WEDNESDAYS #7 vs. DUCKS:

(vol. 16W, no. 7; newsletter by b.n.)
As 2003 came to an end, I raised a Miller Beer (which is only fitting since it is the “Champagne of Beers”) to the sky and thought of all the resolutions that would make me a better person. I thought about selling all my worldly possessions and moving to India to live with the Meher Baba — then I realized that the Baba probably doesn't have an ample supply of Pabst Blue Ribbon on hand. Then I considered moving to South America to work with disadvantaged children — but the more I thought about it , the more uncomfortable I was with the whole crossing-the-equator-thing; I really don't understand it fully, but I'm pretty certain that everyone on that side of the Earth is hanging upside down and if someone decides to shut off the switch that operates the Earth's gravity, then all those people are just going to fall off! So I weighed my options and finally decided to stay close to home and work with those that are considered mentally-challenged. It was my mission to seek out and find these mentally-challenged people and spread the love. With love all is better. With love, even a grey day can be sunny on the inside.

So with that said, I headed to the hockey rink to see what sort of love I could spread. When I got there, it seems that everyone had the same resolution that I had — the love was spreading. Ewww! It was contagious. Well, sort of anyway. First I came to Harris. He was not spreading the love. He actually seemed to be mad about something. Perhaps he knew that this newsletter would be over a week late. Nah, you can always tell when Harris is mad about something because, well, I guess because he is always mad about something. But other than Harris, everyone was spreading the love. Well, of course I must exclude Mike Farrell from the list because when I got in to the locker room, Mike was standing on his soap box and was bashing George Bush (“Where are the weapons of mass destruction?” Mike wanted to know! “Why are we spending all this money on a war in Iraq?” Mike was adamant! “Why is America sending billions of dollars of our tax money over to Iraq to provide free healthcare to the Iraqi people when people in America can't even get free healthcare?” Woah! Jump back Mike, you are really started to sound like the Reverend Al Sharpton. Before I could blurt out that Mike was stupid (whoops, I shouldn't say that — let's just say “mentally challenged”), Chris jumped-in to defend the President and Supreme Commander; Chris was extremely giddy about the President's decision to legalize the millions of illegal workers in the United States. I hate to say this Chris, but you are stupid (whoops, I shouldn't say that — let's just say “mentally challenged”).

You know, after dealing with the mentally challenged for just a short period of time, I decided that I, in fact, was stupid! and decided to abandon my New Year's resolution before the first month of the New Year had even expired. But as I did so, there must have been a God of New Year's resolutions that decided to show up to the game and really stick it to me for abandoning my resolutions so quickly — for as I took the floor against the Ducks, I found that the entire opposing team was stupid! Actually, they were worse. They were $#@&*%# stupid! These guys seemed to think that they were the actual Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. When they stepped-out on the floor, it looked like they wanted to avenge their Game 7 loss to the Devils. Come on, it's a freaking “B” league! Everyone is supposed to go to work the next day, but you wouldn't have been able to tell by the way the Ducks skated around the rink: hacking, slashing, tripping, spitting, whining — wait, that wasn't the Ducks, that was Russ.

To say that the 1st period was a feeling out period would be an understatement: There wasn't much touchy-feely stuff — it went right to the bare knuckles. It was the Ducks that were first on the board with a one-goal lead that held up for the entire 1st period.

Going into the 2nd trailing 1-0, things started to get interesting: First it was Scott Miller from the far blueline hitting his brother Evan who broke in to the zone full speed; Evan was able to fire a shot that handcuffed the Duck goalie and tied the score 1-1. The Ducks, however, where able to regain the lead: It began when Harris made a great play to stop a breakaway, but no one picked up the trailer and the Ducks converted the rebound for the 2-1 lead; then the Ducks were able to convert on a play where Harris seemed to have the puck in his glove, but the Ducks were able to swat (Harris says “slash”) the puck loose and pick up another rebound for the score. Holding a 3-1 lead the Ducks were getting cocky. After one of the goals, one of the Ducks skated towards the Pirate bench and taunted the Pirate players — that's right, he must of thought he was on Monday Night Football instead of Wednesday Night “B” League Hockey. Oh well. Bizarre as that seems, it was even more bizarre when Bob Correo blew the whistle for a penalty for “unsportsmanlike conduct” on the play (As he explained later: “When someone trips you, you want to trip them back; when they slash you, you want to slash them back; when they taunt you ... you want to kick their ass!” That is a real quote from Bob, you can check with him on it). Anyway, the Ducks finally lit a fire under the Pirates as they were finally able to get things going: First it was #67 who chased a defenseman into his own corner when said defenseman suddenly fell down and #67 picked-up the loose puck and nailed a pass to Evan who one-timed it off the bottom of the crossbar; then it was Russ who picked-up the puck to the left of Harris and skated through the neutral zone and then through every Duck player before blasting a wrister over the goalie's shoulder (after the goal, the goalie was heard screaming: “You can't let him skate in like that!” Well, duh!). While I was trying to spread the love, the Ducks were trying to spread something else, and it certainly wasn't love. One of the Ducks (who must be a foot or so shorter then Keith) tried to reach out and touch him — unfortunately touching him with his elbow across his chin was really not the smartest play the Duck could make; so the Pirates found themselves on a powerplay. With just :08 remaining in the 2nd, Russ made the Ducks pay for their crime when he blasted the puck from just inside the blueline, giving the Pirates the 4-3 lead at the buzzer.

There is only one thing you need to know about the 3rd period: If you sit in the bleachers to watch the game, you will notice that the Pirates have a rather nice advertisement along the boards. If you look to the left of that dasherboard, you will see a corner — this corner, while lacking any special markings, should be known as “Miller Time” or “Scotty's Corner.” For whatever reason, whenever Scotty is in this corner, he is deadly. It seems that whenever he throws a puck at the net from that corner, it somehow goes in. So is it any surprise that Scotty picked-up another goal from the corner to ice the game at 5-3? Well, it shouldn't be. And you thought the game was over. Well, the game itself was over, but the gamesmanship continued; instead of being humble and accepting the defeat handed to them, the Ducks had to get cocky. After shaking hands, one of them was heard yelling: “Just wait until we meet in the playoffs!” Russ, ever the one to cool down a superheated confrontation, was quick to yell: “Oh yeah, well maybe by then you'll have some teeth!” (If you don't get it, sorry, you had to be there). And that wasn't the end of it; Keith continued yelling at the Ducks as he left the rink and chased them into their locker room!

Spread the love baby.
Spread the love.