While Alberta suffers an H1N1 vaccine shortage, the Calgary Flames and their relatives got the shots at the request of the team doctor. Now a senior official at Alberta Health Services, the sole clinic that rather Orwellianly controls the entire vaccine supply for the province, has been fired.

Like most Albertans, I am deeply offended that this circumstance has occurred," said a statement signed by Ken Hughes, Alberta Health Services' board chairman, and Stephen Duckett, the authority's CEO.

"AHS board and management have a fundamental commitment to serve all Albertans according to their needs, in medical priority. This circumstance was a clear departure from that principle. We set the expectation that this should not have happened and should not happen again," the statement said.

Now hold on a minute. You're telling me that professional athletes aren't more important than ordinary people? How very socialist of you, Canada.

I'm sure Jarome Iginla's, Miikka Kiprusoff's, and to a much lesser extent Freddy Sjostrom's health matters a great deal more to Alberta's economy and general happiness than 76-year-old Edna Martyn of Red Deer. And while every child is precious, I doubt the average child is going to have a plus-minus rating like Craig Conroy's.

Alberta Official Fired As Flu Shot Fury Hits Calgary Flames, B.C. Farm Team [Calgary Herald]

ESPN caught this Toledo fan sporting a "Fuck Swine Flu" t-shirt during The Game That Would Not End last night in the presence of Santa Claus, who's apparently lost weight (Maybe he has the pig AIDS?!) and wears shades to night games. Colorado was a four point road favorite going into the game against a team that went 3-9 in the MAC and got half-a-hundred dropped on them. It's going to be another long season in Boulder.

In other sports news from late last night, the Dodgers and the Rockies both won, so the Dodgers maintained their 2 1/2 game lead in the NL West, while the Rockies have a 5 game lead in the NL wild card race. Also, Derek Jeter defiled the memory of Lou Gehrig by passing him to become the Yankees all-time hit leader with 2,722 hits, leaving him, at 35 years old, only 2,034 hits away from Pete Rose's Major League record. On a related note, how the hell do the freaking Yankees not have a single player in franchise history with 3000 hits?!

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Now I'm posting this video of my pals from Better Than Ezra performing "This Time of Year" in Shreveport this past July because it's a college football Saturday in early fall, and this is a song about weekends in the early fall, so there. Sadly, the video cuts off shortly before the end of the song, but its overall quality is surprisingly good. Enjoy.

Jordan Wiener, the son of the late Mitchell Wiener, tossed a five-inning no-no and struck out 14 hitters in a 10-0 mercy-rule win just more than 24 hours after sobbing at his father's highly public funeral.

"When my father was put in the hospital on (May 13), I told myself, 'Death or survival, I was going to pitch,' " Jordan said. "I knew that's what he would have wanted from me, to go out there and pitch. I was going to pitch no matter what."

Wiener's performance has to rank up there with some of the best grieving gamers of all time: Brett Favre throwing for 399 yards and four touchdown the day after he lost his old man, Matt Bryant kicking a game-winning field goal after his infant son passed away, Anthony Brock beating Tennessee for his grandmother. Sappy, yes, but it never hurts to be awed every once in a while.

Jordan's father was a Mets fan, which makes Omar Minaya's next move obvious: Let the kid throw out the first pitch at the next home game. You could use some no-hitter magic.

Wiener's son throws no-hitter to honor dad [NY Daily News]

The length of the ban will be determined over the course of the next three days, according to the South American governing body CSF, who informed Eurosport, "At around the 90th minute of the aforementioned game, Reynoso, following an incident in the game, reacted by spitting at Everton player Sebastian Penco and then releasing nasal secretions at the face of the player.

Ahh, the deadly but effective snot rocket. My favorite part of the story is that Guadalajara players were upset because Everton (from Chile) players were taunting them for their pork diseases and because they were "publicly mocked by shoppers" when they were out on the town.

Look fellas—it's sport. Your opponents will always find something to mock you about; whether it's swine flu, your horrifically violent drug gangs, your comically large hats, or the way you individually wrap all of your cheese slices. Hey, wait a second ...

Guadalajara Defender Hector Reynoso Banned For 'Trying' To Pass On Swine Flu [Goal.com]

The University Interscholastic League, which is actually the high school sports authority (go Texas!), has canceled or postponed all events until May 11, including the Academic State Meet and the State Wind Ensemble Festival. Sonofa! The regional track meets scheduled for this weekend will also be folded into the state meet. I don't know how you feel, but if they are shutting down high school softball games because of this global pandemic then I think the swine have already won.

Even worse, our own president was recently spotted with the University of Connecticut women's basketball championship team playing a game of ... P-I-G! I KNEW IT! Obama is a secret swine operative sent to infiltrate our highest levels of government and give us all stomach cramps. I knew I should have voted for Kucinich.

Swine flu outbreak shuts down prep sports in Texas [USA Today]
UIL competition suspended because of swine flu [HS Game Time Blog]