The Big Daddy of Sports Chowdah Updates- Grin and Bear It, Triumphant B's Return to Boston, Parade & Fenway Ceremony; Interleague's Stranger Brew

NHL- After a private party at the Foxwoods casino club 'Shrine' in which Tim Thomas, Zdeno Chara, Patrice Bergeron, Milan Lucic, Brad Marchand and Shawn Thornton were hand delivered a $100,000 bottle of champagne to drink out of the Stanley Cup, the Boston Bruins capped their most memorable week in nearly 40 years with a parade route jam-packed with yellow and black adorned fans on Saturday and a pregame ceremony at Fenway Park on Sunday.

[By the way, am I the only one that imagined the Bruins exodus from Vancouver might've looked something like the part in The Dark Knight where Gotham Police are escorting Harvey Dent in an armoured truck?- NANESB!]

The players from the Bruins brought the Stanley Cup into the Red Sox clubhouse before Sunday's game and players from both teams posed for pictures with the trophies and swapped caps and jerseys before the pre-game ceremonies.

For the actual ceremony itself, the Bruins entered Fenway Park on the same Duck boats from Saturday's parade (or the Celtics 2008 parade, or the Red Sox 2007 parade or...well you get the idea) taking a lap along the warning track and tossing out pucks and baseballs to fans before disembarking.


For the ceremonial first pitch, every member of the Bruins threw out a pitch to a Red Sox player, with captain Zdeno Chara (#33) throwing to captain Jason Varitek (again, #33) while the Stanley Cup, Conn Smythe award and Prince of Wales trophy were displayed on the mound.

On a side note, I got a book called Travels With Stanley which showed some of the places the Cup has been in its travels. Interestingly, this was not the Stanley Cup's first trip to Fenway in recent history.

Skip Cunningham, the Hurricanes other equipment manager, took possession of the Stanley Cup on August 16 in Boston, Massachusetts.

After a visit to Children's Hospital Boston, hockey's greatest prize visited the Boston Red Sox. In the clubhouse at Fenway Park, slugger David Ortiz did a double-take when he saw the Cup. "My my," he said, shaking his head. "Look at this trophy! Look what those hockey players get to play for. Now that's a trophy!"

Pitcher Mike Timlin stopped by to ogle the Cup, and recalled occasionally attending Maple Leafs games when he played in Toronto for the Blue Jays. Up on the Green Monster in Fenway Park's outfield, Cunningham and the Cup ran into Doug Flutie, retired NFL quarterback, who spun stories about watching hockey while he played in the Canadian Football League. Carolina's Craig Adams, a huge Red Sox fan, was also there with the Stanley Cup.

I remember reading that part and thinking 'Too Bad it's been awhile since the Cup has been inside the Hub- I bet that would go over well with everybody there if somebody took it to Fenway for an afternoon'. I didn't know how right I was, as it turned out.

My, what a differece a few years makes!

MLB- OK, so the hockey season is over- and with the best possible outcome, no less. There's still plenty of baseball to be played, however.

With the Sox taking Friday night's game and the Brewers winning on Saturday by a 4-2 final, Sunday's rubber game almost seemed an afterthought with the Bruins victory lap around the infield.

The Sox got off on the right foot with a 1-2-3 first from Tim Wakefield and 6 runs from the Boston bats in the bottom of the 1st, including a Youkilis 3-run homer. The Brewers would get two back in the top of the 2nd on a 2-run Nyjer Morgan HR, but Wakefield would go on to retire 12 of the next 13 batters he faced while the Red Sox batters continued pouring it on, scoring two more in the bottom of the 4th including a solo homer by Pedroia, followed by a Pedroia sac fly in the 5th and a 2-run Marco Scutaro homer in the bottom of the 6th to make it 11-2. Each team would get a run to make it a 12-3 Red Sox win on Sunday afternoon, with Wakefield going 8 whole innings while giving up 3 hits and 3 earned runs while striking out 6 and walking 1. Wake is now 4-2 on the season with a 4.26 ERA.

Beginning Monday night, the Red Sox will host Adrian Gonzalez (who had his 1000th career MLB hit on Sunday) former team in the San Diego Padres. Wade LeBlanc [0-2; 4.26 ERA] is expected to get the start for San Diego against PawSox call-up Andrew Miller [3-3: 2.47 ERA w/Pawtucket this season]. Game gets underway at 7:05 PM ET, 4:05 Pacific.

