A comedian defends curling as essential Canadian infrastructure, not a hobby. The Montreal curling club predates Confederation by 50 years, and Sandra Schmirler's 1998 Olympic gold team proved its legitimacy. Disrespect curling and you disrespect Canada itself.
Chapters
Yes, we fought over curling, and I will tell you why. First of all, it's been a hell of a year, okay? The American government wants to annex us, people are saying our Prime Minister has daddy vibes, whatever the hell that is, and last week the price of king-size coffee crisps went up at the Rexall on 10th, so it's kind of been a year, okay? We take our curling seriously for the same reason we take our winter seriously, because the season is going to show up whether we ask for it or not, and once it's here, we get extremely organized about it. Curling is not a hobby in Canada. It's infrastructure. This is a sport that began before Confederation. The first curling club in North America opened in Montreal in 1807. Thomas Jefferson was president. And who was prime minister? The fuck have I— no, no one knows that. That's how early this was. Curling existed before Canada, which means curling is more Canadian than Canada. Curling predates the light bulb and the telephone. We were sliding rocks on ice before we had a flag or a rail system or, or, or any consensus on vowels. And why? Because it's perfect for us. Okay? It's slow, it's usually polite, it's rule-heavy, and powered almost entirely by volunteers named Doug. You don't win curling by dominating American style. You win by placing one annoying rock in exactly the wrong spot and forcing the other team to think about it for a full minute. That is Canada's entire diplomatic strategy, by the way, but just with ice. You think we don't take this seriously? The woman who led Canada to our first Olympic gold medal for women's curling in 1998 was named Sandra. Sandra Schmerler! Yes, Schmerler the curler! So yeah, let's talk about the cheating. All this talk, "Oh, Canada cheated, Canada cheating." But really, did we cheat? Yeah, we probably cheated. But who can fucking blame us? Like they say at the colonoscopy clinic, "What's a finger between friends?" Also, context matters. You try throwing a 42-pound rock down pebbled ice while a guy wearing polyester is yelling at you, "Hard! Hard!" Bro, we're trying! How about a couple hair dryers instead of a broom? So yeah, we fought about curling. Because when everything else feels loud and out of control, this is the one place where chaos moves at 3 kilometers an hour and you are allowed to stop it with physics. It's therapy. With rocks. And beer. And if you think we're gonna be chill about it, buddy, you have fundamentally misunderstood this country. I haven't done it once. You can fuck off. You haven't done it once? I haven't done it once. Okay.
