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So I'm running along my usual route and I see a sign for a wedding. At one entrance to the place, there's this:

But at the other entrance, there's this:

Yeah, I was never fond of her, either.

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Google Maps says that it's a 44.8 mile drive between my house and Honda Center, where the Anaheim Ducks will play game 6 of the NHL Western Conference finals against Detroit tomorrow night, but they take you the long way- cut through Long Beach and it's closer to 35 miles straight east. Either way, the Ducks are close by. The games are covered in the local papers, every game is on the radio, every game is either on channel 56, FSN Prime Ticket, or Versus. We're close enough that it's a common occurrence for us to do our shopping at the mall a few minutes down State College Boulevard from the arena.

We did that last Saturday. We spent the afternoon at the Block at Orange, where we saw several people walking around in Angels garb, and a few in Dodgers jersey. Kiosks sold Angels and Dodgers and Lakers and USC caps.

The Ducks?

Who?

And that's where hockey stands right now. I feel sorry for Detroit in a way, because you know a lot more people there actually care whether the Red Wings make it to the Stanley Cup finals, and nobody here cares even a little bit. Correction: about 18,000 people care, a little over 17,000 of whom will pack Honda Center yet again for the game on Tuesday night. But apart from a few bus shelter ads for Ducks season tickets (left over from early in the season), there's no excitement. The sports talk radio stations aren't buzzing over the Ducks- you're more likely to hear Lakers discussions, and the Lakers got booted from the NBA playoffs in the first round. There's coverage in the Times and the Daily Breeze and, of course, the Register, but I don't see anyone walking around wearing a Ducks jersey and I don't see the guaranteed sign of interest in Southern California, those stupid fan flags hooked to the roof of cars. You'll see Lakers flags and Dodgers and Angels flags and, yes, even Raiders flags, but the Ducks don't get that love.

Meanwhile, Detroit cares. It cares not as much as it used to care- the number of available seats throughout the playoffs has been surprising- but fans in Michigan want the Wings to win, they wear the Winged Wheel, they watch the games on TV (when they can find Versus) and listen on the radio and they know the players, all of them. It's Hockeytown still, Hockeytown always, and they face elimination by the team from, er, Not-Hockeytown. West Disneytown, maybe. Angel City. Garden Grove-adjacent. But it's not Detroit. I'd say people around here might be able to name two or three Ducks- Pronger, Selanne, maybe Giguere- but I think that's generous. I doubt most people can name one. And the Ducks, right now, are closer to reaching the finals than the team from the city that cares.

I can empathize with Detroiters right now. I'm a Philadelphia sports fan, and Philadelphia sports history is a litany of being beaten by teams from cities that care a lot less then we do. The Phillies spent a decade looking up in the standings at the Atlanta Braves- Atlanta!- and still do. The Flyers haven't won the Cup in decades, while the Devils (motto: "Plenty of Good Seats Still Available!") have three. You know how long it's been since the Sixers won the NBA- 1983, in case you don't- and there's no way to describe how it feels that the Eagles haven't won the NFL title since 1960 and haven't ever won the Super Bowl while the Tampa Bay Bucs have. That's all just wrong.

But that's how it breaks. And that's why I feel for Detroit. The Wings have had relatively recent success, of course- the '02 Cup- but, still, they care there, and, here, you wouldn't know the series is happening. Life's unfair.

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Welcome, listeners of Deminski and Doyle on WKRK (Live 97.1 Free FM)/Detroit, on which I made a guest appearance today. Between the "y'knows," I hope I entertained y'all with a little hockey humor. Speaking of which, here are a few scans especially for you:

Remember these guys?

Yes, Detroit had a WHA franchise, the Michigan Stags. They started as the Los Angeles Sharks, but moved to Cobo Arena for 1974-75. Hockey in Detroit seemed like a no-brainer, but the Stags didn't make it through January- they went belly-up and were moved, sort of, to Baltimore as the Baltimore Blades for the rest of the season. (Those kind of things happened in the WHA, where the New York Golden Blades finished the second WHA season as the Jersey Knights, and the Denver Spurs hastily moved in mid-season to Ottawa as the Civics and lasted a whole two weeks there before giving it up) The Stags had a few familiar names like Gerry Desjardins and Marc Tardif, but they didn't make it.

