After two periods of superb hockey and one terribly dirty and horribly officiated third, the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Calgary Flames 2-1 to earn their first franchise Stanely Cup! For more on the game, visit SportsGuru.

Vincent Lecavalier was awesome in this game, running circles around the Flames. The Bulin Wall was big when he had to be. And DAVE ANDREYCHUK has finally won a Cup after 22 seasons. Fedotenko had two goals tonight. Richards was dangerous as always. The first two periods were ALL Tampa Bay.

The third period was terrible. A call that was absolute bullshit (since when is two guys colliding a penalty for either one!?) gave Calgary a powerplay and they scored to get within one. Yet, as we have seen before, Calgary got dirty and took a penalty in the last minute of the game, after which Iginla did his famous yapping. And it was dirty, stick up in the face, in the corner, at an awkward angle when someone already had him covered. Of course, Iginila had nothing again – no goals, no shots, no assists, absolutely dick-all. It’s a damn good thing that Brad Richards was named MVP, as Iginla (the other favorite) clearly did not earn it.

So Tampa are the new champs. There are more Canadians on their roster than on Calgary. They finished second overall in the regular season. They played as a TEAM, everyone contributing when they had to, and obviously earned their win. I am a proud Canadian, but I first and foremost want fair play. Tampa won fair and square (and without any dirty play I might add). Saying the Cup belongs in Canada because its a Canadian game is like saying no one should win the World Cup except Brazil. Or that the Blue Jays should never have won the World Series. It simply doesn’t fly.

Oh, and I am an Edmonton Oiler fan. Thus I cannot cheer for Calgary. If you can’t understand that, you aren’t a true Edmonton fan. Go ask a Montreal fan about cheering for Toronto. You’ll get the same thing if they are a true Habs fan. This has nothing to do with not cheering for Canada.

The forecast was LIGHTNING and they delivered!! TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING ARE THE NEW CHAMPS!

[UPDATE: Thanks to SportsGuru for pointing out that Tampa actually finished second in the regular season, three points behind Detroit.]

I went to see the documentary Super Size Me today with Sharon. It was really great, and I definitely recommend it to everyone. I know that I will never stop eating McDonald’s completely, but this movie will definitely make you think twice.

Morgan Spurlock is the interesting fellow who decides to go on the McDiet. Three meals a day for thirty days he eats only McDonalds. He looks like a regular guy, but at the beginning you find out his health is superb. You know, of course, that his health will deteriorate, but you have to watch the movie to see just how bad it is. It’s really astounding.

After the movie it was suppertime, and guess where we went? NOT McDonalds! We had pasta and then went for coffee, but the movie kind of makes you lose your appetite. If you get the chance, watch this movie!

One other thing to note, I was underdressed compared to Sharon, BUT I got lots of comments on my “Have a sister?” shirt! Turns out its an excellent conversation starter for people 🙂

Game 6 was a dandy as Sportsguru will tell you, but Tampa Bay prevailed and we are going to game seven! It was a very tense game, but the end result is all that matters 🙂

The movie (Day After Tomorrow) wasn’t all that bad either. I walked out of the theatre half expecting snow. In fact, it was actually quite humorous in places!

Now, I propose we stage a flag burning downtown after the game Monday night, where Oiler fans who are cheering for Calgary can redeem themselves by taking those stupid car flags and burning them. What do you think? Damn traitors shouldn’t get off scott-free!

OH…before I forget. The Flames lost. HOW MANY GODDAMNED POINTS DID IGINLA HAVE? HOW VISIBLE WAS HE? Useless.

Anyone seen the commercials for Gillette‘s new razor, the M3Power? Looked like a damn cool “shaving system” so picked one up to try. Now, for a device that contains 36 patents I expect nothing less than the “World’s Best Shave”.

I must say, its a damn cool razor. Obviously, its not going to be better than the fancy self-cleaning, self-sharpening, self-coffee-pouring electric razors you can get, but for a normal razor, its damn sweet. And really its not that normal.

It’s green and silver, awesome. It has an on/off switch, awesome. It takes less strokes, awesome. It has advanced lubricated strips with Vitamin E and Aloe, awesome. It uses micro-pulses to stimulate hair away from skin, awesome. It was launched like a movie, awesome. But why do I like this razor? Simple. I am a guy, and this is a gadget 🙂

Don’t mean to trespass on SportsGuru’s turf, but this one irks me. From TSN:

Sources told TSN the league has decided referees Kerry Fraser and Brad Watson, who officiated Game 4 in Calgary, will not handle Game 6 at the Saddledome. [Read Full Story

And in the comments, this one from CAULFIELD14 hits the nail bang on the head:

This is rediculous [sic]. It drives me nuts how a loss is anyone’s fault but the players. Fraser, love him or hate him, has done a great job in this league for 30+ years. Somehow it’s his fault TB scored on a powerplay in the opening minutes? And Watson (a good Regina kid) makes the proper boarding major call and he get pulled from game 6? Why doesn’t someone blame Neiminen for his actions? No one blamed Walkom or LaRue for calling Bertuzzi’s hit? Neiminen takes stupid penalties all the time (his 3 minors vs VAN, game 1). The referees are assigned the finals based on PERFOMANCE. They are consumate professionals, and get the calls right 99% of the time, even when they are against Calgary.

