Monday, December 17, 2012

More MCR, more hockey, and more bears in the net!










Saturday went largely as planned. I posted my story and inadequate sketches in the morning, and went to the hockey game at night.

As we entered the arena, the song playing was “Welcome to the Black Parade” by My Chemical Romance. Now, there is never a bad time for me to hear a My Chemical Romance song, especially that one, but it was extra meaningful this time because I had just listened to the relevant Smodcast:


The deal is that Kevin Smith had been greatly influenced by Welcome to the Black Parade, and he brought Gerard and Mikey Way on to talk about it, and actually, they took so long in the first session that they never got to the song, so this was the second session, #235.

Where it all started was a video on Youtube, Once an Oiler, that was a tribute to Wayne Gretzky, starting with childhood pictures and covering his time with the Oilers. I suspect it was a response to his going to the Kings. (I don’t think anyone in Green Bay has made a “Once a Packer” video for Favre.)

Anyway, it was Kevin Smith’s first time hearing the song, and he was really affected by it, and that’s completely fair. The song is amazing, and there’s a lot to it, which makes doing a section by section analysis reasonable, and I think I have already written about how brilliant the overall structure of that album is in general. In addition, this video is pretty good. It starts with childhood shots, and Edmonton shots, and then it builds and you get the Stanley cup in there, and it’s pretty moving, and it works well with that song. It does get a bit repetitive in the middle, but assuming you have to use existing, available footage, rather than going back in time and shooting your own, it’s really pretty good. Good synchronization with the drums.


And, I just watched that video today, because even though listening to the cast had me considering watching it, entering the game to that song, kind of clinched it. Plus, later they played “Umbrella” and that also came up during their chat, because it was playing a lot when Gerard and his wife were dating. Fortunately, my sisters identified the song for me, because I would not have recognized it on my own. So I listened to that today too. It’s been a day of new experiences. You can see why the blog post is late.

Actually, the music was pretty good overall. It was mostly older stuff—lots of pre-Public Enemy rap and older songs. Actually, right after “Black Parade” Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” came on, so there was something for everyone.

The game was amazing. I was so disappointed in the newspaper article on it, because it was really flat and lifeless. I know it can be hard to convey the excitement of a game verbally, but it’s like they didn’t even try.

So here’s the deal. Maria follows it more closely than I do, and she kept emphasizing how Seattle is the main rival and we (Portland Winterhawks) hate them. Well, we may hate them, but it would appear that we do not hate them nearly as much as they hate us, or they have way worse self-control. Mentally, I think the violence is stupid, and you should just play the game with sportsmanship and skill, but this was insane, and it’s kind of fascinating.

There was plenty of shoving and sticking, but at one point the one Seattle player got one of ours in a headlock and just started punching him repeatedly in the head, and it was all kind of confusing, so I may not be getting the details exactly right, but the one ref tried to stop it, and got shoved off, and then more people got involved where two refs ended up on the ground—one because he was knocked there, and another later because he was lying on a Seattle player to hold him down!

I have never seen them spend so long discussing penalties—it took a while to sort it all out!! Finally they read off the list of penalties, on both sides, and the last thing the announcer said was “five for fighting”, which I would have missed, but the girls in front of me thought it was funny, and I realized, right, that’s a band. I thought I did not know them, but actually, they sing that song that I thought was Ben Folds Five, because I get my 5’s mixed up apparently, but I listened to both of them today, and they sound quite different. (New experiences.)

Incidentally the refs were much more aggressive about intervening after that little melee.

I suppose it was worse for Seattle because they were being so outplayed. The first score happened at just 3:24 in the first period, followed by another at 5:01 (both by Matt Leier). At the end of the first quarter it was 2-0, ending at 4-2, victory Portland.

Obviously, it was the first goal that set off the barrage of teddy bears. Now, I’ve been to a few games, but this was only my second teddy bear toss. As much as I worried about that one bear, seriously, it happened to three bears on my side this time. There was another that got caught in the glass, and on the other side it looked like three got stuck, but they were able to shake them all down. 

Realistically, the puck doesn’t even hit the net that often. I suppose the issue is more the damage that it would do if it did manage to hit anyone in the face, and that would be considerable. So the net needs to stay, but seriously people, take off those hooks! Once it’s no longer on disply in the store, it has no purpose, and it can create problems.

They did flash a picture of the pink one up on the screen with the caption “Don’t forget me!”, so I guess they know how to deal with it. Other fun things caught on video included several Santa’s rocking out (I think it was Santacon that day), and one kid who tried to hide, but then the camera left, he got out, and the camera zoomed back. It’s a little mean perhaps, but I found it funny and his friend was really rocking out. I guess every shy kid needs an outgoing friend.

An irritating thing was that the Timbers Army was there and being really loud. There is being supportive and there is being a distraction and making it more about you than the game, and it just felt disrespectful. I did hear some people yelling “Shut up!” and them, and eventually they did.

Disappointing things were the overall take of 12814. the other year it was 16321. Plus a lot of them were really small. Come on, these are for needy kids—get them something nice! I loved the big pug though—that was adorable.

Anyway, that’s it in a nutshell. Watch “Once an Oiler”, listen to “The Black Parade”, support minor league hockey, buy toys for kids, and cut off the hooks. I know that sounds like a lot, but it’s really not.

No comments: