Sunday, June 29, 2014

Lazy Sunday # 331: The Best Show In The Universe

This week the President of the CBC shared his vision of the future of our national broadcaster. It was a vague vision. Something about being leaner by thousands of jobs and less real estate, not overly committed to documentary projects or news and accessing audiences via social media and mobile instead of the way they are accessed now.

There was an amorphous commitment to giving Canadians more of what they want and what they need without revealing how or why the network had failed to do such a primary function of any broadcast entity up to now.

And while I wish them luck (and hope they soon have some actual concrete ideas) I sensed a certain desperation badly masked by confused press releases approved by executives who’ve lost sight of who their audience and their mission is/was in the first place.

In this day and age, the first thing failing broadcasters seem to do is study the media outlets which are usurping them, like Facebook and Twitter, and decide that what they’re doing is what the troubled network should be doing as well.

So they opt for “Click-Bait”, following which of their shows or news items seems to be most often shared or commented upon as being the secret to winning back an audience.

You need look no further than CNN to see how badly that works, as serious journalism there has been replaced by constant updates on what’s trending on Facebook and Twitter and a desire to either emulate those views and opinions, or not to seriously criticize them.

However, as a result of this strategy, CNN’s ratings have plummeted further than the Malaysian airliner they were convinced obsessed their audience, and they’ve been repeatedly left behind on other stories sending advertisers elsewhere, further exacerbating the network’s ability to provide programming that might draw them back.

There seems to be a belief that it’s now the audience that determines what’s news or what’s important. Which would be all well and good, if the bulk of those posting on social media were there for news and information instead of sharing pictures and their personal pet peeves.

And despite the fact that nobody can follow everybody on Twitter or Facebook, or assess any issue even with the help of hashtag filters, CNN and others spend more and more time reporting what the man on the street thinks instead of getting to the bottom of what’s making him think that way.

If you’re not honestly informing an audience in the first place, doesn’t it follow that their ill-informed opinions will further confuse how you approach your mandate as a broadcaster?

But it seems much easier or fashionable to be like Buzzfeed, spending as much time on which “Game of Thrones” character you are as you do covering wars in the Middle East.

Hey, it gets the ratings up right? And then you can deliver all that important stuff a news or National broadcaster is supposed to deliver, can’t you?

Except you can’t because most of your time and energy are concentrated on coming up with more lists and social media contests to keep the audience you’ve finally snagged coming back.

It used to be said that in the land of the blind, the one eyed man was king. So maybe the secret is for CNN and CBC to eschew removing their remaining credibility by rejecting the direction of the mob and going back to whatever they once felt they did best.

Maybe the audience doesn’t really know what it wants. or needs somebody to point out that the vast majority of what gets shared on social media is transient garbage.

Maybe they need to emulate a guy like Maddox, host of “The Best Show In The Universe”. Millions of people link to him too.

Enjoy Your Sunday.

Sunday, June 22, 2014

Lazy Sunday # 330: A Rose By Any Other Name…

The following statement…

“Go Redskins!”

…now means one of two things:

1. Yay team!

Or

2. It’s time to leave.

I’m taking no side in this name debate. I’ve always been an Eagles fan. Except for the Michael Vick years…

But it’s still somewhat disconcerting that a team once lauded for having the first Black quarterback lead them to a Superbowl championship (Doug Williams 1988) is now considered an ugly symbol of American Racism.

This week several newspapers announced they would not use the team name in their sports pages due to its insensitive nature.

Among these was the Kansas City Star, whose own NFL team practises a form of cultural appropriation by being called the “Chiefs” and the Seattle Times where the home team has a logo appropriated from West Coast natives.

Also this week, the US Patent Office suspended the “Redskins” logo because it was (after seventy some years) discovered to be “disparaging to Native Americans”.

Have to say, there’s either a little hypocrisy or moral relativism at work there since the Patent office left alone brand names for “Uppity Negro”, “Cracker Azz Skateboards” and a whole bunch of companies apparently plying their trade while not disparaging another demographic.

Maybe it’s just that the “Redskins” are more widely known and thus the change to being a more sensitive society starts there.

But if that were the case, somebody better come up with a new name for the state of Oklahoma –- which is the Choctaw word delineating the home of the “Red People”.

I hope they’ll try to find one that rhymes with “Okay” so high school musicals don’t have to suffer.

Here in Canada, there are already people signing petitions to have the CFL Edmonton Eskimos change their name. Eskimo pies will likely be next. There’s no telling how much emotional havoc they’ve wrought.

