My Next Road Trip (hahaha)

First catfighting cheerleaders. Now this. It's pretty much settled; I'm going to Tampa Bay for a game (lol)

http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/special1/article.adp?id=20051129160909990012

HEY!!!

Perhaps it's time that the Thunderbirds and any other teams that use this song start looking for another one.

http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/music/article.adp?id=20051121192609990011

http://www.jimrome.com/home/article/article_3.html

11-15-05 Seattle vs. Tri-City

The Thunderbirds did themselves in tonight losing to an inferior Americans team, 5-2. All game long, the Thunderbirds looked lost and confused. Which was especially suprising after how well they looked on Saturday down in Portland. Well, now that I think about it, they really didn't look too good on Saturday, either. Gavin McHale looked great on Saturday. The rest of the team looked okay at best.

The star of the game was Tri-City forward Juraj Gracik. He rolled up four goals on the night. Not a bad little game. The goat of the contest was Seattle's Chris Durand. He took FIVE minor penalties in the game. He even took some time to complain to the ref. Here's some advice to Mr. Durand; if you don't like it when the ref keeps calling penalties on you, then stop hooking, holding, tripping and high-sticking the other teams players right in front of the referee. If you follow this simple advice, I promise that the refs won't call any penalties on you. And if I'm wrong, I promise you DOUBLE your money back!

James McEwan tried to fight Aaron Boogaard of the Americans. Once again, he didn't do too well. I commented to Kelly that Boogaard was landing so many right hands that McEwan was begging him for a left (lol).

As for this weekend, I may or may not get up to Everett on Friday for their game against Kamloops. Friday night is just the WORST in getting through Seattle and into Everett. But that'll be a decision I make after work on Friday. Then on Saturday, it's yet another meeting between those old friends, the Seattle Thunderbirds and the Portland Winterhawks. This time it's up in Seattle. On Sunday, it'll be down to Portland to watch the Winterhawks play the Regina Pats.

Now, if I go strictly by my schedule (which includes a Husky game in Mountlake Terrace on Thursday and that game in Everett on Friday), I'll have games to go to on 10 consecutive nights! And possibly 11 if I decide to get to the Thunderbirds game after the Seahawks game on Sunday the 27. So I'll be Mr. Busy here over the next little while.

Revenge is a Dish Best Served Cold....and WET

The Seahawks "Revenge Tour" ended on Sunday when they pounded the Rams 31-16. Shaun Alexander ran all over St. Louis for a total of 165 yards and another ho-hum 3 touchdowns. Can anyone stop this guy? I'm not calling him the next Jim Brown, Walter Payton or Barry Sanders. But watching him run this season, you just get the feeling that we're watching something really special unfold in front of our eyes.

Another question...was Mike Martz calling the Rams plays from his couch in his living room or something? In one of the more bizarre play-calling sequences I've ever seen, the Rams had a 4th and two on the Seahawks 6 yardline. First, they lined up the offence like they were going to go for it...a call that made some sense since they were so deep into Seattle territory. If they made it, they had either a new set of downs or even 6 points on the board. However, that wasn't what they seemed to be doing. Instead, they tried to make the Seahawks defense jump offsides. It was a pointless exercise since when the crowd is as loud as it was the defense are told to just watch the ball for when it's snapped. So the Rams were forced to take a timeout when their little ruse didn't work.

Then things got even stranger than that. For some reason, they decided to fake the field goal and have the kicker...yes, the KICKER...try to roll out to his left and throw a pass. Needless to say, that fell apart at the seams and the Seahawks slipped out of danger.

The Hawks defense was pretty solid all day. For the most part, they stopped Stephen "Ms." Jackson (if you're nasty) in his tracks just about everytime he touched the ball. Of course, as has been proven in the past, the Rams receivers were shaken everytime the Seattle corners played them tight. The only two dissapointments were Marcus Trufant (over-rated in my book. Which hurts me to say since he's a Tacoma boy) being burned for a touchdown by that wussy Tori Holt and the fact that, once again, the defensive brain-trust decided to go back into their stupid dime package at the end of the game. A strategy that almost backfired on them until one of the Rams receivers slipped and fell on an out-&-up route enabling Michael Boulware to make an easy pick inside the Seattle 5 yardline. Other than those two little gripes, the Seahawks looked good...VERY good.