OTHER RED SOX NEWS: Shortstop Jed Lowrie, OF Carl Craford and starting pitcher Clay Buchholz all went on the 15 day DL this weekend. Lowrie is reported to have a left shoulder injury while Crawford is said to have a left hamstring strain. Buchholz will miss his scheduled start tomorrow with a strained lower back- Andrew Miller has been called up from AAA Pawtucket to fill in Monday night.

NEW POLL UP: I took it upon myself to wonder who's behavior would be considered more self-destructive this month- Congressman Weiner's or fans of the Vancouver Canucks? I'm interested in why you might think, so there's a poll where you can choose- It will be up for the next couple of days.

AHL: The Binghamton Senators of the American Hockey League are the 2010-2011 AHL Champions after defeating the Houston Aeros on the road by a final of 3-2 earlier this month. The Ottawa Senator's AHL affiliate won the best of seven series by a 4-2 margin over the Aeros.

June 12, 2011- Puerto Rico Day Parade in New York City

Aspiring waitress Melody Morales proudly displaying Puerto Rican flag

June 12 marks Puerto Rico day in that bustling, sweltering metropolis that's home to nearly a million Puerto Ricans- no, not San Juan! I'm talking about New York.

Neither enjoying the benefits of full fledged independence nor U.S. statehood since Spain ceded it to the USA in 1898 after the Spanish-American war, the commonwealth of Puerto Rico is classified as an unincorporated territory of the United States. Thanks to the Jones-Shafroth Act of 1917 residents of Puerto Rico were automatically given US citizenship. Migration to the US Mainland increased during WWII when factories producing war materiel needed manpower with most of the American men in the workforce now drafted into military service. The advent of commercial air travel made it easier for Puerto Ricans to travel to the continental US and back.

Interestingly, while the date of New York's Puerto Rican Day parade falls on the 2nd Sunday in June each year, it is not a holiday in Puerto Rico.


No word on whether or not 23-year old Puertoriqueña Melody Morales will be in attendence this year. In 2009, the buxom latina filed suit against the now-closed Hawaiian Tropic zone in New York's Times Square claiming she was discriminated against on the basis of her accent, which the manager considered 'too ghetto'. In it's defense, Hawaiian Tropic Zone had pointed out that they had employees from Puerto Rico, Russia and Nigeria at the time Ms. Morales sued them [this could very well be an instance 'Fran Drescher Syndrome'- i.e. an attractive woman with a voice like nails on a chalkboard- NANESB!].

While the ultimate disposition of the lawsuit remains unknown by yours truly, the curvy latina attracted the attention of Rick's Cabaret [NASDAQ: RICK] and local businesses within weeks of the lawsuit, who approached Morales' lawyer with a number of job offers.

Since I can't seem to find any video that clearly has her voice, I figure the best I can do is offer these photos of Ms. Morales that were circulating at the time of the lawsuit, including Melody's very admirable display of the Puerto Rican flag.

The Lonely Planet Blonde Guide To Latvia

Well....this could modify my future travel plans somewhat.

From the country that brought us the Blonde Parade comes word that a gender imbalance that skews 8% towards the women has left the Baltic former Soviet republic of Latvia short of men.

While more boys are born in Latvia than girls, the balance shifts dramatically in adulthood.

A high early male mortality rate means that there are 8% more women than men in the country

In the busy entry hall of the University of Latvia, Riga, the gender imbalance is visible.

According to sociologist and lecturer Baiba Bela, there are 50% more women enrolled there than men.

She says this means that women often find it harder to find a partner with an equal level of education.

And by the time women want to settle down, men are dying younger and are four times more likely to commit suicide.

"The first time the gender imbalance appears is between 30 and 40," Baiba explains.

"In this age group the mortality for men is three times higher than the same age group for women."

"Car driving, alcoholism and accidents in the workplace are mainly riskier for men than for women," she adds.

Among the under-30s, there are almost 9,000 more men than women. But between the ages of 30-39, there are almost 3,000 more women than men.

A couple of facts about Latvia- it covers roughly 25,000 square miles and is bordered by Estonia to the north, Lithuania to the south, the Baltic sea to the west and Russia and Belarus to the east. The unit of currency is the Lat and although it is supposed to be integrated into the Euro-zone, the economic crisis of the last two years have put those plans off until at least sometime in 2012. Latvia's official language, unsurprisingly, is Latvian. Citizens of the USA, Canada, Australia, the UK, New Zealand and most EU countries do not require visas for stays of up to 90 days.

Included among Latvia's exports, mezzo-soprano opera singer Elina Garanca (appropriately enough, the blonde in the duet):

On a 100% completely unrelated note, my passport expired nearly three years ago, yet I somehow feel the driving need to get a new one as soon as possible.