At that same time, the "real" local hockey team, well, sucked:

This was the end of the "darkness with Harkness," the years under first coach, then GM Ned Harkness, a college coach who didn't cut it in the NHL. The cover-boys are Mickey Redmond, the one consistent star the Wings had in those days (although Marcel Dionne also emerged before really becoming a star in L.A.), and Alex Delvecchio, who showed up on the cover the next season:

The Wings fired Ted Garvin after a month of the previous season and named Delvecchio coach, then fired Harkness later in that season and named him GM, too. That didn't work out all that well, so by the next season...

...they named Doug Barkley coach and kept Delvecchio as GM. Delvecchio traded Dionne and Bart Crashley to L.A. for Dan Maloney, Terry Harper, and a draft pick. That... didn't work out. Things continued not to work out until Stevie Y showed up, but you know that now.

In these media guides, there's a weaselly lawyer pictured among the front office staff:

Wonder whatever happened to him?

But the best thing about those dark years for Detroit hockey was this:

They absolutely don't make arenas like the Olympia anymore. For one thing, they all kinda look alike, or at least look like nothing special- the Ducks' Honda Center, which is quite a nice facility, still to me looks like it could be a Nordstrom's attached to South Coast Plaza. Staples Center kinda looks like most other late-90s-early-2000s indoor arenas. We won't even talk about what replaced the Olympia. But what's cooler, this...

...or this?

Out here, you get this...

...which is quite nice. But hockey should be played in a cold, musty, drafty barn. Maybe that's why I don't care as much anymore.

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What's my excuse tonight? I spent hours at America's freakin' Tire replacing a bald tire and getting a nasty screw removed from another. That would normally take maybe a half hour; today, 2 hours. So I'm behind on work and frazzled and the Slingbox died and I've had enough.

(Oh, OK, I just want to get done so I can see who won "Idol.")

(Just kidding)

(Really. I don't care.)

(Stop it. I don't even know who the finalists are.)

(I'm warning you.)

(Think Jordin can take it, or will the mouth-sounds guy win?)

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Apparently, Jordin won. I say "apparently" because it won't air out here until 8 pm Pacific. Which one was she again? They all blur together.

Seriously, if you told me six years ago that it would be all downhill from Kelly Clarkson- Jennifer Hudson notwithstanding- I would have laughed. But it's not that funny, is it?

OK, back to not caring.

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This week's All Access newsletter deals with the radio news of the day and looks to the future- specifically, tomorrow, when we can take a couple of days off:

I could write the usual long "Letter" this week, but, you know, I just don't feel like it. Nobody wants to think about work on the eve of a long weekend. Throw in the high-profile format changes in a couple of major markets- anticipated, inevitable, but still not fun- and I just don't feel like the standard filibuster.

Enough. Go have a great long weekend. Make my burger well done. Where's the cold beer?

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As we enter the holiday weekend, a few personal messages for people I don't know:

To the gentleman who was doing some sort of yogic contortion naked on the floor in the locker room of the Torrance Y this afternoon, with his spread cheeks facing the full-length mirror so it was impossible to ignore as one walked by: no. Do not do that ever again. On behalf of the rest of the world, please take it behind the closed doors of your home. Even there, I'm not so sure.

To the gentleman- it might be the same guy!- who was reclining naked and sweaty on the couch in the same locker room area, also facing the same mirror, seemingly posing: no. Again, no. Just... don't.

To the woman in the Lexus SUV driving up Hawthorne Boulevard trying to dial her cell phone while in traffic: no. Pull over or put the phone away. Some people can dial and drive; you are not one of those people.

To the woman in the Nissan Altima behind whom I was stuck while trying to exit the Torrance Best Buy parking lot: no. You may not just sit there confused when there's a rare opening in traffic so you can pull out. Do not make me honk my horn again. Just freakin' drive.

To everyone else: have a great weekend.

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Geez, what are you doing at the computer? It's Saturday, it's a holiday weekend, go out and do something.

Or sit here and watch the opening to a lost cartoon from the 60's, "The Beagles" (hat tip to Cartoon Brew):

Or this one, "The Funny Company," which I hadn't seen since about 1966:

Or "Spunky and Tadpole," which I probably haven't seen since earlier than that:

Or Q.T. Hush, even more obscure (Toon Tracker is the source for this and other incredible clips- at least SOMEONE remembers this stuff besides me...):

And then there's Dodo, the Kid From Outer Space, which I watched every week early Saturday mornings (just after "The Modern Farmer"!):

Paired with Dodo was the exquisitely cheesy Col. Bleep, the first color cartoon made expressly for TV, which blew the budget enough that they just used narration and didn't try to do voices or sync:

And that should get you through the day.

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