Who Should Be My Favourite Canuck?
So way, way back in the old timey days of the NHL pre-season, a young Jake Virtanen caught my eye, mostly because he was wearing jersey #27, which is *my* jersey number1 and then I Googled him and not only is he a hottie, but he was born in New Westminster! So clearly, I thought, he should be my favourite Canuck this year, given that my last year’s favourite Canuck, the then-#27 Shawn Matthias, signed as an unrestricted free agent with the Leafs in the off season, as the Canucks did not re-sign him. But then the regular season started and Jake switched jerseys numbers to 18 and I got busy with teaching and promptly forgot about my need to choose a new favourite Canuck for this year.
So now I’m trying to decide: should Jake, the New Westie, be my favourite Canuck this year, or Ben, #27? Or should I declare it a tie and say they are both my favourite Canucks this year?
“Jake Virtanen” by 5of7 – Jake Virtanen – 2014 Top Prospect. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Commons.
“Ben Hutton 10-2015a” by Bure’s Triple Deke – Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 via Commons.
David Booth, I thought? Who the hell is David Booth? Turns out that I’ve been a negligent Canucks fan and had missed the news that we’d traded away Samuelsson and Strum for Booth and Reinprecht from the Florida Panthers.
My friends know me too well!
The rest of the people in this deal are uggoes, so by my calculations we unloaded two not-hotties and picked up one hottie and one not-hottie. Thus, I approve of this trade!
My post for today consists of one thing: What he said.
Also, Maxim Lapierre, I will have your babies!
So, we all know that Boston Pizza has changed its name to Vancouver Pizza, the Boston Cream donut is now known as the Vancouver Cream donut and even the town of Boston Bar is going by the moniker Vancouver Bar.
Are You A Canucks Fan? Do You Have A Heart Rate Monitor?
Are you going to be watching games 3 and 4 of the Stanley Cup Final? Do you own a heart rate monitor and would you be willing to wear it during those games? If you answered “yes” to these questions, leave a message in the comments. Or email me. Or Facebook, tweet, DM, IM, text, call, or send me a message via telepathy5.
Also, if you know anyone else who might want to partake in this groundbreaking piece of research, let me know!
Things are crazy awesome in this city right now. Cars are covered in Vancouver Canucks flags. Every second person you pass on the street is wearing a Canucks jersey. On game days, the energy across the city is palpable! It’s like the Olympics all over again!
After every win, the number of playoff games we’ve won – and the number of wins left until we hoist the Cup – are s updated on the whiteboard 1. Also, that photo doesn’t really do it justice. The Canucks posters go across the entire wall of the lunchroom.
And the town of “Boston Bar” is now being called “Vancouver Bar”.
I watched Game 1 on Wednesday with some friends at Coppertank on Broadway. And made some new friends, as the place we so crowded we had people from the group at the next table squished in at our table. And when I went to the bathroom at second period intermission, I came back to find some random in my chair! There were more people in there then you would believe could fit, all of whom sang the national anthem at top volume along with Mark Donnelly and there wasn’t a moment in the three hours that followed that wasn’t filled with cheers, screams, gasps, hugs and many, many high fives! When the goal was finally scored in with 19 second left in the game, the place erupted, with every person jumping to their feet screaming (including my non-hockey watching friends who had come to hang out3! I jumped up so enthusiastically that my chair actually went flying backward, much to the delight of my new friend Annamay4!
Image Credits: “Vancouver Cream” sign and donut both posted by Stephen Dyrgas on Flickr.
Updated on May 30, 2011: Because there is now a YouTube video to embed. And I have new things to say.
So the other day, Lisa Johnson1 from the CBC tweeted, “Hockey fans who watch in pubs: is your Canucks support playing havoc with a healthy lifestyle?” Naturally, being a fan of both hockey and the CBC2, I replied, “Yes! I don’t think I’ve ever drank so much beer and ate so many French fries in my life!” and “Also, I’m running a half marathon in June and my training is certainly suffering as there’s no time to fit in a run on game nights!” Because, seriously, these playoffs have turned me into a total beer consuming machine! Beer didn’t used to be my drink of choice, but something about these last few rounds has had me consuming beer like there is no tomorrow! Anyway, this Twitter exchange led to a few emails and an invitation to join Lisa and a few other for lunch at the Lennox!
Note: To see the video, follow the link above and click on the play button on the image. Some people have mistaken it for just a photo rather than a video.
I think my favourite part of the whole story was Dennis’ description of what he eats during a typical playoff game.
As soon as the story ended, my phone exploded with calls, texts, emails, tweets and Facebook messages. Attention whoredom: achieved!
And finally, I don’t have anything of import to say about this final screen shot, but I thought I looked good here!
Also, that beer was delicious.
Update on May 30, 2011: In addition to my phone exploding with calls/texts/emails on Friday night, apparently a lot of my coworkers watched the CBC News 3 because all day today long I was met with comments like “Hey! I saw you on the news!” and “Hello TV star!” and “Why didn’t they say *you* are a nutritionist??!!” And when I went to get my afternoon coffee at the little coffeeshop across the road from my office, the coffeeshop owner said, “You were on the news! I had it on the TV [points at the big TV]4 and I said, “That’s my customer!!”” Steve Buscemi’s doppelgänger, however, said nothing.
And Now My Boys Are Off To THE STANLEY CUP FINALS!!
Why yes, I always dress like this at the office. Doesn’t everyone?
We beat the Nashville Predators in 6 games.
And last night we beat the San Jose Sharks in 5 games.
Clearly, we are going to take the Stanley Cup in 4 games.
It’s simple math, people. Simple. Math.
In addition to PowerGels, I’ve now added Sharkies – fruit chew thingys that are shaped like sharks – to my half marathon training regimen. Like PowerGels, Sharkies are meant to replace electrolytes and provide carbs for when you do crazy thinks like run for hours or play hockey for days. Unlike PowerGels, Sharkies are delicious, organic, and you get to hum the Jaws music when you eat them1.
Me, devouring a Sharkie, just like the Canucks devoured San Jose in last night’s game!