What do America's Next Top Model, the NHL, and the Tamil Tigers have in common?

... absolutely nothing.

But because I couldn't think of one thing to write about, I decided to write about everything. Here we go:

Having a girlfriend sometimes means making concessions when watching television. For every episode of the Ultimate Fighter I get to watch, there's an episode of Desperate Housewives that has to be sat through. But by far, the most annoying viewing experience on TV has to be America's Next Top Model. Now while all reality shows are inherently goofy, there's something about ANTM that just rubs me the wrong way. I think it has something to do with the fact that it pretends to be a reflection of the actual modeling industry. Sure Survivor has nothing to do with actually surviving in the wild, but the show knows that, and I know it knows that. But like The Apprentice, an equally vapid show that pretends to provide insight in an industry through nonsensical challenges and cloying insights from a similarly irritating host, ANTM pretends to know something about modelling, and tries to make modelling seem a lot more challenging than it is. To listen to Tyra pontificate about the challenges that models have to go through you'd think that these women were going into their surgical rotations atmedical school the next day, rather than, you know... standing in front of a camera and smiling (or not smiling, if it's one of them ‘serious' photos.)

Does it take talent to be a model? Sort of. Obviously Giselle Buncheon has physical assets very few other people in the world possess; but let's be honest, that's not exactly a ‘talent'. You're either born looking like a model, or you're not. And yet the show somehow manages to neglect the one skill that models really do need to succeed: the ability to not eat. Base a show around that, and I'll be there every week.

To be fair, I did become emotionally involved enough to havea personal favourite: eventual runner-up Allison Harvard.



Sometimes creepy and kind of hot don't have to be mutually exclusive.

On a side-note, I managed to accurately predict who would be voted off every single week ten minutes into every episode, and the final five contestants, including the winner and runner-up four episodes into the entire season. And yet despite such prodigous talent I still live in relative poverty/obscurity.

Is there a worse run business right now than the National Hockey League? Twenty years ago, when the NHL began its aggressive expansion into the United States, it was seen as the genesis of a new prosperous era for hockey. Finally, the large American market would be cracked, and Canada's national sport would become get the respect it deserved. The league grew from 22 teams in 1992, to 30 today, and moved 2 Canadian teams from Winnipeg and Quebec City to Phoenix and Colorado, respectively. In other words, the NHL decided to roll the dice and dilute an already relatively shallow talent base, and build its future in apathetic medium-sized markets, sometimes in near-tropical climates. Unsurprisingly, despite much fanfare and goofy marketing tricks (the glowing puck!) hockey has become a fringe niche sport in the US,  where most of the population can only watch games on "VERSUS", formally known as the "Outdoor Life Channel" and whose programming consists mostly of lumberjacks competitions (which are often higher rated than their hockey games by the way.) How fitting that despite the most entertaining playoffs in recent history, the NHL has been all but ignored outside of Canada.

What's the latest example of managerial incompetence in the NHL? The league's mystifying reasons for not allowing the bankrupt and failing Phoenix Coyotes franchise move to Ontario. You know, a market that cares about hockey.

And consider that after the current economic crisis, the futures of several professional teams were called into question as their owners were suddenly lacking the money to keep financing such economically risky hobbies, like owning a professional sport team, (the Cleveland Cavs being the prime example, owned by Quicken Loans, a mortgage service provider whose finances are now on shaky ground.)

So along comes Jim Basille, CEO of Blackberry with his billions of dollars of actual, hard capital, and is willing to pay for some godforsaken reason $215 million for the team. You'd think that the NHL would be kissing the guy's feet, right? Think again. Apparently the NHL is trying to negotiate a deal that would sell the Coyotes to Jerry Reinsdorf, owner of the Bulls and Whitesox, for half of what Basille is offering. What's the NHL's rationale? Honestly, I don't know. The most popular theory is that Commissioner Gary Bettman just doesn't think Basille would be a good owner and doesn't particularly like him.

Excellent.

Keep in mind that Bettman was the one who championed William Del Biaggio over Basille regarding, the ownership of the Nashville Predators. Del Biaggio later was hit with criminal charges from the FBI for shady financial dealings.

Can anyone name one good thing that has happened in hockey since Gary Bettman has taken over the league? How does he still have a job? George W. Bush had a higher approval rating by the time he finished his term.



While I have no formal opinion about what is occurring in Sri Lanka I will say this - the Tamil Tigers' flag is pretty badass.



I remember in grade six art class, we were asked to design an alternative national flag for Canada, and in my research (looking at an atlas) I realized how boring most flags are. Good on the Tigers for at least thinking outside the box and choosing a flag that makes them look like part paramilitary, and part high school Volleyball team.

Other cool flags you may not have seen?

Assyria



Whenever you can make your flag look like a level in Starfox, you gotta do it.

Nepal



Mad respect to any country that refuses to make their flag a square, and thus be a target for ridicule from the rest of the world

Mozambique



Just so we're clear, that's an AK-47 on top of a book (IE: Don't fuck with Mozambique.)

I think we have a winner.