As you know, I don't harp on refs too often. But I did have to wonder if the Back Judge had some cash riding on the game. In the 1st quarter, he allowed one of the Rams d-backs to tackle Bobby Engram as the pass was coming his way. The d-back never even turned around...he just wrapped his arms around Engram and dragged him down. Bobby probably would have caught it, but we'll never know since he had a St. Louis player laying on top of him when the pass flew by. Then, later on in the 3rd quarter, the Seahawks were called for pass interference when Kelly Herndon TURNED AROUND to play the ball and got his feet tangled up with the Rams wide-out. And it wasn't one of those ones where he turned around at the last second...he was looking back at the ball for a good ten yards! A legal play in the rule book (incidental contact), but apparently not to that one official. At least he didn't trip up the Hawks wide receivers like one of them did two years ago in St. Louis (lol).

In other news, Dan brought his new girlfriend along to the game. Her name is Mia and she's a definite upgrade over the last one (lol). She was quite friendly. The only real knock on her is that she's a devout Raiders fan (BOOOO). But don't let that cloud your judgement (haha). Every now and again throughout the game, she would sing me one of the songs she wrote about the Raiders. And I'm telling ya...there were quite a few of them. She told me that she had more, too (lol). She also gave me some helpful advice; "if you ever go to a Raiders game in Oakland, be sure that you bring a knife with you".

Note to self....stay away from Network Associates Coliseum on Raiders game day!!!!!

11-12-05 Seattle/Portland: Overtime, Big Hits and Fights, Oh My!

Things didn't exactly get off to a roaring start. I got off to a late start on my way down to Portland. Well, at least later than I had originally planned. But I still left in what I thought was plenty of time to be able to meet Rick and Karin at the Red Robin just up the road from the Rose Quarter. However, just getting through Olympia proved to be difficult and trying. For some odd reason, there was just one traffic jam after another on I-5. So instead of getting there at about 4:00 like I had originally planned, I wound up pulling into the RQ parking lot at just a little after 5:00.

So the three of us just wound up standing around outside by the ticket booth for a good 45 minutes or so. Jackie and some other woman came along a little bit afterwards and joined in our conversation. Jackie kept saying how bored she was...which apparently didn't speak well for our conversational skills (lol).

Anyway...onto the game itself. It was quite a thriller to say the least. Seattle jumped out to a 2-0 lead after the first on not one, but TWO power play goals. The first was scored by Aaron Gagnon and the second was put in by Ryan Gibbons. I was actually on the phone with Joe in St. Louis when the T-Birds scored their second goal. I thought that was pretty good timing on his part.

Kara also called a little later during the first intermission. For those not in the know, Kara joined the Army last July. Of all the people in the world, she's one of the last people I (or just about anyone else) would have expected to join the Military. But she made it through Basic Training. And she's now studying to be a field medic. But she's also hit a bit of a snag. While going through Basic, she developed some stress fractures in her hips. So she basically spends all day hobbling around on crutches. I guess she's still going through the training. But she's unable to participate in any PT. They're also accessing whether or not she's going to be able to stay in the Army. If they decide to let her go, she'll still get all the benefits that they promised her when she signed up for her 5 year hitch. But I think that she's still a little dissapointed that they might be discharging her.

Okay....back to the game (lol). The two teams skated around without much happening for almost the first eight minutes of the 2nd period. Then someone apparently hit T-Birds defenseman, Clayton Barthel, in the face with a stick or something (I couldn't honestly tell you since I didn't see it). As play came back to center ice, what started out as a small gathering between the benches turned into a bit of a line-brawl. Eli Grossman of the Thunderbirds was punching away at the back of Brandon Dubinsky's helmet. Portlands Max Gordichuck then jumped into that fray with James McEwan diving in just behind. All the while, Seattle's Joshua Schappert and Portland's Scott Gabriel were duking it out just off to the side. There was chaos and mayhem on the ice; or just another typical Seattle/Portland hockey game. Just the same as most of the others over the last 100+ years (lol).

While they were cleaning up the mess on the ice and sorting out all the penalties, they had kind of an impromptu dance contest on the big screen. The two contestants were a fairly decent looking chick and this fat kid. So they would put the woman on the screen and she would dance a little and people would cheer a little. Then the kid would be put up there and get some cheers. Then the stakes were raised a little. The woman did this little shimmy with her butt that got the crowd whooping a little bit more. Knowing that he was now behind, the fat kid turned around and just started shaking his butt wildly. The crowd really started cheering for him and the chick conceded defeat to the kid. For some odd reason, I actually found that entertaining (haha).

When the dust settled, Portland had a five minute power play. And about three minutes into that pp, Portland's Jannik Hansen scored a goal to pull the Winterhawks to within one. The final highlight of the frantic 2nd period was a doozy of a scrap between Seattle's Benn Olsen and Portland's Frazer McLaren. The two 6-5 players just stood there trading punch after punch. I called that one a draw. Portland out-shot Seattle 18-4 in the period.

