No, I don’t mean the place surrounding every city, I mean the new, totally awesome album released two weeks ago by Arcade Fire. This album seems to have been met with mixed review, but I for one, have nothing but great things to say about this piece of work. I defended their last album three years ago, and (not-surprisingly) I’m happy to do it again!
Why I Love "The Suburbs"
This just doesn’t end, does it? It looks like all of the drama surrounding Ilya Kovalchuck’s massive $102 million contract is back for another season, making this one of the more tumultuous off-seasons ever.
In case you haven’t heard, heard an independent arbitrator has ruled in the NHL’s favour and has voided Kovalchuck’s insane contract for cap circumvention. As a I said a few weeks ago, it’s about time that the NHL stepped in on these contracts. I can’t say that I’m particularly surprised or stunned by the news, but what shocks me is the fact that the league has said that they will be looking into other, already registered contracts, namely those of Roberto Luongo, Marc Savard, Marian Hossa, and Chris Pronger. This my friends, has the potential to get ugly, very, very, ugly.
It looks like everyone spoke to soon about Ilya Kovalchuk’s mammoth contract with the New Jersey Devils. The NHL has rejected his 17 year, $102 million contract because of cap circumvention. All I can say here is, what took them so long?
Precedent was set for this kind of front-loaded, stupidly long term contracts last year with Chris Pronger, Marian Hossa and Roberto Luongo’s long term contracts. In all three cases the contracts start out huge but taper off very rapidly, and takes them all past their obvious playing days.
While this may not seem like a big deal, it is something that really shouldn’t be allowed. In all cases the Devils, Flyers, Blackhawks, and Canucks all are creatively getting around the cap. They are signing these player for longer than they will play, knowing full well that they will retire before the contract runs out. Once the players retire, they still get paid but their salary does not count against the cap.
Every so often something comes along and changes the face of what we know. A few years ago we had the OK Dance Video, before that “All Your Base”, and now we have something so amazing that it simply escapes words. I love people that don’t have lives…
The LeBron James nWo video…the greatest thing ever achieved in the Internet bar none.
Until next time,
G
Well it’s been a while since I have done this. With Money in the Bank all over and Summerslam just around the corner. It is as good of a time as any to make some guesses for the really big show that will be coming our way in March. I have a feeling it will be a good one. And it may just look like this…
One of the more interesting things to circulate both TSN and The Globe and Mail last week was the six-part, multi-platform story where they investigated the possibility of Canada adding a seventh NHL team, title Why Not Canada?. They looked at four potential locations for franchises including Winnipeg, Hamilton, Quebec City, and a second team in the Greater Toronto Area.
If you did not get a chance to either watch it on Sports Centre, or read it, I highly suggest that you do it now. It was a very interesting and intelligent look at the different locations and went beyond the “We Want a Team Here” and looked at the building, corporate support, legal issues, and regional demographics.
After it was all said and done, they seemed to be high on the possibility of a team in either Winnipeg or Quebec, and not so much on adding a third team to Ontario. As much as I would love a team in Southwestern Ontario, or in Toronto, I think that I understand the situation now.
While this blog has been dedicated to The Nerdy Things in Life, I feel that I haven’t really used this space to honestly and truly geek out. That changes here and now.
A little while ago I touched base with an old friend, Brian. He recently started a blog called The City State of Balic (which you can see a link from to you right if you look for it) which is primarily dedicated to the nerdiest of nerdy endeavors, Dungeons & Dragons. He sent me an e-mail a little over a week ago with an idea. He and I would join together and make a D&D setting, each taking part time responsibility for things. So far it has been really fun reconnected with that nerdy side of my life, and an old friend. While we are still in the draft stages, the setting got off to a good start. We both included some “creative” sections to lay a bit of the land for our planet which I’ll include here…
Now it’s been a few weeks since the G20 Summit and Protests in Toronto, but I’m still at a loss for explanations. Normally I can understand things that I don’t agree with, but this certainly is not one of those times.
When the G20 was announced in Toronto, I didn’t understand. They started moving the G8 Summits to small towns, like Huntsville, to stop disrupting local economies, and ensure easier security. So why did they put this giant summit in the biggest city in the country?
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