The Times NB 580 comes in black or white and look like they couldn’t get more comfortable unless they were lined with baby seal pelts.  Here are some specs on the boots from New Balance’s 686 website:

Based upon the original MT580 sneaker, the 686 design team recreated a fully functional, technically advanced snowboard boot with a sneaker-like fit. The intense process utilized New Balance’s proprietary features like Rollbar and Abzorb, as well as combining BOA’s proven Focus lacing system. The end result is a true masterpiece of New Balance’s quality footwear heritage and 686’s technical snowboarding history.

Basically that’s a lot of fancy language for “they feel awesome and have a lot of cool stuff inside them”.  I also noticed that they have these neat dials on the tongue and on the side of the boot… maybe they are volume knobs to turn up the good and turn down the suck?  I think it might have something to do with the BOA Focus lacing system where you don’t actually lace up anything but rather tighten by twisting the dials… so even an idiot or someone with only one hand can tie them up tightly now!

Snowboard season is already underway so I probably wont try to pick these up until it winds down in April as the $300US price tag is a little high for me.   I’m hoping it will drop a bit after the initial launch.  Looks like another season of wearing my Burton Godzilla/Mothra hybrid boots for now.

Cheers!

jordenf

Nike designed a unique jersey that incorporates several icons and cultural symbols that were developed by Musqueam artist Debra Sparrow. The dominant imagery depicted inside the Maple Leaf crest includes smaller Maple Leafs representing the gold medal counts for Canada’s men’s, women’s and sledge hockey teams, the thunderbird and eagle, two powerful First Nations symbols supporting and protecting the central Maple Leaf – and the heralded hockey player and stick.

Hockey Canada’s 2010 Olympic Winter Games jersey features the Vancouver 2010 and Canadian Olympic Committee marks. There will be two versions of the jersey: one in red and a second in white that the teams will wear in competition at the Olympics.

Read my original post from August 14, 2009 below.

Quick hit on this one.  I’ve just posted a couple pictures to my Flickr feed of Hockey Canada’s new jersey’s for the 2010 Olympics.  Gone is the hockey player over the maple leaf crest that we have been used to.  Hockey Canada had to come up with a new logo because the International Olympic Committee doesn’t allow national sports federations advertising on the front of the Olympic gear anymore although Hockey Canada was able to sneak a smaller version of the Hockey Canada Federation’s logo on the sleeve of the jersey (which you can see on the image of the red jersey), on the other sleeve is the Vancouver 2010 Olympic logo.

The jerseys aren’t supposed to be released until Monday August 14th at a press conference at UBC Thunderbird Arena in Vancouver (where some of the hockey games will take place).  The announcement on Monday will coincide with the start of the sales for the jerseys but there are some images floating around from staff who have already opened the crates containing the swag.

If you look closely at the crest you will see there are some designs in it, what those designs mean I have no idea (maybe you could tell me!)  I think overall they look pretty slick.  They’ve got that heritage old-time feel to them and look fairly timeless.  Apparently Hockey Canada and the IOC had to go back and forth 5 times before an agreement was made on the logo and design being okay.

Go Canada Go!

jordenf

It’s the time of year when grown men all over Canada and the United States make sure they have the latest virus protection software on their laptops, they upgrade their wireless internet connection so it works flawlessly, they subscribe to the NFL Network so that they can watch 4 games at the same time, and they make sure they’ve bought something nice for their wives so that they don’t divorce them for some organic hippie named Andre who doesn’t “need” cable or “care” about sports.  It’s Fantasy Football Season! Or as we call it in my house “you better be super nice and not neglect your wife on Sundays or your computer and television will be thrown out the window season.”

