The SBP Archives - Your less than frequent dose of SBP!

Easy question, easy answer: I had my long weekend getaway to Buffalo, New York this year with the usual gang to catch some NFL action. No, not a football fan, but the company is great, and the atmosphere is electric. It's easy to get caught up in the moment even if your knowledge of the event at hand is minimal.

Little did I realize that I would also be a witness to history. What history? For the first time in his 13 year career, perennial whiner Tyrell Owners did not make a reception. He did NOTHING! Of course, it would help if the team tried to use him a little more, but the Bills played scared. The strongest evidence of that being the decision to punt the ball at the 7 minute mark of the 4th quarter with one measly yard to gain to get the first down. They're losing by ten points...no time to be conservative, you gotta go for it. When the punter hit the field, the fans immediately crapped all over that decision. The New Orleans Saints would go on to win 27-7.

Anyway, to commemorate my Buffalo trip and also because I thought it was kinda funny, I got me a T.O. jersey. Sure, he may be gone in the next couple of months, but everyone knows what he's all about and you can at least enjoy a chuckle with it on. Although for Bills fans, they don't see anything funny about being 1-2 to start the season.

Stuffed my face with crap, downed lots of beer, became the unofficial World Euchre champ...indeed, it was a good weekend filled with good times!

I am glad that some players of the NHL, for which without them there would be no professional hockey, no fans, no TV deals, no millions of dollars to be made for the overstuffed greedy owners of the NHL, are taking matters into their own hands and not allowing Gary Bettman and his gang of idiots take away something that both fans and players of the game of hockey look forward to every four years.

Alexander Ovechkin, my personal choice for overall best player in the NHL, isn't waiting for an agreement to be made with the NHLPA and the owners to allow the players the right to play at the 2014 games in Russia. He's gone on the record and saying he's going no matter what. And rightfully so: On an international stage, in his home country, where more people will tune in to watch worldwide than the Stanley Cup finals. Shortly afterwards, Evgeni Malkin made the same declaration. He's also not going to allow Gary Bettman tell him he can't play in what could be one of the most exciting moments of not just his hockey career but his whole life.

In some ways, I would personally love to see the agreement on the Olympics fall through between the union (who want to give the right to have players participate) and the NHL just to see how the league will react when they see Alex and Evgeni book their flights and miss games 62 through 67. What will they do? Suspend them? Bar them from the league? Yeah right: The fans and certainly their fellow players wouldn't stand for that crap. They would look ridiculous for not allowing the best players in the league play for their country to see who's the best of the best.

The good and growth of the game is more important than lining the wallets of NHL owners who put on too many regular season games. For being allowed the right to make money off of the sport of hockey and exploiting the talents of the athletes to sell tickets and merchandise, the absolute least the owners can do is allow the players the thrill of playing for their country and allow the fans a chance of seeing something truly special. And this is coming from someone who perhaps saw his Ottawa Senators lose the Stanley Cup in 2006 because Dominik Hasek was injured during the previous Olympics.

Let's hope common sense prevails.

...but I was really impressed when reading about one of the new cell phones just released in the marketplace that is being sold primarily on its environmental benefits. The Samsung Reclaim M560, available in "Earth" Green and "Ocean" Blue, is a tree hugger's cell phone that is a bit wider than your average cell but only 0.56 of an inch thick. So what makes it so environmentally friendly? The casing is made from, I can't believe it, corn. The packaging itself features 70% recycled materials and is printed using soy inks. The charger uses 12x less energy than a standard Energy Star model and to top it all off, $2.00 will be donated to the Nature Conservancy's Adopt an Acre program.

It's too bad I've already signed a contract with Virgin Mobile on my current cell, as with it's sliding keyboard, two megapixel camera & GPS, I definitely would have picked this one in a heartbeat. I know I sound like quite the shill, but I find it quite exciting reading up on these types of products that can be competitive with the run-of-the-mill environmentally UNFRIENDLY products we are inundated with.

Hopefully such enviro-features will become standard in EVERYTHING we buy, for as Jerry Seinfeld said, everything we acquire is just the first day on its journey to the garbage dump.

In with the NEW!!!



I said goodbye to my Jeep. The photo above was taken from inside the Chrysler dealership I sold it to, waiting for them to give my cheque. I really enjoyed having it for the 7 or so years in the SBP fold. It was especially fun to drive in the summer, top down, no doors...ah, the good old days! But since moving to my apartment, I haven't driven with the convertible feature for about three years, and the doors seem to be rusted into place real good, making removing them near impossible. And after my last car repair bill, I felt it was time to get something new.

My Honda Civic SI it a lot of fun to drive, and it has a lot of neat features, such as FOUR doors and a TRUNK! Yes, the Jeep wasn't exactly the most practical vehicle. And oh yes, it was a bit of a gas hog which was another problem. Everyone seems to agree Hondas are pretty solidly built, so hopefully it'll serve me well.

- How important is U.S. health care reform? So much so that we Canada has a former Conservative Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney, supporting President Obama's bid for health care reform. Now not all Canadians are perfect: Current PM Harper declined to rally behind Obama as health care is a provincial, not federal, issue. Weaksauce.