And once the grammar Nazis wake up, the Toronto Maple Leafs will undoubtedly have to go looking for a new moniker. How could the Ontario Teachers Federation own them for all those years without making that correction?

It probably won’t even be that long until PETA demands that teams not be named after animals either.

Part of me wonders if this is really about cleaning up our act on the equality front or it’s just about appearing to do so.

And maybe that’s all okay. Maybe it’s time the “Redskins” go the way of the cigar store Indian, the lawn jockey and Noddy’s Golliwogs opening the way to the great leaps forward in racial harmony those previous exiles brought about.

Or maybe we’ve reached a point in our evolution where we don’t need to define ourselves by symbols or colors or even nations.

Hell, the CFL used to have two teams called the “Roughriders”, how much more confusing would it be if they had nine?

And God knows, Shakespeare was right. “A Rose by any other name would smell as sweet” and a Washington Redskin by any other name will still get his ass kicked nine Sundays out of sixteen.

So who cares what they call themselves. And maybe we could concentrate on changing things that directly affect any group’s ability to thrive and be happy.

The larger point is, this may well be about insensitivity or a perceived insult. But it’s not about Race.

In fact, there are some who believe the whole issue of race in sports was settled way back in 1959. There’s even film. If it offends you, take it up with HBO and…

Enjoy Your Sunday.

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Creating The New Textbook

I live between two schools, with High School kids going one direction in the morning and the kids attending Elementary and Middle school travelling the other.

One thing they all have in common are back-packs almost as big as they are. There’s even one poor girl who’s so tiny she travels with a luggage roller because she’d never make a block on her own without a Sherpa.

Most of what’s weighing down those backpacks are textbooks. And I’ve long wondered why, in this day and age, schools don’t just supply kids with an iPad with courses accessible by apps.

But teachers tell me that this would mean the death of an entire industry dependent on revising and publishing textbooks, an industry that sucks up a huge portion of our school taxes –- money that could go to pay more teachers (or pay them better) and build new or better schools.

Part of me has come to believe it’s also a conspiracy organized by Chiropractors to ensure future employment.

But while books were once the cheapest way of spreading knowledge, that’s just not the case anymore. And for some subjects, it never was.

Take screenwriting.

Walk into any bookstore and there’s a shelf of “How-to” books for screenwriters. A lot of them are spectacularly helpful. But they all suffer from one tragic affliction. They can’t combine the tenets of story-telling with the experience of the final product.

Yes, they can show the step-by-step process of character creation or structure, but they depend on a previous or later viewing of a finished film so the student writer can fully understand how the writing process works.

And the lack of that immediate experience and connection means most screenwriting texts come off as dry or overly technical, turning off many budding filmmakers, most often the ones inspired to follow that career because of the visual power of the medium.

It’s comparable with training chefs by having them read cookbooks while rarely stepping into a kitchen.

Enter Janine Lanouette.

A teacher of screenwriting for more than 20 years and founder of online teaching site screentakes.com, Ms. Lanouette has now launched a project to teach the craft in a way that finally combines the process of script creation with the immediate experience of the final product.

“Screentakes Media Rich eBooks on Screenplay Analysis” is a project currently seeking funding on Kickstarter. And for me it’s the future of how screenwriting will be taught. And maybe the future of textbooks in general.

Check it out here. A brilliant way of saving burgeoning screenwriters now and maybe all kids and our education system itself in the future.

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Lazy Sunday # 329: Happy Father’s Day

Since “Oedipus Rex” and maybe even earlier, dramatists have dealt or tried to deal with daddy issues. For some, fathers are mysterious and unknowable, villains for others, heroes, role models and inspiration for another group.

As a result, there are countless works of fiction featuring countless examples of what it means to be a dad. Meaning that whatever presence or status our real father had in our lives, we had a ton of father figures to measure him against.

Whatever they really were most of the poor bastards never had a chance.

In some ways, I think it’s just an ongoing writers conspiracy to create an audience open to the next generation of writers’ explorations of their own daddy issues.

Or maybe it’s an excuse, whenever Father’s Day rolls around, for somebody who’d like to think of himself as a writer to wonder aloud or in print -- which TV or movie father was “the best dad” and the most memorable role model of our formative years.

It’s a pointless exercise, of course, since the examples run the gamut from Sheriff Andy Taylor to Walter White. And depending on where you came of age in that lineage you’ve got a whole different take on what made a fictional father meaningful.

So put all that aside and either sit down with or fondly remember your old man while watching the following.

