Life In the Trenches with Jude St.John

What is the Meaning of Meaningless?

2008-11-01T12:44:00.001-04:00

Rails from the Rails 23 – What’s the Meaning of Meaningless?(as seen here)

All Aboard: “The spirit, the will to win, and the will to excel are the things that endure. These qualities are so much more important than the events that occur.” – Vince Lombardi

Tickets Please: Games have meaning on many layers and in many ways. When people suggest that some football games are meaningless I wish they would be more specific. We have found ourselves with two games at the end of the season that have no meaning in a certain sense: we cannot make the playoffs. And make no mistake; this is extremely frustrating and disappointing. But even in the standings, these games are still significant. Where we finish will determine where and when we get to pick in the coming year’s draft. And the outcomes of the games have a big impact on the other teams who are fighting for playoff positioning. Thus, the games are significant in the standings despite our untimely exit from the playoffs. I would like to discuss 3 other ways in which these apparently meaningless games have great meaning for the players: competition, character, and “corazon”.
Competitive Significance – All games have great meaning for competitors. CFL athletes rose to the elite level they are at because, for the most part, they are very competitive. Competition is the fuel that fires their engines. Under no circumstance am I, or any other CFLer, indifferent about winning or losing. To win is the thing! Furthermore, most football positions, especially those on the line of scrimmage, compete in a fashion that is akin to hand-to-hand combat. We contact, collide, and carom of one another with significant force. If you lose on the gridiron it is probably because the other team physically beat you down. And that infuses every play of every game with meaning. It means a great deal to me from a competitive standpoint if I get beat up, beat down, or just plain beat.
Character Consequence – These games have meaning because they are both creators of character and indicators of character. Games like these show what kind of integrity a person has. Does one prepare and practice for this game as you would for any other? Does one exert the same amount of effort in games that seemingly lack playoff implications? Is one as passionate for this competition as others? If a player answers no to any of the preceding queries I think that their integrity is called into question. But, if one pursues excellence in these games as he would in many others than his character is strengthened and he has shown himself to be who he purports to be. If “character is king”, then I don’t want to be the emperor with no clothes.
Corazon - Corazon is the Spanish word for heart. In ancient times and now, the heart can mean both the physical organ responsible for circulating blood and the seat of one’s intellect, will, and emotions. In this piece I mean to use the word in the latter sense; the heart is the core of your being. And let me share a sentiment that I have about losing. When I am part of a losing effort in a football game, I feel as if a small part of me dies. A loss causes an infarction of the soul as it were. As players we take losing to heart. And though we can learn from losses and persevere through them, they are painful. Where winning can seem like really living, losing can seem like a death of sorts. And for this reason, all games are infused with meaning and significance beyond their effect of the standings or the win-loss record they create.
Thus, for of the sake character, competition, and corazon these games must be considered meaningful.

Last Stop: Vince Lombardi is well known in coaching circles as a coach who magnified and extolled the importance of winning. His quotes on winning are some of the best known quotes from the world of sport. I was recently informed the offensive coordinator Steve Buratto spent some time under Coach Lombardi as a player when he tried out for the Green Bay Packers.

Rails from the Rails 22 – Political Musings

2008-10-22T20:38:00.000-04:00

Rails from the Rails 22 – Political Musings

All Aboard: “In politics, madame, you need two things: friends, but above all an enemy.” Brian Mulroney.

Tickets Please: If you care to read an earlier Rail from the Rails on politics you can see it here. Allow me to share with you some further musings on politics.

• The leader who is the best politician at the moment is Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Now before you Harper-haters go off on a rant allow me to explain myself. This is not necessarily a compliment. Considering the negative impression most Canadians have about politicians, labeling one of them “the best” isn’t necessarily praise. I think Harper is the best because he plays the political game with more savvy than the other leaders do. His last minority government lasted longer than most thought it would and his new government has more support now than the last one. Were it not for the economic crash I think Harper may have had a majority government. We’ll see how the Conservatives fare this time around.

• I hate the negative advertising. But I hate the fact that it works even more. I hear many people complaining about the negative advertising that political parties use during elections. It seemed Dion got more than his fair share of the negativity but the Prime Minister got a dose as well. Many websites I visited had a banner ad at the top of the page that had a picture of Stephen Harper alongside George Bush as if they were running mates. The other parties fly under the radar for much of this type of propaganda. I’m guessing the Liberals and Conservatives do not feel the need to fight the NDP, Green Party, and Bloc in this fashion. I liken the complaints about negative advertising to the complaints that sports fans spew when talking about professional athlete’s salaries. Here’s an idea: if you think athletes are paid too much stop paying exorbitant ticket prices and stop buying jerseys and stop watching the games on TV. As matter of fact come to a CFL game because it is a lot cheaper and you probably make more than some of the guys on the field. Sport figure’s salaries and the effects of negative advertising are both something the average person is responsible for.

• What happened to the NDP and the Green Party? This was supposed to be their year. I guess not. I think in some respects they have the advantage when delivering promises: they’re not going to have to back them up. Elizabeth May was an intriguing personality during the debates. One thing she supports which I really like is the idea of income splitting. This would save my family thousands of dollars in taxes every year. But, I also realize she can put forward this idea on her platform with little chance of having to actually see it through. I think voters realize that the smaller parties aren’t held to the same level of scrutiny as the larger ones and take that into consideration when voting.

• Our election does seem boring compared to the US election frenzy. It has been quite a ride with starting with the battles that Obama and McCain fought to represent their parties. This was followed by the meteoric rise of Mrs. Palin and the ensuing media circus. And they are all appearing on Letterman and Saturday Night Live and Leno. And think of the money being spent. It’s high drama for sure. But would you want that here in Canada? Not I. I’ll take our process for us and watch their horse and pony show from afar.

• I heard on a radio talk show a caller complaining about the cost of the election to tax payers. The host informed the caller that it worked out to be about $25 per Canadian to cover the cost. That seems to me to be a small price to pay in order to participate in democracy.

Last Stop:

Where does the term Tory come from? The name originally applied in the 17th century to Irish Roman Catholic outlaws and bandits who harassed the English in Ireland. In the reign of Charles II the name came to be applied as an abusive term to supporters of the Crown. It came from the Irish word toraighe which means pursuer.

And what about Grit? “Clear Grits” were reformers in the Province of Upper Canada. Their support was concentrated among southwestern Ontario farmers, who were frustrated and disillusioned by a lack of democratic enthusiasm. "Clear Grit" was a complimentary term meaning tenacious or dedicated. The name derives from a quote by party member David Christie who describes the movement as "all sand and no dirt; clear grit all the way through", a reference to the type of sand preferred in the preparation of masonry. The word "Grit" is used as a neutral reference to members of the Liberal Party in English Canada.

Rails from the Rails 21 – Coffee Chronicles – Part 2

2008-10-20T12:38:00.002-04:00

Rails from the Rails 21 – Coffee Chronicles – Part 2 (as seen here)

All Aboard: You can view Part 1 of the Coffee Chronicles on the Argos website

Tickets Please: I have made another monumental leap in my coffee consumption journey. In the aforementioned Rails from the Rails I shared with the reader about my penchant for great coffee and my pursuit of this quaff by grinding and brewing my coffee. Well I have taken yet another step in the process into my own hands; I now roast my own coffee. I bought a home roasting appliance called the I-Roast 2. Well, I actually did not buy it for myself rather my wife bought it for me as a Father’s Day gift. Since receiving the roaster I have put it through its paces and have roasted over 20 pounds of coffee. I also learned how to roast coffee with an air popcorn popper. Perhaps some of you youngsters did not realize that popcorn has not always been made in the microwave. The process of roasting coffee beans is quite interesting.

Roasting coffee beans is exactly what it sounds like. It is applying heat to the beans in order to roast them. Many roasters apply the heat to a drum which holds the beans. My home roaster applies the heat on a “bed” of hot air. It really is a glorified hot air popcorn popper. A coffee bean, which is actually a seed, is usually a greenish colour in its un-roasted state. When the roast begins it does not take long for the greenish colour to change to yellow and emit a grassy aroma. The heat begins to dry out the beans which naturally contain water. The roasting process does all of the following: release water from the bean, caramelize the natural sugars of the bean, release oils, and break down the beans structure. These processes continue until you remove the beans from the heat or until the beans combust. Removing the beans before combustion is crucial to deriving palatable coffee. The longer the heat is applied to the bean the darker the roast will be. Generally, the darkest coffee most of us drink is French roast. Different levels of roast produce a huge range of tastes and textures in the coffee and determining roast levels is very much a matter of personal preference. That is where home roasting comes in.

I now have the ability to roast my coffee to my own specifications. I can get my machine “dialed in” so that I can have coffee the exact way I like it. Now this isn’t all that easy as I have to garner this information through my own tests and trials. But the many cups that are produced in searching for the perfect brew are enjoyable in themselves. My wife has declared that I already have made the perfect cup of coffee. Early on in my experimentation I blended a dark Kenyan bean with a lighter-roasted Cost Rican bean and, in my wife’s opinion, this was the best to date. I keep notes on all the different beans and roasts so that if I do mange to make something worth trying again the information can be retrieved. It really is a lot of fun. And it has been going on for quite some time.

Traditional methods of roasting are believed to date back to the fourteenth century. Originally coffee was roasted in iron pans and it can still be roasted in similar fashion today. I have talked to some people whose parents or grandparents roasted their own coffee on the stove top or on baking sheets in the oven. Modern roasters can be very technological appliances as companies who sell coffee now need to be precise and consistent in making their particular brand. But there are still some who like to do it the traditional way.

Roasting coffee at home has been an interesting endeavour for me. It is yet another way for me to enjoy my beverage of choice. A little over the top? Perhaps. But wait until you taste a cup of my coffee.

Last Stop: Perhaps one day I’ll serve you a cop of coffee at the St.John Coffee house but until then you can consider this backhanded compliment served up by Duane Forde: While veterans Mike O'Shea, Chad Folk, and Jude St. John are clearly on the downside of their impressive careers, they remain valuable assets to the organization as mentors to the young Canadians who will one day succeed them. Ouch! Duane does a great job with his new job at TSN but don’t you think he could have given a fellow UWO alumnus a little more love than that? The truth hurts I guess.

Rails from the Rails 20 – Many Partings

2008-09-21T18:29:00.001-04:00

Rails from the Rails 20 – Many Partings (this post did not make the Argonauts website)

All Aboard: The title of this piece is the same as a chapter title from The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien. This quote can be found in that same book: But Sam was now sorrowful at heart, and it seemed to him that if the parting would be bitter, more grievous still would be the long road home alone. I recently wrote on partings and I am doing the same far too soon!

Tickets Please: We have had several Argonauts leave our ranks in the last few weeks and I’d like to mention a few things about each.

Orlondo Steinauer – Though a common saying in locker-rooms around the league is that “nothing surprises me anymore”, I think we were all surprised when “O” was released this past week. I have played on the same team with Orlondo for the majority of my career. He is an incredibly gifted football player who has been an all-star at every position in the secondary. I am not sure if anyone has ever done that before. Orlondo has been a leader of our team since he arrived. He is one of those guys who make going to work everyday worthwhile. There are not many players who I have played with that I look to for approval, but “Steiny” was one of them. If he looked you in the eye after a game and told you “Good job!” you knew that you had been successful. You cannot replace a player like Orlando. The best you can do is hope to be successful without him. I wish him all the best.

Michael Bishop – Michael Bishop belongs on the field as a starting quarterback. And so I have mixed feelings about his departure. Although he was a good friend, and was coming off his best year in the CFL despite a serious injury, I am glad that he will be a starter in Saskatchewan. It was difficult to watch him in a back-up role yet again. Michael is a fierce competitor and is arguably the best athlete at the QB position that I have ever played with. I have not seen a stronger arm in all my years around football…Matt Dunnigan was close but I would still go with “Bish”. Mike was a lot of fun in the dressing room and on the field. It is disappointing to see him leave but I believe he still has productive years ahead of him and I hope that he finds success when ever he plays… except against us.

