Riding the bus to the Spirit of Edmonton party somewhere in northern Manitoba, we chance upon Boatmenblog friend Tuck - who, we find out, is fresh off a brush with Canrock greatness.

Tuck, it seems, was among a contingent of fans called upon to greet Tom Cochrane - who, at long last, is playing Saturday night with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra - at the airport. We know what you're thinking: Tom Cochrane has greeters? Well, in this town he does. But let's just say he's not quite getting the Nelly Furtado treatment.

Allow us to set the scene. You're the man - nay, the legend - behind classics like Life Is a Highway, Big League and that weird Muhammad Ali song from the Argos' Drabinsky era. You've touched down in Winnipeg, and you're waiting patiently for your limo, or at least a van of some sort. Instead, there's nothing - your ride is considerably late.

And then you see it: a yellow schoolbus. But not just any yellow schoolbus - a yellow schoolbus filled with drunk CFL fans waving white pom-poms out the window and chanting your name.

Only the best, it seems, for Tom Cochrane. But then, only the best from Tom Cochrane, too. Because now, courtesy of Tuck, we know how Tom signs his autographs:

Tuck,

Life is a highway

-Tom Cochrane 

Awesome. 

Day 1:

Blogging from the Grey Cup may prove to be more of a challenge than we originally anticipated.  We're still a little tipsy, it's freezing outside, and A-Rad seems to be passed out on the floor in the tuxedo that he's wearing from yesterday's post.  Onwards we press...

11:00 AM We show up at the airport and head immediately to the bar... where they aren't serving until 11:15.  Seems like a bit of an arbitrary time.  Number of people lining up at the Terminal 3 bar for beer at 11:00AM on a Wednesday: 18.

12:15 PM Lining up for the flight we notice that the gentlemen in front of us - Blue Jays play-by-play man Jamie Campbell - is looking kind of impatient, which leads to the following exchange:

Campbell: "You're serving on this flight, right?"

Flight Attendant: "No, you're going to have to wait until Winnipeg"

Campbell looks distraught and may start to silently weep...

Flight Attendant: "no, no, I'm just kidding..."

1:00 PM The flight officially runs out of beer

1:01 PM We officially switch to rum

1:30 PM "This is your captain speaking... The weather in Winnipeg is -30 and there is currently 2 feet of snow on the ground"  An eerie silence takes over the plane as we all believe that this is entirely possible.

2:00 PM Touchdown in Winnipeg.  I'm the only person who makes the obligatory touchdown signal. 

2:15 PM Hey, Bob O'Billovich was on this flight.  Hey... Bob O'Billovich has a pink suitcase.  Hey... Bob O'Billovich has three pink suitcases?

2:30 PM Our driver mentions that they are currently renting rooms in Brandon for the game.  Those people who didn't book on time are idiots.

2:35 PM Shoomy gets recognized for his Jerome Davis jersey by an Argos staffer.  "I knew it was you because only you and his girlfriend have a Jerome Davis jersey."  (We can only assume that Jerome's wife is an Arland Bruce fan.)

2:45 PM We get to the Delta Winnipeg where we are told that Expedia never called them to book the room.  They don't know if they can accommodate us... but they may have a room in Brandon.  We regret not asking our driver which rooms in Brandon are available.  (Big ups to the Delta Winnipeg who figured out a way to accommodate us.  Jeers to Expedia who basically couldn't book their way out of a paper bag.)

3:00 PM Recommence drinking.... Things get a little hazy around this point....

9:00 PM End up at the Tigers Lair and meet the gentlemen who claimed to be Stripes from this story... Stripes claims that A-Rad got him into some trouble, we find this improbable.

9:10 PM Shoomy reveals his plan to get a picture of a cheerleader from each team kissing him on the cheek.  A member of the Outriders mentions that she's not allowed to do "anything sexual" while in uniform, but gives him a hearty "air kiss".  Shoomy spends the next 3 hours trying to figure out if there actually is a ban or if she just isn't a Jerome Davis fan.

9:30 PM The Blue Lightning show up and immediately dispel the notion that the ban on anything sexual stretches to the dance routines.  Is that a fake bobsledding routine?  Jermaine Copeland would be so proud.  Shoomy re-evaluates his opening lines.

11:00 PM We see the stadium as we drive 20 minutes past it and into oblivion to get to the Spirit of Edmonton. 