Happy Father’s Day and…

Enjoy Your Sunday.

Saturday, June 14, 2014

Evil Will Pascoe Triumphs Again!!!

In the end it seemed inevitable. Yet, for most of a magnificently played double overtime game, it was anybody’s to win.

Congratulations LA! New York, as your goalie aptly stated, from the beginning you knew it would end in tears. But you still played your hearts out. It’s all any of us could have asked.

The other inevitable from last night was (the far from evil in reality) Will Pascoe tying another Infamous Writers Hockey Pool scalp to his belt. What is that, three now?

I got dibs on taking this guy to Vegas next season – where, in an odd coincidence, some of us might have noticed what the smart money was thinking several months ago…

Second place goes to Jon Brooks, who came up just a couple of skaters short once we hit the finals.

Maurey Loeffler, another former Pool champ, takes third AND the “Props” contest. Maybe this guy oughta be on that Vegas trip too.

I'll be in touch with all the winners over the next couple of days and Will’s address will be passed on to all poolies, so the booty of their choosing can be delivered to him.

The Legion will take care of rewarding our 2nd and 3rd Place finishers and the Props winner.

And then the 2013- 2014 Season will be a wrap.

I hope you all had fun and the Pool added a little something to your enjoyment of what's already the best Championship series in professional sport.

And for those hungry to redeem themselves, the Infamous Writers Hockey Pool will be back for an Ninth Season next April, hopefully with more Canadian teams in the hunt for the Cup.

Have a great Summer. Training camps open in about a month…

THE FINAL STANDINGS:

pool final

Friday, June 13, 2014

Pool Report: The Dog Days

Those of you still paying attention may have noticed I didn’t post a pool report last Monday. Partly because it was the eve of what could well have been the final game. But mostly because the languorous pace at which this final series has been scheduled meant that there had only been a single game since we last charted our progress.

Yeah, I know everybody’s bruised and battered and there’s a cross-continent flight between games. But please –- if we’re being sensitive, could we do something to keep fan interest from flagging? I walked into a sports bar last night to see one lonely Ranger sweater among a sea of NBA and World Cup jerseys. Bettman! Dude! People are moving on!!!

That said, it’s good to know the Rangers finally showed up to reignite a little interest. Although I’m not sensing a sudden win streak that gets us to a pumped up Game 7.

As a side note, the Rangers forcing a game 5 and Don Cherry’s correct prediction of #4’s outcome appears to have knocked a whole lot of people out of contention in the Props contest.

But let’s not get depressed. I’ve been wrong before. Just look at the standings if you don’t believe me.

And the Standings are:

Will Pascoe in first. Jon Brooks hanging in at second and Maurey Loeffler in third by a point.

Back Monday. Possibly with a winner. If not I’m sure we’ll have one by this time next week. Which I suppose is one less week we’ll have to watch guys running around on some Brazilian lawn pretending they’re doing something exciting…

dog pool1

Thursday, June 12, 2014

The Duke

Yesterday marked the 35th Anniversary of John Wayne’s passing. A moment mostly forgotten since, for most people, he’s a Hollywood star a lifetime in the past, someone they only know from perpetual Saturday re-runs on AMC.

And most of the rest of us only knew him as a Hollywood Star who churned out a half dozen movies a year, mostly Westerns.

As a kid, I loved John Wayne movies because they were full of bravado and action. I didn’t have the intellectual skills to see all the character levels he built into “Red River” or “The Searchers”. And by my late teens, he was a symbol of an American way of Life and set of values that didn’t seem to fit anymore, a guy so out of touch, the sunset he walked into at the end of “The Green Berets” was actually a sunrise.

But my appreciation of the man has grown over time, grown through the realization of how hard he worked at his craft and the business and the humanity and basic decency that pervaded all that he did.

I never got a chance to experience John Wayne in person. But a good friend of mine did, Canadian director/writer/producer Allan Eastman and I asked if I could post a small section of the journal Allan’s been keeping all his life.

The following excerpt is from 1977/78:

I suppose I was ahead of my time. Nobody was in the market for directors in their 20‟s those days and that’s all they want now. Eventually, my career took me from being the youngest person in any room to being the oldest so I guess you have to count that as some kind of a success. Back then, I read the trades, took meetings and waited for the phone to ring, a universal pastime in Los Angeles. And then one day - inevitably in retrospect - corny old Lew Sherrill came through. He had a non-union director’s gig on a NBC network show for me, “Grizzly Adams”. It seems that the video of my wholesome family entertainment TV show, “Beachcombers”, had fit right into their profile niche and Lew had pitched me as the next big thing.