Ross Weaver – Life can be ironic. The same week that Ross Weaver willingly answered the US Air Force’s recall to active duty, Canada was deporting Iraq war deserter Robin Long. There are many people who support Long’s desertion which he made on grounds that the war in Iraq was against his morals. I believe that it is fully in Long’s right to object to the war as illegal and unjust. But it seems to me that a man so concerned with principles would have remained in the US, gone to trial, and accepted the judgment of the military court. As it turns out, this is what has happened with Long who has been dishonourably discharged and sentenced to 15 months in prison. Contrast that story with Ross Weaver who has dutifully returned to his position within the Air Force. The core values of the Us Air Force are “Integrity first, Service before self, and Excellence in all we do.” Ross Weaver is an apt example of someone with these core values. Good on you, Ross.

Last Stop: How is this for a backhanded compliment served up by Duane Forde: While veterans Mike O'Shea, Chad Folk, and Jude St. John are clearly on the downside of their impressive careers, they remain valuable assets to the organization as mentors to the young Canadians who will one day succeed them. Ouch! Duane does a great job with his new job at TSN but don’t you think he could have given a fellow UWO alumnus a little more love than that? The truth hurts I guess.

Rails from the Rails 19 – Let the Music Play

2008-08-21T08:58:00.001-04:00

Rails from the Rails 19 – Let the Music Play (as seen here)

All Aboard: "Music hath charms to soothe a savage beast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak." William Congreve

Tickets Please: In yet another glimpse into the world of the CFL footballer, I’d like to share with you some thoughts about the music that is listened to in the locker-room before a game. If you watch The Office regularly, you will have seen the episode in which Dwight and Jim go on a sales call together. Dwight insists on being left alone for a few minutes in Jim’s car. Dwight plays a rock anthem on the car’s stereo to get psyched-up for the sales call. This is a good image of a football team listening to music before a game. They are using the music as a tool to prepare for the game. I am no expert on music, but as far as I can see there are 3 criteria that football players look for when choosing pre-game music: type of music, lyrics, and the nostalgia factor.

As mentioned, I am no expert on music. I cannot define or even describe in any detail the different notes, scales, melodies, sounds, beats, rhythms, or harmonies that constitute a powerfully motivating song. But I do know that you rarely hear any folk, gospel, classical, jazz or soft rock songs before a game. From Air Supply to Zamfir, the easy-listening music does not get much air time. But harder and heavier music, from AC/DC to Zeppelin, gets the nod. Rap and rock get the lion’s share when it comes to what gets played in the dressing room. I think most of us would agree that the bolder, brasher music is more likely to get one amped up for competition. Now I remember back a few years when Clifford Ivory used to listen to gospel music before a contest. I also remember how he used to drive Sandy Annunziata crazy by belting out the lyrics for the whole team to hear. But for the most part, whether it is golden boy Michael Phelps listening to rap music before another record-breaking performance or the Toronto Argonauts listening to heavy metal before taking to the gridiron, music with loud beats or lots of base gets preferred.

Lyrics can also make a song acceptable to get the troops motivated. It seems that lyrics which encourage urgency and success are often used to help motivate. Consider the lyrics to Van Halen’s song Right Now:

Right now, hey
it’s your tomorrow
Right now,
C'mon, it's everything
Right now,
Catch a magic moment, do it
Right here and now
It means everything.

The emphasis it places on the moment can be used by athletes to think about the urgency of playing well. Or take a look at Eminem’s words in his rap Lose Yourself:

Look, if you had one shot, one opportunity
To seize everything you ever wanted – One moment
Would you capture it or just let it slip?
You better lose yourself in the music, the moment
You own it, you better never let it go
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime

And if you can’t feel, see, and hear the lyrical superiority of Survivor’s Eye of the Tiger over Kim Carnes’ Bette Davis Eyes then there is no amount of explaining that I can do that will help you. Lyrics that motivate will get a song some time on a locker-room iPod.

The final criterion for acceptable game day music is probably the most powerful of the three: nostalgia. Songs that remind us of the past are particularly popular, especially songs that we listened to while preparing for competitions when we were younger. Play a classic rock song by Guns N’ Roses or Aerosmith and Chris “Hard Rock” Hardy will find you and tell you how he used to listen to this song while preparing for high school hockey games. Memories of teams and games from the past often have a very stimulating psychological effect. It makes you want to “get after it”! For me, classic rock has this influence. I can remember sitting in the hockey dressing room before big games with Tom Cochrane and Red Ryder’s Lunatic Fringe playing. And when I hear that song it makes me forget the aches and pains of 18 years of football and for a brief moment I feel like I’m 15 again. Powerful stuff!

The triumvirate of music-type, lyrics, and nostalgic-effect are the keys to discerning what music will be played in a locker-room before the players take the field. If you can find a song that meets all 3 criteria, you’ll definitely have a song that guys want to hear. It seems to me that the most popular pre-game song is Phil Collins’ In the Air Tonight. It combines a haunting musical score with lyrics that point towards the urgency and electricity that is in a locker-room:

I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, oh Lord
I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord
I've been waiting for this moment all my life, oh Lord, oh Lord
I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lord
And I've been waiting for this moment all my life, oh Lord, oh Lord
I can feel it coming in the air, I can feel it coming in the air I've been waiting for this moment all my life, my life.

Last Stop: Three songs with which Offensive Lineman can relate to:

1) Much Too Young by Garth Brooks

And the white line's getting longer and the saddle's getting cold
I'm much too young to feel this damn old
All my cards are on the table with no ace left in the hole
I'm much too young to feel this damn old

2) Baba O’Reilly by The Who

Out here in the fields
I fight for my meals
I get my back into my living

3) Sundown by Gordon Lightfoot

Sometimes I think it's a shame
When I get feelin' better when I'm feelin' no pain

Rails from the Rails 18 – Are you hurt or are you injured?

2008-08-21T08:55:00.000-04:00

Rails from the Rails 18 – Are you hurt or are you injured? (as seen here)

All Aboard: “Are you hurt or are you injured? Because if you are hurt, you can still play. But if you are injured, you can’t.” – Larry Haylor, retired UWO football coach

Tickets Please: With the rash of injuries to marquee players that the CFL has been confronted with I decided I would share some thoughts I had about this unfortunate aspect of the game.

Along with many not-so-serious injuries, I have had several serious ones. My most serious injury occurred in my third year of professional football. I was playing for the Ticats at the time. In the 8^th game of the season I suffered multiple fractures in my lower leg. The tibia and fibula both “broke” with the tibia being a compound fracture: this means the bone broke through the skin. Another serious injury I experienced was a herniated disc resulting in back surgery. This was way back in 1992. And lastly, I re-injured my left lower leg in 1999 while with the Argos. I broke my fibula, again, and it was displaced and required surgery. Those are the big ones and now that they are out on the table let me address my first thought on injuries: they are part of the game!

I once had a friend ask me if I had ever wondered why a serious injury had happened to me. I think he was looking for a metaphysical explanation such as bad luck, karma, or the like. I had his full attention when I told him I knew why it happened. I told him it was because I was employed in a high risk job and that playing a violent sport such as football exposed me to such injuries. They are part of the game. If I worked at a desk all day I probably would not have a metal plate in my leg. He was less than satisfied with my answer but I think it reflects the approach most football players take when it comes getting hurt. I have heard very few players lament “Why me?”

The second thought I had about injuries and football was the relatively common disregard players have for the issue. Most guys I have played are not preoccupied with actual injuries or the chance an injury might befall them. I think if a player was overly concerned with the harm that might come his way he would not be able to focus on the game. Players certainly take precautions such as taping their ankles or bracing their knees. But when the game starts it is not something that footballers dwell on.

My final notion about injuries pertains to recovery and rehabilitation. One of a footballer’s finest moments comes when he battles back from an injury to play again. I have seen many inspirational comebacks by players who have shown their mettle by persevering through rehab to play again. I would not wish an injury on anyone, but they are character builders as well as life lessons. At least they have been for me.

Let’s all hope for the safety of CFLers this season while at the same time understanding that injuries are part of the game. At least that is my position.

Last Stop: One injury in particular causes alarm for us players: a serious neck injury. I, along with the rest of the people who love this game, was very relieved to see Jason Tucker of the Edmonton Eskimos smiling at Edmonton’s game this week. I wish him all the best as he continues to recover.

Rails from the Rails 17 – Fans Say the Darndest Things

2008-08-02T17:02:00.000-04:00

Rails from the Rails 17 – Fans Say the Darndest Things (as seen here)

All Aboard: “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” Seneca

Tickets Please: Part of being a professional athlete is the inevitable interaction we have with our fans. We meet them at events, on the street, and at our games and practices. Most of these exchanges are good, some are bad, and some are neither here or there. In the category of neither here nor there a few misconceptions regularly surface. I would like to address these ideas for a few reasons: one, I think they are inaccurate; two, according to my teammates they occur frequently; and three, they are a pet peeve of mine.

The first myth I would like to dispel is the one that causes those not part of the Canadian Football Player’s fraternity to envy those of us who play because we have 6 months off every year. It is as if people think that once the season is over players go on an extended vacation until the next year’s training camp. This is certainly not the case. When I first entered the CFL over 14 years ago, off-season preparation was in full swing. The days showing up to training camp to get in shape were long gone. Off-seasons are rife with training and preparing for the next year. I usually take 1 month off from training and then it is back to the workouts. And once I start it is a 5 or 6 day a week commitment. The training sessions usually end up being at least 2 hours in duration. So, even though it is the “off” season most CFLers are hard at work. Add to that the fact that many players find a job for the off-season to prepare for their life after football. For the first 11 years of my football career I was a substitute teacher in London. Now most of my off-season work centers around speaking and appearances. Many other players fill their out of season time with other work. I doubt there would be many people envious of Brian Ramsay at 6:00pm on a weeknight. Brian would be on the GO train after a day in the office where he works as an accountant. But he wasn’t on his way home to kick off his shoes and put his feet up. He was heading to the training facility to get his workout in. And those workouts are grueling affairs where one pushes oneself to get to a new level of physical readiness. Only after this would Brian head home for a short night’s sleep before doing it all over again the next day. That is one example to show that CFL athletes have an off-season that isn’t very “off”.

The second idea I’d like to scrutinize is one that also comes up frequently in conversations with people who know we play sports professionally. This is not limited to footballers as I have heard similar things from other professional athletes I have met. It usually comes out when in the course of a conversation we hear: “Man, you are lucky to be getting paid to play a game!” Now I realize that this phrase could mean a few different things. The person speaking could really be meaning to say that they think it is cool that your occupation is a playing a sport. Or they could simply be trying to communicate the idea that they would love to be in your shoes (or cleats as we call them). I have no problem with those sentiments. But I think some people are saying that they attribute our position as professional athletes to chance or good fortune. Now, I don’t even believe in luck. I’m more likely to attribute things to providence than chance. That being said, if by luck the person is thinking of the aforementioned quote by Seneca than I would accept that. Most professional athletes, of any discipline, have been successful because they have PREPARED themselves. They have worked hard to put themselves in a favourable position for the opportunities that come their way. Luck and chance are not keys to success for athletes. More likely they have been disciplined, passionate, and indefatigable in the pursuit of their dream. There are some athletes that are so naturally gifted that they do not have to work very hard but for the majority that is not the case. Before you tell a professional athlete how lucky he or she is, be sure to let them know you understand that they have toiled for their chance to do what they are doing.

