The 18.5 Hour Day

So on Sunday we had to redo our ice. As many of you know, there are new lines and such on the NHL ice surfaces for this year. As we are the official practice facility of the local team, we had to make sure that we were done in time for training camp to start.

We started at 7:00am on Sunday. We were already behind schedule when Ben & Rich showed up to give us a hand. They were the experts at this process. They are in charge of the Norfolk (VA) Admirals ice at the Scope Arena. They are also hilarious!

Anyway, we had alot of problems that pushed a 4pm finish for me to a 1:30am finish on Monday! First, the white paint that we had for the ice was not good enough to cover the blemishes, which is why we should have melted down 100% and start from scratch, but noooooooo... Then the second (new) shipment of white paint was not that great. So we had to get some from the arena downtown. That worked like a charm - at 1:30pm. We were so behind on everything. One person who was here, we'll call him GiM, did NOTHING all day. Thankfully there were large gaps that he left for.

We eventually got all the lines marked and painted. You can see where we made mistakes if we point it out, but luckily you have to be looking to see those spots.

Begining at about midnight Sunday/Monday, we began to "flood" the ice. At 1:30am, knowing that my kids were going to be up at 7am, I called it a day.

Over all it was a very interesting process. I really wish we could have done it properly. That takes about 3-5 days and looks a whole lot better. To make matters worse, we lost power very early Monday morning and the "floods" were taking forever to freeze. So the process that was only supposed to take about 12 hours according to GiM, wound up closing us down Monday as well and as of Wednesday was still not at a comfortable level.

So basically, I worked 18.5 hours in one stretch and it looks like we just slopped it together at the last minute. Roger busted his ass for about 100 hours in 5 days (not much of an exaggeration), Jim put in some major hours, and Lee and Justin were also there for extended periods of time. Nice job boys, regardless!

Quickie Post

This maybe the strangest threesome that I have ever seen...

The Hands On Approach

I have been lucky and played hockey with a bunch of great guys. One of which got married on Saturday. Steve, the groom, and his brother, the best man, Jason and groomsman, Nick are 3 such great guys. But lets flashback to my wedding 4 years ago.

We had, by what I was told, a fun reception (and one of the best Best Man Speeches ever). Kathy and I walked through an arch of hockey sticks and came in to the reception with the same music (from the Blues Brothers) that the Blues come out of the locker room to for the pre-game warmups and between periods. We had some good food, and of course, there was some "face humping" wherein Larry and Hackmeister were trying to assert their dominance - that is a story for a later time. For now we will just say that Larry has an infatuation with monkeys.

Anyway, we, and by we I mean Kathy, decided that we would do a "dollar dance". For this dance, I had every guy that I played hockey with pay at least a dollar to come up an squeeze my ass! Make no mistake, I thought that it was hilarious! So did everyone at the reception. If I am not mistaken, Larry was the first one to do this to me. Regardless, 15 times, I was groped. Out of those 15 times, none of those were by hot chicks - just dudes. This still amuses me to this day.

Fast forward to Saturday night. Larry has already told me to give Steve a grab for him. So I am more than happy to return the favor to Steve from 4 years earlier. So after the service in the receiving line, I give him the two handed squeeze and said, "Larry says congratulations!" Steve, Jason and Nick find this amusing as did those in the near proximity. We then get to the reception later and Steve is going to do the "dollar dance". So with a quick word to Kathy and Tina, I tell them that I am going to get a good one in. Steve will not be totally expecting it because of earlier and now we have cameras!

Jason who already knows what I am going to do as I am next in line, says for me it will be $3.00. I say, "I think I can cover that," and show him a $10.00. He smiles and I give him the cash turn Steve toward the cameras and ...

New Practice Jerseys for the Blues

As the Blues came out for the Captain's Skate on Wednesday, they were sporting the new RBK practice jerseys for the first time. RBK will be making all of the practice jerseys for the NHL since Reebok bought out CCM/Koho. I will go on record right now and say that I am NOT a fan of the new practice jerseys.

They were wearing the blue jerseys and the gray jerseys. They have the Bluenote prominantly displayed on the chest as you would imagine, but on both the blue and the gray, from the underside of the arm from elbow to ribs, it is white. It looks VERY derby-ish (roller hockey).

I will try to get up there on Friday to get a picture since I could not find any pictures online yet. Until then, enjoy the old CCM Center Ice practice jerseys!

Oh what a week.

So this week has been plenty busy. As most of you already know, I am mostly a stay at home dad. I have a job at an ice rink, but I take care of my 2 kids full time while my lovely wife works her butt off to pay the bills.

Anyway, my daughter, Delaney loves the Wiggles. So we got tickets awhile back to go to their concert. We were lucky and got great seats. They put on a wonderfully entertaining show and both Delaney and my son, Chase, were completely entertained - as were Kathy and I.

I know that I sound like a total Dad when I say that we were entertained but the show had a great deal of humor for the adults also. They had added in the intro to Stairway to Heaven during one part, made a joke about Ozzy Osbourne and did imitations of Rod Stewart, the Rolling Stones, Metallica and Enrique Iglasias and were constantly cracking each other up. Clearly they were having as much fun as we were. That always makes for a great show. You also know that it is a great show when, for and hour and fifteen minutes, you keep the attention of a toddler and an infant!

Nice job, Wiggles! See you next time you come to St. Louis!

Gone is Prongs

At about 1 a.m. Wednesday, the Blues announced a trade with the Edmonton Oilers in which Chris Pronger was traded for Eric Brewer, Doug Lynch and Jeff Woywitka.

On the surface, I am not completely disappointed by the trade. However, if the red line is removed from the game, it would have been nice to have Prongs on our team. He had one of the best, if not THE best, outlet pass in the game today.

Brewer is 26 (Pronger is 30) with 6 seasons under his belt. He was an All-Star in 2003 and was on the gold medal winning Canadian hockey team in the 2002 Olympics.

Lynch is 22 and Woywitka is 21. Lynch has appeared in 2 NHL games while Woywitka has yet to see any NHL time.

I guess we will see...