11:30 PM Four shuttle buses go by the Spirit of Edmonton as we wait to go back downtown. One of which was going to Brandon.  Who stays in Brandon?  You've got to book ahead for these sorts of things.

Midnight:  We run in to Noel Prefontaine who is both in and having some fine spirits after his snub at the CFL awards.  Noel appears to be less impressed with the Rolling Stones cover band at Riderville than A-Rad. 

12:10 AM: Just when you think things can't get any more Canadian than being at the Grey Cup... we spot the Riderville make your own caesars bar.  Beautiful.

Time to start drinking again, see you tomorrow. 

and all through the nation, not a creature was stirring, not even this abomination.

As I'm sure we've mentioned before, we'll be heading out to beautiful sunny Winnipeg tomorrow to take part in the Grand National Drunk, and we can't wait.           

As those who have been to Grey Cup before know, the Big Game is secondary to the people you meet and the stories you hear in the run up to Sunday.  So if you see A-Rad, who will be a more inebriated version of the guy on the left with a blue Clifford Ivory jersey, or myself (the tall guy in the Jonathan Brown jersey) then come say hello.

For those of you who can't make it to the Peg, don't worry.  We're going to try to update the site often enough that you'll feel like you're right there being groped by Darren Flutie.

With our four-day Winnipeg binge drawing tantalizingly, alarmingly close, there's only one way to get into the spirit - fuzzy reminiscing about drunken moments at Grey Cup parties, Grey Cup afterparties, and maybe even Grey Cup games. In honour of the newest member of the Fort Erie city council, we bring you a genuinely heartwarming memory from the Argos post-game celebrations in '04.

***

Allow us to set the scene. It's roughly 4:00 a.m., the Argos are a few hours removed from winning the Grey Cup, and we're pretty sure our night's not going to get much better. Having weaseled our way into their post-game party at an Ottawa nightclub, we've already witnessed everything from Arland Bruce's awesome fashion sense to Tony Miles' drunken attempts at conversation to Romaro Miller's phenomenal game. And so we've staggered into Dunn's for some smoked meat sandwiches, hopefully to be consumed before we collapse.

Our meal begins in less than promising fashion, courtesy the arrival at our table of a rather scraggly and thoroughly inebriated gentleman who proceeds to engage us in twenty minutes of inane conversation. (Him: Tomorrow, I'm going to call down to Vegas and place a bet that Damon Allen's going to play another year. Us: Really? They're taking bets on that now? Him: Oh yeah. You bet. I'm calling tomorrow.)

But then, out of the corner of our eye, we notice something. Seated in a corner booth, minding his own business, is Sandy Annunziata - with the Grey Cup sitting in the booth next to him.

Every Canadian bone in our bodies tells us to leave the man alone. But every beer in our bodies tells us to make our move, forthwith. And so we approach Sandy, offer our hearty congratulations, and ask if we can take a picture with him and the Cup. (Just to be clear, we have no affilation whatsoever with those two people at the front of said picture. Truth be told, we can't really remember who they are.)

The next thing we know, we're holding the Cup as it's passed among us. Truthfully, we have no idea what Sandy's teammates would've thought of this. But to our minds, it made him quite possibly the greatest person ever elected to Fort Erie's city council.

This has been your Grey Cup moment. (You were expecting something snide, weren't you? What can we tell you...we get sentimental this time of year.) 

You thought you were rid of us, didn't you? Damon ages before our eyes, Arland Bruce shows the effects of not relaxing with a good old lasagna cookoff, the Argos season ends, and we all crawl back into whatever hole we climbed out of.

Not so fast. Not only will we be bringing you Canada's most comprehensive coverage* of Grey Cup weekend; we'll be keeping this going, one way or another, all winter...so when our new hero Michael Bishop returns next summer to lead the Argos to a perfect 18-0 season, we'll be ready for it.

In the meanwhile, we're in a surprisingly good mood. Part of this is because Winnipeg looms on the horizon. (Who among us hasn't said that at least once in their life?) But it's also because, even if the game itself was a little grim, we considered our Montreal foray a learning experience.

See, we now have a definitive answer as to who the stupidest fans in the CFL are.