- Isn't this nice: You live in an isolated northern town and to protect the people from the H1N1 virus, you're sent...body bags? I would laugh if only it was funny. We're told not to go to the hospital, don't overreact, just use Purell and all will be fine. Is there something Health Canada would like to tell us?

- The NHL scheduling needs to be revisited. Three pretty much guaranteed sellouts at Scotibank Place: Detroit Red Wings, San Jose Sharks and Anaheim Ducks, won't be visiting Ottawa this year.

With a top line of Chris Kelly, Ryan Shannon and Eric Condra (I admit, never heard of him) the Sens are playing their first pre-season game tonight with not much fanfare. But I'm looking forward to seeing how they do, and especially how new goalie Pascal Leclaire fares playing his first game since December of 2008.

Yup, the NHL season, with training camps starting this past Saturday, is just around the corner, and while it's tough to see summer go (well, we got gypped on the weather front but it got nicer late August), I get pretty excited knowing the NHL regular season is very close to getting started. And with the Sens biggest makeover in recent history with the Dany Heatley trade completed, fans are anxious to see how the new acquisitions pan out and if the Senators can rebound from a bad 2008-09 season.

Win or lose, it's going to be interesting (at least at the beginning anyway if they have another losing season). The big question marks are:

- Can Alexei Kovalev provide a consistent, second line scoring threat?
- Can Jonathan Chechoo rebound from two sub-par seasons and score again?
- Will Erik Karlsson be the saving grace on defence the Senators hope he can be?
- Was Cory Clouston's winning record a fluke or is he the real deal?
- Will Pascal Leclaire fight the injury bug and be the dependable, solid goaltender Ottawa has been looking for?
- Is this Bryan Murray's last stint as GM?

It's fair to say with Murray's contract expiring at the end of this year, if the team doesn't return to the playoffs this year he'll be replaced. The only thing Ottawa has to show since Murray has taken over as GM is getting swept in the first round by the Penguins in 2008: not exactly something to be proud of. Many pieces must fall into place for this season to be a success, but if they can, Ottawa just might be able to contend again.

I'm not sure what to make of the trade.

I certainly don't mind the acquisition of 24 year-old Milan Michalek. 6"2, 225 lbs, can be counted on for about 25 goals or so, and is likely just going to get better. And no one can really complain about obtaining a second round draft pick.

But Johnathan Chechoo, the guy that rumour had it prevented a deal between the San Jose Sharks and Senators from taking place earlier because GM Bryan Murray wanted nothing to do with him, is a disappointing return for a goal scorer of Heatley's caliber. Chechoo won the Rocket Richard trophy once, but since then hasn't done a whole heck of a lot. He managed only 12 goals last year and you have to wonder if he was just a flash in the pan. But, maybe a change on scenery will help.

I am convinced though that a trade sooner rather than later was in the Senators best interests. Having a locker room poison like Heatley on the team would not have helped anyone and the distractions likely wouldn't have resulted in wins. I guess not getting "full value" for him is a consequence of that reality.

Anyway Heatley, no matter what you say, your reputation HAS taken a hit. You are considered a selfish player and Vegas already has odds on when you'll ask to be sent out of San Jose. It's too bad the Sharks won't be visiting Ottawa this season and it was declared tomato day, for I would have liked to have pelted a few right between your eyes. GET LOST YOU LOSER!!!!!

I certainly didn't like reading the news Ottawa council is going to have to pay out $37 million to contractors for reneging on the proposed light rail project a few years ago. It's been proposed each taxpayer is going to get a bill for $100-200 to pay for this screw up. It's especially grating when you consider $5 billion was approved a little later on to pay for another light rail project. I'm not sure what the difference is, buy anyway, there you go.

It's too bad that back in the 1970s, someone thought it would be better to have buses as public transport instead of street cars because they figured it would be cheaper. So all of the above street cars you see above were decommissioned and the estimated costs of the buses turned out in the end to be about 450% more than expected. Oops! Anyway, I'm being a bit grumpy. I really enjoyed getting emailed the above photos, seeing the way Ottawa used to look. The first picture is from Sparks St, the second Queen & Elgin St and the last picture is Nicholas & Laurier St. Good times!

I like it! Although after him mentioning his love for St Hubert's chicken, I would have approved their poulet wearing that centurion helmet...

- It's terrible : I've had a four day hiatus from writing a blog entry from being away at a cottage (Verner, near North Bay. Good times!) and I've been finding it harder and harder to come up with things to write about. I can't believe the norm used to be once a day with the way things have been going lately. My aim is one entry every 2nd day, so we'll see how helpful my brain is when it comes to these blog entries. Anyway, hope you a nice long weekend. I also took today off because, meh, extra days off are good!

- I've found a place on the net that's a great time waster: flickchart.com. It ranks your favourite movies of all time by randomly taking two movies and then you select your favourite one. And repeat! Simple, but very addictive. And you can get a lot of different combination that really make you pause and think: Goodfellas vs Star Wars was a tough one. So was Raiders of the Lost Ark vs Pulp Fiction.