Motor City gets Oiled.

Canada gets its second team through to the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs as the Edmonton Oilers defeat the first place Detroit Redwings in game six.

Looked like the Oilers were going to throw it away after they slept right through the first two periods of the game, heading into the third period down 2-0. But local boy Fernando Pisani put in two quick goals for Edmonton at the start of the period, evening it all up. Detroit came back and scored one, but Edmonton tied it up again on the powerplay. Just when it started to look like overtime was going to be necessary, Ales Hemsky put one more in for the Oilers with just 1:03 left on the clock. It was too late then for the Red Wings to come back and Edmonton advances to the second round for the first time is 8 years.

They now join the Ottawa Senators, Colorado Avalanche, New Jersey Devils and San Jose Sharks in the next round.

No Koivu, No Chance

The Montreal Canadiens lost their captain, Saku Koivu, in game three of their series against the Carolina Hurricanes. Koivu took a high stick to the face which severely injured his eye and he hasn't even practiced with the team since. Although Montreal was winning the game at the point where the injury took place, they soon crumbled and lost the game and the two following games. In fact, they've only managed to score three goals since the injury. That has mostly to do with Hurricanes goalie Cam Ward playing extremely well, but the Canadiens just can't seem to get many plays set up and just seem to be wandering around aimlessly without their leader there to show them what to do. They're now just one game away from elimination and head home to play in game six on Tuesday. Montreal has not won a game at home yet this post season. It'd be a good idea to start now.

Sticks And Stones May Break Their Bones

Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards fell out of a palm tree while on vacation in Fiji. Why was the rock legend in a palm tree, you may ask. I have no idea, he wouldn't say. But for a 62 year old guy to climb a tree which has very few branches, that's pretty impressive. He was then taken to a hospital in New Zealand and they said he had a mild concussion. But that's not enough to slow down Keith Richards. He heads right back to Fiji and goes jet skiing... where he crashed and is taken back to the New Zealand hospital again!

I guess after the string of luck that the Stones have had during their career, Richards is acting as the band's scapegoat and is taking all the bad luck in one big lump. Mick Jager is loving it.

Snoop Dog Put in the Pound

Famous rapper, Snoop Dog, was arrested in Britain last night for brawling in an airport. Snoop was there with a group of friends, or his posse if you like, when the fight started. Some of the people in his group held first class tickets and were allowed access to the first class lounge. Others in the group held economy class tickets and weren't permitted to enter the lounge, which angered Snoop Dog. A heated argument broke out, which eventually turned into a brawl that injured seven police officers. Over thirty people were involved in the fight.

Anyways, Snoop was thrown in jail overnight, and missed a flight to South Africa. But was let out without charge this afternoon and will now appear at the scheduled concerts in South Africa.

A police officer told the BBC, "The party was told that they would not be permitted to board their flight and officers then attempted to direct the group to baggage reclaim. A number of the group became abusive and pushed officers."

There's justice. A five year old kid can be arrested and charged for saying "bomb" in an airport, but a bunch of fancy rappers can beat up some police officers and be let go with nothing less than a stern talking to. "Now you be good ok? Please?" Give me a break. I still think that there is no stupider looking person on the planet than Calvin. Oops, I mean Snoop Dog. With a real name like that, I suppose even "Snoop" is an improvement. A slight one anyways.

Heather McCartney Hates Babies

A new study shows that if a pregnant woman does not drink the recommended intake of milk during pregnancy, it can lead to small, underdeveloped babies. It was previously thought that drinking less milk, and consequently less fat and lactose, could actually be better for a baby, but this has been found to be false. Yes, excessive amounts of fat during pregnancy is bad for the baby, but milk isn't going to make too big of a difference. Just stay away from the McDonald's.

The researchers say that by drinking milk during pregnancy, it gives the baby the nutrients (mainly calcium and vitamin D) that it needs to mature properly. Denying it that could be very bad for the fetus and eventual infant.

