Background Of my earliest retained memories, the most vivid is of waddling up to our couch to find my father watching one of the New York Islanders Stanley Cup finals appearances on TV. The Islanders wore blue; I liked blue. The game captured my father's attention like nothing else I had seen before.
I grabbed his cane, turned it upside down, and began 'stickhandling' a tennis ball with it, using my mother's stereo cart as the goal. I was Mike Bossy. I was to be 'The Greater One' who would break 'The Great One' Wayne Gretzky's records. My father didn't notice--there was a game to watch--but somehow, if I kept doing this, I knew he eventually would.
More than two decades later, I'm still playing and following this silly game. My father lives 7,000 miles away now. But hockey is still the first thing he talks about when I call him on the phone.
Continuing the line My oldest nephew, back when he said he wanted to be a goalkeeper. Of course he does. They all do at this (then-four-ish) age. The goalie is the action figure of the team: he's different and he's got cool equipment. What five-year-old isn't enchanted by that? But my brother Decoy has wisely checked his budget and started him off as a skater.
Thunder (ice hockey team) The fabled Rolling Thunder is the HNA huff-and-puff ice hockey team with whom I play. I think this is Year 5 for me on the team, but I lose track. (This is the team of the fabled float trip.) It's a great, fun bunch of guys who like to hustle but not take anything too seriously (salaries are low in this league, everyone works in the morning). It's the most fun I've ever had with a stick in my hands and clothes on my body.
I think I'm going to do some Game Recaps this year, as a way of amping up the chops-busting.
As you may have noticed, the site has changed. Sampa, the free-site host, did a version 2 of some sort.
Despite an FAQ that made it sound like allowing one's site to go through v.2 surgery would be okay, there were several flexibilities that surprisingly disappeared with the click of a button. (e.g. I cannot believe sidebars like this one are even narrower than before.)
And I'm told -- miraculously! -- that the conversion cannot be undone. Truth be told, I'm actually quite pissed. But free is free. Sampa has otherwise been good to me.
So I need to sort through site "features" to see how I can make do. Except that I don't have the time at the moment, in the middle of graduate classes and Lighthousehockey.com. (btw, I've removed that Lighthouse RSS feed so that you're not clogged with random Islanders hockey gibberish).
But I promise to touch up the accessories when I get a chance, and return to irregularly scheduled blogging.
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My oldest nephew, back when he said he wanted to be a goalkeeper. Of course he does. They all do at this (then-four-ish) age. The goalie is the action figure of the team: he's different and he's got cool equipment. What five-year-old isn't enchanted by that? But my brother Decoy has wisely checked his budget and started him off as a skater.
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