ALLARD: TUESDAYS WITH EDNA; LONGING FOR HODGE AT THE LODGE

Jean-Pierre Allard of Smarting Senators regularly channels his columns through alter ego Edna Babblecock, who is a composite of many members -- not all, mind you -- of the Sens Army.

Boy, let me tell you there's some mad scramble at the Lodge these days.

And it's got nothing to do with Darquise insisting on listening to Dean "SCRAMBLE" Brown and sidekick superfan Gord Wilson describing the Sennies games instead of Bob "Ole King" Cole and Greg S-Mitten on the state-sponsored CBC TV. That is when they even bother airing their COTU-infested broadcast for a full 60 minutes.

No, it's because Hortense and I just can't figure out the recent segments of Oaf's Corner during the first intermission. Now, even though we both lost our husbands in the M.A.S.H. war (or was it the Nixon conflict with the Kennedys?), and notwithstanding the fact that we're also not getting any younger, we can't remember exactly when it was that the in-between period segment of Hockey Night In Canada became a showcase for the Canadian Armed Forces. Like, what the fuddle duddle does that have anything to do with heavily armed bodies dropping like flies in the eternal pursuit of finding a hole in the enemy line?

Why is it a forum for Don Cherry to provide instant relief to all of Canada by making it sound that it's OK to be a racist and a bigot, as long as you're behind Harper's Army? We sure as heck never had to put up with such nonsense when Dave Hodge was the host of the show or even when Ward Cornell moderated the old Stovepipe League.

I'm afraid I've fallen off the wagon again and for this I have no one to blame but all those Senators' diehard fans -- and the ones that wear their sweaters too. To hear them speak on radio and at Mass, you'd think Ottawa has already won the Cup, when they're only halfway on their march toward merely getting their eyes on the prize.

While they only needed 10 easy games in stopping the March of the Baby Penguins and then doing some Clean Dancing With the Devilled Eggs, the Buffalo Herd is next on their battlefront and I have this huge fear Ottawa is about to find out that when you live by the sword, you also die by the sword. Or in this case, the Sabre.

Besides, I'm 1-1 in predictions so far, so I'm due to be right again, even if the Senators sure look for real this spring, especially with the way they swamped Jersey.

WASTIN' AWAY AGAIN IN JASON POMINVILLE

What worries me more today is the mindset of captain Daniel Alfredsson. I mean, this guy carried the entire team on his back the last two series and I can't thank him enough, nor can I shower him with more compliments than I already have without sounding like the Ottawa Citizen's giddy cheerleaders.

But if I read correctly what I just read today, Captain Alfie is still defending himself for his mistake last May 20 when he let a freaking rookie waltz around him and score the easiest, short-handed, series-clinching overtime goal that everyone at the Lodge has ever seen.
OK, so maybe the dumb local scribes keep asking the same dumb question but geez, even the dumbest IKEA cashier has enough smarts to give us a different story every time we politely inquire about the fat contents in them Swedish meatballs.

Get this, Alfie said he still wouldn't change a thing in his season-ending decision, because he much preferred risking being sent to the golf courses early than taking a hooking penalty which, by the way, would have only evened up the sides at that time.

Well, to a tee, we'd sleep much better knowing that he will whack wicked good any Sabres forward over the head if facing a similar situation in the next two weeks.

Hortense nearly made me spill my porridge when she yelled to all that if she hears that horsechips story one more time, she's gonna put up for sale all of her 73 Drew Stafford mint rookie cards on the eBay.

I agree and I also want to chime in and say that just because Jason Spezza took a faceoff late in a playoff game against the Penguins and won, and then followed that with a few more games in which he actually went back in his zone to see if his pal Ray Emery needed a wake-up call, doesn't automatically make him the next Bob Gainey.

Sure, the big pussycat is getting much better at playing without the puck but let's see how he does when the Alphabet Guys named Afinogenov, Brière, Connolly, Drury, Gaustad, Hecht, Kotalik, Pominville, Roy, Stafford, Vanek and Zubrus start tripping the puck fantastic.

And another thing we can't figure out.

While it would be perfectly acceptable for us ladies to be totally in love with the young and perpetually-smiling hunk, we're thinking it's rather odd to see grown reporters have such a giant man crush on a young man who was just a boy three years ago when Jack Martin was opening the bench door at the Corel Centre.

You'd think reading all the quotes that the beat writers get from Spezza every day that his team is called the Ottawa Spezzenators.

Finally, as if we needed another controversy, Jeanne D'Arc in room 3B was overheard saying she sure hopes that the Senators' fans don't start booing the Sabres' top player and Gatineau native Daniel Brière.

I mean, it's one thing to boo a kid that needs his mouth washed with Palmolive like the star of NBC's The Crosby Show, but it would be totally disgraceful to boo a father of four young kids, who was born here and would have given both his hands to play for John Muckler after Wayne Gretzky decided that Brière was too small for the pre-lockout days of the NHL, unless "99 flavours of whine" thought his last name sounded more like a curling term.

The fans have the right to do what they want, especially after paying nearly triple the cost of a regular season ticket, but here at the Lodge, we're all afraid that this might escalate into a nasty confrontation between the feds and the Federation du Lait Québecois. Next thing you know, senator-hopeful Don Cherry will put in his two-bit and, with his best smirk, call the Sabres co-captain Danny Brier. And that will be our cue to skip this loonie interlude.

Jean-Pierre Allard is a freelance writer who has been following the Expos/Senators for MVN since 2004. In addition, he has covered the Ottawa Senators since 2004-05 on MVNiTimes,

His work has also been published in the Washington Times, Ottawa Citizen, Ottawa Sun, Toronto Sun, Calgary Herald, Vancouver Province and Ottawa City Woman Magazine. As a sports historian, he has also appeared on Global TV, CBC Radio and SRC Radio.