Beer is like my baby

The column I'm posting here first appeared in the North Shore News as a fill-in for vacationing humourist and all-around tall person James Weldon. If you haven't read James' work, please don't so I can fool you into thinking I'm the funniest writer at the paper. Ah crap, I forgot about Brendan McAleer too. Also, our arts and crafts lady is a riot.
Seriously though, if you have an afternoon to kill read through James' stuff here — especially if you enjoy movies with explosions, zombies, or exploding zombies in them — and Brendan's stuff here — especially if you enjoy talking about cars and teasing the Germans.
My column is about beer. I wrote another one which I'll post in a few days. It was about the budget ceiling crisis in the States. Just kidding, it was about TV. I'm tackling all the major issues of our time.
One of these days I'll post something original here too. What day, you ask? I don't know, get off my back. Some of us work for a living instead of sitting around all day drinking beer and watching baseball while occasionally throwing bits of pork butt at babies. God I miss parental leave.

It's over

 

it's not you, it's me

 

BY ANDY PREST, NORTH SHORE NEWSJUNE 3, 2011

 

 

Dear Beer:

I don't know where to start -- this is one of the most difficult things I've ever had to do. I'm just going to come out and say it: I think we need to spend some time apart.

You know I've loved you ever since I was 16 -- erm, I mean 19.

I never thought the day would come when I would have to write this letter to you. The truth is, there's someone else. A man, in fact. Well, a very small man. A baby, actually.

When I went on parental leave five months ago I thought you and I would become closer than ever. I envisioned us hanging out all day watching afternoon baseball. Maybe you'd be my booze-muse while I banged out my novel as the baby did what I thought babies do best -- not move.

I was wrong -- babies are hard work. It turns out babies are best at being adorable, getting other people to take them places and getting everything dirty. I know the health nurses at the drop-in centre would frown upon me showing up with a six-pack of you to share with all the mamas. And remember when I always used to drop stuff on the ground, including you, after a few hours of us hanging out together? Well, that's not cool anymore for various legal, ethical and familial reasons. Being a dad demands my un-woozy attention, which is why I think we need to slow things down for a while.

Please don't take this the wrong way and do something crazy like de-alcoholizing yourself or trying to make yourself more attractive by drinking a bunch of lime. It's not you, it's me.

In fact, you're better than ever. Here in British Columbia, caring, alcoholic nerds are craft-brewing you with rich, delicious flavours. You're so hoppy these days you should be selling Trix cereal.

Sorry, I shouldn't be joking at a time like this. I hope you're not too upset.

Remember all those great times we had together? I don't either. But I have seen the pictures and it looks like there were some great parties. And usually a lot of barbecued meats. And why am I always wearing some sort of household item on my head as a makeshift hat? And where are my sunglasses?

Last weekend you introduced me to tastes I've never experienced before when we met up at Howe Sound Brewing in Squamish. An extra special bitter, a black IPA with a touch of grapefruit, even a mystery weiss beer that managed to pull off a subtle hint of gummy bear. It was all so beautiful.

But where were you at 6:30 the next morning when my boy was up and kicking at the foot of my bed and I couldn't get up to play with him? I'll tell you where you were. You were inside my brain playing racquetball with my hypothalamus.

I don't want to sound harsh, but the fact is my baby is just more fun than you are. And that's saying something because I think you're better than a go-kart that shoots fireworks.

Did you know that my baby is barely nine months old and he has already learned to give high fives and to flirt with pretty girls? Not the kind of flirting you always got me to do, which I've come to accept was mostly just shouting. No, my baby loves the blondes and I'm not talking pale ale.

He also loves Cheerios, banging his head into things and giving his mama and daddy hilarious, slow-motion open-mouth kisses. I'm sorry beer, but there's nothing in the world that will stop me from enjoying every minute I can with my little guy. And I want to remember every moment, not hear about it the next morning after my wife finds me passed out in the bathtub.

I know, without you there would be no baby because I wouldn't have had the courage to plop down on his future mama's lap in the middle of that crowded Quebec City pub -- love the work you're doing in la belle province, by the way. But we've all changed since then.