Let me tell you a quick story that illustrates the final notion that really gets my goat. My second training camp in the CFL saw me at Brock University getting ready to try out for the Hamilton Tigers-Cats. The day before the training camp started I was walking across a parking lot heading to the dorms we would be staying in. A black Camaro with heavy metal blaring on the stereo slowly pulled up beside me. Inside the car was a flabby, long-haired stereotypical “rocker” puffing on a cigarette. The individual questioned me: “Do you know if they allow walk-ons at this training camp?” As it turns out, this fellow had played highschool football a few years back and was interested in trying his hand at professional football. WOW! I actually come across this quite often. Whether it is the one–time athlete who played football years before or the big man who has never played but towers over the average guy, many people insinuate that they could be playing professional football. “I played football my senior year in highschool and I was pretty good. Do you think I should try out?” Sure, if you’d like to spend some time in a hospital or rehab facility. Sometimes I feel like responding with this: “When I was young I used to pretty good at the Milton Bradley game Operation. Do you think I should become a surgeon?” Now, I do not mean to be arrogant. And certainly there are many great athletes who were overlooked when they were young. And if professional football is a dream of yours than regardless of your gridiron pedigree I would not dissuade you from your journey. There are guys who have never played football who make it professionally. But understand that these are the exception and the fact that they succeed is usually because of their incredible athleticism. Professional athletes are a very select group of individuals who have honed their skills so that they can participate in their sport at a very high level.

Please do not take these grumblings of this curmudgeon too seriously. I may just have a burr under my shoulder pads. And do not think that athletes critique all the things that get said in conversations with fans. We enjoy the interaction. I encourage you to interact with us as you always have.

I’m sure that I, and other athletes, say perfectly inane things regularly. Maybe you’d like to tell me about it. Feel free: football@judestjohn.ca.

Last Stop: Another good quote about luck: Depend on the rabbit's foot if you will, but remember it didn't work for the rabbit. ~R.E. Shay

Rails from the Rails 16 - A Great Game, A Terrible Business

2008-07-12T13:19:00.000-04:00

Rails from the Rails 16 - A Great Game, A Terrible Business(as seen here)

All Aboard: The following is an excerpt from a message I received from a fan and friend:

If you're ever stumped for an idea I would love to read how the off season (or mid season) roster changes affect the team atmosphere. What kind of effect does, or can, it have in the locker room? How does it change the game for you when you play against guys like Jeff Keeping, or Jordan Younger later on? How hard is it for a new guy to fit in, especially if he's traded for a long time team mate? Just something to think about.

I have decided to share a few thoughts I have about this topic.

Tickets Please: I think the title of this piece sums it up. The personnel changes that can happen to a team can be beneficial on the field but remain difficult for the players off the field. I first heard this saying from long-time teammate and sometimes sage Chad Folk. It bears repeating. Talking about professional football he said “It’s a great game, but it’s a terrible business.” Well, terrible might not have been the adjective he used but you get the idea. There are several things which cause player movement and I’ll tackle them one at a time.

The first locker-room altering event is a trade. Over the course of my career, trades have been relatively rare. Considering the fact that they are a constant possibility, they actually don’t happen very often. That being said, there are 2 trades that have affected our locker-room and me personally to a greater degree than the others. The first was a trade orchestrated by J. I. Albrecht and John Huard. I remember walking into the locker-room the first day of training camp to be informed that our own Mike O’Shea had been traded. O’sh has always been a team leader and an important cog of the machinery that makes up a healthy locker-room. Aside from being a friend, Mike is and was one of the best linebackers to play our game. His replacement, Calvin Tiggle, was an excellent player as well but was not someone I was good friends with. I think that was a rather bad first step on a perilous journey for Albrecht and Huard. This year we I had a similar experience with a player who I have spent 1/3 of my life sharing the same locker-room. Again, this was a difficult situation and many of us miss seeing Prefontaine on a daily basis. These types of “blockbuster” trades, as well as many others, definitely remind the players that this is a business. And the constant changing of personnel definitely causes a constant morphing of the locker-room chemistry.

Free-agency is another occurrence that can cause player movement. There have been many friends I have watched leave a team I have been on for other teams. This can be tough, sometimes tougher than the trades because the person who leaves often does so by his own volition. He likely has good reasons to do so, but it still leaves one wishing they didn’t leave. In my first year playing with the Argonauts I had the good fortune of playing with fellow offensive lineman Jeremy O’Day. He was also my roommate when we went on road trips. Jeremy is a good friend despite the fact that we only played together one year. The following year O’Day signed with Saskatchewan as a free agent. He has gone on to have a stellar career there. However, it would have been nice to keep him around a little longer so I could have continued to teach him in his apprenticeship as a fisherman. I was reminded of another good friend lost to free-agency a few weeks back. I had phone interview to do with Mike Hogan and Sandy Annunziata. Upon getting on air, I was verbally lambasted by Sandy for my physical appearance…man I miss that guy. Sandy made the locker-room a place for laughing even if you had to laugh at yourself once in awhile. This year the o-line watched another good friend leave for another team. Jeff Keeping, not only a friend but a UWO grad as well, signed with Montreal. Jeff was a great locker-room guy and was a lot of fun. He is missed regularly and us o-lineman are constantly text messaging him to let him know what he is missing. Free agency is another way in which a football team faces changes. It would be easy to call it a bad thing, but one must also remember that free agency brings its share of good guys into the locker-room as well.

The last way we can lose teammates is through retirement. Retirement is an interesting event because sometimes it is chosen and sometimes it is forced upon people. Jimmy Kemp is one of the best friends I have played football with. He opted to retire from football in order to pursue other interests. Jimmy still had years of playing left in his body but he chose a different route. Though he has been retired for quite a few years, I still find myself saying “I wish Kemp was around to see this!” Noah Cantor is another good friend who retired while still able to play the game at a high level. Being a defensive lineman he had many faults, but he was still a good guy who made the locker-room a more enjoyable place to be. Losing such quality individual cannot but make a difference to a team and individual players.

I have gone through the three main ways in which rosters are altered: trades, free agency and retirement. They cause a considerable amount of change in a locker-room. At times, a new player can step in and compensate for the loss of the player that they are replacing. But sometimes that is not possible regardless of how great the new guy is. How well a new player fits in really depends on the new player. Is he going to buy in to what the team is doing? Is he willing to fill the role that he has been brought in for? It takes all types to make a team successful and there is room for many personalities. Football players quickly learn that player movement and roster instability are part and parcel of the game, or business, that we participate in. One has to deal with these changes as anyone else would in their own line of work. Sometimes it is fairly easy, while other times it is much more difficult. And with the loss of some teammates one is never quite the same.

I appreciate the feedback I receive from many of you in regards to Rails from the Rails. In an effort to hear back from more of you, here is an email you can send comments to: football@judestjohn.ca. I hope to hear from you.

Last Stop: Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art.... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival. ~C.S. Lewis

Rails from the Rails 15 – The World for a Cup of Coffee

2008-07-03T08:27:00.000-04:00

Rails from the Rails 15 – The World for a Cup of Coffee (as seen here)

All Aboard: Coffee leads men to trifle away their time, scald their chops, and spend their money, all for a little base, black, thick, nasty, bitter, stinking nauseous puddle water. ~The Women's Petition Against Coffee, 1674

Tickets Please: Lots of people have a drinking problem. But it usually is an issue of drinking too much alcohol. My problem is with a beverage of another sort; coffee. I am a hardcore coffee drinker. I have a minimum of 3 coffees a day, whether I need them or not. And over the past several months I have indulged in the world of coffee more than I have in any other period of my life. I’d like to share a little bit of that journey with you.

Brewing: This whole period started out with buying a new coffee brewer. Our old brewer had a carafe that was constantly spilling annoying streams of coffee whenever it was poured. It was my sister, Heidi, who finally became fed up with this. She offered $100 to us if we would buy a new coffee maker. This got the ball rolling.

I did some research on the internet to find out what the experts thought about drip coffee makers. We own a Starbuck’s Barista espresso machine, a stove-top espresso pot, and a French-press coffee maker as well. And I wanted to add and top-of-the-line coffee brewer to that line-up. The experts were unified in their praise of one home coffee brewer: the Technivorm Moccamaster.

Technivorm’s brewers were singled out for several reasons: their ultra-hot brewing temperatures, their dependability, and their approval by the Specialty Coffee Association of America. The Technivorm brewers use a 1400 watt heater, as opposed to the 800 watt heaters of most household coffee brewers, to get water to a steamy temperature of 200°F. Apparently this is the ideal temperature for brewing delicious coffee. Their dependability indicates that the company uses quality parts and materials and assembles the machines properly. I don’t know much about the SCAA but it sure sounded respectable to me.

So, we bought the Technivorm KBT741 from Transcend Coffee, a coffee shop in Edmonton (www.transcendcoffee.com), and we are more than pleased with this brewing unit. The coffee is hot; I measured the temperature of the water before entering the filter cone and it was indeed 200°F as promised. The coffee tastes great. I would even say it tastes better but that may be in my head. And it is carrying the workload of brewing many pots of coffee for my wife, my friends and family, and me.

Grinding: All the coffee aficionados out there insist that one of the keys to great coffee is having freshly roasted beans that you grind just before preparing. More on the fresh beans later, but first let’s talk about grinding. The essential tool for grinding coffee beans is a birr grinder. They are more expensive than a blade grinder but are superior for several reasons of which the most important to us home coffee makers is consistency. Birr grinders consistently grind coffee to a uniform grind. We had our new-fangled coffee brewer and it only made sense to buy a grinder that would match the brewer. We ended up purchasing a Krups Birr grinder from Starbucks. This little unit is relatively quiet and, like our brewer, we have been very pleased with the results.

Coffee: We found ourselves on the verge of being able to produce an exquisite cup of coffee. We were always content with the coffee we made before, but, our new journey into coffee-nirvana was a slippery slope. We couldn’t own a birr grinder and the queen-mother-supreme home coffee brewer and be satisfied with the regular coffee we always used. So the search was on for the final ingredient for top-notch coffee; freshly roasted coffee beans.

I “Googled” the words “coffee roaster London Ontario” and came up with a site that listed a coffee shop that I was not familiar with: Fire Roasted Coffee Company (www.fireroastedcoffee.com). This store must have come in under the radar because I’m usually on top of coffee developments in my town.

On my first visit I was fortunate enough to be able to roast some coffee beans in a home roasting unit with FRC Company’s proprietor Dave Cook. He sent me home with a small batch of coffee that he and I roasted as well as a couple pounds of freshly roasted coffee. The coffee from FRC is outstanding and its freshness has to be one of the reasons. Freshly roasted coffee has a “pop” to it that is unforgettable and the intensity of the flavours has me hooked. I have made many trips back to Fire Roasted Coffee Company’s Art Roastery Studio in London. I have been there to buy coffee: single varietals, coffee blends, espresso blends. I was also invited to partake in a coffee tasting evening which was a lot of fun. We tasted 12 fair trade organic coffees from around the world with exotic names such as Ethiopian Yirgacheffe, Mexican Oaxaca and Dominican Republic Bani. It was almost shocking to taste how different coffees from different regions can taste. You would think that coffee is coffee but not so. The variety of tastes and textures was definitely unexpected. Fire Roasted Coffee Company is going to be my portal to the next stage of my coffee odyssey which will be home roasting. There are home roasting appliances that are both effective and user-friendly. And the opportunity to have the freshest roasted coffee possible is something that I need.

So there you have 3 of the main aspects of a good coffee; brewing, grinding, and roasting. Where to and what else will my passion for a good cup of coffee take me? I’ll let you know. Oh yeah, and by the way…just because I get a headache in the afternoon if I don’t have a coffee in the morning doesn’t mean I’m addicted. It’s not the caffeine I crave, it’s the epicurean experience.

Last Stop: Apparently, a “cup of joe” has been a term to denote a coffee since the early 1900s. There are several explanations for this term. Here is the one I like the best:

In 1914, the secretary of the US Navy, Admiral Josephus 'Joe' Daniels abolished the officers' wine mess. From that time on the strongest and thereby drink of choice on board navy ships was coffee. It was dubbed 'a cup of Joe' after the secretary.

Rails from the Rails 14 – The Road Less Traveled!

2008-05-21T18:15:00.001-04:00

Rails from the Rails 14 – The Road Less Traveled! (as seen here)

All Aboard: “Canadians are less likely to shoot someone. However, we are more likely to club someone over the head with a hockey stick.” – Tim Cerantola

Tickets Please: In my home town of London, Ontario we receive a weekly paper called The Londoner. It is a community newspaper and it comes along with some flyers. I came across an article that I found quite interesting.

