The Return of Storytime (Or, We Have Too Much Time on Our Hands)

Back in the day (the day being my time at Oxford Housing and my year of living on East Washington Street in Ann Arbor), my sister Dorkus and I would exchange what we affectionately called Storytime—it is a round robin of sorts that we play, focusing on the wacky adventures of the Detroit Red Wings and their friends across the National Hockey League. It occurs mostly in the off-season, but has been known to continue, with adorable humdrum situations, throughout an entire season. Because we have developed personality traits that are no doubt in stark contrast to the true personalities of the Detroit Red Wings, I’m sure the entire team, from 1999 to the present, would collectively go “The hell!?!?” when reading one of our stories.

We have covered everything, from the Stanley Cup being damaged by the Dallas Stars’ Guy Carbonneau stupid attempt to toss the Cup into a pool (which the Cup cop says never happened, but I don’t believe him—he’s probably just embarrassed enough to have to hang out in Texas, where the Cup should never have set foot) to Chris Osgood getting married. Storytimes could last months—we typically dated the story in order to keep them in order when we revisited them. Sometimes, Storytimes were carried out over email; at other, more fun times, Storytimes were carried out via snail mail. Our envelopes would be decorated with small doodles, the words “Go Wings!”, quotes from a particularly funny Storytime, or recurring character quotes (such as “Oh, nothing!” “To the bus!” or “Sweetie!”). We always geeked out upon receiving a Storytime in the mail, ready to read and ready to write.

My sister wrote a brief Storytime last year after the Wings were outed from Stanley Cup contention—she never sent it, but read it to me over the phone a few weeks ago. I nearly lost it, I was laughing so hard—the tone was still there, the same characters had re-emerged (we pretty much stopped Storytime after Chris Osgood was yielded to the New York Islanders), the plot was set up to continue more Storytimes. Dorkus proceeded to send me the initial Storytime 2007 (which still doesn’t have an official name—I think we went through Storytimes I – V and Storytime Returns!, but nothing since). I had to take a couple of days to think about it, but I finally wrote a response and mailed it back to her.

I eagerly await Storytime’s continuation. Of course, nothing will ever be as funny as Ozzie’s nose crinkling up upon taking a whiff of an unwashed (and fictional, remember that!) Brett Hull, lying on a deserted Texas road, drunk off his ass and so bloated he couldn’t get up. However, we will try to at least partially match the hilariousness of Storytimes past.