The Magic Satchel

Yes, the new season is almost upon us and I’m ready to actually follow through on the “we should hike and / or camp more this summer” we say every year.I don’t see it happening every weekend, but I need to get out and see more stuff like this on a regular basis:

I’ve got myself some fancy collapsible trekking poles which should help distribute the load off my older than they should be knees and ankles. Also, for the first time in a number of years I’ve actually bought myself some real honest to goodness hiking boots.
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and then I joined a playoff pool and made predictions to show just how much I knew.
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This weekend I decided it was time to chisel off the winter dirt and get my bike ready for spring.

I took everything I could off the bike and scrubbed for over two hours to get everything back to an acceptable level of clean. All winter I wanted to wash my bike (and I did take it through a car wash once or twice), but for the most part I had to just add more chain lube and keep riding because it was always too cold to really clean it.
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and the heart, and the clutch players, and the fan support.

After the first two games in Chicago in the Hawks vs. Flames series it didn’t look like we were going to be in for a very long playoff season. We couldn’t hold a lead, we couldn’t play for 60 minutes, we didn’t seem to have everyone on the same page. Apparently all the Flames were needing was some good home cookin’.

With another 2 games in the bag the Bulin wall has definitely been showing signs of weakness, and the Hawks as a whole can’t seem to do much to slow the Flames down once they get rolling. Jokinen (finally!) had a monster of a game, and Iginla definitely stepped up to answer some of the yapping from the Hawks big talkers. Nystrom’s goal in the 3rd was absolutely huge, and emphasizes the importance of the secondary scoring the Flames have been getting so far in this series. Nystrom, Glencross and Moss have all been very noticeable when they are on the ice (in a good way), and it is paying off on the scoreboard.

The biggest enemy of the Flames? complacency. Don’t stop hitting, don’t stop the pressure, don’t stop shooting every chance you get. You’ve already seen what happens if you take your foot off the gas… a 4-1 lead evaporates in a very short period of time.

I’m not saying the rest of this series is going to be easy, but it is now a best of 3 and the Flames would appear to have all the momentum. Yes the Hawks managed to come back last night and tie the game with 3 straight goals, but to me that was more us breaking down than them being better than us and asserting dominance.

The best sign of the night made it on to TSN’s highlights, with Jarome’s head pasted on the incredible hulk’s body and “don’t make me angry, you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry” written on it. classic.

“It’s always a good thing for us when Jarome gets that fired up. When he’s on that edge, that’s when he’s playing his best hockey.”
– Craig Conroy on Jarome Iginla

NHL summary

wow.. sure has been quiet on here lately, and since I’m the biggest poster I guess that is mostly my fault.

busy is the best word to describe myself in the time I’ve been silent, and I’ll fill you in on the details in a little while. I could do some now, but I really just wanted to break up the streak of days without a post

I don’t think there is much I need to add to this.

To continue my verbal spewing this evening, it is time to talk about travel. Everyone likes travel! yaaay! wheee!

The Bad News: I have no plans for an other side of the world, gone for a month by myself sort of extravaganza in 2009.

The Good News: Working for a company that encourages you to take time off (unlike my previous employer who “strongly suggested” we only take time off in the slow time, and only with their approval) means I will be making a couple of smaller, gone for a week types of trips this year.
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Excuse me a moment while I chase the dust bunnies away from my keyboard and attempt to pick up the threads of my story where I last left off… almost 2 months ago.

It amazes me how quickly time has gone by, and how often I’ve told myself “I’ll write about that show tomorrow” or “man I wish I had my camera with me, again”. Truth be told I haven’t been doing anything incredibly amazing, life has just got in the way for a while. The good news is it has (mostly) been good times and good fun, so I don’t have anything horrible to relate as a reason for why I’ve been away.

Go go gadget summary mode!

First up, the review for the Watchmen concert will be posted shortly, and when it does it will be as if I didn’t put it off for the last 3 months as it will appear on the day it should have been written. Also, I’ll blab a bit about the Metric / Tokyo Police Club / Dears concert, and upcoming plans for yours truly including immediate and future travel plans. Yay travel!

Next, the cycling map and the total distance I’ve gone is horribly out of date, but I’ll have to fix that when I get to work tomorrow as I kept my records in my daytimer. Here is a picture to show my most recent milestone:

(executes a self high five)

6000km, and it looks more and more like the odometer can display another number (at least a 1) so I wonder how far I can go before the battery dies? More importantly, how much longer will my bike tolerate my abuse and lack of maintenance before the chain explodes due to excessive rust? Hang on until Thursday, I promise I’ll clean you!

Now that I’m sitting here there is a lot I’d like to say, so I’ll break it up to hit some of the “bigger” stuff in posts of their own.

Yep, the games nights are back. What? you want details?

You’ll remember (or maybe not) a while back I was quite upset with the number of banks I had somehow found myself dealing with on a monthly basis. Blood sucking leeches draining my bank account off to a number of different piles of debt I’d managed to acquire over the years, and all to seemingly no positive gain in my financial position.
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