Notorious sore losers Jamie Sale and David Pelletier, who have plagued airwaves and talk shows with their complaining and whining, were finally thrown a bone on Friday with the awarding of a "special lifetime achievement" gold medal for bitching, kvetching, and poor sportsmanship.

The Canadian couple, Sale and Pelletier, suffered a bone-crushing defeat at the hands of Russian skaters on Monday night in the Olympic pairs figure-skating competition. Despite the fairly straightforward rules of this simple game, the Canadian team has refused to concede, seeking loopholes in the International Skating Union's official rules to somehow extract victory out of the jaws of humiliating defeat.

The issue has become one of national pride for Canadians at home and at the Games. The streets of Salt Lake City, UT, have been plagued with overweight, pasty Canadians buttonholing passersby to wax at length in flat, nasal tones on the so-called injustices of the judge's decisions. Use of tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse the unruly, mustachioed Canucks has proved fruitless. "The power of Canadian indignation apparently knows no bounds," said an official with the SLC police. "These people have a national martyr complex a mile long, and the events of Monday night put a big fat fucking Olympic torch to the Canadian inferiority-complex powderkeg."

Olympic officials and figure-skating panjandrums met in a closed session late into the night Thursday to discuss how to get the pissy Canadian hordes off their backs. Proposals allegedly ran the gamut from publically stripping Sale and Pelletier of their second-place silver "consolation" medals to deportation of Canadians and border closings along the Minnesota and Montana state lines.

The final decision, reached after many bottles of fine Napa Valley merlot, was to, and I quote, "Let the babies have their way." "Jesus fucking Christ," one anonymous official is quoted as saying, "When will these little bitch Canadians grow up and get a goddamned job? 'Waaah waaah waah!' It was too much!

"We decided just to throw some trinkets and beads at these unscrupulous sour-grapers and hope it will shut them up. We had a couple of medals in the back office that we were going to throw away anyways. But we scratched out the words 'Thanks for Participating' and put the word 'GOLD' on them, and we're pretty sure the Canadians are fooled.

"For God's sake," he continued, "I hope they enjoy their stupid medal. I'm sure it will be a national fucking day of celebration. I can only wonder at a people who would exult in the kind of 'victory' that you have to whine and complain for. By the way, thanks for ruining the fun of the Games for everyone else, Nucks."

Olympics viewers have been happy with the results, as it will mean much less nerve-grating Canadian gibble-gabble at regular 15-minute intervals. One sports commentator noted, "If I had to sit through another interview with those puling icebacks one more time, I was gonna just throw a copious stomachful of acrid barf all over them. I really don't want to hear what the Olympics are all 'aboot' from some two-bit snivellers. The Olympics are 'aboot' playing a goddamned game, and not being a little blubbering bitch-boy when you lose. God, I'm gonna be glad to be rid of them."

Regardless of bitter feelings on all sides, the world breathes a sigh of relief as Canadia receives its meaningless bauble and meanders on home.

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guvnor@pigdog.org