Now, don't get us wrong. We love Montreal. Great nightlife, great culture, great smoked meat. And from our experience, the crowds at Molson Stadium tend to be pretty endearing, when they're not throwing peanuts at us. But for some reason, when they're joined by thousands of bandwagon jumpers at the Big Owe, they all turn into the world's largest herd of sheep.

We come from Toronto, and we've been to the odd Leafs game, so we know from crowds that need prompting to make noise. But we've never seen anything quite like the Als playoff crowd. Give them those bloody thunderstix, and they smack them together like trained seals. Tell them to "fait de bruit," and they bring the bruit. But ask them to figure out for themselves when to make noise, and they're hopelessly lost. Allow us to offer a few examples:

• Approximately 50% of the time, Argos' offensive plays are preceded by the call for bruit. The place roars. On the other 50% of Argos' offensive plays, it's virtually silent.

• Late in the game, while the Als are on offence, someone screws up and the "fait de bruit" call is played over the speakers. The crowd instantly works itself into a frenzy, prompting Brian Chiu to have a meltdown as he flaps his arms in the air to shut them up.

• On a close, deep play, the referee waves an Argo pass incomplete. At this point, it becomes clear that the fans have watched so little football that they don't recognize the signal. Only once the PA guy tells them it's incomplete do they burst into cheers.

• Our personal favourite comes at the end of the national anthem, when the trained seal in front of us sits through the entire national anthem  - and then proves unable to resist the banging of thunderstix at the end of it, abandoning his noble separatist cause to clang his 'stix together with them. Way to take a political stand there, jackass.

So, yeah...we're going to be pretty welcome at Grey Cup '08, aren't we?

* = Assuming your definition of "most comprehensive" is "most replete with stories of our drunken encounters with mascots, cheerleaders and middle-aged men in body paint."

We're mere days away from the start of Grey Cup week, and I for one can't wait.  But before we get on to this week's picks, let me just say that I find the behaviour of the Calgary Stampeders organization to be reprehensible.  Firing Steve Buratto simply because you do not want to see him in a Speedo on the Coaches Cruise is despicable. 

I'd like to take this opportunity to apologize to all of our readers who are now picturing Steve Buratto is a Speedo.

Rusty's Picks:

Toronto at Montreal

In yet another example of things that only I remember, shortly after the 2004 Eastern Final Anthony Calvillo gave an interview on Montreal radio about the state of his injured shoulder.  It was a perfectly reasonable interview except for the fact that Calvillo could not say the word shoulder and kept complaining about the pain in his "soda".  Which leads to this key question: What sort of soda was Anthony's arm made of?  After studying the issue for two years, two key conclusions have been reached: 1) given the state of the Als passing game that day, the soda was almost certainly flat, and 2) it couldn't have been coke, or Lawrence Phillips would have attempted to steal it back in 2002.

Pick: Toronto

Saskatchewan at BC

For the love of God, please do not let this game end on a successful Paul McCallum field goal.  As of this moment there are thousands of Riders fans stalking up on manure to dump on McCallum's new Vancouver digs if he wins this for the Lions.  Think of all the fertilizer that manure could have made.  Think of the world's food supply.  This could be the biggest disaster in Western Canadian history.  Oh, please don't let this game end on a successful Paul McCallum field goal.  The consequences could be dire.

Pick: Saskatchewan

A-Rad's picks:

Toronto at Montreal

I've never encountered backers of any other team, anywhere, who require more prompting to make noise than Als' fans. This has occasionally gotten annoying during East Finals past, since these prompts happen between every single play when the Argos have the ball. But it does represent possibly the finest commitment to bilingualism I've ever seen.

See, in order to hype up the crowd, the Als use DJ Kool's classic 1996 hit, Let Me Clear My Throat - specifically, DJ Kool's call to "make some noise." But since the language police would presumably object, we get a DJ Kool imitator requesting that we "Fait de bruit." And then, for us anglos in the crowd, we get the original version.

Sadly, the bruit might not be faited quite as much as usual this time, since they're apparently expecting a crowd of roughly 35,000 for this one. But don't worry, Jack Todd: The scalpers will be raking it in now that Don Matthews is gone.

Pick: Toronto

Saskatchewan at BC

Okay, so maybe I'm not the only one who reads Marty York's column. Apparently, the 'Riders were preparing to fly Roy Shivers to Winnipeg if they made the Grey Cup. Now, with Marty having incited Mt. Roy to blow sky-high, they've decided to take a pass, thanks very much. 

