The Lightning Round

Some quick hits as I head back to work from my weekend.

The more I hear and read from Dick Cheney, the more I wish he'd have stayed in hiding.
Seriously, if he thinks the things that are happening are making the country worse, maybe he should just go back into his bunker so when the "attacks" come, he can be safe.
Doesn't he realize that things that don't change with the times tend to atrophy, become useless and die off. Oh, wait, maybe he already does, and the process has already started.

You'd think a firefighter would know better than to hose down cement in the current California drought environment.
It looked like he was doing it because they'd been working on one of their cars. So, great, he was might have been washing hazardous materials down a drain. And with all the calls for being water wise ... hope they don't need that water to put out a fire soon.

Guy Fieri has the best job in the world. And man do I wish I knew of a place in the region like the ones he profiles on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives.

Bigger sign it's time to move: Small amounts of graffiti start showing up in the neighborhood. Nothing that's affiliated with gangs, per se, but it's never a good start when the kids who live there don't respect the place they live.

That was a heckuva weekend for Corona police. An early morning stabbing that resulted in two young girls deaths (allegedly at the hands of their father), and then two people who allegedly tortured, killed and buried a 2 1/2-year-old girl in a shallow grave. Then the couple (one of them, the girl's mother) called the police to report her missing from a trip to the park.
Oh, and yes, that's the upper-scale CORONA, not dirt poor SAN BERNARDINO.

Not surprised to see scuttlebutt starting that the NHL's Atlanta Thrashers are being targeted as a team that could be in danger of moving in the near future. Never did like the NHL giving the area another chance in the first place. When your first franchise, the Flames, picks up and moves to Calgary, you know the market really doesn't want or appreciate hockey.

I wish Gary Bettman and the rest of the league would just let Jim Balsillie take the Coyotes already. Balsillie's the co-chief executive officer of BlackBerry maker Research in Motion, and this is his second or third shot at trying to buy a team to break to South Ontario (Canada). I know the guy's been generally an ass to deal with, and this end-around he's trying to pull on this deal is shady at best, but don't you want owners in the league who want to own teams and are dedicated to hockey?

Of course, the biggest reason they don't want him to take an existing team is they are hoping to get an even bigger payday out of him by getting him for an expansion fee. That's big bucks for the league, and every other owner. And with no solid TV deal generating money, they'd like the check he can write.

And I'd say the people in the Greater Toronto Area have a point about the need for a team to move in. They haven't had a team, in the Maple Leafs, worth watching in how many years now?

The Kings will be playing an exhibition game in Ontario this fall. Ticket prices are set, and be prepared to pay NHL prices to see a preseason game against the Sharks at the Bank. Great, one team that can't make the playoffs, and the other who can't win in the playoffs. (But I still plan on attending.)

One more NHL item: The league needs to find a way to get a presence back on ESPN. I don't care what it is, but since the World Wide Leader doesn't carry any of their games, they pretty much ignore the sport. Versus and the NHL Network are never going to get the households, or have the pull, that the family of networks has. I'd settle for a half-hour nightly highlights show on ESPN8 (THE OCHO!) about now.

That's all I got for now. Have a good day.