On Frozen Blog

Sober, erudite analysis, arrived at by the deliberate accumulation of core facts and data, is generally the immediate casualty in the raw aftermath of a bitter defeat at the hands and skates of an undeserving rival. Armed with this sage insight, and slumped low upon a Capitol Hill home’s couch among a hardcore set of Caps’ fans near 10:00 last night, I managed to urge, successfully, initially, our collective suppression of high-pitched, neighbor-frightening invective. I reminded my friends of the spirit of the season, of the blessings of good health we all enjoyed (save Marleen’s blood pressure then), and of the dignity to be achieved by accepting this latest dose of dastardly cruelty with Hemingway stoicism and a champion heavyweight’s chin. I reminded them of the less bountiful fortunes generally found among the widely unemployed in the hills of western Pennsylvania.
For some moments, commendably and without precedence under such duress, we silently admired the array of festive holiday cards hanging in warming splendor across the crown of the dining room’s entrance. Marleen however, mere seconds into our meditation, delivered a troublemaker’s thoughts and shattered permanently all aim at tranquility.
“I don’t understand why we don’t crosscheck them in the throat, forcefully.”
By “them” Marleen was referring to Sidney Crosby the power play QB, Sidney Crosby the Hart Trophy holder, Sidney Crosby the omnipresent marketing symbol of Versus, Hockey Night in Canada, and Reebok and undoubtedly the name of Gary Bettman’s next grandchild.
So provoked, I sought to restore some semblance of a spirit of charity in a sacred time in the Christian calendar.
“Penguins versus Baathist regimes, I root for Baathist regimes. Easy call, too.”
Marleen’s husband Michael at this moment became preoccupied with the age-old dilemma for Caps’ fans taking in a game between the two Pennsylvania franchises.
“Overtime results, in which both teams earn points, are particularly painful,” he noted.
Once again, I appealed — however naively — to our room’s better angels.
“Catholic catechism,” I interjected, “in such instances instructs us to light candles in support of a high tally of reserve list designating injuries, on both sides.”
“Enough of them,” Michael then clarified, “so that if the schedule denotes a home-and-home between them, night two requires the wholesale callup of a majority of the rosters for both clubs’ farm teams.”
The appeals of religious dictates generally are of limited utility with my friends Mike and Marleen — they are secular fatalists, and the moreso on Caps’ visits to Pennsylvania with a McCreary or Fraser or McGough wearing stripes then. With this in mind, I next vaguely referenced a relatively obscure United Nations resolution (“S87″ I called it) that forbade both unilateral and coalition humanitarian aid to a Pittsburgh stricken by natural disaster.
“What prompted that?” Michael asked.
“The Nedved and Jagr mullets,” I replied.
Next I reached for the remote and scrolled fast away from the cable sports sections of the torture chamber TV and to an oldies-movies outlet to try and temper our room’s bubbling bile. I landed on a Gene Kelly film.
“He’s from Pittsburgh,” Michael pointed out.
“Cross-check him in the throat,” Marleen ordered.