This is not entirely unreasonable. But the really entertaining part is that Shivers is apparently hanging around Vancouver even as we speak. I can only assume that Eric Tillman won't see much of the game against the Lions, since he'll be too busy looking over his shoulder for flying toothpicks.

Pick: Saskatchewan

Bonus pick: 

All of the Argos have been injured in practice, leaving Pinball to play the Als by himself. This being Montreal, Pinball spends much of the game being chased by Montreal's finest. How does Pinball do?*

Rusty's Pick: Pinball 276, Alouettes 0. (Pinball's weaving in and out of traffic on the field only enrages the police even more. But in the end it doesn't matter, as Pinball's moves make the officers look like the Keystone Cops - leading to a slight Pinball victory.)

A-Rad's pick: Pinball 819, Als 4. (Pinball cleverly enlists Ricky Williams as a decoy, asking him to stand on the sidelines wearing his helmet. Since tinted visors are among Montreal's most serious offences, the cops spend the entire game harrassing Ricky, allowing Pinball to run roughshod over the Als.)

* = Everything we need to know about football analysis, we learned from early '90s SNL sketches. 

Well, this is familiar. After a break last year - when, to our knowledge, no East Final took place - we're back to Montreal in November. This now being something of a routine, we're reminded of some of our more memorable Montreal moment from the past few years:

2002: At 9:00 PM the night before the game, we're wandering through the Crescent Street area (yes, we know Monrealers don't actually go there) when Argos' starting quarterback Reggie Slack wanders by looking rather enthused by the nightlife. This does not strike us as a good sign. The next day, he gets injured in the first quarter and is replaced by Marcus Brady. On a happier note, we wind up the Saturday night leading (or attempting to lead) Argos chants at an Irish pub while chatting with a coach from the University of Saskatchewan

2003: The night before the game, we nearly get run over by a man on an electric scooter. But before that, we take in the Habs game - where Argos yells (not by us) are unexpectedly heard around the upper deck. At the end of the gamne, we're quietly waiting outside the washroom for Cowbell Jenny, wearing our Argos jerseys, when a group of similarly attired gentlemen emerges and begins high-fiving and back-slapping us. The group proceeds down the stairs and somehow finds a couple of a Ticats fans to begin taunting. This all strikes us a good sign. The Argos proceed to lose on a controversial Calvillo touchdown that  should have been ruled a fumble.

2004: Stumbling onto the Santa Claus parade the day before the game, we're pretty sure we hear a choir singing a chorus of "St. Hubert. St. Hubert, St. Hubert." (We're still not entirely convinced it was "c'est l'hiver.") Accustomed to disappointment on game day, absolutely nothing strikes us a good sign. The Argos proceed to win handily, as we discover that Montrealers go silent the moment their team falls behind...and throw their thundersticks at us.

We steadfastly avoid talking politics here, partly because some of us spend too much of our time doing it elsewhere. And if we ever were to talk about politics, we wouldn't have thought it would be about Toronto's excruciatingly boring mayoral race. But alert reader ArgoMan brings to our attention that there's at least one good reason we should care. Over to you, ArgoMan:

Subject: Jane Pitfield hates the Argos

didja see her full page ad in the post today?
in her list of david miller's flawed decisions is this one:

"NFL FOOTBALL: Mr Miller opposes bringing NFL football to Toronto despite
wide public support"

Huh??
Is Paul Godfrey's slip showing??

This is especially bad news for Rusty, who lives in the St. Clair area and has been chomping at the bit to take his construction-related furor out on David Miller. But some issues clearly supercede others, so it's a safe bet none of us will be voting for Pitfield. And as if her own poll numbers weren't bad enough, this one from today's Star suggests her new attempt to position herself as an NFL superfan won't help that much, either.
 

As you may recall, or not, we went slightly postal on a couple of sports media columnists last month. Something about being "the least important people at their respective newspapers."

Now, we entirely stand by our rant about Bill Houston - especially now that his feud with Peewee Smith has reduced Peewee to writing articles with headlines like "Arlandzander the great." But Chris Zelkovich? We're feeling a lot better about him. And yes, it doesn't take much to appease us. A feel-good column about the CFL as we prepare to jump into the car and head for Montreal will suffice.