So, what is the Food Standards Agency advising pregnant women to do? Not listen to Heather McCartney. That wasn't their exact words, but they said to drink plenty of milk and have lots of dairy products during pregnancy. So don't take McCartney's advice. It will kill your baby.

Beans, Beans are Good For Your Heart

Beans, a food that is famous for giving people gas, may now have a chance to change it's reputation. Researchers in Venezuala claim to have found to way to make, as they call then, "fart-free beans".

Beans have a coating on them that is not digested in the stomach, and certain bacteria in the large intestine eat the remains of these coatings, producing a gas which is released from the body as flatulance. The researches say that by cooking the beans in a solution containing these bacteria would remove the coating before the beans are eaten, and as a result, eliminating all the farting.

It's great to see that the medical researchers are on top of things. Well that's a load off my mind. I can sleep easy now knowing that they've found a cure for farting. All right boys, next thing on the list... cancer? Nah, skip that one. AIDS? Maybe later. I got it! Let's get rid of sneezes! Who knows how many people will die from that this year!

Cooking Up Bad TV

Reality TV had its time, but enough is enough. They stick some people on a beach and tape them. Not that entertaining. So to spice it up a bit, they eliminate the whole wilderness aspect (along with the hopes that one of them may be attacked by some wild animal) and stick them in a house. Again, not that entertaining. But week after week, people will waste their time watching them, just because it's trendy, and not doing what the cool kids do is a fate worse than death, right?

They've made up watch people take vacations, build houses, paint a wall, plan their wedding, go on blind dates, dance around, and get their hair cut. All the while, the viewers sit at home watching other people's lives instead of going out and doing something themselves.

But nothing, ever, comes close to the lamest new reality show. Think of something you could see every day. Something that your mother has done in your house each and every day since the day you came home from the hospital. Something that you would potentially die without. Cooking. Yes, cooking. But not just any kind of cooking. A washed up, forgotten celebrity cooking. So if you've ever wondered what somebody looks like when they cook, and you're too lazy to walk to the kitchen to watch, have no fear. The television people had the bright idea of recording it for your convenience! How clever.

The only difference between watching celebrities cook and watching your mother cook, is that you don't get to eat any of the celebrity's food. Just watch them cook it. How thrilling.

Yet people watch this crap, so they will continue to make this crap. Just take any random household chore, slap a celebrity into it, and make it into a compitition, and then BAM! Every trendy wanna-be "cool" kid will watch it. Mark my words: keep an eye out for the celebrity bubble bath challenge.

Habs Blow Away Hurricanes

Ok, that was a lame headline. I apologize.

So the Montreal Canadians didn't get beaten as badly as I had expected. In fact, they dominated, scoring six unanswered goals on Carolina Hurricane's goal tender, Martin Gerber. The Canes came out and scored on the Canadians just seconds into the game. I sighed at this point, assuming that another one of Canada's NHL teams were doomed, but then they scored, and scored again and again and again and again and again. I'd like to see Montreal win the series, just because they're a Canadian team, but I really am not getting my hopes up. Carolina had an incredible series and between their Brind'Amour and their new star, Eric Staal, it's really no surprise that they were just a couple point away from being the number one team in the east.

Other winners last night were New Jersey over New York, Colorado over Dallas, and Buffalo over Philadelphia.

Clean Up Vancouver, Not Yourselves

The mayor of Vancouver has come up with a great idea. Well, he thinks it's great anyways. He is putting $500 000 into a program to provide free drugs to addicts if they agree to help clean up down town Vancouver in preparations for the 2010 Olympic games. Yes, that's right. If you can't afford to feed your heroine addiction, just grab a broom and the city will pay for all the heroine you need.

Of course I'm not promoting heroine use or anything like that. I think the mayor is a moron for proposing such a thing. He calls in a "win-win" situation. I laughed. He, to my surprise, received much criticism for proposing this idea but defends himself by saying that these people will get their drugs regardless, but at least this way they won't have to mug people and break into stores for it.