I'm going to miss you. The switch to dreadfully boring beverages has been hard for me. There's a reason water is free.

It's not like we'll never see each other again. I'll probably bump into you at my sister-in-law's wedding next week, but I'll be in charge of the little guy again so I'll have to keep my hands off of you. I'm sure it would be fine for me to bring you as a +1. The problem is you always turn into a +7.

Please know that my baby will eventually turn eight and be able to fend for himself. When he does you'll be the first one I'll call, opener in hand. Don't think of this as goodbye -- it's more like . . . taste ya later.

Sincerely,

Andy

PS. Seriously, I think you grabbed my sunglasses, by mistake of course. I'll be by to pick them up tomorrow. I don't want it to be weird so it would be great if you could just leave them outside your flat.

© Copyright (c) North Shore News

Vancouver Canuck fans are not like my baby?

One of my earlier Sports Baby blog posts was titled "Vancouver Canuck fans are like my baby."

When my wife remembered that title she was horrified, what with last month's downtown bonfire and all. She was also horrified by the riot itself, frowning away and eventually choosing to leave the room rather than watch people act so boorishly.

I was the opposite. I couldn't get enough of it. It was a lot more entertaining than the damn game 7, wasn't it?

I feel a little funny writing about the riot so long after it happened but 1) I work for a newspaper that only publishes two sports sections a week so I'm used to reheating cold chicken from time to time; and 2) we're now one month removed from the riot and everyone still seems to be talking about it, so what the hell. Somewhere a Hummer still smoulders.  

As I watched the riot I was thinking:

1. Rob Brown is awesome;

2. Those rioters suck at building barricades; and

3. The claims coming from the cops and mayor — that this was not the work of hockey fans but rather the devil deeds of criminals and "anarchists" — were as silly as the world's tallest jockey. 

Of course a lot of people called bullshit on the mayor and it very quickly became clear that these weren't anarchists at all. They were hockey fans. They were our friends and neighbours. They were Vancouverites. They were car salesmen. They were UBC students. They were water polo players.

Back to my wife. Her horror stemmed from her relatively new designation as "mother." As the drugstore cowboys smashed their way through London Drugs, no doubt stealing Gold Bond powder and other people's vacation photos, my wife couldn't help but repeat the refrain: "those are someone's kids doing this."

And she wasn't thinking about Ma and Pa Anarchist watching on stolen cable TV as they tore the labels off unsold mattresses. The rioters, and their parents, came from all walks of life. A dread passed over my wife as she thought of one day seeing our little guy all grown up and playing air guitar with a smashed up mannequin's leg on the 11 o'clock news. Oh, the shame.

The riot wound down and amazingly no one was killed. But then things got really bad. The public shaming, rage, threats and judgment that followed the riot as seemingly limitless photographic and video evidence emerged was much more frightening to me than people kicking Sears.  

Here's the thing: young people are idiots. I grew up in a very loving, respectable middle-class, two-parent family. I was a good kid. And while I never had physical altercations with the local police force, I can certainly remember my friends and I running and hiding from them on occasion following some idiot teenager shenanigans. Fire may or may not have been involved at some point. Transplant those shenanigans to Robson Street after watching a hockey team lose game 7 and it's not ridiculous to think that my actions could have led me to become one of the famous riot idiots outed by online evidence and anger, the shame following me for life. That would not have been cool.

Back to my son, idiots, and shame. I'm a daddy now so everything I think about revolves around my boy. Here's the question: what if my son had been there? What if I saw him on some grainy news video doing something that looked really bad? What if it ruined his life long before things like the judicial system or facts could be introduced?

Here's a hypothetical: Let's say it's 2029 and the Canucks have finally made it back to the Stanley Cup finals. My boy, now a young man, wants to be a part of the downtown celebration. The following stuff happens. The question is, when should I feel the shame of raising a rioting monster:

Step 1: My son and his friends from his basketball team go to watch game 7 as the Canucks take on expansion franchise the Mexico City Sombreros. (I already feel shame. I can't believe my son is a Canucks fan.)

