Manicures, iPads & Hockey

Yesterday my friend the roller derby girl gave me a shellac manicure. It's so pretty and shiny, even on my clipped shorty-short nails. Tonight at work though, something in the
skin prep wipes I use made my right thumb nail really dull. I keep wiping it with alcohol, but whatever it was ate the top layer of polish off, I think. Bummer.

I'm composing this entry on my new iPad using the touch screen keypad. My wrists are getting sore since I have to hold my fingers up to see where I'm touching since there's no sensory input for where you fingers actually hit. I bought the iPad on eBay, took the chance because the seller was very close and the price was very good. There is a scratch on the screen, but I'm hoping when the Invisible Shield goes on the scratch will disappear. The seller did disclose it in the auction listing, it's only a tiny bit worse than the auction led me to believe. All in all I'm pretty happy with it since I only paid $257 for an $800 piece of electronic equipment I'd been trying to convince myself I didn't really need. It's pretty. In every way. My kids are each going to want one next.

Today is the first practice of spring hockey. It's Dids' first day as a Pee Wee, let the checking begin. Most of the team is first year Pee Wees. I think there are only 3 on the team who played this level in the fall. Scott got roped into basically coaching the Squirt team as well since none of the dads stepped up to volunteer. I wonder if any of them can even skate. Jeff, the owner of the arena is officially the "head coach," but he told Scott he doesn't think he's going to get on the ice today and asked Scott to be there at 1 for Squirt practice. I guess it's extra ice time for Dids. He's going to be a tired boy after 2 hour and a half practices today. He could use the practice though, maybe it will improve his stick handling. He's still a little unsure of himself there and can't turn on his jets and skate around anyone with the puck.

Maybe I Should Blog Something

I've had this blog thing set up for a long time now, but have never blogged anything. In an effort to cut down on my Facebook posts that annoy my friends, maybe I should just blog it. Then if they want to read my thoughts, they can come find them instead of me blasting them into their newsfeeds. Ha!

I'm angry and excited and happy and cold today. Yes, all at the same time. Over the weekend my son's hockey team won the Becker Cup. It's this little local "tournament," where all the teams in each level from the 4 local rinks play each other to determine who has the best team. Yahoo, we won. Either my husband is a good coach or we just have some kick ass kids on our team. Actually, it's a little of both. What should have been a really happy and proud moment was marred for me by the goings-on in the stands. Allow me to explain the situation:

There's a "home" section and an "away" section at our rink. Apparently the "away" section in inaccessible for wheelchairs. The family of one of the kids on the other team sat in our "home" section for the final game. I'm assuming the guy was the grandpa. He sat there and questioned every single call the refs made, and the ones they didn't make as well. On and on it went until EVERYONE who could hear him was incredibly annoyed. He dogged my husband when he yelled at our son for making a stupid play. Apparently a coach isn't supposed to question what the kids are doing on the ice, he's just supposed to let them do whatever they want to do. Anyways, I digress. At some point in the third period when we were winning and the other team was getting desperate, this kid came down and shot on our goal. The goalie deflected it and my kid swatted it away from the goal. Here's what it looked like to me: the tall kid who took the original shot was angry at my short defenseman and skated up to him very fast and cross checked him IN THE FACE...INTO the side crossbar of the net. My little 70 pound kid's head snapped back and he went down. Then the big tall kid landed on him and the net. I jumped up and yelled for a call on that, then stood fearing my kid's neck was broken. He hopped up and skated over to the bench, apparently fine. The kid who hit him kind of staggered up. The mother next to me was apparently in the same head zone I was because she echoed my thoughts when she yelled, "I hope you're hurt!" I immediately repeated it, and at the same time thought to myself that's not exactly what I mean. But in the heat of the moment when someone has just intentionally tried to hurt your child things come out of your mouth that you might not mean. It ratcheted up from there when the old man yelled to me, "That's just hockey! You don't know the game!" This pissed me off. That was my kid's last game as a Squirt, playing at the level where checking is NOT ALLOWED. Shoot, even in the NHL they are questioning hits to the head. So, with the filter on my language shut off, I yelled back, "Oh bullshit, go sit in your own damn section!" Then the mother got on me, "I can't believe you'd wish for someone to get hurt!" Blah, blah, blah...about then the puck was dropped again, at which point common sense prevailed in my brain and I sat down and disengaged to watch the game. After the game that mother went tearing off the locker room to report my behavior to all the other parents on the team. Except instead of reporting that I was mad at HER kid, she said I was badmouthing someone else's kid. A kid I happen to love. A kid I know and who is friends with my kid and would never in a million years dream of intentionally hitting my son in the face to hurt him. And she reported this inaccurate information in front of the kids.

So we're all taking pictures of our kids with the trophy and one of my favorite kids from the other team (also the other team's coach's son) comes up to me with big puppy dog eyes and asks me why I would say those things about his team mate. My heart fell as I realized that my poor sportsmanship had been reported to the kids. I turned around and saw that mother and immediately apologized to her, and informed her that I would never WISH for a child to get hurt playing hockey. She told me that she hoped not, shook her finger in my face and informed me that her child would NEVER play for my husband before she stormed out of the rink. I'm still not aware that she said I was dogging someone else's kid, not hers. I decided I needed to find the boy who asked me why I would say those things about his team mate, and in front of his parents explained to him that I was a very poor sport when I said what I said, that in the future I would try to keep my more stupid thoughts to myself, and that I would never want anyone to get hurt. HE was the one who then said, "but why would you say that about _____?" I was flabbergasted. To my knowledge the kid he thought I was angry at wasn't even involved in the play. I told him I hadn't dogged that kid, that it was someone else I was angry at and that I certainly did not say a thing about the kid he thought I had bad-mouthed.

Today I got a message from the parent of the kid I like, shaming me and telling me that now she knows who her friends are. I knew it would blow up like that. Now I'm mad again at that dumb lady who lied about who I was all fired up about. Grrrrr!

On the bright side, I think we have a good spring team. We kept almost our whole team together. One of our defensemen is going to play goal for the other team. Two of our kids didn't move up to Pee Wee. We replaced those 3 with kids from another rink, kids who have played with us before and who are pretty darn good skaters. The only drama for the whole winter season was mine that last game. I'm glad we kept mostly the same group of parents, because it would be nice to have another drama free season. Please no bitching about ice time, or "I don't want my kid to play defense," or "Coach Scott said 'damn' in the locker room!"

Dids (my 10 year old hockey player) got a new Warrior stick and blade in the pro shop for $32. They're clearing out all stock dirt cheap so they can put in a BAR. I'm certainly happy about that! Now if they'll heat the place in the winter I'd be the most content hockey mom ever.

We have our family vs player skate at the Joe Louis Arena next Tuesday followed by our awards banquet at Hockeytown Cafe. We're all looking forward to that. Hopefully since the Wings don't play Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday next week a couple of them will accept our invite to come skate with our kids and bring theirs out too. Wouldn't that be the icing on the cake for our team?!