I'll admit, he has a good point. But I still think if I knew my tax dollars were going towards supplying the town's dead beats with their marijuana and cocaine, I may consider moving to a new town.

John Ferguson Jr Fails Bigtime

John Ferguson Jr, the General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs franchise, has let down the entire city of Toronto, and millions of fans nation wide. He traded some of the Leafs best players (Joe Nieuwendyk, Gary Roberts, Alexander Mogilny) for the washed up, concussion prone Eric Lindros. Yeah, Lindros is an incredible player, but only when he plays. This guy only manages to squeeze two or three games in a year before he's out injured. Ferguson tried to pin all their hopes on this one guy, one guy who isn't reliable. Nobody expected Lindros to stay healthy all season, and he didn't. He only played a handful of games. And the Leafs suffered as a result, missing the playoffs for the first time in nearly a decade.

But of course Ferguson pushed all the blame on head coach Pat Quinn. Quinn is one of the best coaches in the NHL and has coached Canada's world cup teams and Olympic teams, winning a gold medal in Salt Lake City. But Ferguson fired Pat Quinn as head coach of the Leafs in response to the poor season that the Leafs had. But when you look at the talent they had a couple seasons ago (Mats Sundin, Owen Nolan, Joe Nieuwendyk, Gay Roberts, Alexander Mogilny, Brian Leetch, Ron Francis) and how of that list, only Sundin remains, there's really no surprise at all that the Leafs had a disappointing season. But look at how the Leafs battled back towards the end of the season, winning all of their final 5 games. That was Pan Quinn. The players were tired and sick of their disappointing season, but Pat rallied them back to take one last stab at it. And this is how Ferguson repays him. The Leafs were really on a good path towards building a solid team that would have a chance at the cup back when Pat Quinn was the coach and the GM, but ever since Ferguson took over as GM, he has been dismantling the team and now it looks like it may be a long time until the Leafs are able to be a Stanley Cup contender.

The Queen is 80

Queen Elizabeth turns 80 today. Apparently she has received over 17 000 birthday wishes via email, 20 000 via snail mail, and piles of people were waiting outside Winsor Castle to wish her happy birthday when she woke up. This hardly seems fair.

Everyone threw a huge deal when the Queen mother turned 101, but when you think about it, anybody could live that long if they sat around doing squat all. I'm sure the Queen is a very nice lady, but I work at least a hundred times harder than her, and I have nobody waiting outside my house to wish me happy birthday.

The Queen plans on going to a birthday dinner hosted by her son Charles later today, and then her suck-up son will broadcast a television special in honor of his mother. Wow, he really wants that crown.
This is 300 people in New Zealand who woke up early to make an "80" on the lawn of the Government House. I, personally, would prefer to sleep than to celebrate the birthday of some old lady that I don't even know and really has no real power over anything. But that's just me.

The Baby's Here

Yesterday I reported on Tom Cruise and his soon-to-arrive baby. Well it arrived. A 7 lb 7 oz girl. Keeping with celebrity tradition, they gave it quite an original name... Suri. Cruise claims to have chosen it because in Hebrew it means "Princess", but I prefer the Japanese-to-English translation of the word: "pickpocket". Yes, if Tom Cruise's baby ever visits Japan, her name will be Pickpocket. Maybe she'll just hang around with a lot of Hebrew speaking people instead.

The couples spokesman hasn't said whether or not Katie Holmes was permitted by her fiance to use anesthetics or not, and also didn't comment on whether or not Cruise ate the placenta. Although Tom Cruise is a devote Scientologist, a group opposed to medicine, he says that it was not because of his religious beliefs that he didn't want Holmes to have any anesthetics. What a shame. At least that was half of an excuse... all he has left to blame it on now is that he's an asshole.

Tom Cruise Enjoys placenta

Tom Cruise and his fiance, Katie Holmes, are expecting a baby shortly. A while back I reported on celebrities being weird parents and naming their kids after fruit and prophets... but Tom Cruise, by a landslide, wins the Oscar for most mental father of the year.