Step 2: He and his friends are 18 so they're old enough to vote and go to war but not old enough to drink alcohol in B.C. Instead they drink six Red Bulls each.

Step 3: The Canucks, worn out from a long team walk on the Seawall to "find themselves," lose. Trouble starts. Someone burns a stuffed Speedy Gonzalez doll. A nearby hover car is lit on fire. My son and his friends see a young family trying to get away as a mob fight starts nearby. They rush over to help the family leave the area.

Step 4: Though awkward and pimply, the boys are all tall so they become targets for hopped up water polo thugs looking to fight. To keep his friends from getting pummeled, my son says "no no no no no no no" over and over and pushes some dudes back to clear some space. The police barge in with clubs.  

Step 5: Things start to get really dicey so my son and his friends make for a SkyTrain station. On their way out the team's resident jackass (every sports team has one), pissed off about getting clubbed, kicks a store window.

Step 6: Free Holograph Phones! A shower of phones rains out of one of the 168 telecommunication retailers on Robson Street. As wild-eyed water polo players stuff phones down their Speedos all around him, my son scoops up what he can and brings it to a cop who is standing nearby doing nothing. "Eff off," the cop says.

Step 7: My son stuffs a pair of retro skinny jeans into the gas tank of a police car and lights them on fire. Then he punches a police horse in the mouth and runs to Stanley Park and chops down the tallest tree.

As I said, this is a hypothetical. Obviously grown up Sports Baby would never put himself in any of those situations. He'd be off with the Intergalactic Peace Corp saving baby space pandas from Martians or something.

But say it did happen like that. I'd say there's nothing in the first six steps (except cheering for the Canucks) that I could get really upset about and be forced to take away his used, piece of junk 2016 Toyota Prius.

Until Step 7, the token ridiculous joke step, there's not much to really kill a kid over. A little bad judgment mixed in with wrong place at the wrong time. But it's conceivable that at any point between Step 3 and Step 6 a camera or a video recorder or a brand new iHat could have captured him doing what may have appeared to be hardcore rioting. Facebook tag, story in The Province, basketball scholarship to Ball State revoked, poop thrown at our front door, life ruined.

It's not all that far fetched.

Let's come back to 2011 — Awwww, my baby is so cute and such a good boy. Kisses for daddy? High five? Alright! Sorry, I had to reset his future.

Anyway, a coworker of mine has a 15-year-old son whose first time ever venturing downtown with his buds without parental supervision was for game 7 of the Canucks vs. Bruins series. A car flipped and burned right next to them and, because they're good kids who were scared shitless, they ran straight to the nearest cop, told him about the car and asked how they could get out of there. Take that kid one year later and maybe he sticks around a little, laughs with his buds and snaps a few cellphone picks. A camera catches him at the wrong angle and all of a sudden he's another one of the criminals to be tried and convicted on Facebook.

The thought that I was ultimately left with after the riot and its aftermath is that my wife was right. In cases like this — and with the explosion of social media this is only just the beginning — we'd do well to remember that those are people's children out there. I'm not the first to say it and I won't be the last, but before we start doling out online, vigilante justice we all need to realize that every picture does not necessarily tell the whole truth. If the Internet brands you as evil, the sting of that will likely burn your whole life.

As a parent, that would be a pretty horrible thing to see your kid go through. One of my baby's favourite things to do is to knock down toy towers. We build them up and he slams them down with glee. When he does it we all watch and cheer. Uh oh.

What's that slogan? We are all Canucks? Maybe that's not so far from the truth.

Photo: Andy Clark/Reuters

Follow me on Twitter @Sports_Andy

Dirk Nowitzki is like my baby

"Know this; It gets better every day. As cool as your kids are when they are 5, it's even better when they are 6. As great as that is, it's even better when they are 7. And so on.

