Irmageddon is seemingly baring down on Florida with an arrival scheduled for late this weekend. One could only hope that a strong Canadian cold front will dip down and force the hurricane away for us. Obviously, the best case scenario is for this storm to take a hard right out to sea. Trust me there is no way to elevate someone’s blood pressure than the satellite imagery of a KAT 5 storm heading towards them.
This far out it is hard know exactly where this storm will land. Meteorologists and scientists can give us a pretty good idea, but sometimes these storms have a mind of their own. Moreover since Irma is such a large storm (almost 500 miles wide and 400 miles tall), you cannot take this monster for-granted.
Needless to say with Irmagedden looming, hurricane preparations are well underway in South Florida. We spent much of our work day contingency planning for the coming days and weeks. With a storm like this, you could be looking at weeks of business and school interruptions. Importantly, the potential loss of life is a far scarier prospect than the interruption of our everyday life. Consequently, we’ll be putting up our shutters tomorrow and ready to batten down the hatches for Irma’s arrival. Please keep us here in Florida and those in the path of this massive storm in your thoughts in prayers.
I’ll leave you with some levity. When you’re looking at 185 mph sustained winds, you need to laugh so you don’t cry.
Congrats to our champions!!!!!! We had a wonderful weekend with our hockey family in Orlando. Of course, the cherry on top was our U-14 AA boys winning the championship. At a number of different times during the game, they seemingly felt compelled to make it interesting. Alas through hard work and team work, they persevered and they won the championship game.
Goalielocks saw little action in the first, which is a difficult situation for a goalie. Goalies need to see some shots to get into a rhythm, so protracted periods of no shots are tough. Nevertheless, he wasn’t happy with his level of play even though they won and he got second star of the game. Such is life as a goalie. The good news is that’s why you practice. He can work on improving the things he felt he didn’t do well this weekend and work on maintaining what he felt he did well.
I’ve written about it previously, but its hard to believe how old and grownup these kids look. Many of these kids started out together as mites in 1st and 2nd grade and now many have started high school. They used to be so small that their legs would dangle from the bench in the penalty box since they couldn’t touch the ground. Now they’re ginormous and take up all the room in the box with both their size and smell. Irrespective of the change in size, they remain the same sweet smiling kids they were in mites albeit with an expanded vocabulary. All kidding aside, these kids are amazing. They’re hard workers, gritty, fierce competitors, but also good teammates and good friends.
The tournament did a great job putting on a nice show for the championship games. These things may seem small, but I’m sure they make a world of a difference to the kids playing in those games. In addition to the introductions, they also had an announcer and some pretty sweet music. Even better though was the fact that all of our families, which are spread throughout the world, could watch the game live. For my parents in Minny, it was an awesome opportunity to cheer for their grandson and his team from afar.
The Mayor’s team did not walk away with a championship, but they had a blast this weekend. I can see that they’re excited to hit the ice together as a team, which is amazing. My Mayor is the kind of kid that goes all in when he does something and I love. He’s small, but he’s the fiercest competitor I know. He works his butt on and off the ice to be the best he can be for his team.
This morning his team played a consolation down in Kississimee. Sadly, I missed most of because I had to get Colin’s gear to the other rink in time. I was super bummed that I had to miss the Mayor’s game because him and his team are so much fun to watch. Shortly, after I departed he scored a pretty sweet goal. One of the team dads, who is totally my hero, videotaped the goal and sent it my way.
The best part of all of this was how the Mayor told me he scored his goal. As he told the story, very little of it had to do with what he did. He spent most of the time detailing what his teammate did to facilitate the goal. The Mayor couldn’t say enough about the awesome pass he was fed by his Boy B that led to the goal. I can’t lie it was pretty cool to hear him heap the praise on his teammates because he gets it. He understands that no matter who scores the goal, it took a team effort to get there. Notwithstanding, the Mayor loved sharing the details of his post goal celebration.
All in all it was a good weekend filled with great hockey and even greater people. Quite frankly, it takes a lot of energy to survive these weekends due to the lack of sleep, increase in alcohol intake and increased stress from watching the games. All things considered, these tournaments have left us with many priceless moments. There’s no doubt in my mind that I should probably educate myself on some mindfulness techniques for before, during and after Goalielocks’ games.
We were playing a team they should have handled with relative ease, but in hockey (as with any other sport) you can’t take your opponent for-granted.
Throughout the entirety of the game, I had quite a bit of company. It was clear the ref’s were intent on maintaining control of the game. As a result, both boxes were packed throughout the 2nd with coincidental penalties. While it jacks up the rhythm of the game, at least it wasn’t one sided officiating.
