Monday Morning Sentimonies: Prophet Convention

This may come as some a surprise to you, but I am not the only Prophet in the CFL. In fact, each team has their own duly appointed Prophet. Admittedly none of them are as well renowned, successful, popular or handsome as the Rider Prophet, but they do exist. You are likely wondering why you have never heard of the other 7 prophets before and why I have never mentioned them up until now. The reason is that, unlike myself, the other 7 like to keep a very low profile, not because I just fabricated this entire story this morning in an attempt to cover up the fact that there is very little CFL news to talk about and I needed some sort of filler material so I decided that it was far easier to just make up something to talk about than to put in the effort to come up with an actual topic. That is definitely not the reason.

Anywho, each year all the prophets get together to discuss the upcoming season and sports related propheting in general. The annual convention is a weekend full of intense discussion and debate, excessive drinking, the odd fist fight, a potato sack race and enough blasphemy to send most of the western hemisphere to hell. It is tradition at these meetings that each prophet bring a gift for the others that represents his team.

Unfortunately, three of our esteemed prophets could not attend this year for various reasons. Eskimo Prophet couldn’t make it because he’s actually an Eskimo and we had to send his invitation via dogsled so I’m not sure it has even reached him yet. Argo Prophet received his invitation but given the relative importance of football in Toronto he chose to stay in Toronto and watch the Maple Leafs spring golfing endeavors. It's really not a huge absence as Lion Prophet has taken over most of his propheting duties anyway. Bomber Prophet tried to attend but was detained at the airport. I guess in this post 9/11 era a name like Bomber Prophet raises some security concerns.

Despite the absences, the convention went ahead as planned with myself, Ti-Cat Prophet, Stampeder Prophet, Lion Prophet and le Prophète Alouette (who has reluctantly agreed to rejoin the convention after a failed attempt to separate and form his own convention).

We try to start out the convention on a positive note with the exchanging of the gifts. I brought a bottle of Wisers for everyone because whether you are drinking to celebrate or drinking to drown your sorrows, it’s a necessity for all Rider fans. Despite not attending, Argo Prophet couriered his gifts to us. Unfortunately it was the same stupid thing he gets us every year - old NFL jerseys featuring names of players that have been washed up for ages but that Argo Prophet is still enamored with for some reason. Stampeder Prophet gave us all hats that had “Calgary Stampeders Grey Cup 2010 Champions” stitched on them. Lion Prophet tried giving us Paul McCallum as his gift but we all refused to accept it which led to a heated exchange in which McCallum tried to kick me in the head but missed and inadvertently concussed the Lion Prophet who was standing to the left of me.

Once things had calmed down and Lion Prophet had received medical attention, we continued with the gift giving. Ti-Cat Prophet’s present was a private performance by the Ti-cat cheerleaders. The sheer physical repulsiveness of the ensemble led Stampeder Prophet to try and gouge his own eyes out with a fork (oddly enough none of the other Prophets attempted to stop him). The rest of us managed to cope by aggressively downing the bottles of whiskey I had gifted. Le Prophète Alouette was the last to go and announced that he wanted to give us all his famous coq au vin. Unlike myself, the other prophets are not fluent in our nation’s other official language, so they mistook Prophète’s statement and all went running for the door… well except for Stampeder Prophet who seemed strangely excited at the proposition.

As per usual the rest of the weekend was full of spirited debate, drunken shenanigans and only 2 fire related incidents (a new record low for the convention). I’m already excited for nest year, as Eskimo Prophet will be hosting the conference which means seal clubbing and inukshuk building!