"So if you are about to embark on the journey of parenthood, I hope you embrace it. Whenever a friend tells me they are going to have their first child I say the same thing, 'Welcome to the greatest club in the world, parenthood.'"

The two little paragraphs above made me feel all warm inside, kind of like how Vancouver Canucks fans can make a Smart Car feel all warm inside. They were part of a Father's Day blog post by Gus Ramsey, one of the tamer characters from Sports Guy Bill Simmons' circle of funny friends.

My experience with parenthood so far has been a mini version of what Gus is talking about: every month, heck every week, seems better than the last. I feel a little weird talking smack about two-minute-old Sports Baby but it's true — nine-month-old Sports Baby is just way cooler. Granted, two-minute-old Sports Baby had just gone through the wacky waterslide of life, but still, he wasn't exactly cracking off one-liners (eg. "Hey Doc, could you leave the cord for a little while, I just figured out how to do cat's cradle.")

But after we washed the little birth canal bits and bobs off his head, Sports Baby got down to the business of getting more and more awesome with each passing day.

He has already figured out a whack of physical things like babbling, sleeping, crawling, eating and Skyping — now he's developing his own little personality. Right now I'd call his personality "loveable rascal." He's got a great move where he'll crawl toward something he's not supposed to touch, look back at us mischievously, then turn back and double his speed while laughing hysterically. He drinks from a regular cup — no sissy sippy for him — and when he's had enough he'll blow bubbles up his nose. He's a hilarious handful already and I can't wait to see where he goes from here.

His development reminds me a bit of the career of Dirk Nowitzki. Always regarded as a talented basketball player, Dirk finally joined the game's elite this season, guiding his Dallas Mavericks to his and their first NBA title with a six-game win over the super villains from Miami last week. To get to this point he has continually worked on and improved his game, getting harder and harder to guard. Here's how he looked when he came into the league:

 Yikes! That's him on the left, looking like a friendly German lesbian, alongside former Dallas coach Don Nelson and Sugar Ray frontman Mark McGrath. Dirk came into the league as a seven-foot-tall 19-year-old who had a nice scoring touch but who also was, very understandably, a little terrified.

Since that time he has continually added to his arsenal while also becoming a team leader. Working with former German national team player Holger Geschwinder, Nowitzki added new moves every summer, eventually earning a title reserved for a select few: unguardable.

He's like Lebron James except the total opposite. Lebron seems a bit like a basketball Benjamin Button — he came into the league as a fully formed basketball man and has since regressed into a confused, mean-spirited little boy. Meanwhile Dirk has just gotten better and better.

Is it a coincidence that Lebron has no father in the picture and Dirk, if you count coach Holger, has two? Probably.

Happy Father's Day!

Photo (Nowitzki MVP) Roland Martinez/Getty Images

Photo (Nowitzki, Nelson, Nash) Carolyn Herter/NBAE/Getty Images

Follow me on Twitter @Sports_Andy

Vancouver Canuck fans are like my baby

Finally something at a sporting event that my baby is really interested in — boobies!

In case you missed it — or haven't gone back in your DVR to rewatch, then pause, then slo-mo forward, then slo-mo backward, then pause, then regular time forward, then pause again — a tanned Vancouver fan punctuated her team's victory Wednesday by flashing her breasts at San Jose thug Ben Eager as he sat in the penalty box, an act that was broadcast across the nation on CBC's Hockey Night in Canada.

As you know, Sports Baby is still too young to watch TV and it's probably for the best as this random boobing likely would have confused him into thinking it was time for a late-night snack. Not sure what he would have made of the piercings, though.

This spirited young gal, however, clinched it for me as I am now fully onboard with this Canucks playoff run. With the Sedins back performing their creepy magic and Ryan Kesler playing with more grit than an ice cream cone dropped on the beach, there's a lot to like about the team these days (except for Bieksa. Who are you going to fight next? The goalie? The masseuse?) Throw in the Green Men and their chesty one-game replacement and you've got yourself an interesting team. An Albertan by birth and blood-beef level, I'm ready to get behind the team of my adopted home at least for these playoffs.     