We went into the 3rd period and the contest was farther closer than it needed to be. Consequently, my heart was racing, my stomach was in knots. My resting heart rate is normally around 68-70. While Goalielocks is in net, it varies from 90-120 depending on the game situation. According to my Fitbit, I get at least 2 hours of fat burning out of one of his games without having to lift my finger. Its great to be a goalie mom, isn’t it?
My dear friend Sharyn, seeing my angst, was kind enough to get Chris Kunitz to take a picture with me. At this point, we had 6 minutes left in the 3rd and I was officially dying. I popped out of the box to pose with the kind and very accommodating Stanley Cup winner, which knocked at least 60 seconds off the clock for me.
Unfortunately, the boys seemed intent on causing some heart palpitations and I once again had a full box. This time there was just over two minutes left and there were no coincidentals. Cheese and rice, it was a long two minutes! My heart was beating out of my chest as Goalielocks and his boys faced a 6 on 3. They stood strong.
Goalielocks ended up drawing a penalty after his buddy from the Bulldogs took a chop at his arm. Thankfully, this critical penalty ended the 6 and 4 and they were forced to put their goalie back on the ice. The squad weathered the storm and soon (although it felt like forever) the final buzzer sounded. As expected, the boys from both teams scuffled a bit after the buzzer. Consequently, the refs sent both teams off separately. Happily, this goalie mom survived and even her picture with an NHL star.
Post game we headed to Twin Peaks, which was clearly a mistake. Their hiring practices definitely do not emphasize critical thinking, time management or anything other than looks. While the food is decently price and pretty tasty, no team lunch should ever take 2.5 hours. Fortunately, our groups of parents is awesome. After all these years, we continue to enjoy each other’s company. Nevertheless, it was a bit tough to stomach that serving our group could be that complicated.
For many of us, this is our 6th year at this tournament. I was looking back at pictures from our first trip to this tournament in 2011. Our boys were so small and so sweet. Conversely, they’re no so big albeit they’re still mostly sweet. The relationships my boys and I have formed over the last 6 years of travel hockey have been absolutely priceless. There is no amount of money you could spend to replace the experience or our hockey family. In the most critical and difficult times of our lives, they’ve been there for us and we’ve been there for them. I couldn’t imagine life without our wonderfully crazy, wild and fun hockey family.
The madness continues with Day 2 and 3 of the Labor Day tournament. Thankfully, the schedule gods were kind and I got to see both kids’ games yesterday.
Both the Mayor and Goalielock’s teams played the Ice Bandits from Atlanta. The mayor’s game was earlier in the day. For the majority of the game, it was a close contest. Unfortunately, the Ice Bandits opened up on the 3rd and we lost.
The Mayor worked hard and was more than ready for the team lunch at Sam Sneed’s post game. It’s never easy to feed a team of hockey players and all their families. Yesterday’s lunch took quite awhile, but the food was quite good and the Mayor enjoyed the time with his team.
Goalielock’s and his squad were up next facing the same organization. He’s played with most of these kids since mites and now they’re huge. They look like giants and men. Now longer do they look like the sweet little first and second graders they were when this crazy journey first started.
Their game was pretty good. These boys are coming together quite nicely and will be fun to watch this season. They came away with a strong 4-1 win.
Of course the best part of tournament weekends, is hanging with the crew and barbecuing back at the hotel. The rain put a slight damper on the festivities in that it wrecked most our hair and diluted our drinks. Aside from the rain, the night was pitch perfect. This morning on the other hand was a bit rough.
After driving for what felt like countless hours on the turnpike, we finally made it to the Labor Day Tournament. Well at least hubby and Goalielocks did. Due to a number of accidents, the drive took longer than expected so I dropped them at the rink in Kississimee before heading to Orlando.
I abhor driving in Orlando, but driving in Friday night rush hour in my hubby’s truck takes the cake. Nevertheless, I survived the drive. The Mayor and I made it to RDV in once piece.
Both boys played last night at 6:45 and 7:50 respectively in two different rinks. I was bummed that I had to miss Goalielock’s game. The rink in Kississimee is like a cave. There’s no cell service, so this goalie mom was dying from anticipation in RDV.
Goalielocks and his squad played great. They ended up winning the game 10-0. Always a good night when your goalie gets a shutout.
The Mayor’s squad played a local team that was pretty well padded with travel players. They ended up in a tie, but they had a lot of critical opportunities they were unable to convert. My mayor had a great game getting a hatty and an assist. The Mayor was excited to play last night and is really looking forward to today’s game.
Last night’s loser was definitely Steak N Shake, who saw their entire computer system go down during a storm. By the time we had left, their credit card processing machines still hadn’t come back online.
Finally, the parents were in good form. We kept the bartender in the lobby busy and the bicep curls looked good. Nobody got arrested, broke anything or got sick, so all in all it was a good night.
