In an effort to get more people in the US talking about hockey, the NHL has got celebrity bloggers on their site who talk about whatever they want, as long as it’s hockey-related.

I like this idea because it gets us a look at the “real life” of the celebrity, because they are, after all, just real people too. But it’s fun to hear them talk about their favourite team, or the game they just watched. Lots of fun. Without further ado, I give you a list of some of them for this season:

1. Tom Cavanaugh: You know him as the loveable dude Ed from the show of the same name, but we Canadians will remember him from those Labatt beer ads from many, many years ago. I love it that he still cheers for his hometown Habs, and also because he’s a cutie. But I digress for a moment. Tom is a Habs fan, how cool is that? And he talks about having a Richard jersey, and even the wonderful poem by Roch Carrier that we all had to read about, The Hockey Sweater.
2. Jay Baruchel: That cutie loveable geek from Knocked Up and Freeks & Geeks, Jay is also a Habs fan. Who knew there were so many down in La-La land?
3. Eddie Cahill: Currently on CSI: NY, I remember Eddie from his time on Friends, and as Carrie’s bi-sexual boyfriend on Sex & the City. But he’s also a hockey fan, which is awesome! His team is the Rangers, which I’ll forgive him for, since he’s from NYC.
4. Thorsten Kaye: Thorsten first caught my eye on One Life to Live, playing the dreamy Irish dude whose name I completely forget. Thorsten was born in Germany, but raised in the US, and ever since he moved there, he got hooked on hockey. He was hooked on the Wings in the 90’s when he lived there during grad school. So he’s got the bug and even tries to sneak in the Red Wings logo into his scenes on All My Children! Talk about funny. Kind of like Matthew Perry sneaking in a Toronto Blue Jays cap into scenes while he was on Friends.

There are a few other celebrities blogging this year too, but I haven’t listed them all since I figure you could go there and find them yourself. But I like the fact that the NHL is trying to be progressive and trying to get Americans to get excited about hockey. Here in Canada it’s not a problem to get ratings, to get people to buy jerseys, and show their support for their team. But in the US, it’s a bigger challenge. For a professional sports league that isn’t on the radar of most sports fans, that’s a big issue.

Ah yes birthdays. They happen every year on the same day, and some years we want to celebrate them, while other times we don’t. This year I wanted to celebrate, especially because my beloved Montreal Canadiens were playing the dreaded Toronto Maple Leafs ON MY BIRTHDAY. Oh yes, I thought this was a perfect thing to celebrate. To make matters even more fun, the game was in la Belle Province (that’s Quebec for y’all non-Canadians), and as I hadn’t been to Montreal in over 8 years, I thought this was the perfect opportunity.

To start the celebrations off, I went to the Irish Embassy Pub in Toronto on Friday night for some drinks with some colleagues. Here’s me & Shannon at the beginning of the evening:

(That’s me on the right.)

 Next there’s Clint, Paul & Matt mugging for the camera:

I tried to be good and not drink too much that night, as the next morning I was off on the train to Montreal, but of course we all know that didn’t happen. Although I was good and drank vodka-based drinks, as I know they cause less of a hangover (and let me tell you that less is most definitely a relative term here), I still wasn’t feeling as fresh as I could have on Saturday morning. BUT, I made it to the train on time to meet up with the girls, and off we went.

Strangely enough, only Melanie was in full form, as I was battling the hangover, Jana was getting over a nasty cold and Christine was having some sympathy nausea for me, but we all managed to rest a little on the train, and we in decent form by the time we got to the hotel. Where we were greeted by this view from our 16th floor hotel room:

This is the view from the Fairmont Queen Elizabeth hotel, one of the grand dames of Montreal.

The best part of this room and hotel is that the Queen Elizabeth is directly over top the train station. All we had to do is take an elevator, and we were in the hotel (or train station, depending on your perspective.) This was an important fact to us, since we were taking the 09:40 train Sunday morning, and we wanted to maximize our sleep time.

So now to the main attraction: the game. We walked over to the Bell Centre and purchased some scalpers tickets for the Molson Zone. We found these are at one end of the arena, and each section is assigned a player. If your player scores a goal, then one row is chosen to win free beers. Not bad at all.

Here are Jana & me at the game. 

You’ll note that Jana is still smiling even though she’s wearing a Toronto Maple Leafs shirt…this was before the Leafs got trounced 4 - 1 by my Habs! YESSSSSSSS! She still had fun though, enjoying all the raucous fans and all.

Next we have some photographic proof of Christine’s fraud: she’s really a Senators fan, however in the spirit of the day, she wanted to wear one of my Habs jerseys. I told her she could wear her Sens jersey, and in fact her husband was going to lend her his, however she declined, much to Jana’s chagrin.

In the pre-game festivities, the Bell Centre people did a historical retrospective on the Canadiens teams of the past, flashing up some interesting pictures and stats  on the ice as they did.

So the game got underway, we had a few beers and pizza slices, and the chanting began “Let’s Go Habs! Let’s Go Habs!” Followed by the equally fun “Leafs Sucks, Leafs Sucks” (you have to remember we were in Montreal, and those francophones sometimes add extra s’s to words. ) There was an undercurrent of “Let’s Go Leafs” occasionally, but then we’d drown them out. See, Christine was right into it…

See the blonde in the referees shirt? She was handing out free beer tickets to fans who were wild & crazy, and Christine was wild & crazy enough to win!