The title of the article by Jeffrey Reed was in the form of a question that I often ask myself: Where has all the road hockey gone? The author uses the article to lament the lack of road hockey being played and to discuss the lack of activity of children. I have often wondered about why there doesn’t seem to be as much road hockey being played. And the fact in itself disappoints me. So allow me to make a few comments about a one-time national pastime.

I have very fond memories of playing road hockey when I was young. In particular, I recall with nostalgia when we lived in Chatham, Ontario. We used to play a lot of road hockey and we played it year round. We played more often in the winter, but even in summer it was not uncommon to find a game of street hockey at Finch Place. We even had our own team called the Finch Flyers. I remember once carrying our nets to Baldoon Road to play the Baldoon Bulldogs. I’m not sure who won that game. Even at school we relinquished the sticks but still played a version of the game that we called foot hockey. The space between portables made a perfect venue for an out-of-sight rough-and-tumble game.

Later on in my youth I recall a hockey trip we took to the United States. I think I was in grade 7 or 8. We played a game against a team that was physically superior to us. Even in warm-up we could see their skating prowess. They were big and fast and I thought we were in trouble. Fortunately for us, they couldn’t handle the puck. We beat them convincingly. After the game their parents paraded into our dressing room to thank us for showing them how real hockey was played. I have always attributed Canadian’s advanced puck handling ability to hours and hours of road hockey. I wonder if the Russians and Europeans play much road hockey.

My brother-in-law is probably the best road hockey player I know. He has always been a wizard with a tennis ball and hockey stick. Unfortunately, growing up he didn’t play ice hockey. And though he was dominant in a gym or on a street, hockey played on ice was far from his forte. Due to not playing ice hockey, his skating was inferior and this was evident whenever we played shinny with friends or our church youth group. Recently my brother-in-law decided to take adult power skating lessons. The results were incredible. He has become a proficient skater. That was not entirely expected. However, due mostly to the many years spent playing ball hockey, he has great hands. And with the new found ability to skate well coupled with good touch on the puck, he has become a good hockey player. At least good by old-guys-playing-shinny-late-on-Sunday-night standards. And he can thank road hockey for that.

I will give you a couple reasons why I think kids are not playing as much road hockey these days as compared to when I was young. First, many children have hockey schedules that are ridiculous. They are on the ice 3, 4, or 5 times a week for 5 months. No wonder they don’t want to play road hockey. They also have a myriad of technological entertainment at their hand: Xbox, Wii, Nintendo DS, iPods and the internet. I had none of those distractions when I was young. As a matter of fact, I recently had to convince my daughter that we didn’t have remote controls for the TV when I was young. “Well how do you turn it on?” she said. Lastly, parents don’t kick their kids out of the house the way our parents used to: “Go outside and don’t comeback until I call you for lunch!” I believe that safety is a big reason why this doesn’t occur as much. A kid has to find something to do and we often found a game of road hockey would suffice.

I hope that road hockey experiences a renaissance among the youth of Canada. If not, our dominance in the hockey world might not be the only thing in jeopardy; our health might be as well.

Last Stop: The current Boatmen have their own list of accomplished hockey players. The roster would include such skaters as:

Chad “I’m 6 Feet Tall With Skates On” Folk

Danny “Elbow For Bugsy” Webb

Bugsy “Glass Jaw” Bryce

Mike “North Bay Brawler” O’Shea

Jeff “Pump It, Pump It” Johnson

Rails from the Rails 13 - Will Boys Be Boys?

2008-04-17T07:45:00.003-04:00

Rails from the Rails 13 – Will Boys Be Boys? (as seen here)

All Aboard: "Some parents say it is toy gus that make boys warlike. But give a boy a rubber duck and he will seize its neck like the butt of a pistol and shout "Bang!" - George F. Will (American editor and news commentator b.1941)

Tickets Please: As mentioned in my last Rails from the Rails, on a recent train trip to Montreal I came across a couple of interesting articles. The first, which I have already written about, concerned itself with some of the culinary niceties of Toronto. This installment uses an different article from Maclean’s magazine as a starting point for some of my thoughts on boyhood.

I nearly passed on the magazine as it had as its cover a large picture of one US presidential hopeful Barack Obama. It seems even in Canada we get inundated with American politics. However, a sub-headline caught my attention: Why Boys Need Less School And More Fighting. Now this sounded interesting.

The article is an interview in which the writer, Kate Fillion, asks questions of child development expert Leonard Sax. It is a fairly long interview and I will attempt to share with you some of the more interesting points as well as give you my take on them.

Sax suggests that there is a problem with how boys are performing in school. Whether this is accurate or not is debatable. I think it is true. One of the causes he proposes for this is interesting. He suggests part of the problem is that in early childhood education there has been acceleration in the onset of instructional curriculum. When I was a kid, kindergarten was mostly crafts and games and stories and songs. Now they are learning reading, writing, and arithmetic. I am no child education expert, but I would prefer it if my children were doing kindergarten the old way. I can see where competing in the new global marketplace might require earlier education, but to me it is less than ideal.

Sax goes on to talk about how boys, generally speaking, are less ready for school at earlier ages than girls are. My experience would leave me with the same conclusion. Generally speaking, my daughters and nieces have appeared more ready for school and learning at an early age then my son and nephews. There isn’t any concrete science there, just my observations. My son is not interested in learning about colours. Not until I relate it to the colour of superhero’s costumes, that is. I will ask him the colour of a pickle and he will either guess wrong or respond “I don’t know.” But if I tell him the pickle is the same colour as The Hulk he quickly tells me it must be green. Words and reading do not get him really excited either. He’d rather wrestle or have a pillow fight. Fair enough, that is a type of learning too.

Sax is also a strong advocate for single-sex education. He makes some strong points in favour of boys and girls being more successful in same-gender classrooms. I have heard this before. I was surprised to read that he believes that it is also beneficial socially and emotionally for children. Again, I am no expert but I like the idea. If there was the opportunity for my children to go to school and participate in single-sex education I would try it. I am much more satisfied with my girls playing in girls-only sports leagues. And it seems to me that most of their problems at school with other students involve boys.

Perhaps the most controversial aspect of the interview can be summed up in the following quote by Sax: “Prohibiting children from playing with toy swords and guns does not decrease the likelihood of any bad outcome. It accomplishes no useful end.” He goes on to refer to zero-tolerance policies in schools as zero-intelligence policies. Strong words! For what it is worth, I tend to concur with his line of thinking. I would love for all of you to be able to watch the children and teachers’ faces when I talk at schools. One of the things I mention to them is that I get paid to hit people (break it down people, that is what I do). The children’s faces beam. Many of the teachers scowl. I go on to explain that there is an appropriate time and place for me to hit people; on the field. I go on to explain that in other places it is entirely inappropriate. I feel strongly about this. I do not think it is helpful to suggest to young boys that rough play is wrong. I do however believe it is my responsibility to teach my son the appropriate times and venues for such behaviour. He knows that play fighting with dad, his uncles, or his cousins is almost always fair game. He also knows he better not hit his sisters, aunts, or his mother, or any stranger for that matter, unless they encourage it in a playful manner. And guess what? He is very good at discerning the proper time and place to roughhouse. And that is what life is like. I want him to be able to check other boys on the hockey ice and have fun doing it. But also understand that bullying other kids in the schoolyard is unacceptable.

At any rate, it was an interesting article and as the father of a boy and the uncle to several nephews I can always benefit from such information. And I think this particular expert is on to something.

I must go. My son has just finished watching a video about some ninja-turtles and I’m sure he will desire to try out some new martial arts moves. And I feel like the luckiest guy on the planet because I happen to be the only animated target he can practice on. And I’ve got a few moves myself!

Last Stop: One of the sports my girls play is ringette. It is a hockey-like game and it is played primarily by girls. Mike O’Shea, a North Bay native, was quick to inform that it was invented in his hometown. If you want to verify this claim or learn more about this sport than Rigette Canada’s website is one place you could start (www.ringette.ca).

Rails From The Rails #12 - Green Riders

2008-02-26T16:52:00.001-05:00

Rails From The Rails #12 - Green Riders ( as seen here)

All Aboard: A proximis quisque minime anteire vult. - Titus Livius (No man likes to be surpassed by those of his own level.)

Tickets Please: As I mentioned before, there is nothing tougher in my chosen profession than watching another team hoist the Grey Cup above their heads in celebratory victory. As mature as one would like to be, it is difficult not to be overcome by envy and remorse. Nevertheless, as time passes you deal with it. There has been a sufficient amount of ‘water under the bridge’ for me to make a few comments about the Saskatchewan Roughriders and their Grey Cup victory.

Despite my strong desire for my team’s supremacy on the gridiron, there are a few members of the 2007 champions that I was glad to see raise the cup:

1) New head coach Ken Miller – Coach Ken is without question one of the finest men that I have had the pleasure of crossing paths with in my career. It was an honour to play for him for several years in Toronto. He is a man with much skill and competency, but those qualities are overshadowed only by his strength of character. He is an excellent motivator and he truly cares about those around him. I was genuinely excited to see him get promoted to a head coaching position. With the exception of a few games this coming year and the final game in Montreal, I wish him all the success in the world.

2) Center Jeremy “Moe” O’Day – Jeremy was my roommate for a year when we played together in Toronto. He is a hard-nosed competitor and has made his living in the trenches. He is a good friend and if the team raising the CFL’s grail could not be wearing double blue then I was glad for this Green Rider to be raising it. I am sure it is of some consolation for him to best me in this manner since he lives everyday of his life knowing I am a better fisherman than he is.

3) Veteran lineman Gene Makowsky – Until this past year, Gene had been faithfully and doggedly patrolling the Riders offensive line with nary an opportunity to play for a championship. For 13 years he had been toiling and had been doing it with enough skill to win individual awards and personal accolades. But individual awards mean nothing to a true footballer when compared to winning a championship. Anyone who is a member of the O-Line fraternity must be happy for Gene. I know I am.

4) Western alumni Andy Fantuz and Mike Abou-Mechrek – As an alumnus of the vaunted University of Western Ontario I am always keeping my eye on ex-Mustangs who now play football professionally. And though I would definitely prefer it if it was this Mustang raising the Cup this past November, I salute these two for their success. In particular, I was impressed by Fantuz and his play in the final. I knew Andy was extremely athletic, had great hands, and was a ball-magnet, but I would never have guessed that toughness would be added to his arsenal. Toughness in receivers is the quality I most admire and nothing displays this more than the capacity to not be tackled. Andy’s touchdown in the final was reminiscent of the hardest-to-take-down receiver I have witnessed; Terry Vaughn. Congrats to these ‘Stangs.

5) Coaches Kent Austin and Paul Lapolice – Both of these coaches are talented and have proven themselves at a young age in their profession. They are also men of character and playing for them was memorable. I would expect that both will continue to be successful.

6) Fans of the ‘Riders – Regina was the first place that I was noticed on the street as a professional football player. Fans of the Riders are passionate about their team specifically but also about the CFL generally. The fact that they would recognize me in my rookie year was shocking. They love the game and they love their team. Again, if I had my druthers, I would have had Argonauts fans celebrating a Grey Cup victory this year. Things turning out the way they did, I hope The Green Nation enjoyed their championship.

Last Stop: G. K. Chesterton penned these words: There is a great man who makes every man feel small. But the real great man is the man who makes every man feel great. Ken Miller is a great man of the latter type; a real, great man.

Roger Clemens' best case scenario!

2008-02-14T07:33:00.002-05:00

Yesterday I had a training session with my personal trainer Lee Griffith. In between exercises, when I could see through the sweat and hear over my own gasping, I watched the House Oversight Committee on steroid use in baseball grill Clemens and his ex-trainer Brian McNamee. To be honest, it was difficult watching one of baseball's greatest pitchers come under fire like he did. Guilty or not, it was tough to watch. Unfortunately for Rocket Roger, the worse case scenario is he is a perjurer, a liar, a cheater, and a criminal. Even worse, the best case scenario is his name will be tarnished by his involvement in this affair. Sounds like a lose-lose situation to me. I can understand a guy in his position taking HGH or steroids. I would lose a little respect for him if that were the case. But someone was lying yesterday...big time. And I would lose a lot more respect for Roger if it comes to light that he was staring into the camera, and thus into the eyes of the world, and lying. We will wait and see.

