The CFL posted a fun video of American players weighing in on "What's the most Canadian thing you’ve ever seen?" Even though the feature requests to not say poutine, Winnipeg QB Matt Nichols said poutine. Nichols did say he hadn't had poutine in awhile.
There were some obvious answers, such as Ottawa RB Mossis Madu, who pointed out the way Canadians say "sorry." Hamilton QB Jeremiah Masoli had a great story about a 4-way stop where drivers were exceedingly polite.
"Bacon donuts, Bacon everything in Canada. That's real Canadian." That was Saskatchewan SB Emmanuel Arceneaux. Then he brought up a breakfast served with a slice of tomato. "What am I going to do with this tomato with my breakfast? Why did you put a tomato with breakfast?"
The bacon is American bacon, not to be confused with Canadian bacon. The tomato with breakfast sounds more like a British breakfast Arceneaux might found when he played in Vancouver. I had a tomato with breakfast in San Francisco this winter. I've seen a few British breakfasts with a slice of tomato. Pretty sure that isn't truly Canadian.
Speaking of the CFL, 13 new Canadian citizens had their citizenship ceremony at the Canada Day game at Mosaic Stadium in Regina last night. Becoming a citizen of Canada is incredible even in a more boring setting. Canada Day with the Roughriders and their fans has to be electric. The significance of 13 comes from the Roughriders fans, who act as the 13th man on the team.
CanadianCrossing.com film reviews
CanadianCrossing.com film coverage
Clara was the free Canadian film shown the Wednesday before Canada Day. We will have a full review soon. We cover Canadian film trends as well as provide Canadian film reviews.
Hopefully, you included a Canadian film in your celebration.
Celebrating Canadian classic rock contributions
97.1 FM WDRV Chicago, known as The Drive (and 96.9 WWDV Zion, IL) has had fun with Canada and Canadian classic rock songs in the past. This year, they devoted their Ten @ 10 feature on the actual Canada Day.
Here was the playlist:
Born to Be Wild — Steppenwolf
Working for the Weekend — Loverboy
Closer to the Heart — Rush
Takin' Care of Business — Bachman Turner Overdrive
Straight from the Heart — Bryan Adams
Sundown — Gordon Lightfoot
Rockin' in the Free World — Neil Young
Just Between You and Me — April Wine
Up on Cripple Creek — The Band
Lay It on the Line — Triumph
One critique: 9 of the 10 songs were played in the August 2017 celebration. April Wine subbed for the Guess Who (These Eyes) on the 2019 list. You might have also picked better songs from Rush and Bryan Adams in particular.
WDRV DJ Bob Stroud's intro mentioned some Canadian delicacies: "get some real maple syrup, Lay's ketchup chips, milk in a bag." Yes, we know milk in a bag is limited to Ontario and Ruffles's ketchup chips are better. Still, that was fun to hear 10 Canadian songs in a row to honour Canada.
CanadianCrossing.com MLB coverage
The Washington Nationals have barely acknowledged its Montréal Expos roots since 2005. The Nationals will change that on July 6 when the players will wear the Expos uniforms in a throwback game with the Kansas City Royals at Nationals Park.
The Expos and Royals came into MLB 50 years ago, so the Royals will also wear throwback uniforms. The Nationals will actually wear the road powder-blue uniforms from that era.
Vladimir Guerrero will be among the Expos-related guests to be honoured. The team will also honour personnel that have ties to the Expos, including Washington manager Dave Martinez (1988-1991); third base coach Bobby Henley (1998) who has been a coach for the team since 2003 when the team was in Montréal; and colour analyst F.P. Santangelo (1995-1998).
If you are going to the game, you should know that poutine and smoked meat sandwiches will be available. Poutine will be available at Grand Slam Grill (Sections 110 and 141), Anacostia Station (Section 218), and Triple Play Grill (Section 318). Steak of the Union (Sections 117 and 133) will have smoked meat sandwiches. Our culinary suggestion is to order both and slip some of the extra smoked meat on your poutine.
We doubt that the batters will be announced in French and English. The young women who served as ushers won't be an option. Hopefully Youppi! will show up.
We can't speak for Montréal Expos fans as far as the connection with Washington. I personally am glad that baseball is back in Washington, though we said at the time that the Florida Marlins should have been moved north to the U.S. capital. Still, the Washington team has been fairly cold to the Montréal Expos legacy. We are looking forward to a game someday with the Montréal Expos and the Washington Nationals.
Canada Day notebook: More delays with edibles
Canadian sports notebook: Record number of Canadians in the 2019 NBA draft
The Kansas City Royals wore a Canadian flag on their jerseys at Rogers Centre for Canada Day. Muriel Kauffman, wife of Royals founder Ewing Kauffman, was from Toronto. The MLB Network carried the Rogers Sportsnet feed for the 11-4 win.
Corner Gas: Animated debuted its second season yesterday on the Comedy Network in Canada. The show continued a tradition of cameos from current prime ministers. Paul Martin and Stephen Harper made appearances (not together) during the original Corner Gas show from 2004-2009.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recorded a cameo for the animated version that will run this season. Show creator and star Brent Butt noted that the scene took about 15 minutes to record. Tom Power of Q asked which prime minister was the best actor: Butt said Harper.
Though the original show did find a life in the United States on WGN America and currently on Amazon Prime Video, we don't know if/when the animated series will cross the border.
photo credit: CFL; Facebook/Corner Gas
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