Tag Archives: sports

Is a Serial Serial Killer a Series Killer?

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Okay. That’s it. I’m raising the red card on an issue I’ve been grumbling about—at least privately—for several years now.

To mix my sports metaphors, I am calling a double dabbling penalty on the television series Bones, which I am just catching up on via Netflix. (Spoilers coming if you’re not up to Season 9.)

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I love procedural programs, and as a certified science geek, I particularly like forensic series such as Bones and CSI. If you want to piss me off really quickly, however, I recommend you start a story line involving a serial killer.

Now that may sound counter-intuitive, but I find most serial killer story lines to be incredibly lazy and highly repetitive. More often than not, the episode structure and format are completely blown apart and rather than being about solving a crime, the episodes devolve into a personal vendetta, where the lead investigator—cop or forensic scientist—goes off the rails and alienates his or her team for a few episodes (or season).

“Don’t you get it? He’s taunting me, testing me, letting me know he’s always one step ahead of me.”

Yes. We know this. So let’s move on and get back to solving crimes (aka puzzles). You know, the reason I watch your ruddy show.

Watching a procedural series turn into a psychological drama is like watching a pretty actor try to take on a meaningful meaty role. It’s typically painful to watch and not what I purchased. You’re reneged on our unspoken agreement.

[NOTE: Dexter is held outside as that always was a series about a serial killer hunting down serial killers.]

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Up until recently, I’d believed that this was just an annoyance I would have to live through. God, how I struggled with Grissom’s Miniature Killer. But Bones just escalated that annoyance to a new level, which is why I raise the red card and call for an ejection…

(Last chance to avoid spoilers.)

…for Bones has used a serial killer to introduce a second serial killer.

Seriously? A serial serial killer?

It’s not bad enough that I had to watch a season or so of Christopher Pelant torment the Jeffersonian team, only to have him torment Bones herself with news that several unsolved murders are connected and that her negligence has allowed a serial killer (The Ghost Killer) to go unchallenged. And all just 24 hours before Pelant is killed by Booth, leaving everyone but Bones questioning if he was just lying to drive her nuts.

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So now, as a fan of the show, I conceivably get to sit through yet another season of the Jeffersonian team getting torn apart by this second serial killer. Can you tell how excited I am?

Remember when Fonzie jumped the shark? Well, Bones just jumped not one, but two (so far only two) serial killers.

As an open note to television writers and showrunners, when you’ve run out of things to say, stop talking. End the series. Take your bows and move on.

I will keep watching Bones, if only because I’m an idiot and have invested 8.5 years of my life to these people. Also, I know there is a significant death coming in early Season 10, not yet on Netflix Canada.

We’ll have to see who outlasts whom, but I know which of us is on life-support.

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Longer Penis (not spam)

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Do you ever find yourself, for whatever reason, wishing you had a longer penis?

I found myself thinking this the other day while standing at a urinal in a sports bar.

You see, as I’ve gotten older, I have found myself becoming increasingly hard-of-seeing. Although I have accepted reading glasses as an everyday thing in my life, I still find that I have to play trombone somewhat when trying to read a book or the newspaper, particularly in poorly lit areas.

So, what does this have to do with a longer penis, you may ask.

For the uninitiated, over the urinals in many if not most sports bars in Canada, the bar posts a section of the newspaper (most often the sports section), which gives gentlemen something to look at while in the bathroom. I’d like to tell you it is for the betterment of our understanding of the human condition, but am more apt to say it is to keep us from inadvertently gawking at our neighbours.

Well, of late, I have found it increasingly difficult to read this newspaper because I am standing too close to the wall. Even with my reading glasses on, I cannot make out the print of the story. And let’s face it, if you have to put your reading glasses on to pee, you are either blind as a bat or have a really short penis.

With a longer penis, I believe, I would have the opportunity to stand further back from the urinal and potentially bring the newspaper into focus. Standing further back with a shorter penis just leads to a mess no one wants and would keep me from accurately hitting the little soccer ball (some of you know what I’m talking about).

