Thug-less Strawbs Batter Blades

Strawberries 5 Blades of Steel 0

Game Report

January 24, 2008


For the third consecutive game or so, the Killer Strawberries were forced to weave their on ice magic without the services of the inimitable Dr. Thelonius Thug, who has been whiling away the hours at home, nursing his 435th career concussion. To pass the time in as pleasant a manner as possible, he has been correcting his son’s university Physics assignments and knitting small booties for the Tse-Tse flies he keeps in his basement lab. Since Dr. Thug’s recent incapacitation, ugly trade rumours have been swirling about the team, most of them originating from the Machiavellian mind of the scheming Warrin’ Peace who is salivating at the thought of a continued increase in his ice time. Mr. Peace has been cautioned by the Executive and by his first wife, and the squad’s biggest fan, the enchanting Samara Desert, a woman who has dedicated her life to fostering harmonious relations in her own home and in households worldwide. In a press release on Friday morning, Mr. Peace was quoted as saying “Dr. Thug, despite his deepening senescence, is an integral part of the Strawbs’ march to a second consecutive Cup. We need him in the lineup. If anything I said could be construed as derogatory, I must have been misunderstood or been quoted out of context. Either that or something else”.

Even though rumours of this proportion can sometimes disrupt a team, such was not the case last evening. Jesse The Leak, fresh from intense training sessions at the Britney Spears School of Goaltending and Child Rearing, was spectacular between the pipes as he repeatedly frustrated the Blades with his cat-like reflexes and horseshit luck. The “Last Steamer in Service”, Freight Train Laronde had his best game of the year, scoring two goals which will be featured this weekend on either Sportsnet or his Mom’s Show and Tell session scheduled for this coming Sunday morning in her church’s basement.

Also playing his best game since his elevation to Knighthood was Sir Gawdawful Gumby. While it is true that it would not have taken much to elevate his normally anemic play, Sir Gumby was awarded the game’s 14th star, as huge an accomplishment for him as anything he has accomplished since being booted out of high school a the age of 32.

Some concern was being expressed, post game, by those stalwart Strawberries assembled just outside the shower doors about the spotty performance of the usually reliable Whoahorny Richardson, the only Strawb with both a suppository line AND a hemorrhoid cream named after him. On at least two occasions, he rounded his own net, gathered what was for him a huge head of steam, only to ungracefully topple himself into a physically impossible heap, barely five feet from his own goal line. There was ample speculation on the bench that he had once again been guilty of over-imbibing one of the toxic brews he routinely creates in his bathtub. ”Didn’t touch a thing before the game” he sheepishly declared. “ My wife does not allow it.” The only problem with his denial is that his wife left him for a lisping Peruvian pig farmer eight months ago to the day. Apparently, Whoahorny missed the team’s public relations session where all players were advised to keep their lies plausible.

Butcher Brophey is to be commended for his unusual contribution to victory. For the second consecutive match, he has failed to get a penalty of any description. In light of his newfound pacifism, the Executive is worried that something may be amiss at home. The normally truculent and obstreperous defenceman has not been his self lately, a fact noticed by everyone including the Zamboni driver at Palangio Arenas. His main squeeze, the delectable and mesmerizing Miss White Go Go Boots has not attended a game since just before Christmas. The only information related to her inexplicable absence has been speculatively gleaned by the team’s only reader, Ice Marshall Walpole who regularly scans the local newspaper for the titillating tidbits he uses to regale his fellow players. “I’ve been reading the North Bay Disser and Slammer closely for the last couple of months, especially to see if my name appears in the obituaries. So far so good on that front. But I did notice that in the Local Improvements section it was mentioned that someone named Miss Green Dancing Shoes was moving to Buttface, Alaska, home to Strawbs’ farm team’s farm team, the Nasty Cupcakes. Could it be that Miss Green Dancing Shoes and Miss White Go Go Boots are one and the same personage? If so, why did she leave? For me, the whole affair is a mystery wrapped in an enigma swaddled in a riddle.”

Despite the controversies which surround the august Strawberries, a victory over their arch-rivals was recorded nonetheless. Everyone forgave everyone else for any minor transgression which may or may not have been perpetrated. In the spirit of togetherness, the team re-assembled post game at the Terminal Tavren to laud each other’s accomplishments and to salve any remaining misunderstandings. Miss White Go Go Boots’ health was toasted and the desire for her return wholeheartedly professed.

1 bottle of Blue, 3 Keiths, 3 Black and Tan, 4 Stella, 2 legal Scotch , 6 illegal Scotch poured surreptitiously from Sir Gumby’s belated 49th birthday present from the Vice and the absent Madame LaChaise Lounge, 1 Bass, 4 Guinness, a plate of lo-cal nachos, and fond memories of a recently departed siren were consumed.