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Back by popular demand, it's "The HOCKEY-L Ode to Joy" !! Several list-
members objected when I posted this last year around Valentine's Day, and,
without going into details, I seriously considered not bothering this year.
However, at the risk of once again being labeled an "insensitive boob," I've
decided - with Wayne's blessing as HOCKEY-L administrator - to post it once
again for your amusement in the light-hearted spirit I'd always intended.
Flame *ME* (not the list) if you're offended - hopefully we can come to some
understanding without dragging all of HOCKEY-L into it. Some hateful speech
should be self-censored, but IMHO the following anecdote is far from that.
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For many years the Boston "Phoenix" would publish a special section
on/around St. Valentine's Day that chronicled reader testimonials of Cupid's
hits and misses. The following excerpt appeared a few years ago, and was
sent to me by a Boston acquaintance who met his future bride at a college
hockey game, and who still plan their social calendar around the UNH icemen.
I think we all know people (of both sexes) who could have written the
following:
"I blame it all on a goddamn college hockey game. Oh, sure, you're
thinking, maybe I should blame myself. Well, the hell with all of you.
The light of my life, she was - or so I'd convinced myself over the
space of the three weeks we'd been taking the same political history course.
Our eyes met during a lecture on Grover Cleveland, and I was hooked. I
asked her out for a beer after class; she mentioned that she had an extra
ticket to that night's game against St. Lawrence. At the time, I understood
less about hockey than I did about Grover Cleveland, but so what ?? I would
be with HER.
That night, I learned that the St. Lawrence icemen are known to one
and all as the 'Larries'; for all I knew, there could have been a bunch of
Moes and Curleys down there too. The problem was .... *she* knew. Worse
yet, she CARED. And she was appalled that I didn't. Which is why she then
launched into a lengthy and aggressively condescending discourse on the
subtle differences between cross-checking, spearing, and aggravated assault,
intermittently punctuated by her emphatic observation that the referee was,
as she put it, a 'blind motherf**ker.' All hope vanished at the moment she
realized that I didn't count Snooks Kelley as one of the five greatest
inspirations of my life; her lips were silent, but her eyes said 'wimp city.'
Dreams die hard - but none so hard as those shattered by a bunch of
hyperthyroidal Canadians with knives on their feet and sticks in their hands.
Goddamn college hockey game. Maybe I'll become a priest ...."
Well, *I'd* sure like to meet her .... !! Cheers, Jim
Jim Love (*grin*)
[log in to unmask]
Go 'Cats
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