First, Cruise forbids his wife to scream while she's giving birth. He thinks it's wrong for the first thing his baby hears is screaming. Like it'll remember. Second, he forbids her to use any medications to help relieve some of the pain, saying that it's not natural. And now, to top it all off, Tom Cruise has promised to eat the umbilical cord and placenta. Yes, eat it.

He said in an interview, "I'm gonna eat the placenta. I thought that would be good. Very nutritious. I'm gonna eat the cord and the placenta right there."

Now, in some cultures, it was believed that if a mother ate the placenta it could prevent postnatal depression, although there is no medical evidence to back up that this is nothing more than superstition. However, there is no culture and no superstitions about any benefits to the father eating it.

Yup, Tom Cruise is a weird one.

Business Trip Officially Released

My first ever novel is finally published and available to order. As you can tell from the picture on the left, it's called "Business Trip".

Basically it's about a guy, Clint Storm, who is just trying to get by. He hates his country and everything that goes with it, and is really shocked and torn in two directions when the emperor personally asks him to go on a secret mission to secure the empire's future. While he's away, a world-wide attack against his home country breaks out, and Clint gets caught up fighting against his own people. He learns a lot about himself, his family, and his past as he takes you on a fast paced journey that will forever change his world and keep you guessing right up until the end.

And just for all you artsy folk who love to analyze stuff and pick apart books, I've been told that there's a lot of hidden symbolism and all that good stuff in there too. So get your thinking caps on. Or if you just enjoy a good book, just read it through. That's the way it was originally intended anyways.

You can purchase your copy at http://www.lulu.com/content/219672 or if you live around St. John's just send me an email and I may be able to sell you a copy myself. There is a free, ten page, preview of the novel if you follow that link above. Enjoy. And watch out Dan Brown. Remember this face... or... whatever.

Benedict's First Easter

Happy Easter everyone. A weird holiday really. Religiously, it's the most important holiday of the year, yet for some reason it is not even close to the magnitude of Christmas we see celebrated by people all over the world each year. I guess people just love presents. Either way, it's Easter.

Pope Benedict is celebrating his first Easter in office at the Vatican and will be delivering his first ever Easter blessing as Pope. He said he was excited leading up the occasion. I suppose he would. He really doesn't seem to get outside much besides standing on his balcony to wave to people once a day.

Thousands of pilgrims have made the journey to Rome to hear the Pope talk today. I never really understood why Catholics did that. I mean, the Pope's just a normal guy who happens to be in charge of something. I love computers, but I wouldn't travel all the way to Rome to hear Bill Gates deliver an Easter blessing. Now if it was someone important, like Jesus or something, then I could understand going there. Anyone who can taking a beating like he did and still manage to stick around for 2000 years is worth traveling halfway around the world to see. But not the Pope. Just look at that guy's picture. He's just plain creepy. Like Emperor Palpatine trying to do that lightning trick with his hands... without so much success.

No More Red Mile in Calgary

With the NHL's regular season coming to a close, many teams are preparing for the playoffs. Among these, are the Calgary Flames, who proved that they are a serious contender back in 2003-2004, who came within one goal of winning the Stanley Cup. The fans in Calgary were loving it, partying in the middle of 17th Ave. each night that their team won. 17th Ave. quickly became known as Calgary's "Red Mile".

But, the Calgary police have announced that there will be none of that this year. Any celebrations from fans must be done indoors and at a reasonable volume, or so the cops say. Needless to say, the fans aren't too happy about it. Hockey is Canada's sport, so obviously Canadian fans are going to be excited when there team makes it as far as the Flames have.

The players on the Flames aren't too happy about it either. They loved it that the fans supported them so much and got so excited about their playoff run and are disappointed that it won't happen again this year. Well, actually it probably will happen again this year, but the police are threatening to place "rowdy" fans under arrest it they block off that street this year.

Oh my, haven't the cops got anything better to do? Are there no crimes being committed? No drug dealers out selling cocaine to kids? No convenience stores being robbed? Somebody must've given the Calgary police a bad batch of doughnuts. They seem awfully grumpy.

