Primer for writing about Los Angeles and hockey

One of those things that screams "This journalist knows nothing about LA!" is using Los Angeles and Hollywood interchangeably. Hollywood is a neighborhood within Los Angeles. Think of it like how SoHo is a neighborhood in Manhattan or Lake View in Chicago. The only hockey player I know of with a house in Hollywood is Sean Avery who has a house in the Hollywood Hills. They're one of those many groups of hills around here that are always catching on fire. I don't even know if Avery still owns that house. Most of the Kings players live pretty far from Hollywood around Hermosa and Manhattan Beaches.

I have slept through earthquakes. I think 60° F is cold. I'm a native Southern Californian, and I've lived in LA for about seven years; but I have yet to find this mythical "Tinsel Town" place you people keep talking about. I can recite some really obscure bits of LA history, tell you how to avoid traffic around the Westside, and find the parking meter Gary Busey had an affair with, but no fucking Tinsel Town.

Hollywood is pink on purpose.*

• It does rain in Los Angeles.
• Areas of the Angeles National forest do get snow.
• We have many ice rinks. Youth and rec hockey are alive and well here.
• You can blame Orange County (and the Ducks) for soccer moms.
• Los Angeles is in Los Angeles County. Anaheim is in Orange County. Just because their baseball team changed their name doesn't make them any less not LA.
  
• Yes, there are a lot of distractions here, which is probably why we are able to do things besides watch hockey. I don't know what, but supposedly it's possible.
• Part of why hockey players are able to lead normal lives here is because being around celebrities eventually leads to apathy. We see them, we just don't care. Personally, I don't bother people when they are out grocery shopping, having dinner with the family, or walking their dogs because that would piss me off.
• I fucking hate the Lakers.

*from losangelesmap.org

Capitalizing on the losses of others

Us LA Kings fans take a lot of flack for being Kings fans. Our team hasn't seen the playoffs in seven seasons. While I was in North Carolina earlier this year, a Canes fan told me, "You aren't a real fan until your team sucks."

So the last time I saw playoff hockey in Los Angeles I was still living two hours away (I moved to LA in 2003). The last playoff hockey I saw inside the Staples was this game in 2001:



I called myself in sick from school (cell phones and sounding like one of your parents are awesome things at that age) and headed down to LA in my piece of shit 10 year-old Ford. If you actually watch the end of that video, you can hear Bob Miller, the happiest I remember hearing him. There was crying. There was hugging of strangers. There were Red Wings' tears. Delicious Red Wings' tears, which taste like Swedish meatballs.

Last night was a pretty lackluster game for the Kings. A disappointment after Thursday, one of the worst days of Roberto Luongo's life.




The seats I had last night often have the visiting team's fans behind them. Last night was no except. A pair of exceptionally dumb Ducks fans sat right behind me. One, these people thought the Ducks stood a chance of getting the 8th seed. This would require not only for the Ducks to win all their upcoming games, but for Colorado and Calgary to lose theirs. Two, the amazing insight of things like "why don't they go down the middle?" Oh, I don't know, because when defensemen do their jobs going down the middle usually isn't an option.

Last night went into a shootout. The first two shooters, as all of us Kings fans know, are always Anze Kopitar and Jack Johnson. The third was Dustin Brown. OK, Dustin Brown just came off of a hat trick on Thursday, but I knew somewhere in the back of my head that there had to be someone better than Brown to go third.


That someone is Michal Handzus.

The big news is, with Calgary's regulation loss today, the LA Kings are going to the playoffs for the first time in eight years!



You know what would've been real cool. Watching the Chicago game at home instead of having to go to a bar, but Calgary isn't one of NBC's 6 teams that they always show.


Rangers are the only wild card in there.

...but watching the game at a bar did mean I got to watch some table dancing after Calgary lost. Baja Mexico also wanted celebrate, 'cause that's how we roll.

Back in LA, just in time

...what day is it? It's still Monday for another half hour. Oh right, and I haven't written on this thing in a month. The Swarles has been sick as a dog. Luckily for me I was not sick in time for the games on Tuesday and Saturday.

Some thoughts from Saturday:
-Kyle Calder as a Duck is hilarious. I guess he didn't have to move far to continue to waste space.
-Stupid Sexy Jonathan Bernier is really fighting for a spot in the big kids' club.
-I. WANT. FRO. LOV.
-I am never sitting in a certain area of a certain section again. The price was good because the STH around us couldn't shut up and watch the game!
-I witnessed the most intellectual fight the NHL has ever seen. George Parros v. Kevin Westgarth. Were they arguing over whose IQ is higher or string theory? ...or Kevin was hungry and he saw some fresh duck.
-I looked Brayden Schenn in the eyes, and my underwear melted. Luckily I was wearing black shoes. What is the black market value for Schenn babies in Canada?
-Ryan Smyth's mullet is a majestic thing of beauty. It almost rivals Jim Fox as the cure for cancer.



Frozen Fury is this Saturday! Vegas, baby, Vegas!

I'm off to study Russian so I can recite Andrei Voznesensky to my sweet, sweet Fro-love in his native tongue. Not really. Two alphabets is enough for me.