About three minutes or so into the 3rd period, Brandon Dubinsky scored the tying goal for Portland. The Winterhawks pretty much dominated the play throughout the rest of the period. But T-Birds goalie, Gavin McHale, stopped everything that was thrown at him. McHale wound up being the first star of the game after stopping 43 of 45 shots.

Portland had the first three shots in the overtime stanza. But then, about three minutes in, Michael "Santa" Funk literally just handed the puck to Seattle's Mitch Fadden who then pushed it up to a wide open Bud Holloway. With nobody within 30 feet of him, Holloway made a move to his forehand side and beat Dustin Butler under his pads to win the game, 3-2.

Another good Hawks/Birds game. Granted, most of them are more than just entertaining. But this was one of the better ones over the last couple years. I'm also making this the first nominee in my "Game of the Year" catergory...at least when it comes to hockey.

More Movies & Some Hockey

This was the list that Karin sent me in regards to that question I had about what movies would be on the schedule for your own personal film festival:

Star Wars
Mystery, Alaska
The Neverending Story
Forrest Gump
Indiana Jones (she didn't specify which one exactly. So I'll accept all three)

I thought that was a good list. I remember seeing The Neverending Story when I was a kid. But the only real thing I remember about it was that they released this song with it that I found annoying (lol). Other than that, I still remember liking the film itself. And the original Indiana Jones movie, "Raiders of the Lost Ark", was one of about 10-15 other movies that were in the final batch that didn't quite make the last cut when I was pairing down my list way back when.

In hockey news...I went down to Portland on Tuesday night to watch the Winterhawks play the Prince George Cougars. Portland won the game 4-3 in a shootout. I thought both goalies played well all night (Dustin Butler for Portland and Real Cyr for PG). With a goal and two assists, Brandon Dubinsky of the Hawks was the star of the game. But the play of the game came with less than 10 seconds left in the 3rd period. With the score tied at 3-3, Portland's Jonathan Bubnick somehow got the puck and made this nasty drag move with the puck that went between his legs. With nothing but ice between himself and Cyr, he let go this wicked wrister that was going up and over Cyr's left shoulder. But Cyr's glove came flashing up and snagged the puck before it hit the twine. Even Kurt, a Winterhawks fan, had to tip his hat to Cyr's lightning-fast glove on that one.

A good weekend is on the slate for me! First off, there's another Seattle/Portland game down in the Rose City on Saturday night. Then on Sunday, it's the Seahawks taking on the St. Louis Rams. They say it's gonna rain alot on Sunday, too. I guess us season ticket holders have to pay the price sooner or later after going 3+ seasons without even a drop at Qwest Field (haha).

Story of the Year!!!

You gotta check out this story! When I heard this at work today, it just cracked me up to no end!!!

http://articles.news.aol.com/special1/article.adp?id=20051107161309990003

Oddly enough, the Panthers website is currently down (lol)

Laugh it Up, Fuzzball

Well, I wound up doing nothing this weekend. My original plans to go over to Spokane were wiped out when it started snowing like crazy in the mountains. Then, when I woke up on Saturday morning, I just didn't have it in me to make the drive up to Vancouver. So I just wound up lounging around here and not doing anything. Well, I did clean up the joint a little. But that was about it.

It was a good thing that I didn't even go to Kennewick on Sunday as I was also thinking about. It turns out that there was yet another rock slide on I-90 again. For those keeping score at home, that's three in about two months. So they finally did the wise thing and just completely shut down the entire freeway for a good 12 miles or so. Which, in the larger scope of things, isn't all that good for our economy...at least for the short-term. I-90 is the main arterial between west and east in Washington. Oh, there's still highway 2 and 12 to go over. But if you're going between Seattle and Spokane, that's alot of extra miles to drive. They just had some pictures on the news of highway 2. It's already jammed up for miles and miles. So I'm sure glad that I don't have a job that takes me to the other side of the mountains on a daily basis.

So to replace the game that I was missing out on, Tom and I first decided to go to Sprinker to watch the UPS club team play. But then Tom called and said that he didn't want to go to that one, but rather the Puyallup High game out at Sparks Stadium. So we decided that we would do that. But then, about 10 minutes before we were to leave, he called and told me that he just didn't feel like going to that one, either. So here I was with absolutely nothing to do on a Saturday night. Which actually didn't bug me a whole lot. I don't get too many Saturday nights at home. So I figured I would just watch a couple of movies.