It’s shaping up to be a memorable, if controversial, series! Why do I get the feeling that if Calgary loses on Saturday, Sutter will come out and complain about the referees being changed?

Read: TSN

If you aren’t doing anything on Saturday you should come to BP’s at South Edmonton Common to watch Game 6 of Tampa Bay vs Calgary! Unfortunately the Flames won tonight, so I’ll be cheering for Tampa to win and then take the cup at home! I’ll be there, and so will Dickson, Andrew, Megan, and probably Sharon and Annie (who, please note, STILL do not have blogs). After the game we’re gonna go watch The Day After Tomorrow.

WHO: You and the people above!
WHEN: Saturday, June 5th, 2004 at 6:00 PM
WHERE: Boston Pizza’s Lounge at South Edmonton Common
WHY: To cheer on Tampa Bay then watch a movie!

Hope to see you there!

Want to see an Inuvik company’s website? Check out MGM Bus Services. Do your magic search engine spiders!

Yep it’s that time again people! I have had a few new requests and decided to make some other new pictures, so here they are, enjoy! If you have a request, leave a comment or email me.

The newest pictures are: Emailing, Blogging This, Star Trek, Inking, Debugging, Finding Nemo, and the new official picture of Blogosphere.ca! You can, of course, see the entire gallery of my display pictures here:

UPDATE: To see my display pictures, click here.

So here’s how the mini series is going to work. Each time I will pick a topic and discuss the various party stands and comments regarding the topic. Based on how well they do, I will award them from 0 to 3 points, where 3 is the best. And occasionally, like tonight, I will pick a more fun topic. Note that I will stick to the five parties that hold the majority of support in public opinion polls – Liberals, Conservatives, NDP, Bloc Québécois, and Green Party. Tonight, we review party websites!

Liberal Party – http://www.liberal.ca
The Liberal website is quite clean looking and not too flashy. It has quite a few useful tools for voters like candidate profiles, election ads, and stories in the news. The best part of this site in my opinion is that it uses the latest technology! The main page features a Flash 7 animation, and the entire site is written in ASP.NET.
Awarded: 3 Points

Conservative Party – http://www.conservative.ca/
Similar to the Liberal site, the Conservative website uses Flash 7. Unfortunately, they only use ASP and not ASP.NET! At least its still Microsoft I suppose. The website is very sharp looking, with well designed pictures. The Conservative site also includes a number of useful tools, very similar to the Liberal site.
Awarded: 2 Points

NDP – http://www.ndp.ca/
Does anyone remember the old HotBot search engine? It worked pretty good for it’s day, but it was UGLY. And the NDP Party’s site is no different. This site looks like it is a tribute to HotBot with ugly orange, yellow and neon green colors. I think Jack Layton should fire his marketing people and get a real color scheme. And having to download a PDF to read the platform is stupid. Give me at least a list in HTML.
Awarded: 0 Points

Bloc Québécois – http://www.bloc.org/
So I fire up the Bloc’s site. French, okay no problem. Search page for English. Nothing. Search page for Anglais. Nothing. Oh yeah! I remember now! They are separatists. I hope they win so we can get rid of them. Oh and the guy in their banner looks like a contact lense commercial.
Awarded: 0 Points

Green Party – http://www.greenparty.ca/
My favorite color is green, so this site gets points right off the bat. Unfortunately, the site is written in php, but it more than makes up for that in design! The website is beautiful and extremely well laid out. They also have stuff like the latest news and event listings. Good job on this site!
Awarded: 3 Points

So there you have it! The first campaign issue has been explored (somewhat) and the first points have been awarded. Until the next episode, here are the current standings:

1. Liberal Party – 3 points
2. Green Party – 3 points
3. Conservatives – 2 points
4. NDP – 0 points
5. Bloc Québécois – 0 points

So here’s how the mini series is going to work. Each time I will pick a topic and discuss the various party stands and comments regarding the topic. Based on how well they do, I will award them from 0 to 3 points, where 3 is the best. And occasionally, like tonight, I will pick a more fun topic. Note that I will stick to the five parties that hold the majority of support in public opinion polls – Liberals, Conservatives, NDP, Bloc Québécois, and Green Party. Tonight, we review party websites!

Read Episode #1