That cold has now struck down ¾ of the family, so we stayed inside this afternoon and evening, and watched Hockey Night in Canada [home, Wikipedia] which is pretty central to who we are here.
It works like this: they show two games. In the first intermission, they have Coach’s Corner, featuring Grapes and Ron in a buffoonish, over-the-top set piece that they’ve been polishing these last twenty years and it’s probably past its best-by date, but still worth a laugh sometimes.
This evening, when the 2nd intermission came around I was cooking dinner and thus listening to “Satellite Hotstove” in the background and just enjoying the sound of half-a-dozen middle-aged Canadian male accents in a light-hearted but erudite discussion of the game’s internals; if you don’t know who Lou Lamoriello or Guy Carbonneau are, they’re not going to stop to explain, but you’ll learn a whole lot about hockey, listening.
To make the evening really Canadian, an unusual (for here) winter snowfall set in, Mother Nature apparently trying to make November 2006 the crappiest weather month on record for Vancouver. As I type this, nearing midnight, the snow is ankle-high and starting to stick alarmingly; I bet there’ll be power failures by morning.
One of the snow casualties was our satellite dish, so we didn’t get to watch the second game; oh well, time to hit the sack and try to get better.
Comment feed for ongoing:
From: Darren (Nov 26 2006, at 15:16)
Trust me, you didn't miss much in the Canucks-Avalanche game. It was a bleak example of Vancouver's unilateral inability to score.
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From: Andrew Phoenix (Nov 27 2006, at 09:20)
The unfortunate weather in BC is interesting - here in Guelph, I'm still wearing sandals and have eschewed my coat for a (light) sweater.
Usually at this time of year, it's the other way around. The last time I was in BC in the winter (a February a couple of years ago) it was almost warm enough to go swimming.
If this post has the barest twinge of "ha ha" I apologize.
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From: Matt Chaput (Nov 27 2006, at 09:37)
Weird note: when I was a kid Ron was the sports anchor for the tiny local TV station (CKRD in Red Deer, Alberta) and I swear by all that is holy, everyone who watched him thought he had some kind of serious mental defect. I don't think he ever got through a single evening of the news without making some weird gaffe or stupid mistake.
Then, suddenly, he was on Hockey Night in Canada! And he was competent! I've always wondered how that happened? Did his new bosses never see tape of his local broadcasts? Was he being sabotaged by an evil teleprompter operator all that time?
Later, TSN poached the two sports guys from the main local stations in Calgary and Edmonton to become their regular national anchors. I guess Albertans know sports...
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