Tuesday, May 17, 2011 3:01 PM EDT
NHL sends in the lawyers
Afternoon all.
You’ll have to forgive the terse, bellicose tone of this week’s instalment, but we’ve been huddled with the gang from legal and their calculated-to-intimidate $5,000 bespoke Philippe Dubuc power suits.
French Immersion Properties PLC, you see, is in the midst of a very clever and possibly doomed intellectual property law manoeuvre to trademark the word “hockey”.
Link to this post
Tuesday, April 5, 2011 2:23 PM EDT
Why not the Habs?
Deep in the bowels of French Immersion’s flamboyantly-designed complex in Montreal’s branché Plateau district, there is a vault.
And in that vault (okay, it's really a bookshelf) is a document – a notepad, actually, which may or may not have a moderate to serious coffee stain on the back of it.
In that notepad is the explosive evidence that FI will not hesitate to produce as evidence of the ridiculous hypocrisy and incipient hysteria that defines the Habs fan should the occasion arise (blackmail is such an ugly word).
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 11:09 AM EDT
Pierre Groulx, goalie whisperer
So there's this guy.
He's at almost all the Habs’ practices, he's on the ice, he wears one of those spiffy CH tracksuits. Ball cap. Whistle. Left-handed stick.
His name isn't Kirk, or Perry, and it sure isn't Jacques.
He never played in the big pro leagues, or even in the small ones.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011 3:37 PM EST
Pacioretty hit the latest example of the unexplainable
There is a soon-to-be two-year-old boy in our house and on most mornings the first word that spills out of his mouth, generally at top, insistent volume is: hockey.
It’s typically followed by a mad run to the living room and an extended finger in the direction of the television.
Hockey! Hockey!
And when his parents are feeling particularly bleary-eyed – so almost every day, then – he is allowed to watch a few PVR’ed highlights of the previous night’s game.
Not today. Not after that game.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011 9:30 AM EST
Alex Harvey deserves your attention
This week, the tall foreheads in FI’s re-imagining centre (no, we’re not sure what those people actually do either), bring you a ‘what if?’
Yeah, yeah, we can hear your harrumphing, it’s not exactly a sparkling news writerly device, but just bear with us.
What if all of a sudden, a generation of kids were to eschew the traditional demands for hockey sweaters and $250 composite sticks in favour of, gasp, cross-country skis?
Wednesday, February 23, 2011 12:36 AM EST
Who cares, really?
Would, dear people, that we were as close-knit a family as the Montreal Canadiens, that valorous band of brothers that has yet to encounter an obstacle it couldn’t surmount.
Other than the Flyers and a decade’s worth of trips to Western Canada, of course, which our boy Sekeres ably describes here.
No, we are a fractious bunch in this country, fighting over the last pork chop, pinching each other when mom’s not looking, seething for months over slights both real and imagined.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 10:58 AM EST
The curtain rises on Carbo’s second act
Sure, we don’t look like much. But the handsomely compensated, chronically under-worked French Immersion executive committee knows a thing or two about reaching lofty heights, only to swiftly tumble back into the muck.
For instance: we were part of the plucky Cinderella team that captured the McGill Intramural “C” League hockey championship in 1991.
Hey, a cup’s a cup, even if it’s an easily-chipped glass beer stein.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011 10:28 PM EST
The view from the true mid-point
Favourite anecdote from all-star weekend: our boy Pernell Karl having to scurry around at the last minute to find appropriate red-carpet wear.
Turns out young Mr. Subban hadn't packed a suit when he left Montreal, thinking he would be spending the weekend messing around with his pals and younger brothers in Toronto.
And he did just fine, turning up in a spiffy pin-striped ensemble that was more or less exactly halfway between Carnaby Street dandy and mafia don.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011 11:21 AM EST
Matthew Darche’s long journey to the NHL
There is a scourge descending upon this and other lands, loyal and gentle public.
And your friends at French Immersion, despite their many irredeemable flaws, are willing to speak its name: homerism.
That’s right. No use burying our heads or mincing words.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011 1:10 PM EST
Shh, genius at work
Cocky, they sniff.
Showboat.
Thinks he's a big-time Charlie; talks when he should be listening; one day someone's going to fix his wagon but good.
French Immersion Contributors
Sean Gordon
Sean Gordon covers sports in the Globe and Mail's Montreal bureau and admits to being a long-suffering Newcastle United supporter. Raised in Ottawa, he studied political science and economics at McGill University, where he discovered the wonder that is Forum hot dogs, and journalism at the University of Regina, where he developed an unreasonable attachment to the "other" Riders. Prior to joining the Globe in 2008, he covered crime, politics and sports, at various points, for the Calgary Herald, Montreal Gazette and Toronto Star, and during 15 years in newspapers has written on topics ranging from rodeo cowboys to street gangs in Haiti.