Rails from the Rails #11 - Cheese Please

2008-02-12T09:58:00.000-05:00

(as seen here)

All Aboard: I have been on quite a long hiatus but instead of going on about the break in detail, allow me continue where I left off.

I will start by briefly addressing the end of the 2007 season. Losing in football is difficult. Losing in the Eastern Final, thereby being prevented from playing for a chance to win the Grey Cup, is devastating. A loss like that is hard to describe. It feels as though a part of you has died; never to be resuscitated. But, you can take that feeling and allow it to paralyze you or you can take that feeling and use it as motivation to move forward; I have chosen the latter.

Tickets Please: On a recent trip to Montreal aboard a VIA passenger train, I came across two very interesting articles in two separate magazines. In this Rails from the Rails, and the one to follow, I am going to use those articles as springboards for some thoughts and experiences.

The first article of interest was a piece entitled Eat, Drink and be Daring: 100 Must-Try-Before-You-Die Tastes. The work by Chris Nuttall-Smith was printed in Toronto Life magazine. It was a very interesting article. Here is the introduction to the article as it appears on their website:

Toronto’s long been an international food city, but it’s fair to say that we’ve only recently melded the flavours of here and far away into a cuisine that’s definitively our own. This is our list, arranged in no particular order, of the city’s must-try foods—from local classics like butter tarts (No. 63) to more recent arrivals like kimchee empanadas (82). They’re all either made in Toronto, unique to Toronto, or hard enough to find elsewhere that they make us feel lucky to live here.

As you can imagine, with my penchant for food, I was intrigued. In a photo accompanying the article, a large hunk of cheese caught my eye and I quickly read about this particular “taste” from Toronto. Number 3 on their list was Thunder Oak Gouda from the Cheese Boutique. A single-herd cow’s milk cheese from Thunder Bay that has been aged an additional 3 years in the Cheese Boutique’s vaults was something I had to try.

Of interest, Mike O’Shea and I had met some of the staff from the Cheese Boutique at a charity fishing tournament in the summer. We spent part of that afternoon “talking shop” with Agim Pristine. The Cheese Boutique was started by the Pristine family in the 70’s and Agim is one of the family members still involved. At the fishing tournament, Agim sent Mike and I home from the fishing tournament with some gourmet cheeses with the promise from us to visit his shop in the future. The article and its contents were a reminder that we had to make this visit.

Mike and I made the trip this past January. We were scheduled to attend the 30^th annual Toronto Ducks Unlimited dinner downtown and we realized that we would be driving past the Cheese Boutique on our way. We decided to leave early and fulfill our promise to visit Agim at work. Now, you need to understand, we did not need any coaxing to get us to visit a place where we would be surrounded by meat and cheese. Mmmmmm, meat and cheese! What else is there? We were not disappointed.

Indeed, we were surrounded by cheese when we entered the public-access cheese vault. Huge wheels of parmesan cheese and large blocks of cheddar were on either side. And by large I mean 500 pounds-large in some cases. Overhead, large slabs of prosciutto dangled enticingly. It was awesome. Cheeses I had never even heard of hung from various hooks, and the aromas were fantastic.

And so it went. Cheese and meat followed by meat and cheese. The Thunder Oak Gouda was as good as I had hoped. The prosciutto and bocconcini sandwiches we ordered kept our hunger at bay. We left the store with various cheeses, some truffle butter and some Kansas-cut steaks that looked like they belonged in an episode of the Flintstones. This was a field-trip catered to perfection for food-loving footballers. It won’t be long until we return to get our fill.

Last Stop: Of the 100 tastes presented in the article I can lay claim to having tried 10 of them thus far. There are several more tastes that should be fairly easy to come by. Putting a significant dent in that list is going to take some hard work but eating is something I’m good at so I’m going to give it my best shot. I figure, with teammates like Chad Folk, Brian Ramsay, Taylor Robertson, Adriano Belli, Jeff Keeping and Mike O’Shea, I shouldn’t have too much difficulty finding company on my quest.

Rails from the Rails #10 - Remember Well

2008-02-12T09:55:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – Ten (originally posted on November 7, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: I am faced with the difficult task of writing a “Rail from the Rail” with Remembrance Day looming a few days in the future. Though I believe it is a privilege and an honour to write about our soldiers, I also find it difficult. But, we must remember.
Allow me to start by sharing a paraphrase of a phone conversation between my stepfather and one of his brothers. My stepfather had several brothers who served in WW2 and he calls them every year on November 11th to thank them for their service and sacrifice. The crux of the conversation goes something like this:

Stepfather: “You know why I’m calling today, right?”
Step-uncle: “Yep.”
Stepfather: “I wanted to thank you for your service to our country and for the great sacrifice you made on behalf of our family and our country.”
Step-uncle: “You’re welcome.”
Stepfather: “I wanted to thank you for your bravery and for saving the world.”
Step-uncle: “Well, I didn’t do it alone you know.”
Stepfather: “Of course. But it could not have been done without courageous young men like you. Thank you.”

My step-uncle said, “I didn’t do it alone”. What a sense of humour! I wonder if that sense of humour served him well in the terrors of war. This man, my step-uncle, was hardly more than a child when he went to war. He was underage and lied about how old he was so he would not be left behind. I often wonder how many teenagers we could find today who would lie about their age so they would be allowed to fight for their country. I wonder what I would do if I were a teenager faced with the same situation. I can only hope that I would live up to the example set by him and so many other Canadians who have served our country. Thank you indeed!

Tickets Please: I want to use something from the current conflict our country finds itself in to cause us to stop and remember the many that served and died in past conflicts. I decided to look at some of the common complaints that are raised in the press and in our daily conversations about our country’s involvement in Afghanistan and use those as a springboard to recollect and revere our fallen soldiers. Now please understand, I am not writing so as to discuss the merits of the complaints. Whether the complaints are valid or not is not the issue that concerns me. Rather, I think the complaints will reveal some things about the past of our Armed Forces. We can remember the past with gratitude. There are two complaints about the Afghan mission that I hear most frequently: first, the Canadian soldiers are playing the hardest and most dangerous part; second, the Canadian forces are playing a role that is disproportionate in terms of our resources (human, military, financial, etc.) when compared to other NATO countries. Let’s consider what we can glean from both these objections.
I agree that, by and large, our Canadian troops are participating in the mission in Afghanistan in very difficult, dangerous, and deadly situations. It seems that there is some consensus on this. The frequency of fighting in which the Canadians are involved and the resulting casualties seem to bolster this assertion. At any rate, it is not the first time that Canadian soldiers have carried the burden of being in the gravest situations of a mission. Consider the valiant fighting of our forces in World War 2 at Normandy. This excerpt from the Veteran’s Affairs Canada website (www.vac-acc.gc.ca) says it all:

Canadians had figured prominently in the defeat of Hitlerism. In Normandy they had been in the vanguard of the Allied victory. The Nazi losses there were horrific – 300,000 men. Moreover, most of the enemy's equipment had been destroyed, including more than 2,000 tanks. The backbone of the German Army in the west was broken in Normandy, and the Canadians had played a monumental role.

Allied casualties during the battle had also been heavy, including 18,444 Canadians, of whom 5,021 would never see their homes again. Of all the divisions which formed part of Montgomery's 21 Army Group, none suffered more casualties than the 3rd and 2nd Canadian.

Like their British and American allies, the Canadians made mistakes in command and in training and their inexperience often came back to haunt them. But their high casualty rate also reflected the specific tasks of the Canadian Army during the campaign and the fact that it continually faced the best troops the enemy had to offer. It was a bloody process, but once they learned the harsh lessons of battle, Canada's amateur soldiers proved to be a match for the professional forces they faced. Often in the forefront of the Allied advance against determined opposition, the Canadians took on tasks out of all proportion to their real power. And they accomplished them sometimes amidst hesitation and confusion, – and always courageously.

Normandy is one example of many. Canadian soldiers have not blinked while staring into the eyes of perilous situations. If indeed our soldiers in Afghanistan are facing the most severe and deadly tasks, then at least they know their military heritage includes such situations. Perhaps it could even be considered a compliment that the coalition has asked Canada to play the part they have. Maybe Canada’s history of producing courageous and determined soldiers led to our forces being in the situation they are now in. It is far from a desirable situation, but I believe our soldiers are continuing a legacy of bravery and sacrifice that they have inherited from those we are remembering. I am proud of them - proud and grateful.
The second complaint has to do with Canada carrying a burden in Afghanistan that is disproportionate to other NATO countries. I think this is likely true as well. When one considers our population, our military resources, and our finances, I think a case could be made that we are doing more than our fair share when compared with other countries. We have been warned that our military is being stretched thin by our work in the Afghan mission. Again, I encourage the reader to remember that this is not the first time we have been in a situation like this. I sincerely believe from the little history I have learned that in the past world conflicts, Canada has done more than what can be expected from a country of our size. We have fought with allies whose populations dwarf our own. We have fought alongside countries whose military might was considerably greater than ours. Our soldiers shouldered their loads, and then some. So if our part in Afghanistan is bigger than it ought to be, we might forgive the other countries this oversight. Perhaps they have come to expect this due to the legacy of our fighting men and women. It seems to me that our brave forces of days gone by have set that standard.
The complaints of a current conflict remind us that we live in a country that has been served by soldiers of great courage, valour, and determination. And we ought to remember - remember and be grateful.

Last Stop: “Thank you forever.” - Message written in English in the Book of Remembrance by a local Dutch visitor to the Canadian War Cemetery.

Rails from the Rails #9 - Politics

2008-02-12T09:52:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – Nine (originally posted on October 30, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: “Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book.” – Ronald Reagan

Tickets Please: The recent election in Ontario to determine our provincial government has me thinking about politics. To be honest, most of my thoughts are negative. I wish that wasn’t the case, but it is. I would not say that I am an avid follower of the political landscape of Canada. However, I do think that I keep tabs on what is going on more than the average person. I follow politics on the news, both TV and radio. I follow it on the internet at such news aggregates as www.nationalnewswatch.com. I find it somewhat interesting and I believe it has a huge cultural impact on Canada. That being said, I will reiterate that many if not most of my thoughts about the subject at hand are not positive. Allow me to share a few of them with you.
First, I am bothered by the fact that I do not believe the individual politician has the impact that he or she should have. With the strong party-politics that is the current trend in Canadian politics, I fear that the individual politician does not and almost cannot make a significant contribution individually. Politicians are compelled to vote along party lines or they are expelled from the party. The fact that a “free vote” must be announced by a party’s leader is ridiculous to me. Hence we are left with voting for the party instead of voting for an individual. And I don’t like this. If there was an excellent candidate in my riding who agreed with me on the issues which I deem are important but he or she was a member of a party with whom I largely disagree with on policy matters, I do not feel the freedom to choose the candidate who best represents me. That is an unfortunate state of affairs.
Another issue related to politics that I find bothersome is “partisan politics”. Partisan is defined as a person who takes the part of or strongly supports one side, party, or person. Obviously, I believe politicians should strongly support the side they feel is best for their constituents. However, it seems that politics these days is nothing more than playing the devil’s advocate ad infinitum. One party says black and the opposition says white. This seems to occur regardless of the true colour of the thing itself. I am waiting for the day when a leader of the opposition stands before the media and announces that, although they may disagree with their opposition on many issues, their opponents are right on this particular issue and will have their support. It seems to me that far too often Canadian politics is about choosing the opposite viewpoint and arguing about it irrespective of the merits of the original idea. I am not saying this is always the case. I just think it is usually the case and things need not necessarily be that way.
One final issue about politics that rubs me the wrong way is that I believe, more and more, politics is becoming more about image and less about ideas. As J. P. Moreland wrote in a book I am currently reading: “The make-up man has become more important than the speech writer.” Moreland was bemoaning the fact that public opinion of candidates following debates was more influenced by feelings, image, and likeability than ideas and substance. This is truly a shame. It bothers me that negative ads work on voters…voters like me. What does it say about a member, leader, or party when the main thrust of an election campaign is not the ideas and policies that they are promoting but rather what is wrong with the other guy? Should we blame the politicians for this or should we look in the mirror and ask why these types of advertisements are effective?