By the third period, the score was:

The crowd started to get really rowdy, including a group of nasty Habs fans a few rows ahead of us. They were taunting a group of Leafs fans with some nasty, personal comments, which really wasn’t necessary. Security came up sometime in the 2nd period, but you knew something was brewing. These were the type of guys who go to bars looking for fights. Sure enough, at this point in the game, somebody stumbled while walking up the stairs to his chair, beer was spilled, words were exchanged, and then Hab Moron #1 lunged at Drunk Leafs Fan #1. DLF #1 threw his beer on HM#1, which pissed him off, and they started grappling as all of us ran for cover. Security was up there in no time and had separated everybody and diffused the situation.

But THEN, DLF#1’s friend (DLF#2), tried to climb over us girls to help his buddy. We were all concerned that he was going to dump his beer on us, so I pinned his right leg, Jana pinned his left, Melanie grabbed him by the waistband, and Christine, who was on the aisle, started yelling at him. She got right in his face and let him have it. While I appreciate his willingness to help his buddy, there was no point since Security was there and was going to toss everyone out anyways.

Finally the situation calmed down, all the DLFs left with their banished brothers, (and one sister), and then we watched the rest of the game. Jana left in disgust with a few minutes left in third, as she had to go buy some Habs paraphernailia for her father, who is a Habs fan (good man!), and she missed the lone Leafs goal! That was funny.

We next headed out to the Sir Winston Churchill pub up on Crescent street for a few drinks after the game. We met up with some funny guys who worked at Molson’s. Melanie was having quite a fun time with them. And then suddenly, it was past midnight, and my birthday was officially over for this year. It was time to get back on the train and head back to Toronto.

If you want to see more of my photos from the trip, go check out  my Flickr page. Melanie’s going to put her photos shortly, so I’ll be linking over to those too, so stay tuned for those too (Melanie’s much more of a shutterbug than I am.)

Tonight I went out to a sports bar with some colleagues to watch the Habs beat the Leafs. And beat them they did! The game went all the way to overtime, and then there were coincidental minor penalties at the end of the game, which meant that the teams each had to play a man down for that time…which means in overtime that they were only playing 3 men a side!

That was just crazy, I haven’t seen that much ice during an NHL game in quite a long time. Heck, it almost seemed like one of the skills competitions during the All-Star game, you know?

And then what happens? Mike Komisarek, a Habs defenceman more known for his body checking than his scoring prowess, intercepts a pass and goes in on a breakaway, and scores! Just wild. It totally crushed my one colleague, who was already upset that he was sitting there in Toronto watching a game with a bunch of Habs fans (go figure, there are three of us at work on my floor, with another who’s a sort-of Habs fan.) This dude was not happy.

But now it’s time to go to bed, as I am dog-tired from my two late nights in a row during the week! So good night!

Those of you who know me, know that I spend my days typing away at a keyboard at work all day. I am a technical writer, so I spend my days writing up software manuals, help files, and right now, internal design specs & process documents. I enjoy what I do, however sometimes the weight of my workload means I’m typing a lot. And since I learned to type back in the day of the typewriter, I tend to hit the keys rather hard…which leads to wrist pain and moderate repetitive strain. Sitting all day in front of a computer doesn’t help my back either, so it tends to protest as well, but usually only when I’m doing a lot of standing (like when shopping.); my body’s just not used to it any more.

Now before you accuse me of whining and complaining about my lot in life, let me tell you that I’m not complaining, I’m just explaining.

A few years ago when a good friend of mine was getting married, and I was standing up for her, I started working out on my home exercise equipment to tone up my arms (we were wearing strapless bridesmaid dresses). And I noticed after a month or so that my wrists started hurting less the longer I worked out. And that my forearms actually developed a bit of muscle on them too, so much that I could notice them.

So the new job has had me typing like a mad fiend, and my wrists are starting to bear the brunt of that work. Getting out the home exercise equipment requires a little work as it means clearing out some space in my spare bedroom, which isn’t going to happen during the week (I’m just wiped by the time I get home.)

Phase 1

Abdominal exercises to help out with the back pain. This is an easy thing to do, requiring me only to just unroll my yoga mat and do the exercises. I’m doing a combo of crunches, targeting all sides of my ab muscles: two where I hold my legs in the air in different positions to target the top and bottom sets of ab muscles; and another one to target the obliques. I’m trying to do it every other day, but since September, I’ve only managed about once a week, which isn’t bad. I’ve noticed already a slight difference, so I figure if I get a move on and do it more often, that I’ll feel a whole lot better.

Phase 2

Digging out the home exercise equipment to do some arm and leg weight training. This will help my wrists and shoulders, which is also good because I slouch a lot, so shoulder work is good. My wrists will get the extra support from the built-up muscles in the forearms, and I’ll be able to work a lot better at the office. The leg exercises will help tone my thighs and butt and make me look better in my jeans.

Feel better

So that’s my plan for getting rid of the pain in my old (read: not really) body. I want to get into the habit of exercising regularly, so that it won’t be so hard to do, and I’ll feel better.

What are you doing to keep yourself in shape?

(Whoa, I just clicked over to the Canadiens game versus the Trashers, and we’re into another shoot out! Same thing as Saturday night, when it went 8 deep, and my Canadiens won with a defenceman winning in the 8th round. Phshew. Keep your fingers crossed kiddies!)

Oh, and one other thing: I watched the Habs play the Hurricanes last night, and we won!! Lately I’ve been suffering from the “we lose when I watch” syndrome, which happens to me occasionally, so I haven’t been able to partake in my Super Sports Pak for hockey. But last night I watched, and it was 5-1 after the first period! That was pretty exciting. They ended up winning 7-4, which is good. Here’s the brief run down:

• 5 power play goals
• 1 short-handed goal
• 1 goal by Mark Streit (that’s important because I have him in the NHL Bench Boss fantasy pool)

Go Habs Go!