Now I’ve tried to get my wife into the NFL and Fantasy Football for years (she calls it imaginary football, or make-believe football by the way).  I’ve said to her, “Hey, you know what!? We’ll just get you your own Fantasy Football Team!  How about that!?  Don’t worry I’ll manage it for you (and my own of course), but this way you can sit on Sundays with me and cheer for your players!  What could be more awesome then spending time together rooting for our teams!”  To which her response was, “you do enough pretend sports for the both of us thanks.”  To which I responded, “could you please stop calling it ‘pretend’!  We pick real players you know… they actually participate on the field, we just watch their stats improve on the internet, improving our chances of beating the other guys fantasy team.”  To which she responded, “Are you even listening to how lame you sound?”  I was just about to respond but then Braylon Edwards went down and I was too busy praying that he didn’t tear his ACL because I didn’t have a spare Wide Receiver on my bench that I could put in next week and I would have to use a waiver wire pickup to get a new one…  And my she thinks I sound lame!

Now I’m not just a one trick pony, I’ve tried the tried and true “look at how good the player’s bums look in tights” approach.  But she sees right through that and points out that the Offensive Line has enough bums for the whole team, to which I point out, “be nice, O-Linemen are people too.”

When that doesn’t work I’ve tried to trick her into doing things on Sunday with her friends so that maybe she’ll forget that I’m not doing anything around the house except making more of a mess and cursing loud enough that our neighbours can hear… but I’m sure they understand that it’s frustrating to watch Phillip Rivers throw 4 touchdown passes the previous week and then throw 3 interceptions the week you put him in your starting lineup.  I’ll smile and say, “Hey, you know who you haven’t seen in a while?  Julia!  You should visit her on Sunday.”  My wife will glare back and say, “Julia lives in Victoria.  Jorden, you know that.  We are not watching football all day.”  Meanwhile I’m thinking ‘don’t give up, don’t give up… Got it!’ “Hey, why don’t you make a day trip out of it… could be fun!” To which she says, “I’m not going to hop on the ferry by myself, go to Victoria for half a day, and then come back.”  But I’m a fighter so I respond, “Take Monday off, you deserve it!  I’ll even drive you there Sunday morning… before kick-off, uh I mean before 10 o’clock, then you could stay the night and come back late Monday… you know get a full two days in, and I’ll pick you up after Monday Night Foot… uh I mean Monday night sometime after 9.”  And then my Macbook is quickly tossed out the window.

Now when none of the above works it really gets down to hard negotiating tactics:

Me – “Okay, I’ll watch What Not To Wear with you if you let me watch the Sunday Nighter.”

Wife – “The Sunday Nighter?  Why?  You don’t even like the two teams that are playing.”

I’m thinking ‘she’s good, she’s researched what teams are playing.’

Me – “Yeah I know, but I started Pittsburgh’s defense and if Maurice Jones-Drew runs for 80 yards and a TD I’ll beat Reggie’s Inbred Cousins this week and be the top of the division!”

Wife – “You play against a team called Reggie’s Inbred Cousins?”

Me – “Yeah?”

Wife – “I wish I had a tape-recorder right now so I could play this back to you and you’d realize how ridiculous you sound.”

Me – “Uh, they don’t use tape-recorders anymore, everything is digital now.”

And there goes the TV out the same window… I’m actually pretty impressed she could pick it up, it’s heavy.

The only time I get lucky and my wife gets interested in football is if we are in the car listening to sports talk and a player does something stupid away from the field.  “Ha ha ha, who shoots themselves in the thigh at a nightclub!!!!???”  to which I delicately respond because I don’t want to ruin the fact that she hasn’t made me change the station yet, “Plaxico Burress that’s who… I’m so screwed on Sunday, why do all my players keep shooting themselves or getting staff infections?”  To which my wife smiles and says, “maybe it’s a higher power telling you that make-believe football is stupid and you should give it up.”  Touche.

Now in all fairness my wife isn’t bad at all.  She let’s me watch most of the time and realizes that she married a bit of a sports geek and sometimes pretend football goes along with that.  Actually to be quite honest she kind of helps put it all into perspective.  When Earnest Graham fumbled on the one yard line and I started to weep and she said while wiping away my tears, “it’s not even real… how much money did this even cost you? 20 bucks?… that other nerd needs this more than you… at least he didn’t shoot himself in the thigh like your last player.”  Always so helpful.

