

(Not to be confused with Frank, the frightening rabbit from Donnie Darko…

…who’s all kinds of weird and fucked up.)

Go here to lissen to my sweet honey John Doe opening for Wilco right now! (Update: It has now been archived, but you can use that same link to get there.)

Last week, on a local radio station, my mother heard a story about the relocation of Albert’s Rolling Lunch, and one of the things mentioned was that it wasn’t going to be called Albert’s anymore… It was gonna be called Suzy’s Icecreamporium and Caf.

Whut? I thought, That’s fucking insane! Albert’s branding is 50 years old. It’s the name people looked for when they drove under the bridge and were faced with more than one chip truck. I drove by the new location on the weekend, and there was a huge sign in the window that proclaimed “new home of Albert’s Rolling Lunch”. So I figgered mebbe the earlier radio report had been wrong.

Now, according to Cathy Dobson’s article in today’s Sarnia Observer, the new location of Albert’s Rolling Lunch is, indeed, going to be re-branded like Mom heard on the radio.

But, again, according to Dobson’s article, they’re going to have a sign that identifies it as the place to come for Albert’s chips and part of the $100,000 of renovations the owners are making to the new location includes knocking a hole in the wall so that folks can still line up for fries like they useta at the truck. Now, that’s a fun idea! And it’s important, ‘cause–let’s face it–the camaradarie of customers milling about the truck and chatting with each other, waiting for their chips, was part of the appeal of going to Albert’s. The fryers from the truck have been installed in the kitchen. That’s even more important. See, if the chips don’t taste the same as they always have, there’s no point to all this. ‘Cause that’s what we went to Albert’s for, all these years. Let’s hope they keep the vinegar sprayer at the hole in the wall. ‘Cause that’s important, too.

I was thinking that if they weren’t going to use the truck anymore, perhaps it could be used as decoration on the new location. If they’ve gutted it for the new kitchen, I think it could look purty funky if they hoisted the shell up onto the roof or incorporated it somehow around the building. And I’m also picturing a mural featuring the truck–painted on the riverside wall of the building. In fact, it would be cool if they painted it around the hole they’re gonna knock in the wall, y’know?

But sorry, Suzy. I will still be calling it Albert’s Rolling Lunch. And I fer sure need one of those Albert’s t-shirts the truck employees wear. Cha, the baby blue one!

Okay, that’s settled, so let’s just move on and see what we can do about all those other no-trade/no-movement clauses that Junior granted in contract negotiations as GM.

He’s gotta be asking himself.

I haven’t weighed in on the question of whether or not Mats should accept a trade to another team. And much as I hate to say it (because her sports writing normally makes me wanna jump offa the ledge), I think that Rosie hits the nail closest to my thumb with her piece in today’s paper.

Sundin was asked whether he feels the need to justify himself, in the arena of public opinion. “I don’t think I have to. I don’t think it’s my problem, do you?”

These difficulties have been created by others – most particularly Ferguson’s mismanagement, the regrettable and handcuffing contract boodles that have saddled the club with five no-movement players and wages for others so out of whack that few trade partners would take them on.

For his part, Sundin accepted a one-year extension last summer, at far less money than he could have demanded, to give the Leafs salary-cap space.

He’s done enough, not to mention unspooling one of his most splendid on-ice seasons in years.

Sundin doesn’t deserve to carry the cross, or be nailed to it.

Indeed, he does not.

And throughout his career as a Leaf, he has carried himself with an extraordinary amount of class and dignity, especially when you consider that he’s been stuck with the role of the on-ice face of such a fucked-up organization.

I respect his feelings about the rental-player trend that has cropped up in the years since Ray Bourque left those perennial losers in Boston for a chance to win a Cup with a strong Avalanche team. I don’t like it either. I can certainly understand why he would prefer to play a whole season with a team and earn the right to fight for the Cup rather than just slide in at the tail end of the year and reap unearned rewards. (Well, that’s how I look at rental players, anyway.)

He hates the whole late-acquisition-for-hire concept, even as Fletcher seems incapable of understanding why any player would decline the opportunity to compete for a Cup, with time running out.

“I never believed in rent-a-player to start with. If you want to be a part of a team that has a chance to win a Stanley Cup, or a team that is going far in the playoffs, my opinion has always been that you want to be there from training camp, the whole season, part of the group.”

In the world of professional sports, Sundin is a heretic, that way. And now his selflessness is being portrayed as selfishness, even that old un-Canadian-boy chestnut resurrected – a Swede who just doesn’t feel the passion of the Cup chase, in his bones.

Mike’s conclusion is a good one, too, but I would make an addition (in bold)…

Whatever he opts to do, Toronto hockey fans and the Toronto media should be thanking Mats Sundin for all the wonderful memories he has provided instead of ripping him for his eventual decision. He is, at least, owed that much.

Looks like MLSE braintrust (sic) may be looking to Mats to boost them outta the hole they’ve dug for themselves. He shouldn’t hafta do that.

My favourite line: ‘CGI technology is still decades away from making an Academy Award win for “Rush Hour 3″ director Brett Ratner look plausible’.