The two I watched were the first two original Star Wars movies. I think I chose those since I hadn't even watched "A New Hope" all the way through for a couple years. Of course, the "Cantina" scene in the first one is still one of my all-time favorite scenes. I still think the best part of that one is when the band starts into the second song and the patrons in the bar let out a little cheer like it's one of the most popular songs of all-time. Even after almost 30 years, that still cracks me up whenever I hear that.

But the real highlight was watching "The Empire Strikes Back". A film that is still in my all-time Top-10 favorites. The battle of Hoth is one of the better battle scenes ever shot. It also cracks me up when Yoda goes rummaging through Luke's little supply box. The scene where Darth Vader and Boba Fett (my favorite character in the saga...by the way...lol) invite their company to join them is still pretty cool. And, of course, the scene that absolutely rocked every 1st graders world in 1980.....when Vader broke the news to Luke that he was his old man. Of course, adding insult to injury was that not even a minute before, he had hacked-off his kids right hand.

Some say the best chase scene of all-time was the one through the streets of San Francisco in "Bullitt". Others like the one in the "French Connection". Those were pretty good. But I still nominate my favorite scene from "Empire".....the chase scene through the asteroid field. Even with the special effects technology being out-dated by today's standards, it still works really well. My highlight of that scene is when one of the TIE Fighters slams into an asteroid and you can see the pilot go spinning through space at the bottom-left part of the screen.

So other than watching the Seahawks whup-up on the Cardinals today, that was pretty much my weekend. Not too exciting. But, when I think about it, it's nice to have a weekend with no running around or driving miles and miles to do stuff. You know...kinda recharging my battery a little bit. Next weekend is a little more normal. Saturday night is gonna be spent down in Portland as the Winterhawks take on the Thunderbirds. Those are always good. And then on Sunday, the Seahawks "Revenge Tour" (that's my title, not theirs...lol) continues as the St. Louis Rams come back to the scene of their crime from last season. Over this little stretch that I've given that special name, the Hawks have:

1. Beaten the Rams in St. Louis
2. Pounded a lesser team (Houston) into submission
3. Avenged last seasons bogus loss to Dallas at home (you were out of bounds, Keyshawn!!!)
4. Avenged last seasons embarrassing loss to Arizona in Tempe

And now for the biggest monkey on their back.....FINISHING the Rams at home. By that, I mean don't go into that ridiculous prevent defense at the end of the game. Keep slapping those softies they like to call receivers around since they don't seem to like that too much. And keep on hitting Bulger like there's no tomorrow. He's almost as fragile as Kurt Warner. And also, hopefully Holmgren's pass-happy arrogance won't get in his way. This time, if they have a large lead near the end of the game, just let Shaun Alexander and Mo Morris finish it off. If they can do that, then they'll be just fine.

To end this little entry, I'm recalling an email I got about a year ago from somebody. In it, they asked "if you could choose 10 movies to show at your own film festival, which ten would they be"? Here were mine:

Pulp Fiction
A Clockwork Orange
Dr Strangelove or: how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
2001: a Space Odyssey
Run Lola Run
Fargo
The Empire Strikes Back
Seven Samurai
Kill Bill (both volumes as one)

Now I'd like to hear what yours are. Feel free to post them in the comments section or email them to me. If you email them to me, I'll post them on here at some point in the near future.

Wheat Kings Aren't Good

Just a quick little bit about the game up in Everett last Sunday between the Silvertips and the Brandon Wheat Kings. Before wamrups, there were three Wheatie players sitting a few rows behind me. Someone else recognized them as such and asked them "so who are your best players out there? You know...top scorers and stuff". One of them answered "nobody, really". The fan then asked "really? Not even one good scorer on your team"? The player then replied "nope. We're pretty much all the same. No differences. We suck".

I'm glad I'm not a Wheat Kings fan (lol).

Other than that, not much special happened. Tom W drove up there just as recklessly as always. And near the end of the game, he was openly rooting for Brandon. Not that he's suddenly a Wheat King fan or anything. Rather, he just wanted to see how the shootout went in the WHL. When Brandon scored in the final minute of regulation, he threw his arms up in the air and whooped it up a bit. I hadn't seen him do that before (lol).

This weekend will be interesting. As of right now, I really don't know exactly where I'll be. If Snoqualmie Pass is open and relatively decent, then I'll be heading over to Spokane and maybe Tri-Cities (if the pass is okay on Sunday night). If it's snowing up there, then I'll be heading up to Vancouver to watch the Giants play the Calgary Hitmen. I'm sure I'll have fun with whatever I do, though.