As it is, my only alternative is to try to read the paper over the next urinal, which has its own risks.

If I am alone in the bathroom, no problem. But the minute another fellow stands at the next urinal…

Well, let’s just say no one likes to have a stranger read over your shoulder, so you can imagine how you’d feel having a stranger read over your penis.

So, yes, sometimes I wish I had a longer penis.

Oh, and unless you have a third hand, don’t try turning the page over…trust me, it’s better for everyone if you just read the rest of the story later.

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Toronto Marlies hockey game

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Took my camera to the hockey game the other day…which means I never really saw the game as it was being played.

Below are some of the better shots I managed to take, just part of a much larger set on my Facebook page.

890+ images taken, 180+ images imported into Lightroom, 93 photos worked up.

Looks like I missed a hell of a game.

SPOILER ALERT: The Toronto Marlies defeated the Hamilton Bulldogs 4-1.

Photographer misses hockey game

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One of the challenges of bringing my camera to Toronto Marlies games (farm team of the Toronto Maple Leafs) is that I barely get to see the hockey game. I am so focused on trying to get interesting pictures, that 99% of what’s happening on the ice eludes me.

The good news is that I get some really interesting shots. The better news is that the team offers a game highlight reel so I can catch up later.

This album represents only some of the best photos of the 477 shots I took (Marlies only took 31 in the game)…more are available on my Facebook page, where most of my fellow Marlies fans reside.

(SPOILER ALERT: The Marlies took the game 4-1 over the Oklahoma City Barons, farm team of the Edmonton Oilers.)

His master’s voice

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You always see cartoons and sitcoms of men completely beaten down by their wives, crushed under the weight of constant haranguing and abusive disparaging language, and I have always thought how sad.

I was fortunate enough to marry a woman who was nothing like those wives and so I did not develop a marital slouch. This is not to say, however, that I couldn’t hear her voice from anywhere, the bat and dog having nothing on me.

Perhaps the best example occurred during a women’s hockey tournament in which my wife—I will call her Leela, because that is her name—was participating.

As a hockey lover and good husband, I attended almost every game Leela played and this tournament was no different. The tournament took place in a large rink complex (about 4 sheets of ice) and so the concession stand was well away from some of the rinks.

With Leela ensconced in the dressing room for her upcoming game, I took the opportunity to sneak off for a coffee and hot dog. While I awaited my food, one of the other husbands showed up and we started chatting. Time became immaterial.

Suddenly, I stopped talking and like an icy meerkat, rose up on my hind legs at a disturbance in the Force. I was being beckoned.

As I peer my failing eyesight through three sets of doors, the Plexiglas getting murkier with each layer, I espied a waving hockey glove.

“Gotta go!” I announced, as I bolted for the doors.

Indeed, it was Leela who, through a mouthguard, did her best to scream my name. She needed new skate laces.

If an audiologist had been in the rink, he would have detected no sound. Likewise, there was no visual clue that anything was wrong. And yet, I had been imprinted, so I knew that darkness had descended and my assistance was required.

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Now, make all the whipping noises you like, but we found out that the connection also works in the other direction.

At Leela’s regular hockey games, in a men’s league, I would sit in the bar above the ice sheet with all of the other wives, where I could watch the game in relative comfort. It also gave me an opportunity to make mental notes on Leela’s play so we could discuss it on the way home (something she wanted, so get off my back).

In one game in particular, however, there were no notes to make as Leela seemed to refuse to actually play, despite taking her regular shift. She would enter the appropriate zone of play and seem to just tripod with her hockey stick, dreaming in a universe of her own.

Annoyed by this, I finally mentally yelled out, “Leela! For god’s sake, do SOMETHING! Skate, check, fall down. Move!”

Miraculously, her body suddenly jolted, as though smacked in the back of the helmet, and she involved herself in the play. The rest of the game, she remained engaged.

On the ride home, afterward, we talked about it. She explained that she was standing there in the offensive zone, completely zoned out, when all of a sudden, she woke up as though shaken and realized that she had to do something.

It would seem, her master’s voice is just as loud as his.

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