It's not the first time I've dabbled in Canuck-ism.

Back in 2009 I wrote this in a North Shore News column:

"I'm not going to jump on your bandwagon just yet, but let's just say I hear the music and am not recoiling in disgust. Another series win and maybe I'll start wearing more green and blue (and orange and yellow and red and brown and purple — gosh you've had some horrible uniforms)."

The weird thing is Canuck fans don't seem to want me. Back in 2009 I got a strongly worded response from a gentleman from Surrey suggesting that, and I'm paraphrasing, "the followers of the Vancouver Canucks hockey club will not be needing your rooting interest and you might be better served to go somewhere else and have sexual relations with yourself."

Odd, I thought. But then this year's playoff run heated up with the thrilling Blackhawks series and the Nashville beatdown and Canucks fans started to voice the same kind of opinion.

"The bandwagon is quickly losing passengers!!" one of my Vancouver friends wrote on Facebook as the Canucks struggled to close out Chicago. "All y'all should just get off and STAY OFF." The post was accompanied by a lot of congratulatory harumphing plus the obligatory Maple Leafs fan reminding us why we all hate Toronto the most.

The we-don't-need-your-support argument even made it into the Vancouver Sun where a columnist wrote this, an opinion piece, titled Dear Rest of Canada - Please Get Your Own Hockey Team, that reads like a 15-year-old's first crack at the humour module of his Grade 10 language arts class. 

I don't quite get the thought process here. This isn't some indie band that you can claim you discovered first and then get all moody and backstabby when your dumb friend Monique claims she heard them before you and your bike courier boyfriend ends up dumping you for that big fake Monique and then proposing to her at Burning Man as that very band wraps up their Songwriter Series set.

This is the NHL. This is the only Canadian team left in the playoffs and, along with Boston, the only team with any sort of history that goes beyond "a brief history of fans not knowing anything about hockey."

How are you going to put together a proper riot after the Canucks lose the finals if only fans who have been with them since the Stan "Steamer" Smyl days are invited?

Canuck fans have gotten to my wife. She's refusing to go anywhere near the bandwagon. She may look sweet but she holds grudges — if a few fans tell her they don't want her support for the team, she's taking that to the grave.

I'm not so hardcore. Tampa Bay broke my little Flames-loving heart back in 2004 so I'd love to see the Canucks beat them. San Jose's Patrick Marleau broke the record for world's glumest face so he and his buddy Joe can take a hike too. (I say this even with Marleau on my playoff pool team. That's how serious I am.)

What does this have to do with my baby? Well, as judged by the Twitter-gasms going on Wednesday night, it seems Canuck fans like boobies. Sports Baby likes boobies too. Heck, who doesn't like boobies? It's a party!

Let's end with a video that made me laugh and laugh (and no, it's not the boobies. If you want to see those try everywhereontheinternet.com).

It's baseball players goofing around during a rain delay. Outstanding.


Photo: Getty Images
Follow me on Twitter @Sports_Andy

The playoffs are like my baby

I'm going to start with what is likely the first piece of actual, legitimate parenting advice found on the Sports Baby blog: sleep training works.

In a previous post I lamented that our sleep training program which was meant to get Sports Baby on a consistent and comforting schedule of naps and sleeps was instead putting him onto a consistent schedule of heartbreaking wailing. Nothing goes better with a crisp spring morning than a confused seven-month-old dropping salty tears on his crib sheets as he stares after the father who has put him down and walked away. It sucked more than Donald Trump's latest dinner date (bravo Seth Myers — I'd recommend watching all of the video in that link but you can fast forward to the 12-minute mark for the Trump evisceration if you like).

Anyway, after two weeks the wailing stopped and the napping started. We used the strategy we found in a book called The Sleep Sense Program written by Dana Obleman who is, I would guess, some sort of powerful She-wizard.

Sports Baby figured the sleeping thing out just in time too, because with him on a regular schedule I've been able to catch a lot of the amazing must-see playoff action going on right now. I can say, with mild exaggeration, that these were the greatest combo NBA/NHL playoff first rounds ever.

