Stanley Cup 2011

Words Can’t Begin To Express…

…how completely angry, distraught, disgusted, outraged, disappointed, sick, mortified, ashamed, etc., etc., etc., I am of what happened in Vancouver last night.

In case you missed it, the Boston Bruins won the Stanley Cup. They deserved it. Just like their goalie, Tim Thomas, deserved the Conn Smythe award for MVP and will likely win the Vezina Trophy next week for being voted the league’s best goaltender. As much as I want to be saying that the Canucks won, they didn’t, and the better team won the series. It doesn’t even pain me to say that. The Bruins earned the right to lift the cup.

In true Vancouver fashion (Google 1994 Canucks riots), “fans” decided to stick around after the Canucks loss and “celebrate.” I use quotes because there is no way that the people who destroyed downtown were representative of either of those things. A true fan doesn’t get into fist fights, over-turn and torch cars, throw barricades at police, break windows or loot stores. Not only did a minority of people ruin it for the rest of us they also embarrassed us on a world stage. We should have been commending our team on an incredible season and an exciting playoff run and wishing them better luck next year. Instead we were glued to our TVs and social media wondering what in the world these people were thinking.

There is NO EXCUSE for their behaviour. I don’t care if you were upset. I don’t care if you were drunk. I don’t care if your friends were doing it too. You put people at risk. You gave a black eye to “your team” and your city. If you think that your friend wasn’t taking pictures and posting them online, think again. If you were dancing around the TV cameras goofing off thinking it was funny, it wasn’t. If you were staying downtown to “see what was going to happen,” you are a moron and you were only providing an audience for those who were BREAKING THE LAW! When the police tell you to go home, they mean it. I wouldn’t be surprised that if your own mother saw you on TV she would turn you in.

There is no reason that a city should look like this over a sporting event. There are far more important reasons to riot and people in Vancouver don’t have the right to think that this was one of them.

If you are ever planning to visit Vancouver please don’t let this change your mind. This is not what the city is like. I have no doubt that this may have still happened even if our team had won. Unfortunately we have a well documented history of “Anarchists” who come out to all the big events solely to cause damage. Almost immediately after this broke on TV there were Facebook groups created to return downtown in the morning to help clean up. Others were created so that people could upload their photos so police can identify those involved.

If you think that I still sound upset it’s because I am. Vancouver isn’t this kind of city. It hasn’t been for many years. Yet now, because of some useless idiots, we’re back to being known as a city with fans that can’t handle themselves. Gone are the days of the Olympics when everyone had a great time celebrating (and that was only a year ago!). I’m sure everyone here would like to “thank” those who have most likely turned Vancouver back to No-Fun City.

June 16, 2011 | Categories: Boston Bruins, Canucks, riots, Stanley Cup 2011 | 7 Comments

Monday Musings

1. Game 6 of the Stanley Cup final is tonight. If you read this blog you know who I’m rooting for. That’s all I’ll say out of fear of jinxing it.*

2. There is nothing worse than obsessing over things that are out of your control. I submitted my entry for the Nuun Hood To Coast contest on Friday. The problem with being somewhat proactive is that now I have to wait. And wait. And wait. You get the idea. The contest doesn’t even close until the 15th. They don’t announce the team until the 22nd.

I’m confident and my entry will speak for itself. But I’m terrible at biding my time. Just ask Colin. I’m a ball of anxious nerves. It sounds kind of silly, but I’m honestly sure this is why I don’t put myself out there too much. The “will they like me” question is killing me because what if they don’t? In my head I know that it has no bearing on me. That’s the insecure 15 year old me talking. It’s not like they’re going to send me an email saying, “You know what? Yeah, just not good enough and we don’t like you.” Either my entry was more creative than the other ~~hundreds or thousands of~~ entries or it wasn’t. If I don’t make it onto the team, I don’t.

After reading that last paragraph it’s obvious I simply need to let go and stop over-analyzing. Easier said than done, of course. I’m sure you’ll hear about it a couple more times before the 22nd.

3. My half-marathon clinic starts tomorrow! Hip hip hooray! It’s 16 weeks long (I think) and will train me for the half in Victoria, BC in October. Colin’s going to be training on his own for the full. It’ll be nice because I’ll be able to watch him finish since my race will be over first. I’m so glad that my running is back to being scheduled. I’ve been so lazy lately. The best thing is that the runs is how (not) long they are. I’ll be able to do most of them on my own since they’re short (think 4km tempo runs, etc.) and it stays light out for longer.

4. I’m considering having a Facebook page for Running 42km. I think my real-life friends might be sick to death of all my running related status updates and blog post links. Question is, though, would any of you “like” it? It’s another added thing so I’d only want to do it if you are interested. Let me know.

5. My parents, Colin and Spud surprised me yesterday with my birthday cake. This is only significant because my birthday was back on 17 March. Things were just too busy around my birthday for my mum to make my labour intensive cake so we had a different one that Spud picked out. Of course, being a mature 31 years old, I complained that I didn’t get “my” birthday cake. For the past month or so the cake and icing were in the freezer, but there was never a chance to assemble it. Spud did very well not spoiling the surprise yesterday! I wrote off his comment, “Happy Birthday, birthday girl!” (said with a big hug) as just him being his cute 4 year old self since he made me a block birthday cake a couple of days before. I’ll post a picture of what’s left of it for Wordless Wednesday!

*No snide remarks from you Barefoot Neil Z.

June 13, 2011 | Categories: Canucks, Facebook, half marathon, Hood To Coast, Nuun, Stanley Cup 2011 | 10 Comments