Takes and trash talk from both ALL sides of the NHL's most obscure PATHETIC* rivalry

* Thanks, Kevin Lowe!

Monday, August 13, 2007

Rudy and Earl: Drinking Buddies?

Isn’t it great how an internet blog-venture with no planning, no organization, no communication, and no leadership can still manage to run smoothly? Case in point, Saturday afternoon, after nearly six months of having Rudy Kelly posting on this site, I finally decided to actually meet the guy and have some drinks. Seeing as we’re both into Eklund-level anonymity, I “neglected” to bring my camera, but the scene looked something like this:


"So, those Sharks sure choke a lot, huh?"

As for impressions, considering the team-rivalry aspect it’s good that we didn’t immediately hate each other—I was impressed with the fact that Rudy plays hockey outside of a video game setting, and Rudy was probably impressed with my willingness to pick up the tab. Besides, in talking we found we have many similarities—we both hate Chris Chelios, we both hate the Avalanche, and we both agree that the Kings franchise had better get its act together—it would be a real kick in the teeth for L.A. fans if their team became the last California team to win a cup.

Anyways, it was a pretty fun meet-up with Rudy, now the fifth blogger I’ve been able to drink in front of (Finny, Cassie, PJ Swenson, and Eric McErlain can all attest to my liver abuse too). There wasn’t very much in the way of “blog business” discussed, but we did both agree that there was no need for any aggressive ambition when it comes to BoC—we’re pretty content in whatever niche we’ve fallen into.

(On a serious note, though: Like Mirtle, from time to time I get e-mails from emerging bloggers looking for advice. As a guy who (a) didn’t even start this blog, or (b) doesn’t have a lot of “vision” or “expertise”, I usually don’t know what to tell them. If you are looking for guidance, the best collection of hockey blogger advice I’ve found is in Christy’s Behind the Blog features—dig through those and you’ll find plenty of good tips from plenty of good bloggers.)

As for us? Look for more of the same rudderless brilliance, I guess, although now that I’m assured that Rudy’s not a monster, we’ll probably be catching a game together this coming season.

Anyone want to fly us to England?

12 comments:

RudyKelly said...

I wanted to look tough in front of my blogging superior, so I ordered a Guinness. What does Earl order? Jack and water. Kudos, sir.

Earl Sleek said...

Yeah, lately I've been awfully fascinated with the Jack-and-water combination (Thanks for the tip, Patty in Dallas!). It's both the source and cure for my hangovers.

Anonymous said...

Does Rudy Kelly maintain an identity at the more-rudderless letsgokings.com?

Does Earl Sleek maintain an identity at the uber-rudderless (bordering on Lord-of-the-Flies chaos) letsgoducks.com?

We're not (necessarily) looking for you to share those identities, just whether or not you participate in those vox populi forums . . . and what you think of them, whether you're active participants or just observers.

Earl Sleek said...

Does Earl Sleek maintain an identity at the uber-rudderless (bordering on Lord-of-the-Flies chaos) letsgoducks.com?

Strangely, I don't think I've ever been to that messageboard before, though I'm not a huge messageboard contributor usually. If I comment anywhere, it's most likely at HF Boards, or maybe at the Ducks' site messageboards.

But these days, I'm more of a skimmer than anything.

Patty (in Dallas) said...

Jack and water is the best. You should try it out, Rudy. Although Guinness is impressive as well.

Marie said...

Where did you guys go? I'm truly disappointed that you accidentally left your camera at home. You should be very thankful that I couldn't make it because now that I'm back into scrapbooking I take my camera everywhere!

RudyKelly said...

I'll just say that I do not comment at letsgokings.com and leave it at that.

Anonymous said...

England? I'm in!

Anonymous said...

I'll just say that I do not comment at letsgokings.com and leave it at that.

Which means you probably posted there (heavily) at one time, then got disillusioned and left. Add that to the wit and writing skills . . . hmmmm. I'll guess that RudyKelly is the LGKer formerly known as "Carlson10" who later morphed into "Tafkact".

Earl Sleek said...

Add that to the wit and writing skills . . . hmmmm.

Heh, I've always made fun of Kings fans as being on the illiterate end of things, but I had no idea the problem was this bad.

Apparently writing skills are so rare among Kings fans that the logical assumption is that all legible witticisms must have come from one source--"Say, aren't you that one guy who can type?"

I kid, of course, but that's my job here.

RudyKelly said...

No, I've never posted on letsgokings.com (and I'm too young to remember Jimmy Carson's heyday), but I almost wish you were right just because that'd be awesome if you were able to figure that out.

Jordi said...

So you didn't show off your hair collection huh?