In the NBA none of the first-round series went to seven games and yet they were all pretty fantastic with some twists and turns and, most of all, star players putting on a show.

The only sweep was Boston over New York but it had to be the closest four-game sweep I've ever seen, if that makes any sense. The Knicks could have, perhaps should have, won the first two in Boston including game 2, which saw Carmelo Anthony put up 42 points, 17 rebounds and six assists in a losing effort. The Atlanta Hawks upset the Magic in six games even though Orlando's Dwight Howard averaged 27 points and 15.5 rebounds per game. Miami and Chicago took care of business against Philadelphia and Indiana, respectively, in five games but both the 76ers and Pacers put up frisky fights. Toronto hosted a clinic for local seventh graders who then went on to defeat the Raptors in a high scoring affair. "They were just making shots," said head coach Jay Triano. "We maybe needed a little more urgency on defence."

In the Western Conference the Lakers beat the Hornets in six even though Chris Paul nearly stole the show by doing his best Jack Layton impression — the leading a team of nobodies to a very respectable finish part, not the having cancer part. In a game 4 win Paul led all players from both teams in points with 27, assists with 15 and rebounds with 13.

Memphis, the No. 8 seed, toppled No. 1 San Antonio in an upset that would have been shocking if it wasn't so thorough — the Spurs never really had a chance against big men Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph, two former immoveable objects (due to fatness) turned unstoppable forces. Oklahoma versus Denver should have been a thrilling speed race but the Nuggets were unfortunately slowed by injuries. Even so, four of the five games were decided by four points or less as the young Thunder moved on.

And then there was Portland vs. Dallas, a series that featured one of the most amazing performances I've ever seen. Portland's Brandon Roy is a three-time all-star who should be in the prime of his career but instead has become a fringe player due to the fact that his knees retired two years ago. In game 2 of the Dallas series Roy played only eight minutes, scoring zero points, and was reduced to tears as he watched the entire second half from the bench. In game 4, however, Roy returned to glory, scoring 18 points in the fourth quarter to lead the Blazers to a two-point victory after they trailed by 23. If you like sports at all and you haven't seen his amazing performance yet, just watch this video. It may be you with tears in your eyes now. And by the way, the Blazers lost the series in six games.

Now, could you imagine, the NHL playoffs were even better. They may not have had the same star power — that's what happens when you let jackal third-liners cripple the careers of stars like Sidney Crosby — but four of the eight matchups went to game 7. Here in Vancouver it was like a Leonard Cohen song: "The whole damn place goes crazy twice and it's once for the devil and once for Christ."

The devil seeped in when the Canuck-killing Chicago Blackhawks won games 4, 5 and 6 to force game 7 after losing the first three games of the series. Christ appeared just in time for this to happen, saving top-seeded Vancouver the embarrassment of being the first ever city to riot following an opening round loss. As they say, the Luongo works in mysterious ways.

In the end there were no major upsets in the NHL, but every team except for Detroit had to work for their series victories (thanks Coyotes — why can't you be doing all this sucking in a place where somewhere will care that you suck so much?).

Not to be outdone, Sports Baby has put on some must-watch performances of his own. Last week he started crawling and he hasn't stopped since. It's pretty adorable. And when I say he's a must-watch I mean it literally as we now can't take our eyes off him for fear he will crawl over to an electrical outlet and discover what burnt toast feels like.  

Looks like I'll be doing some baby proofing this weekend. I don't mind — the playoff second rounds pale so far in comparison to round one-derful (yeah, that's right — I've already fully embraced the terrible daddy puns).

Happy Mother's Day!

Photo: iamatrailblazersfan.com

Follow me on Twitter @Sports_Andy 

Fantasy sports are like my baby

If there's one thing that has held me back from writing the Great Canadian Novel it's my stupid, happy, fulfilled, non-tortured, nourished life that has kept me from grasping the loneliness and isolation needed to make Quill and Quire quiver.

If there's another thing it is fantasy sports.

