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badger_14

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Everything posted by badger_14

  1. While your eyes may not feel dry, the watering is essentially a response to the cold, dry air. The body is cued to think "o no it's dry I'd better protect my exposed mucous membranes", thence the lacrimation situation. (And the runny nose.) One recommendation is protective eyewear (goggles or sport glasses), another is putting in eyedrops before going outside (so your body feels like the eyes are plenty saturated already). You could theoretically try a decongestant (pseudoephedrine) or antihistamine (benadryl) since those do dry you out. If you already wear glasses, ask your eye doctor what they recommend.
  2. The Boston area has at least a couple of rinks with 2+ hour, cheap stick time. However, living costs are pretty high here. Where would you stay? What time of year? Are you looking to work with a trainer?
  3. Pot, kettle, etc, yes, I know. I face enough projectiles in other facets of my life: I'd like to not do so at work.
  4. A member at the gym was so angry over a billing issue that she not only screamed at us, she threw things at my coworker. Suffice to say this is not a good way to get the employees sympathetic to your cause.
  5. I think the only ones I've seen that have an off-ice component are the Can/Am and Heartland camps. I expect it's a time/space constraint for a lot of both rinks, and adults.
  6. I did both Robbie Glantz and Laura Stamm, and found them valuable - there wasn't an adult specific section, but neither program minded if an adult signed up. You were just placed with an appropriate level and could modify drills based on your ability and being two feet taller than the kids. (Memorably, Glantz does the waist belt with another skater hanging on - they just stacked a bunch of mites on my trailing straps. Kids had a ball.)
  7. I have a pair of Easton warm-up pants that fit quite nicely - snug in the waist (like lacrosse shorts) but not too baggy through the legs. (I could fit shin guards under them, but they're not crazy blousing or anything). Unfortunately, they stopped making that particular model. (which is always how it goes) However, assuming that Easton's sizing tends to run similarly, I'd recommend trying something of theirs.
  8. A few sessions coaching 8U will make you more agile than you ever imagined. Or it'll put you in the hospital.
  9. Apologies - I should have said you *can* end up with overskilled guys dropping down a level or two and wreaking havoc. My experience is mainly Somerville and Brighton. I've been out to Concord a few times and it felt like there was kind of a core group there, and even if it ended up being a broader mix, they were polite about it and didn't sandbag the whole game. Somerville's games have always struck me as being a free-for-all generally. It matters less to me personally as a goalie, but I feel bad when people arrive expecting a lower skate and a bunch of B players show up and skate circles around them for an hour. Question, though - who's responsible for keeping track of this? Like, if a skater has registered for both B and D level games, does it get flagged in the system? Or if a skater has identified themselves as B and registers for D and novice skates?
  10. Let's face it, men are weird and get weirder around women; some women prefer to bypass the machismo. 🙂 Also it potentially offers her more opportunities. I have heard NESHL can be a clusterfuck. My experience with StinkySocks is that the skates can be a crapshoot - you'll get clearly-not-D-level skaters at a D game. I have had good experiences with MAHL (MA hockey league) and I believe they have some skates in that region now.
  11. I'm so glad it's worked out for the both of you! Enjoy the season. 🙂
  12. I'd caution you not to bust a gut, but it's clearly too late for that.
  13. I think I've got a temporary fix for ya:
  14. Is she interested in playing co-ed, or would she prefer to skate with women-only? There's a women's league in Fitchburg (maybe a little too far), and a couple of leagues play out of Bedford, MA as well.
  15. Am I clear in reading that they're - if not disallowing - then discouraging you from taking him off the team? Sounds like they want to cash your checks. It sounds like other folks are having similar issues with the coach's behavior. (Cussing out U10s is not appropriate behavior for an adult. It just isn't.) I wouldn't suggest your son talk to the coach. He's 8, after all - he's still at an age where it's the adults' responsibility to make a majority of the choices and set the example for appropriate boundaries and behavior. That's way too heavy a position to put the kid in. But it's clear he's not having fun, he isn't enjoying or looking forward to hockey time, and as long as the determining factor (the coach) remains, that's not going to change, no matter how much he likes the other kids. (And kids will put up with a *lot* if they think it pleases the adults they look up to). I think at this point I would tell the organization "listen, this team is just not a good fit for our family right now, we've decided to switch." Be clear and firm, but phrasing it that way keeps it neutral. Is this an area where this specific organization is all there is? Are there other options around - town programs, house leagues? Are you financially sunk or do you need a release from this team to play on another team in the same league?