So for you guys who have made it through this long blog rant thinking that there was going to be some Fantasy Football tip at the end you’re in luck, there is!  It’s find a girl who likes football and hold onto her.  Hold onto her like you are punching the ball in from the 3-yard line to win your Fantasy Football Championship!

Cheers!

jordenf

It is created by the VANOC designer Ben Hulse who created the torch as well as the other individual event posters and I think looks pretty modern and stylish… especially when you compare it to past Olympic posters.  Let me know what you think!  And let me know quick before VANOC shuts my blog down for posting Olympic images without a license.

Cheers!

jordenf

 A guy named Joel Nagtegaal who with a couple of his goatee growing hockey buddies decided that they would do some good for the world and for every Canucks win in the playoffs (they were hoping for 16) they would donate a goat through The Christian Reformed World Relief Committee (CRWRC) to an African village.

The goats are easy to take care of, provide a constant source of milk, they can sell the offspring to other villages so their kids can afford to go to school, and then later on in their life provide meat for the village to eat. What a cool idea!

But thats not were the story ends. What started as the hope for 16 goats between hockey buddies has turned into a Twitter page, website and as of May 16th 2009 at 9:38am 732 Goats! More proof of the power of the Internet. So props to Joel, his buddies and the goats for trying making the world a better place.

If you would like to donate a goat to an African village ($25/goat) you can do so through the Goat Canucks Goat website (I will also provide the link in “the associates” section of my blog, or directly through the CRWC website.

Goat Canucks Goat!

jordenf

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“By the end, it was like watching Titanic – you knew what was going to happen but you kept hoping that the ending would change.”

The Canucks were out worked tonight plain and simple.  Dustin Byfuglyface was all over Luongo and Patrick Kane was on a whole other rink tonight… 7 goals on a goalie many are saying will lead Team Canada at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver this year.  Yikes!

So now what?  Trade Luongo for a top-ten goal scorer?  Do you really need a 6 million dollar goaltender?  None of the teams left in the Stanley Cup Playoffs have a legitamite number one goalie (with maybe the exception of Thomas in Boston but they’ll be out soon too).  Detroit has Osgood, Hillar in Anaheim, Varlamov in Washington… so is having a great goalie (or one that lets in 7 goals during the biggest game of the year) all it’s cracked up to be?  Luongo for Lecavalier looks pretty good right about now.

Mike Gillis will have a lot to think about this off-season.  Re-sign the Sedins, what to do with Ohlund, who do you replace Sundin with on the first line (or second depending on how you look at it)?

Well unfortunitely we have a long time to think about it… but if we can take solace in anything its that only one team in 30 wins the Stanley Cup and the Canucks were the eighth team left… not too shabby if you remember the dooms day theories at the beggining of the year.  But needless to say it’s the same old same old for the Vancouver Canucks, a ship you know is going to sink but in the back of your mind you always think that maybe this is the year they wont hit the iceberg… or tomahawk.

Cheers!

jordenf

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The day after a Canucks loss is what I call a hangover day.  You wake up feeling bad about yourself and wonder why you do this too yourself every Saturday… or in the Canucks case, every single year of existence.

photo from tsn.ca

Sports are a funny thing that way, I expect the Canucks to be just above mediocre every year and then this year they surprise me (I even picked them to win the Stanley Cup in my hockey pool which is something I never do… so you can probably blame me for jinxing the team), but just as you start to think this is going to be it… they go ahead and bring you back to reality.  Although with a win on Monday I’ll be singing a new tune of how resilliant they are and how no one can beat them.

But like most hangovers by mid morning or early afternoon I start to feel better and realize that there are more important things in life than the Canucks, like coffee and blogging.

Cheers!

jordenf

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