As I write this I am toggling back and forth every minute or so to a Stattracker webpage and secretly cheering against my favourite baseball team — the Jays, natch — because I own a relief pitcher for their opponent and he is currently in line to record a save.

I've had a fantasy flurry lately, drafting two baseball teams and a playoff hockey squad while also completing stretch runs in basketball and hockey. I know what you're thinking: "Wow Sports Andy, that's a lot of fake teams. You're the coolest person in the world."

Even so, as a husband and now father I sometimes wonder if fantasy sports takes up too much of my time. And now that my friends are rich enough to drink artisanal beers rather than mass-produced swill, they've decided to bump up the league entry fees from zero to something.

I'm not in any $150,000 leagues — yet — but it still does feel kind of odd coughing up 20 or 25 bucks several times a year for fake sports when I have a baby I could be buying books or salmon or replica basketball jerseys for. On the plus side, more often than not I tend to finish in the money in these things so I have actually made more than I've spent. If I were to hazard a guess as to what kind of return I'm getting for my time spent managing my teams, I'd say I make about $0.0000000000001 per week.

I'm very happy to report, however, that I've never left my baby alone in the crib or bathtub or whatever to go and tend to my teams. I wasn't sure this would be the case. Now that I'm on parental leave and home all day I find that I actually have a lot less time to compulsively scan the Internet looking for info on players and matchups and what the weather is like in Baltimore and such. When I was at work with a computer right in front of me it was much easier to sneak a quick peek for one or two hours a day. (Haha, my boss reads this blog — I'm only kidding of course. It was more like one or two minutes a day. Haha. Moving on.)

The one thing I say about fantasy sports to keep myself from feeling like a maladjusted, obsessed addict is that it does help me stay up-to-date on all of the Big Four sports. As someone who writes about sports for a living I feel like this is a good thing.

If not for my playoff hockey pool I'd have no idea who Teddy Purcell is. If you asked me last week who Teddy Purcell is I probably would have guessed that he's a recovering alcoholic lounge singer who briefly made a name for himself in 1997 with a recording of hilariously crooned 2 Live Crew songs. Now I know that Teddy Purcell, one of those guys whose name always should be said in full, plays hockey in the NHL for the Tampa Bay Lightning. I know that this year was his first as a full-time big leaguer and he did quite well, scoring 51 points in 81 games. I know that he went undrafted and hails from St. John's, NL. Important stuff.

I also know that Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Ted Lilly gives up a lot of dingers but always has a pretty good WHIP, Cleveland Cavaliers guard Ramon Sessions played a lot better at home than on the road this year and Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice still does not get all of his team's goal line touches. Scandalous, I know.

How does this help me cover the local sports scene for my job with a community newspaper? I'll get to that later. (Note: by later I mean never.)

Those little details that I learn playing fantasy sports remind me a little bit about having a baby and the little things that I notice now that I never did before.

Walking with a stroller is one activity that introduces you to a whole other world known only to parents and perhaps people riding Segways. Recently while taking Sports Baby on his first ride on Vancouver's Skytrain we joined the little parade of strollers heading for the elevator. I'd never noticed it before but it's an adorable little line that gets tucked away from the dead eyes of the rest of the commuters. At the Marine Drive stop we took one slow elevator up one floor before transferring to another slow elevator to get to the platform. Kind of fun if you have the time to enjoy the view of the Fraser River out of the windows of the elevator. Not so fun if you're rushing downtown for an important sit down with the head of the Vancouver Police Department's anti-gang unit. (We weren't. Why would we take a baby to a business meeting?)

The baby-less have also probably not noticed the swarm of strollers that converge on community centres and libraries like little cup holder-equipped sharks whenever a free class is offered. Thankfully I haven't yet witnessed any stroller rage incidents.

The same little stroller jams can form at malls as parents search out the one washroom equipped with a change table. God forbid there could ever be a nice place that doesn't smell like broccoli farts where I wouldn't have to wait forever and then feel rushed while I changed my baby's diaper.