Last Stop: Amidst all this negativity, let’s not forget that we can vote. We can vote! Freely, without undue manipulation, without fear of reprisals, in fair elections, we can vote. And vote we should. If you missed the most recent provincial election it looks as though it will not be long before you can participate in a federal one. Don’t miss it.

Rails from the Rails # 8 - Thankfulness

2008-02-12T09:49:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – Eight (originally posted on October 16, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: There Before most meals, my wife and I ask our children if any of them would like to say grace. Usually 2 or 3 of them race to raise their hands so they are chosen to give thanks. The prayers that follow are usually very sincere and often quite humorous. The children routinely forget to give thanks for the meal we are about to eat while they give thanks for almost anything else they can think of. As parents, one of the reasons we encourage our children to participate in saying grace is to cultivate an attitude of gratitude. We have much to be thankful for. Our pre-meal routine is one way we can instill thankfulness.

Tickets Please: Having just spent a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend with my family, I thought I would write about thankfulness. I mentioned above that we try and say grace before meals regularly. It is a way for our family to give thanks to God for the many wonderful things we have in our lives. The word “grace”, when used to denote a pre-meal prayer, comes from the Latin word gratia which means thankfulness or to give thanks. So the prayer before meals giving thanks has been aptly called grace.
As with most traditions or rituals, they can become a meaningless endeavour if we do not participate in them purposefully and intelligently. As a result, we encourage the kids to think and then to thank. They continually open my eyes to the many things that we have to be thankful for: pets and playmates, family and food, safety and sanity, football and the future. This thankfulness displayed by the young ones reminds me of a quote by G. K. Chesterton: “You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.” During this Thanksgiving season we have much to be thankful for!
Gratitude is like a barometer. Our level of thankfulness can give us a good idea of how much “pressure” we are under. But it does not just indicate “pressure”; it can release it as well. When we come under the pressure and stress of difficulties, disappointments, and drudgery of daily life, it is easy to feel sorry for ourselves and even become embittered. But taking time to be thankful, even in tough times, alleviates the pressure and stress and gives us a new perspective on our lives and how good we have it.
My family was preparing for a wonderful and rare occasion: all of my siblings and their spouses and children were going to be in the same place at the same time. The roll call would be as follows with my siblings in bold: Ray and Meaghan with their children Robbie, Noah, and Molly; Mike and Heidi with their children Maleah, Michaelah, Malachi and Micah; Jon and Bryar with their children Jacob, Jesse, and Sparrow; Kevin and Kylie with their children Kayden, Mekhi and Jayla; Nicole and myself with Ena, Adele, Mara, Judah and Arwen. And to really gild the lily my mother, step-dad and grandmother would also be in attendance. I hope you can appreciate the difficulty in arranging everyone’s presence at the festivities. It has not happened with this entire group…ever. We were looking forward to the food, the fellowship and the fun of this Thanksgiving Day. As it turned out, some sickness prevented this reunion. Bryar’s children became sick and she and her husband made the tough choice to return home. They did not want to risk passing the bug to others and would have their hands full with caring for their own children. Though this was disappointing for us all, we chose to be thankful on Thanksgiving Day and we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. That is the thing about thankfulness and gratitude - it is a choice. We can choose to see things in our lives from different perspectives. We can find things to be thankful for or we can find things to complain about. I definitely need more thankfulness in my life and if I take a moment to contemplate the list of blessings in my life, I quickly realize that I could not easily exhaust that list.

Last Stop: "In ordinary life we hardly realize that we receive a great deal more than we give, and that it is only with gratitude that life becomes rich."
- Dietrick Bonhoeffer

Rails from the Rails #7 - Reading Between the Lines

2008-02-12T09:47:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – Seven (originally posted on October 8th, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: There has been a preponderance of injured quarterbacks this season: Bishop, Allen, Printers, Calvillo, Burris, Ray, Dickenson, Pierce. And all this after the league has gone to great lengths to protect quarterbacks. If a defensive lineman looks at a quarterback in an unkind manner, he risks being penalized for it. This obviously isn’t working. But fear not, I have a solution. Instead of worrying about what defensive players are doing to Quarterbacks, the league should adjust the rules to allow offensive linemen to use all means necessary to keep their quarterbacks safe. I can assure you that if there were no holding penalties called on O-Linemen, the throwers in the league would be significantly safer. Problem solved: No holding in the CFL. I can’t see Defensive Linemen having a problem with that.

Tickets Please: I enjoy reading. Since I was young, I have found reading an easy task and I have enjoyed it as long as I can remember. I thought I would share some of the books I have read over the past year and some of the genres that I prefer. Ooops, I didn’t mean to startle you…yes, football players can read…really, we can.
The genre that I read most often these days is biographies. I find true stories of real people to very inspirational. I find motivation for life in them that can be applied to many different areas. They are also a great source of learning. There is much in life we will never experience unless we have the opportunity to live vicariously through others. Biographies are a good means of tapping into a resource otherwise inaccessible. During training camp, I would spend the evenings playing cribbage with Chad Folk. Yes, we are just like old men, thank you. Then, in the few minutes before my eyelids would come crashing shut, I would read biographies of two English authors. Michael Coren has written a short quasi-biography on J.R.R, Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings is by far my favourite work of fiction and I enjoyed Coren’s book on this literary giant. The other English author whose biography I read was Malcolm Muggeridge. It was a very interesting read. Over the past months, I have read some military biographies as well. A dual biography on Lee and Grant was fascinating. Following that military theme were books full of biographical snippets of military personnel written by Colonel Jeff O’Leary (Ret.). Though not a military man himself, Raoul Wallenberg was involved in saving Jews during World War II. The biography Righteous Gentile tells his story. He may have saved 100,000 Hungarian Jews from the holocaust. I found it hard to put that book down. Another genre I enjoy reading is spiritual/religious books. The Confessions of St.Augustine is a classic that contains both autobiographical information as well as spiritual enlightenment. St. Augustine is one of the foremost minds in Christianity’s history. I have his well-known City of God on my “To Read” pile. I spent many trips on the train reading through Alister McGrath’s textbook on Christian theology entitled simply Christian Theology. This was a difficult read but one that was well worth the effort. This past year, I also read spiritual works by Canadian pastor and author Mark Buchanan that I found informative and inspirational.
In an earlier column, I shared with you some of the things like to ingest through my mouth, now you know some of the books that I feed on through my eyes. As I look at this list, I have come to realize that I do not read fiction anymore. I am not sure when that stopped, or why it happened, but I think it needs to be remedied. I enjoy fantasy and science-fiction books so I think I need to find a few titles to read in the closing months of 2007.

Last Stop: Canadian children’s author David Carruthers and I visited quite a few schools this past year with a literacy program we call “Charge Through Life”. I have had the opportunity to encourage young boys and girls to become life-long readers. Reading is a skill that has enriched my life and the lives of countless others. Take some time to read, and more importantly, take some time to encourage some young ones to do the same.

Rails from the Rails #6 - Dog Fighting vs. Hunting

2008-02-12T09:43:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – Six (originally posted on September 20, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: Stephon Marbury: "I think we don't say anything about people who shoot deer or shoot other animals," the Knicks point guard told an Albany TV station. "You know, from what I understand, dog fighting is a sport. It's just behind closed doors."

Mark Twain: “It is better to remain quiet and thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.”

Tickets Please: I recently participated in an on-air interview with Mike Hogan and Adrion “Pee-Wee” Smith during the “Inside The Argos” program on The Fan 590. Mike asked me to comment on the quote by Marbury that appears above. He was interested in my opinion as he knew that I was a hunter. Mike asked what the difference between hunting and dog-fighting was. I told him one of the main differences was that hunting was legal and dog-fighting was not. I was stating the obvious, but, I feel that this fact cannot be overstated. I have heard similar comments concerning the similarity between dog fighting and deer hunting from other people interviewed in the media as well as from people I rub elbows with. I would like to expound on why this obvious yet essential point differentiates the two activities.

Since hunting in general, and deer hunting in particular, is a legal activity it follows that it is under the watchful eye of the public. The activity does take place off the beaten path; however, it is open to scrutiny from landowners, outdoors people, and Conservation Officers. Hunting is also placed before the public in the form of magazines, television shows, internet sites, trade shows and books. It falls under the responsibilities of the Ministry of Natural Resources. Thus government agencies keep tabs on the happenings in the hunting community. Is this no different from dog fighting? The dark details of dog fighting are not known to the public. The recent investigation of Michael Vick has brought some facts to light, but, information about this canine enterprise is scarce. That is the rule for illegal activities - they are participated in behind closed doors.

Hunting’s legality leads to it being regulated. Governments, with input from stakeholders such as hunters, outdoorsmen and outdoorswomen, scientists, naturalists, conservationists, and even anti-hunters, make laws to govern the activity and those who participate in it. It seems to me that dog-fighting and dog-fighters answer to nobody. This secret society answers only to itself. Deer hunting has been deemed acceptable by the public and it remains under enforceable guidelines, rules, and laws which is the way it should be.

Deer hunting is also a tool for benefit of the environment. Government agencies use hunting as a method of managing animal populations so they remain at stable and healthy levels. They require hunters to pay money for licenses to participate. Often this money is returned to the system to aid environmental issues in many ways.

As legal activities, hunting and fishing also facilitate our economy in Ontario with over $3 billion in economic activity. Hunting’s legitimacy allows it to contribute such benefits. There are many people across North America who are employed in various jobs directly due to the outdoors industry. There are certainly economics tied to dog fighting, but it is mostly gambling-related and I assume that this is why it is a federal offence.

Deer hunting’s legal position in our society leads to several things: it is under the scrutiny of society, it is regulated by government with many interested parties having input, it provides economic benefits, and it provides a valuable service to the environment. This is not an exhaustive list by any means. These are a few examples of how being a legal activity makes deer hunting different from dog fighting. I could also go on about many other issues such as: the inherent prolonged suffering of dogs in dog fighting versus the intended minimal suffering intended to deer by hunters, the use of venison as a source of food versus the seemingly senseless death of fighting dogs, the penchant for hunters to contribute time and money to environmental groups and causes, or the vast legal and storied tradition of hunting versus the unknown, illegal history of dog fighting. You may not agree with hunting. But you cannot say that it is the same as dog fighting. I have only focused on the most obvious difference which separates the two activities which places them beyond logical association: one is legal, the other is not.

Last Stop: This has been a difficult year for professional sports. Gambling, drugs, official’s integrity and other issues have put the pressure on North America’s paid athletes and their employers. I think it is apparent that these problems have always been there. The difference is that they come to light more regularly and more rapidly now than they have in the past. The question I have is: “How much will the fans put up with?” Like it or not, the fans can have the greatest reforming influence on professional sport. They only need to act upon their displeasure by not spending their money on sports-related expenditures or their time on watching them on TV or in the arenas. The players and the administrations have to work for improvements too, but, the fans and their spending habits will have the last say.

Rails from the Rails #5 - Enhanced Performance

2008-02-12T09:40:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – 5 (originally posted on August 28, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: I would like to start by making an unequivocal statement such as “I have never taken performance enhancing drugs”. But, I do ingest caffeine in the form of coffee before football games. I have had ibuprofen in my system during a contest. Both caffeine and ibuprofen are considered drugs by some and they definitely do enhance performance. Any statement concerning “performance enhancing drugs” cannot be unequivocal. Definitions and further clarification are necessary when speaking of “drugs” in sport. I can, however, aver the following: I have never taken anabolic steroids. Chad Folk often accuses me of taking “pear-oids” on account of my Bosc-like physique, but, there is no substance to those accusations.

Tickets Please: I am in favour of drug testing for CFL players. I think a concrete drug policy and a testing program is both necessary from a public relations standpoint and beneficial as a deterrent. That being said, I do have some concerns which I will put before the reader to consider.

