The Top 10 Questions on Everyone's Mind

I recently added Google Analytics to this site, essentially for my own amusement. It's fun to see where people visit from, and, even better, what search queries landed them here. With that in mind, I will give you the top ten questions that people seem to be looking to marriedtotheoil for answers to, and as I'm all about service, I'll do my best to answer them.

10. tim wakefield carries sick kid

Aww, what a sweet image. I'm sure he would, if you asked. How far do you need this sick kid carried?

9. "oilers flag" + tennessee

Oh, I'm so, so sorry. I wish I could help with your situation, but I don't think this is something mail order can fix.

8. edmonton oiler mascot

Is a terrible idea.

7. gene principe

Is perhaps googling himself? What does he do during the off-season, exactly?

6. hey, get well soon

Why thank you. I'm feeling much better already!

5. is dean arsene married?

I applaud your rapid, opportunistic response to a recent Oilers transaction, and am a little afraid.

4. sidney crosby

Surely I can not be an early result for that query. I have, however, had 3 visits from Nova Scotia, so I am concerned Sid needs a better summer hobby than vanity googling to assuage his off-season boredom. Go live a little, you just won the Cup!

3. rexall brand hair gel

Sheldon, my man! How's your summer going?

2. tarnst porn

Oh dear. I do not know what this is, and I'm not sure I want to. I'm assuming "porn" is a wild-card query word on google by now? A perfunctory visit with a german dictionary would suggest that "tarnst" means disguised or masked. Good luck with that. Or it could be featuring Dick Tarnstrom, I suppose. I don't know what disturbs me more of these options.

1. tarnst hockey

I suppose that's less disturbing than #2, but I fear I still do not know what this means, readers, though I have had enough queries about it to imply it is in the current zeitgeist. Can anyone else help?

More Knuckleballs

The MLB All-Star Game this year was, as always, a bloated spectacle, and from my partisan point of view, a disappointing one. I thought it was pretty lousy of Joe Maddon not to put Wakefield in--it was his first All-Star Game and possibly his last, given the vicissitudes of pitcher selection, and I sincerely doubt Rivera or any other AL pitcher would have grudged him a couple outs. Bush league, says I.

Here's a nice article on Wake from the NYT.

New Oilers Job Posting:

I tip my cap to the individual who can accomplish all of the tasks listed in this job description in a 40hr week.  Or an 80 hr week.  Or a 120 hr week.  I'm assuming there's an opening because of a nervous breakdown?

My favorite part of the listing is this:

Write articles and features for the Oilers website and Oilers publications and the general public

So does this mean I can call and request, as a member of the general public, a feature on Shawn Horcoff for my own use?  What a nice service!

Knuckleballers are All-Stars too!

I'm delighted by the news that Tim Wakefield will be one of the six Red Sox players (including Horc's buddy Jason Bay) playing in the 2009 MLB All-Star Game.  Wakefield, a 42-year-old knuckleballer, has been an integral part of the team since I first started watching them in '95. This will be Wake's first All-Star Game, which is somehow unsurprising, as he has always been excellent at a very low profile.  I had the pleasure of meeting him at a fan event in 1999, and he was polite and painfully shy.

Wake is probably the current greatest athlete benefactor of sick kids in New England (though I'm happy to say he has many rivals for the title) and his dedication to the rugrat crowd is reciprocated heartily. Every time I have been to the giant souvenir store across Yawkey Way from the Park, someone behind the counter is promising a parent that they'll have more #49 shirts in x tiny kid size in "by Monday, they just sell out so fast."  Anyone that under the radar with that many little kids worshipping him anyway has got to be doing something right, and it's delightful to see the League acknowledge it.  Congrats, Tim!

Roloson to the Islanders?

Harrumph. This day is just annoying me more and more.

I'll miss you, Crazy Eyes. Sorry you're going to one of the most obnoxious arenas in the league.

Happy Canada Day! Free agent drama for all!

I love poutine.  As a lifelong resident of North America South, I was not exposed to it until D brought me home to Edmonton to meet his family.  Since then, I have been trying to make up for lost time, as far as poutine is concerned.  Here in Austin, one grocery store actually carries squeaky cheese curds, though somewhat unreliably.  Our original plan for celebrating Canada Day 2009, was to make poutine, because "it's Monday" also works around here as an excuse for such. Alas, no curds at the store, so we have settled for a 750ml Unibroue Trois Pistols, a Terry's Chocolate Orange, homemade maple shortbread cookies, and worrying about the free agent market.

I am unabashedly disappointed that the Sedins will not be coming to Edmonton.  I know it wasn't much of a risk, but still, it would have been lovely to have them in Copper and Blue and I was mentally drawing up lines around the Sedins +1 and Horc and Hemmer +1 and sighing ecstatically.

Ah well.  This Heatley business is bewildering and seems to have no happy resolution. Perversely, if it does go through, I will miss Laddi the most.  He's a feisty player, and has an air of the undersized underdog trying to prove his credentials and courage, so much so that I mentally clock him at several inches shorter than his rightful 6'3".

To all I wish a day filled with good libations, celebrations, and constant applications of F5 to the TSN homepage.

To anyone kind enough to still visit this languishing blog for updates, my sincere apologies for my lengthy and unplanned (a now-resolved personal medical debacle) hiatus.  I'm back to posting at least sporadically: preferable (I hope) to not at all.