“Grizzly Adams” was a queer success in those unrelentingly trying to be hip times, the continuing adventures of a bearded mountain man and his sidekick bear righting wrongs, fighting bad guys and delivering moral messages in the high country of the western frontier. It had struck some chord with a significant portion of Middle America, presumably those searching for old fashioned values in a post Vietnam, post Watergate era now encumbered with the weakling prez, Jimmy Carter. Also, at a time when most TV shows were all about a high jiggle factor (“Good morning, Angels…”) and heaps of blood drenched cop show violence, Grizzly Adams was something the whole family could sit down in front of on Wednesday night at 8 and not have to cover up the children’s eyes.

Accordingly, a few weeks later, I flew by standard jet liner to Flagstaff, Arizona and then by two engine prop plane up to the location, which was in a small town high in the mountains РPayson, Arizona. This place was a nowheresville hamlet, one building deep, strung along a secondary highway like the bones of your vertebrae Рcaf̩, bar, general store, gas station and a mock Alpine Chateau motel called, what else, the Swiss Village. A place where weary motorists could bed down when they got too frightened to drive the narrow winding canyon roads after dark anymore. All pretty Twilight Zone for a city boy like me, but logical enough for the production which needed mountains, forests, virgin wilderness for its frontier setting.

This was my first foray into what was the real American West and right from the start, I was a stranger in a strange land. Everybody walking around sported weather beaten cowboy hats, sheepskin coats, flannel shirts, well broken in jeans and scuffed cowboy boots. I was only a year from living in London and Paris and still sported hip European threads that fit in fine in LA or Toronto but made me look like a Martian in this neck of the woods. The 70’s were the most terrible time for fashion ever – I’m sure you’ve laughed at the antique videos on MTV of those platform heeled, tight shiny jump suited, broad belted, afro wearing musicians of the time. And those were the white guys. In fact, it seemed like the designers were pushing as hard as they could to make everybody look as much like circus clowns as possible – wide lapels, wide loud ties, floppy bell bottoms – ridiculous, really. I wasn’t quite that bad but still dressed like I was strolling on the Champs Elysee or Oxford Street – long double breasted black leather coat, beret (I still wear a beret in cold weather), waist length bright yellow turtleneck sweater, flared pants, Beatle boots. I still had traces of an English accent from my 3 years living there. Dan Haggarty, who played Grizzly Adams, surrounded by the film crew who all looked like the Dalton Gang, took one look at me and said, “You’re going to direct us?!” I was nothing if not cocky in those days, so I looked him hard in the eye and said, “Yup!”.

Actually, despite looking like some hippie dandy, I was already a pretty good filmmaker – visual, very well organized, analytical, production savvy, comfortable directing actors and able to put together and shoot a strong action scene. And confident with youth. As I prepped the show, the people I was working with started to see that I knew what I was doing and the word got around. My show was about the Wright Brothers fictional father showing up in the high country to test out a prototype glider. After an initial nasty crash, he is nursed back to health by old Griz‟ and given pointers in aerodynamics by a friendly Hawk so he is eventually able to make a successful maiden flight. Not a bad little story.

While prepping, I spent a lot of time on the set, watching how it all worked and getting to know some of the crew. The bear was a gigantic female named “Daisy” or some such, declawed and defanged, and in general was docile and surprisingly effective
walking through her paces for a food reward. One day though, she was in a bad mood and they had to keep her locked in her cage all day, which she rocked and rattled on its axles in a series of powerful jumps and shoves, trying to get the hell out of there. The trainer pointed out that some days, you couldn’t expect to get any shooting done with her. 

Patrick Wayne was guest starring in the episode that was shooting while I was prepping and one afternoon a couple of 4x4‟s rolled into the location deep in the woods and out of the front seat of the first one, stepped his old man, come for a visit. The Duke in person, John Wayne, greatest hero of all my childhood Saturday matinees – Big Sam, Sgt. Stryker, Nathan Brittles, McClintock, Davy Crockett himself! Everything stopped dead and we all crowded around. The Duke was well into his 60‟s by then and didn’t bother wearing his girdle or his wig when visiting his son but was hale and hearty, unbelievably tall, raw boned and definitely bigger than life. Seeing him in the flesh, I realized that he bore an uncanny resemblance to my Father.