First and foremost, I would hope that any program that the league implements will be in the best interest of the players. Perhaps this is naïve as I do not believe the motivation behind the current push for testing is the player’s well-being. I think the true impetus behind current discussions of drug testing is public relations. And I don’t necessarily have a problem with that. But my hope is that through the process of development the player’s health, safety, and welfare becomes paramount. I am sure the CFL Players Association will strive to ensure this.

Secondly, I hope the parties involved will carefully consider which models are used when generating a stronger and expanded drug policy for the league. It is irksome that when the topic of drug testing and sports surfaces many people point to the Olympics as a model. I truly believe that from a “drugs in sport” perspective, and some other perspectives for that matter, the Olympics very well may be the most corrupt, complicit, and culpable organization in sports. Note that this opinion comes from anecdotal evidence, such as conversations with Olympians. However, I think a strong case could be made for it. The Canadian Football League needs to create a policy that is effective and just in dealing with this problem. Thus, when considering other examples, those involved in the process need to discern which programs are truly beneficial and productive.

My third concern has to do with the fans and how they perceive drug use is sports. It is a topic that often elicits “black and white” opinions when there are many grey areas to consider. I have a tendency to polarize issues but allow me to present a few situations that may help the average CFL fan to appreciate some nuances of this controversy. Consider an athlete who has diagnostic blood work done and finds that his/her testosterone levels are significantly lower than levels present in the average person. And that athlete takes testosterone to raise his/her levels to a normal range. Should we group such an individual in the same category as those who take steroids to boost their systems far above natural levels? What about the third world athlete, or the first world athlete who lives in poverty, who chooses to secure his family’s financial future by taking drugs? Is this no different from the millionaire athlete who takes pills or injects medicines to stay at the top of his/her game? Or consider the athlete who experiences a serious injury and decides to take some banned substances in order to promote healing. Is enhancing healing synonymous with enhancing performance? There are many similar situations in which it may not be so easy to label the athlete “cheater”. I hope those involved in the process of developing a CFL drug policy will take such dilemmas into account. As I approach the end of my career I better understand the pressure to use substances to maintain or improve performance. I am not as fast or strong as I used to be and that fact makes an athlete consider how he might stave off retirement. Things aren’t as black and white as they once appeared.

Please do not think that I sympathize with any athlete who wants to take substances in order to perform at a higher level. I do not. But seeing things from inside the athlete’s perspective may bring some understanding that was not there before. If the CFL begins a testing and punitive program for performance-enhancing substance users, than I believe that “levels the playing field” in my favour as well as in favour of every other athlete who chooses to “play clean”. But it needs to be done properly, with wisdom and innovation, if it is to be a benefit to all the players of today as well as the future footballers.

Last Stop: I can remember vividly Ben Johnson winning the 100m finals at the Seoul Olympics. That was an incredibly exciting moment in Canadian sports history. The fallout from the ensuing chaos still reverberates in Canadian athletics today. My money says Ben wasn’t the only “dirty” athlete in that race and I believe that fact was well-known by many Olympic and world sports officials. Though not innocent himself, I think Ben Johnson was made the scapegoat for many guilty athletes.

Rails from the Rails #4 - Pinball, O'Sh, and the Legend

2008-02-12T09:38:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – 4 (originally posted on August 17, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

Tickets Please: Confession: I have never been to the Canadian Football Hall of Fame. Shame, shame, double shame. I will remedy this soon.

All Aboard: Over the past 10 years with the Argonauts I have played with many good football players. I have shared the locker-room with a handful of great football players. But I have also been a teammate of a very few double-blue athletes who are destined for the Canadian Football Hall of Fame. These players have differentiated themselves from their peers in so many ways it is hard to decide which accomplishments to focus on or which attributes to highlight. I have decided to share their greatness with you by telling you how members of my family have reacted to these players and then sharing a statistic associated with that player which may be overlooked when their careers are considered.

Let us begin with Damon Allen. What can be said about a quarterback that has passed for more yards than anyone who has ever played the game? And what can you add to the fact that he is also 3^rd on the all-time rushing list? At a loss? Well let me tell you something about him that you may not know. Damon is my eldest daughter’s favourite Argonaut. Ena was recently asked by her teacher who her favourite Argonaut player was. It should have been easy to figure out: dad! But my lovely child did not mention her father. No way. Her favourite is Damon Allen. And people wonder why offensive linemen have inferiority complexes. My own daughter didn’t pick me! Please, nobody ask my wife the same question. I couldn’t handle the rejection. At any rate, my daughter has chosen a future hall-of-famer and the choice is a good one. Many people mention Damon’s passing and rushing yardage when considering his greatness on the gridiron. However, let me share with you a statistic that impresses me: 366 games played. That does not include pre-season or post-season. That is 366 regular season games and counting. Damon is number one on the games played list if you disregard special teams players. When I consider the years that Damon has played this game at a high level I am amazed. Damon is a sure-bet for the “Hall”.

One can look like a fool on a football field. I have been there many times. In my second year I made the play that TSN considered their “Turning Point” of the game for a contest between the Ticats, the team I first played for, and the Saskatchewan Roughriders. Not bad for an offensive lineman. Unfortunately, it was because I was offside! I fall down, get knocked down, trip over my own feet, go the wrong way, and miss assignments far too regularly. However, I don’t often play the fool on center stage with cameras rolling in front of thousands and thousands of people. But it does happen occasionally. In 2003 we were playing the Montreal Alouettes in the eastern final. The “Big O” was filled with close to 60,000 loud fans. One had to yell to be heard even if the listener was right beside you. All verbal communication was accomplished only through screaming. In the 4^th quarter the offense made a costly mistake that we had made several times that game. I was furious. We had discussed how we might resolve this error, but we erred again. As I walked to my bench, our head coach asked what happened. I screamed back at him that someone repeated the error that we had tried to fix earlier. So there I was, screaming at the head coach with a scowl on my face. I was screaming to be heard, not because I was upset with the coach. And I was scowling because of our team’s inability to correct the aforementioned problem, not because I was angry with the coach’s question. The camera caught it all. I was angrily screaming at my head coach and the many viewers did not have the explanation I just gave to you. No big deal you say? In many cases, perhaps not. But when it appears as though you are disrespectfully yelling at the nicest guy in professional sports, and the camera catches it, you are in hot water. That is what my wife saw while watching the game at home. Her husband was bellowing at fan favourite Michael “Pinball” Clemons. And I got an earful when I talked to her after the game. Instead of sympathy for losing another opportunity to go to the Grey Cup, I heard “I hope you’re not taking advantage of the fact that Pinball is a friend of yours. He’s your head coach!” As with most, she holds “Pinner” in high regard and wanted to make sure I wasn’t taking his position as head coach for granted just because at one time we played together. That was the first I heard about that incident but it was not the last! Michael Clemons is another sure-thing hall of fame footballer that I had the privilege to play with. His many on field accomplishments are only over-shadowed by his off-field philanthropy. He is one to marvel at. And one could choose to look at his numerous awards and records, such as his all-time all-purpose yards or Outstanding Player award. But let me give you an amazing and often overlooked statistic: 165 lbs. That is what he weighed. And that was probably with his shoes on. When public speaking I use that fact to inspire many young kids and many undersized football players. The man did all he did on the field and only weighed 165 pounds. Incredible! The CFL Hall of Fame in Hamilton will not be without a bust of the “Pinball Wizard” for very long.

The final yet to be recognized Hall of Fame Argo is still getting it done on the field. His impact as a player can be sensed if you ever meet my grandmother. “Nana” is a sports fan. My earliest memories of her are of watching Maple Leaf games together. Until this past year she followed the CFL closely. But recent days have not been good to her. She had been entirely self-sufficient until this past winter. She fell ill and even though she recovered, she was no longer able to solely care for herself. Her health has not allowed her to watch CFL games this year. She has good days and she has bad days. She occasionally forgets her great-grandchildren’s names (she has 21 of them). She doesn’t always clearly remember people and events from the past. But she always remembers a good friend of mine. Her face lights up when I mention his name. When I tell her that I will see him at practice she informs me that I must give him, along with advice for the upcoming game, a big kiss. My Nana loves Mike O’Shea. She loves him because he plays the game the way it was meant to be played. And he plays it at a high level. And he has played it that way for 15 seasons and counting. “O’sh” is another Argo that I have played with who is destined for the Hall of Fame. His 1000+ tackles guarantee his presence there. But the incredible statistic that I would like to mention is a relatively small part of those more than a thousand tackles. More than 160 of those tackles are special teams tackles. That is outrageous. Mike has been a starting linebacker his entire career. He has always been on the field when his team’s defense is playing. But when the ball needs to be kicked, or a kicked ball needs to be received, Mike is still out there. While many starters are resting on the bench, he is still fighting tooth and nail. His defensive competency is well known. His special teams prowess is almost unattainable. Of the two defensive stars who have more career tackles than Mike, one has 85 special teams tackles and the other only 36. O’Shea has excelled at every aspect of the game. We have all been witness to a career that will entitle him to a place among the CFL’s greatest.

Damon Allen, Pinball Clemons, and Mike O’Shea are three players adored by my family and are surely to be enshrined by the Canadian Football League.

Last Stop: Perseverance is not the same as patience. Many people use the words synonymously. But perseverance is patience with hard work. It is defined as continued, patient effort. And it is an attribute highly esteemed in the sports world. Great achievements over the course of one or two seasons will get you recognition. But perseverance in a sport over the years will get you respect and recognition. Respect from fellow athletes and recognition by Hall of Fame committees. Most of us will never experience the latter. But achieving the former is success enough.

Rails from the Rails #3 - Food For Thought

2008-02-12T09:34:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – 3 (originally posted on August 4, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

Tickets Please: It was a sad day for me when the Hamilton Ticats released Rob Hitchcock. Rob and I were rookies together in Hamilton in 1995. We endured that tough camp and have both battled in the CFL ever since then. When we would see each other on the field, which was frequent since we play for the Ticats and Argos, we would encourage each other to keep playing the game we both love. Rob had a great career and played the game the way it was meant to be played; with intelligence, great passion and great teamwork. He is respected by both those who played with him and those who lined up opposite him. As an Argonaut, I am glad that we do not have to face that fierce competitor anymore…he bettered us many times. As a friend and peer, I recognize that not having “Hitch” on the field is a loss to all of us who love this game.

All Aboard: As I enjoy a coffee and bagel with cream cheese having just left the Oakville VIA rail station, I have decided to share some thoughts I have in a field of which I consider myself an expert. Food! My expertise is not due to a degree or diploma from a culinary educational institution. But rather it comes from the practical experience of doing what true offensive lineman do best: eat. I have decided to share with you some in-season eating practices as well as the names of some eateries frequented by my teammates and myself during the football season.

A very common question that is presented to me has to do with the nutrition I ingest before a game. I have a fairly concrete routine which I am prepared to share with you. You must understand, however, that this regimen is not from a textbook and thus should not be taken as an ideal method of feeding oneself for competition. This was developed from years of trial and error and if it meets nutrition professionals approval it is only by coincidence.

The evening before a game has Chad Folk, Mike O’Shea, and me (and whoever else we can convince) looking for a sushi restaurant. I first got hooked on sushi (pun intended) when Mike O’Shea convinced me to join himself and some others at an all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant in Vancouver. To be honest, my first impression was less than stellar. That being said, I persevered by trying the Japanese-style food several more times and soon found myself craving sushi the night before games Does it taste good? Absolutely! The straight raw fish, called sashimi, is my favourite. But it also serves another purpose. Being a beefy person, I prefer my vittles in large portions. However, this is in conflict with my desire not to feel bloated the night before a game. For clarity, I want to eat a lot without feeling like I ate a lot. Impossible you say? Not so. All-you-can-eat sushi accomplishes both goals; a full stomach without feeling stuffed. This is an offensive lineman’s ideal meal.

On the actual day of the game, my pre-game meal ideally consists of a deli sandwich of some sort along with a bean or grain salad and some fruit. I do not have a favourite sandwich, but if I cannot find a deli I like than a good fallback is an Italian BMT from Subway. You can always find a Subway. I have also started to drink fruit smoothies if I can find them. Finally, despite warnings from some of the therapy staff, I must have a coffee or two. I do not do this specifically for football, but I drink coffee daily and I do not make an exception on game day.

