In the concrete aisle behind Box H at Ivor Wynne last evening, spouse drew to my attention a young lass wearing a black t-shirt that insisted, in very large lettering, “I HAVE A Ph. D.*” The asterisk naturally led one’s eye to the insignia emblazoned below in a somewhat smaller font, which indicated, “Pretty Huge Dick.”
Now, generally speaking, I’m not one for insisting that certain apparel be restricted in its wearing by either one gender or the other – except when the apparel in question is my favourite sweatshirt, spouse has her thirsty eyes all over it and is hatching a plot to carry it away to her secret underground treasure cave (which is, I believe, stocked to the roof with such sweatshirts). In this case, however, I think it would be wise to make an exception and consider the “Ph.D.” shirt to be dude-specific. Please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not suggesting the said garment would be appropriate or even funny when worn by a man. It would be, however, somewhat less puzzling and simplicity – not gender bending in your face-yo brain farts – is what I’m all about when I’m settling in to my seat with a tall boy in hand and oskee wee wee in my heart.
As for the game, Jason Maas failed to impress and was replaced early – too early, in my considered opinion – by Timmy Chang, who also failed to impress. The story really is the same as it has been since the beginning of the 2006 season: too many stupid penalties to get anything going. That story has no doubt been overshadowed by Maas’ struggles and the consequent failures of the Ticat offence, but in truth the lack of discipline and stupid penalties at stupid times were the undoing of Greg Marshall, as the ‘Cats lost a couple of games early last year either late or by only a few points in which the penalties were the difference. In the meantime, Maas got hurt, the offence went in the toilet, Ron Lancaster got fired and basically the entire receiving corps got changed. Predictably, they are still struggling to get on the same page. Throughout this entire time, however, the penalties have continued unabated – it’s just that nobody has really noticed them because the ‘Cats have been getting so thoroughly thumped that no single penalty has marked a turning point in any game for quite some time. There were some big momentum killing penalties last night, especially early. Think about last week’s season opener against Calgary: Maas isn’t backed up into his own end zone and facing second and twelve from the beer concession if the preceding punt return isn’t brought back fifty-something yards because of a stupid (i.e. unnecessary) block in the back, and we all know what happened when the punt WAS brought back. Jason threw that pass.
As an aside: spouse and I nearly busted a gut in the second half when two Ticats were involved in a pileup with an Argo receiver. There was the usual pushing and shoving (can’t have “pushing” without “shoving”) as they disengaged, but then something wondrous* happened. The two Ticats reached out, grabbed the Argo by the waistband of his pants and basically gave him the most public wedgie I’ve ever seen, right in front of the official on scene to break up the melee. The said official somehow either completely missed or completely ignored the wedgie, but threw a flag on the Argo receiver who retaliated by kicking backwards at his tormentors – and struck the ref in the shin. This, according to spouse, was the highlight of the game, to be followed closely by that fan who caught Steve Christie’s field goal in the third quarter and then ran around high stepping and “looking like a chicken”.
No doubt the sportstcasters and sportswriters will be calling for Maas to wear an “I AM A Ph. D.” t-shirt, but I tend to agree with Coach Taafe who bemoans the “microwave mentality”, the belief that things are going to get fixed in thirty seconds by pushing a button. No doubt right now, the soup is spoiled – step one towards fixing it is to instill a little discipline in the trooops.
*by wondrous, I mean of course, “puerile, juvenile and foolish.”