That evening, we all hung around the Duke in the Swiss Village bar and he regaled us with a ton of great stories – how he had scooped a Mexican beauty right off Tyrone Powers’ lap in the Brown Derby one night, how cranky John Ford was when drunk (usually), what a pussy Ronnie Reagan could be, what a great kisser Bette Davis was and so on through a hundred more. Duke was gregarious, had a huge laugh and a rough sweet natural rumpled comfortableness to him that made you love him. He bought every drink in the bar that night until long after midnight. His last words to me were, “Give ‘em hell, kid!” with a solid clump on my back. That made me feel great for weeks and I can still hear it in my mind.

Sunday, June 08, 2014

Lazy Sunday # 328: Disney Girls

As warm weather arrives, radio stations break out the Summer oldies, which mostly means “The Beach Boys”.

Unfortunately, the endless replays of “Barbara Ann”, “Little Deuce Coupe” and “409” don’t really recapture what “The Beach Boys” music meant to those of us who were in the original audience.

I had the good fortune of seeing “The Beach Boys” perform before Brian Wilson retreated to his room. Back when Summer was about escape from the 24/7 supervision of school and parents, having the freedom to sample all the possibilities Life might hold and getting to know girls.

And that’s what “The Beach Boys” captured and communicated to us. Yeah, we liked hot cars and surf culture too. But those were the trappings, the shiny baubles, not the spirit of our Summers.

Later in their lives, “The Beach Boys” became known as “the American Beatles” for the ways they innovated in the recording studio with classic albums like “Pet Sounds”, albums so far ahead of their time, some waited almost another generation to be appreciated.

But they were innovating from the get-go, layering lyrics and musical phrasing that pulled us back to those quite sunset moments after a long day at the beach.

Those moments when the pretty girl in the bikini was finally at our side. Our bodies were baked and our thoughts were as close to Nirvana as you can get at 16. The moment when you realized there was a chance that kind of bliss could last the rest of your life.

Or at least the rest of the Summer.

It wasn’t the magical pen of Brian Wilson that best captured that moment. It was one of his replacements, Bruce Johnson, in a song titled “Disney Girls” written in 1971.

But Brian and his band-mate brothers, under pressure from the record company that year to complete the long-awaited “Surf’s Up” album, an album engineers were massaging to make the band sound like they did at the height of their 60’s fame, certainly realized the song summer-ized all that “The Beach Boys” were.

In fact, the song’s full title is “Disney Girls (1957)” the year “The Beach Boys” first recorded, the time they first tried to capture and reflect that special Summer moment.

For me, it is the ultimate Summer song. I hope it captures that feeling for you as well.

Enjoy Your Sunday.

Friday, June 06, 2014

D-Day Wasn’t About Interpretive Dance

Just sayin’…

Pool Report: The Reminder

By this point in the season, it feels like we’ve been at this a very long time…

But the sad reality is that it’ll be over all too soon. Perhaps a good time to remind ourselves of just how lucky we are to be a part of something as exciting as the Infamous Writers Hockey Pool.

In addition to bragging rights, the winner here will walk away with a bag of swag donated by those who have been bettered in the contest.

Although none of us have any idea what will be in that bag, I can guarantee it will far surpass what the Governors of New York or California receive should their state based team come out on top.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and California Governor Jerry Brown have wagered the following…

If the Kings win, Gov. Cuomo will hand over a “Taste of New York” gift basket including wing sauce, wine and a hockey puck he was awarded for scoring a “budget hat trick” by keeping the state on budget for three years in a row.

If the Rangers win, Gov. Jerry Brown will give Cuomo an “organic, lightly salted brown rice cake” and a book of California history.


That doesn’t even come close to the prize pack that will be awarded for our secondary “Props contest” which is still open to all comers. Details in the post right below this one.

All that said, we’re only one game into the final set. Which, as The Onion suggests could become a lot more exciting if Henrik Lundquist finally picks up some of the NY offensive slack.

The standings as we go into the second last week of the season…

Jon Brooks and Will Pascoe tied for first. Barry Keifl tenaciously hanging on to second, perhaps hoping for a short, low scoring series so Maurey Loeffler in fourth can’t knock him off the podium.

We may have come a long way. But there’s still some distance (and a lot of exciting hockey) to go.

image

Monday, June 02, 2014

Pool Report: The White Room

I had an acting teacher who had the perfect metaphor for the battle one wages to break through in accomplishing any creative endeavor.

I’ve found it applies to many things in life…

Imagine that you’re in a white room. A room so white you can’t tell where the floor or ceiling meet the walls. You can’t make out where the walls become corners. It’s just a big white void. But you know there’s a door somewhere that gets you out.