For the second part of this article let me share some places my teammates and I like to frequent during a practice week. We have had the good fortune of finding a great all-you-can-eat sushi place near University of Toronto at Erindale campus called Momiji. They have sushi, maki, sashimi, and other Japanese inspired foods in quantities only hindered by the size of your stomach. The entire offensive line recently ate there and our eating exploits will be shown on national television in the near future.

To sate the appetite for Caribbean cuisine, shrimp or chicken roti from Calabash is the answer. It wasn’t until I joined the Argos that I first tried roti. This little Caribbean restaurant is a favourite of my wife as well. I often stop and pick some roti up from her and deliver it to her in London. Food from all over the world is one of the many benefits of Mississauga’s multicultural society.

And is there a better sandwich than a California’s veal sammy with onions, hot peppers, cheese and mushrooms? You would have to feed me one to prove it to me. It is not often that one sandwich is enough for me, but California’s does the trick.

Viet-Thai food from Pho Big Bowl or Pho Ben Thanh is the ticket when noodles, curries, smoothies and spring rolls are the desired meal. It is tradition for us to go to Ben Thanh at least once during training camp. This tradition started when Paul Masotti was the assistant GM for the Argos is the Sherwood Schwartz era. He took Chad Folk, Mike O’Shea and I out for lunch. We have done this ever since.

And for coffee I must confess that long ago I joined the cult of the faithful followers of St. Arbuck. A coffee or the occasional specialty drink gets me my daily dose of caffeine. I have at least one other fellow Starbucks disciple in Dave Costa. As a matter of fact, it was Dave’s cheery face and a warm cup-o-joe that helped get me through training camp this year.

I hope this less than exhaustive list of some of my favourite eating establishments has given you some insight into an offensive lineman’s eating activities.

Last Stop: Consider the following quote by Woody Allen: The food here is terrible, and the portions are too small. It gets right to the two issues that are of most concern to an o-lineman when contemplating a meal; quality and quantity. Any true offensive lineman has only one answer to the question of the superiority between quantity and quality. When asked “What is more important in regards to food, quantity or quality?” the lineman will simply respond YES.

Rails From The Rails #2 - Old School

2008-02-12T07:58:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – Two (originally posted July 18, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

All Aboard: Abraham Lincoln is quoted as saying “Don’t worry when you aren’t recognized, but strive to be worthy of recognition.” There is a player on the Argonauts who epitomizes this quote: Chris Hardy. “Hard Rock” has toiled in the CFL for 11 years and has played in a manner worthy of recognition. I’m afraid he has not received as much as he should have. However, he received a little this year as the coaching staff named him an Argonaut special teams Captain. Well deserved!

Tickets Please: One of the things older football players worry about, and by older I mean those having played at least 10 years, is the question of who will carry the torch once they have ended their careers. The elders in a football locker-room are always looking for certain qualities in up-and-coming athletes that will ensure the storied tradition of CFL players will be honoured and upheld. And what type of qualities do they look for in younger players? One phrase can answer that question: “old school”.

Wikipedia defines “old school” as a slang term referring to an older school of thinking or acting and suggests that it may be used to refer to a time of perceived higher standards or level of craft. That is the way in which I am using that term. Older football players are looking for the next generation of players to demonstrate they can play football, and be players, reminiscent of those in the good old days. When we see players of that ilk, we say “he’s old school”. To clarify this idea, allow me to list a few traits and give you a few examples off of the current Argos roster.

There are 3 traits in particular that I would like to highlight; toughness, humility, and teamwork. I admire football players who will collide with opposing players with such velocity and violence that they actually knock themselves silly. I also admire teammates who may be smaller in stature than their peers but play as if they were giants. Players who play in this fashion make their courage and toughness evident by the way they play. This is truly “old school”. Mark Twain put it like this: It is not the size of the dog in the fight, but rather the size of the fight in the dog. This trait is something the old men of the CFL love to see. The Argos have such a player in Brian Crawford. “Crawdaddy” will not back down from any assignment that he is asked to perform. Seeing him hurl his body at defensive lineman considerably bigger than himself is inspiring. Last year I gleefully watched “Crawdad” propel himself into a Ticat with such vigor that he did not know where our bench was when he picked himself up off the ground. I made sure the aforementioned Chris Hardy would escort him back to his teammates. That is how the game was meant to be played. Toughness is an “old school” character trait.

Humility seems to be a rarer commodity amongst rookies and young players every year. I am amazed at the arrogance of some young players who have never proven themselves at a professional level. The arrogance usually becomes evident when young players open the mouths with too much regularity. Now, call me a curmudgeon, but I like to see players speak with their pads before they speak with their mouths. Or as ex-Argo Elfrid Payton would say, “Let’s see you bring it before we hear you sing it”. The Argos have an excellent corner in ex-basketballer Byron Parker. The league recognized him as an all-star this past year. Interesting thing about Byron, despite his early success in the CFL, he goes about his business of being one of the best defenders in Canadian football with little fanfare and even less tongue wagging. If you would like to engage him in some fun, verbal jousting, he will oblige. But he made his mark, and continues to do so, with his skill on the field… which is the way it should be. That is “old school”. That’s what us over-the-hill footballers like to see.

Finally, the noblest trait in the eyes of over-the-hill CFLers is the ability to be a team player. Football is a game which requires more teamwork than anything I have been a part of. Teamwork is held in reverence by veterans of the gridiron. And seeing this understanding in a young footballer gives us old-timers hope for the game’s future. One such player is Toronto Argonauts offensive lineman Jeff Keeping. Now in his third year, “Keep” exemplifies what teamwork is all about. The key to teamwork is the deferring of one’s own goals for the goals of the group. Jeff will do anything that is asked of him. He has played offensive line, defensive line, tight end, fullback, special teams, and even lined up as a wide-out. He will put what is best for the team at the forefront. If anything is “old school”, willingness to put the team first is!

As I consider the future of this great game, I am one old-timer who is confident of the able young men who will carry on when I am done. I hope that other teams have some equally “old-school” athletes on their rosters. It appears as though the Argos have a glut of them with the addition of rookies such as Brian Ramsay, Glen January, and Durham Cato. It looks like a good crop of “old-school” rookies to keep us old guys from fretting.

Last Stop: “Honouring tradition” is one of the mottos being used by the Argonauts this year. Here is a quote by G. K. Chesterton about tradition: Tradition refuses to submit to that arrogant oligarchy who merely happen to be walking around. Some of my arrogance was quickly subdued when I read the list of offensive guards who were nominated for the All Argos Team. Their collective accolades and achievements are incredible. The tradition that the current Argonauts have inherited from these players as well as the other nominees is something truly worth honouring.

Rails from The Rails #1 - Introduction

2008-02-12T07:50:00.000-05:00

Rails from the Rails – One (originally posted July 10, 2007 at www.argonauts.ca)

Many people marvel at the fact that I commute into Mississauga from London. For the past 5 seasons I have made the trip from The Forest City to either Erindale Campus for practice or to The Rogers Center for games. My wife Nicole and I made the decision to make our home in London after we had our third child. Both Nicole and I grew up in London and most of our family resides there. We now have 5 children and we are both glad we made the decision to live close to the support that only family can offer. At least that is what I tell myself repeatedly on the boring stretch of 401 between Woodstock and Brantford. Commuting doesn’t seem like such a great call at that moment.

Anyways, I share the reasons for my commuting as an explanation for the opinion piece you are now reading. I am working on this little piece of prose as I watch the beautiful southwestern Ontario countryside pass by. No, I am not hurtling down the highway with a laptop balanced on my thighs while my knees do the steering. Rather, I am enjoying the commute in comfort aboard a VIARail passenger train. The cost of fuel, the difficulty of driving, the hazards of the road, and many lost hours led me to consider taking the train to work. And the ease of this type of travel allows me to work on my laptop without endangering other 400 series commuters. And so the name of this section of the Toronto Argonauts website is Rails from the Rails. The dictionary suggests to rail is to complain or to speak bitterly. My contribution will not necessarily be so negative, but it may venture down that track on occasion. And it is coming from my mobile office; a VIARail passenger car. Hence, you have Rails from the Rails.

I hope to cover many topics from many areas, but the majority of my writing will be related to the sport that has been my profession for the past 12 years. The topics will be presented in a three-part format. Part 1, “All Aboard”, will be an introductory paragraph on nothing in particular. Perhaps a quote I read, maybe a joke I hear, or even an anecdote that our head coach, and sometimes sage, Pinball Clemons has shared with the team. It may or may not have anything to do with rest of the article. Part 2, “Tickets Please”, will be the main body of my online musings. The third and final section will be called “Last Stop”. Here I will attempt to sum up my document with something the reader can take with them the rest of the day. This first article will give the format a test run. Let’s give it a try!

All Aboard: Before our home opener Coach Clemons shared a battle strategy used by famous warriors coming to the New World. They learned this strategy from the ancient Greeks. When they arrived at the country they were invading they would disembark from their boats and burn the ships to the ground. That is commitment! It was an apt illustration for a football team named the Argonauts.

Tickets Please: As I sit in my seat, feeling a tad guilty for enjoying my commute so much, I am struck by some similarities between this train that I am riding and the Canadian Foot ball League. It may seem like a bit if a stretch, but bear with me. I remember learning about Canada’s transcontinental railroad in history class. I still recall the textbook picture of Lord Strathcona driving in the last spike in 1885. It seems to me that both the Canadian railway, and the companies that built them, and the CFL are Canadian institutions with rich histories. The CFL was officially started in the 1950s, but the formation of the Argonauts predates the completion of the transcontinental railroad. We have been playing Canadian football in this country for a long time. My vague memories of history lessons on the Canadian railway have left me one overriding impression. The railroad that linked British Columbia to eastern Canada was a unifying force for Canada. I have forgotten many of the details, but the idea of a mode of travel bringing the country together has not left me. I think the CFL serves a similar function. It is a truly Canadian institution that brings us together. I never grow tired of talking football with Canadians all over this great country. And they are truly proud of their football league. Yes, I run into the NFL fans too, but the hordes that supposedly prefer the American game to ours seldom discuss it with me. I sometimes wonder if they are really out there. I believe the CFL is a point of unity for many in this country.

I am also always amazed by the two relatively thin strips of metal that guide and control these racing metal vehicles. Without the rails to ride on, this train would go nowhere. The CFL also rides on two rails. One of the rails that helps make this league successful is the players. They are individuals who are truly responsible for the sport. Whether it is Brent Johnson in BC, or Jeremy O’Day in Regina, or Anthony Calvillo in Montreal, it is the players who are largely responsible for the success of this league. I could name hundreds of players who in hundreds of ways have shown this to be true. They are the treasure of the CFL. The other rail on which this league depends can be seen on the business side of things. Canadian Football is a sport indeed, but the CFL is also a business. I, and many others, endured some bleak years in the 90s when bad business practices brought this league to the edge of oblivion. These days seem to be much better. The various owners, presidents, front offices, and commissioners of the recent past have brought health and vitality back to the business side of football in Canada. And that is good because the CFL needs two rails to ride on. It needs an exciting sport, supplied by the players, and good business practices, offered by the owners and their offices. Let’s hope that both these groups keep the CFL hurtling down the tracks safely and speedily.

Last Stop: I recently watched a documentary on Garth Brooks. I was intrigued when he spoke about the strained relationship between musicians and the record labels that they are under contract to. Garth suggested that this relationship was healthy when there was conflict. He suggested that musicians care about the music where as the record labels cared about the business. Good musicians put the music first; good businesses make money. And he wanted his records to make money. But he also cared about the music. Thus, conflict was inevitable if things were running like they should. Keep that in mind the next time you read or hear about the CFL Players Association being at loggerheads with the Commissioner or the owners. Maybe it’s not just about the money…maybe it’s about the game that the players love and the businesses that the owners are running. And maybe it’s a good thing they are in conflict.