Wow, my fantasies really are changing.

Photo Justin K. Aller/Getty Images

Follow me on Twitter @Sports_Andy

Being a sports fan is like raising my baby

Frequent readers of the Sports Baby blog might be under the impression that raising a baby is the coolest, easiest thing in the world.

Teething is no big whoop. Adding solid foods is as natural as hemp shoes. Sports Baby is cuter than homemade undies and even his sicknesses are cherry-coated.

Probably the only person who will see right through this is my dentist. I haven't been to see him since Sports Baby was born but when I do finally hit the chair I can envision him taking one look at my grille and declaring, "New parent I see."

"Haaaaa iiiiiiiii huuuuuuu oooooooo aaaaaaaa?" I'll blurt out in response.

"You've been clenching you're jaw a lot, grinding your teeth. And I also see you're related to Vikings."

Actually, he says that every time I see him. Not the clenching part, the Viking thing. He won't shut up about the Vikings. Apparently my mandibular tori are a dead giveaway. Plus I pillaged like three boxes of floss from him.

Anyway, I have noticed recently that I am unconsciously clenching my jaw and grinding my teeth a lot when I am around my baby. It often happens when I am carrying him or holding him or spotting him so that he doesn't slam the back of his head into the floor while he works on sitting up. I certainly wouldn't want that to happen. Again.

Sorry Buddy.

I think the clenching is just part of the overall worry, anxiety and stress that arrives at the exact same moment that the baby does. Every second that I am in charge of his wellbeing is a beautiful gift from God and/or Buddha but every second is also terrifying. Every second is one more moment that I could lose focus and he could do a header off the change table, putting me on the front page of The Province under a huge headline "Daddy's worst nightmare!" I don't remember grinding my teeth very much when I used to spend an entire Sunday afternoon tinkering with my fantasy baseball lineup in between naps while "watching" golf. 

Now on top of the constant fear of breaking my baby there are things like sleep training to worry about. Sports Baby knocks out his night sleeps but still has trouble napping. The baby books say he is sleep deprived and if he doesn't get a good nap soon his development will be stunted and he'll end up at some third-rate kindergarten that doesn't even have a Latin teacher.

The sleep program will help put him on a consistent schedule and give him good sleep habits for the rest of his life, they say. It's tough going, however, and the only thing it seems to have added to his schedule so far is a good hour or two of puzzled whimpering. Grind grind grind.

It kind of reminds me of what it can be like to be a devoted fan of a sports team. In every league in every season the fans of all but one team end up disappointed. While the ride can be thrilling, there's also constant dread about when and how the whole thing will come crashing down.

As a young boy I was won over by the slap shot of Al MacInnis and the moustache of Lanny McDonald and became a Calgary Flames fan. I don't live and die with their every move anymore but my gut still churns deepest for them. This season I've followed their playoff drive from afar, even listening to one important game on the radio.

For those of you under 20, a radio is a thing that airs music that you don't like and gassy windbags that don't like you. It also plays the Flames games that you can't watch on Sportsnet West in Vancouver because of some ridiculous blackout rules enforced by the ridiculous NHL — what better way to build up a following for your league than massive blackouts!? (See my Twitter rant on March 21 for an elaboration on my thoughts about this arrangement.)

Of course, this meant that I got to listen to my team lose on the radio. Fun.

Somehow the Flames are still alive in the playoff race, leaving just enough hope for fans so that they'll sit through a few more molar-mashing games before finally getting their teeth punched out once and for all.

There's a difference between being a fan and being a parent though. Unless you're a 70-year-old fan of the Montreal Canadiens or the New York Yankees or a five-year-old fan of the San Francisco Giants, most of your sports seasons have come to a grinding halt at some point.

As a parent, however, I find that the teeth clenching is far outweighed by every little awesome thing Sports Baby does from laughing at my funny faces to barfing on my shoes.

There isn't a Stanley Cup at the end of this journey. There's something infinitely better. 

Photo: CP Photo/Bill Grimshaw

Follow me on Twitter @Sports_Andy