So you search for that one way out. And finally you find it. You grab hold of the door handle and fling it open, stepping into…

Another white room.

Last week, with the triumph of the NY Rangers in the NHL East, I saw my breakthrough moment in the pool. Not only was I one of the few players with Rangers on my roster, I had some LA Kings as well. If the Kings could get past Chicago, I’d be almost Golden, with a clear path to the top.

And last night LA put Chicago away, after seven of the best games we’ve seen this season.

So I checked the standings. Below me were poolies whose teams had been devastated. And ahead of me –- was everybody else. After weeks of languishing in the basement of the pool, I was once again back in the basement.

But because it’s the finals, there are now two doors to success.

THE PROPS CONTEST IS BACK!!!

wayne gambles

For those of you unfamiliar with the concept, a little history.

Betting on sports has been around as long as there have been guys who needed to pump up their self-esteem by proving they were right about something.

And for centuries money changed hands based on who won or lost a contest.

Then Las Vegas and the Super Bowl were invented. Pretty soon the guys who ran the Casinos realized that while they could make millions on who won a football game, they could make BILLIONS with side wagers.

So Proposition Betting was created to give us sports degenerates an opportunity to blow our money on outcomes nobody in their right mind can confidently predict.

You might be wagering on the coin toss (Janet Gretzky's favorite -- seen above at Caesar's Palace with absolutely non-betting husband and Hockey Great One Wayne) or if a touchdown is made by a player whose jersey number is over 30.

Props are also not one bet options. You need to pick at least a half dozen. The odds of collecting are infinitesimal. But then, you can't put a price on a good time, can you?

So here's how the "Infamous Writers Pool Hockey Props"  works…

There are six bets. All are related to the Stanley Cup Finals. Some require sports knowledge. Some only require guts!

The player with the most correct answers wins. And a special piece of Canadian Hockey memorabilia (currently treasured by Yours Truly) will be awarded to the winner.

Should there be a tie -- uh -- we'll figure that out if there's a tie.

But this contest will definitely not be decided until well after the final game!

Entry is open to all current pool players, everybody who’s been kicking themselves for not getting in on the original action and anybody who thought Pittsburgh had this thing sewn up when the season ended.

Entries must be sent to seraphic77@gmail.com anytime between now and the 7:00 pm Eastern faceoff for Game Two on Saturday June 7th in Los Angeles.

Your six Hockey Propositions are:

1. The 2014 Stanley Cup winner will be decided in:

     a) Four Games

     b) Five Games

     c) Six Games

     d) Seven Games

2. The total number of goals scored in the Final series will be:

    a) Less than 20

    b) 20 to 30

    c) More than 30

3. Los Angeles Goalie Jonathan Quick enters the final round with a .906 Save Percentage. New York’s Henrik Lundquist average is .928. At the end of the final series, the Highest Goalie Save Percentage will belong to:

a) Lundquist

b) Quick

c) Neither

4. "Hockey Night in Canada"  icon Don Cherry always confidently predicts the winner of each game prior to the opening faceoff. For the FOURTH game of the series, he will be:

a) Correct

b) Incorrect

For non-Canadian players -- CBC's "Hockey Night in Canada" is streaming all games at http://www.cbc.ca/sports, usually in more languages than English.

Unless Bob Cole is calling the game, in which case your guess is as good as mine as to what language that is.

5. The Leading Goal Scorer in the final series will be:

a) Marian Gaborik (LA)

b) Jeff Carter (LA)

c) Martin St. Louis (NY)

d) Carl Hagelin (NY)

e) Other

6. The Captain of the winning team is the first player to hoist the Stanley Cup and skate a victory lap. The Cup is then passed to each member of his team. And it's usually passed to someone the player holding the Cup feels is especially deserving. The Goalie of the winning team will be:

a) One of the first six players to hoist the Cup

b) The Seventh to Twelfth player to hoist the Cup

c) One of the remaining players to hoist the Cup

Tough enough? C'mon, suck it up! How often do you get a chance like this?

Meanwhile in the big show…

Jon Brooks leads with Will Pascoe right behind. Chicago-centric Barry Kiefl is in third but fading…

Will there be big changes by Friday. Absolutely. But for one of us, that final doorway is at hand.

pool round 3

Sunday, June 01, 2014

Lazy Sunday #327: Augmented Reality

There’s always a new way to impose your creative vision on the real world.

Enjoy your Sunday…