Google Makes Awesome Calendars

Google, the company which seems to do everything right, has struck gold again. They started off with the best search engine the internet has ever seen... then they completely revolutionized web-based email with their Gmail feature. They put MSN messenger to shame with their incredibly sleet and fast instant messenger, GoogleTalk, and now... yet again, they have Bill Gates sweating bullets with their release of GoogleCalendar.

Yesterday, Thursday, Google released this calendar to everyone with a Gmail account. I checked it out, and it is incredible. None of this clicking on an "add event" button and then filling in the time, date, and all that information into a bunch of fields, and then having to re-enter it all if any of the info changes later on. With GoogleCalendar, you click right on your calendar and a little pop-up box appears where you type in your event. If you have your calendar set to a day view, you can even drag the size of the event to cover several hours. And if something has to be moved to another day for some reason, don't worry. Just drag and drop that event to the new day and time. If you want to print off your daily, weekly, or monthly calendar, just click the little printer icon, and GoogleCalendar will automatically convert your selected view to a PDF, ready to print. It's really too cool for me to explain here, so if you have a Gmail account, drop by http://calendar.google.com and check out your calendar. Enjoy.

Britney's Not A Bad Mother... Supposedly

After a few public appearances with her new child being injured, Britney Spears was being blamed for the injuries and there was even a chance that she would face child endangerment charges. Of course, she denies it. She said the kid fell out of his high chair.

Spears' attorney said "They determined that the parents weren't involved in the injury and nothing was improper within the home."

Nothing wrong with that home? Have you seen her husband? Federline looks like he just crawled out of a bar fight after not showering for a few months. This guy is away "rapping" so often to feed his alcohol addiction that I don't even realize who he's married to yet. If you were married to Britney Spear, would you be away as often as he is? Nah-uh!

I won't go as far as to say he's beating his kid... but when you have somebody who's permanently hung over, and somebody else named Britney Spears trying to look after a kid, chances are that it was not properly put into the high chair and that's why it fell. Probably tried to stick him there with chewing gum or scotch tape. But hey, that's cool. She's Britney Spears.

Sundin's Six Saves Leafs for Now

As I've been saying for a long time now, the Leafs are in big trouble and need a lot of help to make it into the post-season. Well, their captain, Matts Sundin, decided to show them how it's done.

Before last night, the Leafs needed to win all of their remaining five games, and hope that the Tampa Bay Lightning loses three of their last four. Their game last night was no easy task, facing the Florida Panthers who have more than their fair share of talent with Jay Bouwmeester, Gary Roberts, Joe Nieuwendyk, superstar Olli Jokinen, and All-Star MVP goalie Roberto Luongo. The Leafs struggled early, giving the Panthers a 2-0 lead, but then Matts Sundin went insane and score two goals to tie it up. But after the Panthers kept answering back with goals of their own, it seemed like the Leafs were going to run out of time. But no, Sundin steps up again, putting in another two goals, and assisting on another to put the game into overtime. And then who should assist on the game winning goal? Yes, the Leaf's captain.

This guy scored or assisted all six goals that the Leafs scored. It was his seventh career hat-trick. Now if only all the Leafs wanted to win as badly as Sundin, they wouldn't be in such of a mess right now.

But hey, they won last night, and the Lightning lost last night. If they can keep it going, they're on a good path. But, I still think it's too little too late.

Proof Shot Dead

The rapper "Proof", a good friend of Eminem and band member in D-12, was shot at a night club after he got into a heated argument which escalated out of control. Ironically, the rapper was killed on Eight Mile Road, sharing its name with a movie by Eminem. "Proof"'s actual name was DeShaun Holton.

But wait. The irony doesn't end there. Most of his songs with D-12 were about gun violence and how he thought it was cool. He is most known for his song "Good Die Young" where he sings "Now my dreams are just dream cops and gun shots." It's pretty bad to be making fun of a dead guy, so I'll just end this now.