  16. How bad is your eyesight? I have significant nearsightedness in one eye and mildly in the other, and I just go without for the game. My teammate is also nearsighted, and I think he has anti-fog on his glasses, but he also wears a half shield and not a full cage. He tried the sport goggles but found they fogged too.
  17. Crappy ice. In particular, crappy ice that leads to (minor) injury.
  18. Oh, the towns around me do have bantam and midget (most are half or split season midget, because high school is big here), but it's in the same travel league with all the other town teams, so it's still 2-3 practices and 1-2 games per week. The No-Check league and the LTP programs are the only really "in-house" opportunities I know of for 12+. I have no experience with or much knowledge of the private programs, so I can't say anything on that count.
  19. I cannot necessarily take credit for "Root Beer League". I could've sworn it came from someone on here. There's a "No-Check Hockey League" in my area that (functionally) helps fill the recreational void for the tweens/teens - aside from a 1 practice/1 game per week league, they have regular weekly pick-up games for kids and it seems to be very well attended. The company that operates the state-owned rinks also offers learn-to-play for 12+, as does one of the town leagues up in the Merrimack Valley. Those are, as far as I know, the only available opportunities in an hour radius of Boston. I think CigarScott is right that soccer may be better in that regard than hockey, baseball, or American football, although there was a really great article recently in The Atlantic about how US Soccer expends a lot of time and effort into the travel system and funneling kids into their Development Academies. It also brings up (once again) the point that early specialization is physically hard on, if not outright damaging to, growing and developing bodies.
  20. Oooh that looks classy. Simple, but striking. Could the stitching on the front red segment be white, for visual interest?
  21. It feels like to me, even in season, that youth sport is much more of a time sink than it might have been when I was growing up, even at the younger levels. I mean, think of two practices and a game a weekend - it's an hour on the ice, 10-20mins to get dressed/undressed, travel time (in the local league, the furthest travel time to a game is 45mins - 1hr one-way, and the practice rink is probably 20mins at max from any given point in the city). For a practice that's more than two hours of time. And the sports league asks that of people two, three times a week depending on the level, plus a game or two. And then it gets worse as the kids get older - there's no 'beer league' (root beer league?) for the 12 - 18 year old set, you've specialized and gone to the "elite" levels or you're out by 11 or 12. We had a bantam-age kid one time who just wanted hockey as his second fall/winter sport (with football) as he'd started playing about two years before and wasn't into the high-level commitment, but there was just no place for him. By comparison, as an adult, I can be involved in at least three different sports at one time - hockey, horseback riding, and softball - because there isn't a huge time sink and it's all recreational. Several of my regular teammates at pickup are parents, and four of the kids play with us on a regular-ish basis. One of the dads grew up playing hockey, I don't believe he ever played at a super-high level, but he's good. He also, at some point, realized that he cannot/should not coach his kids, whether on the ice or in general, and turned their hockey development to other people. He talks to them on ice the same way he talks to any other teammate. The other dad did not grow up playing hockey, and is not a very skilled player. He has not yet realized that he should leave the coaching up to others, especially at pickup (in fact, never "coach" your children at pickup). I think it's very easy for a parent to get very involved - they want the best for their kid - but in the same way it's very easy to go overboard, and it happens in all sports. It's also harder, I think, for folks who didn't play (x) sport growing up to have a sense of distance. Parents who grew up playing something are maybe better at saying "yeah, kids make mistakes, that's sport, let's move on". (or, like my dad, who participated in approximately nothing organized, has no serious emotional investment in sport at all). I can be worse in certain sports, because they're expensive, or because they're a closed, insular environment, or whatever reason, I think it can be worse, but it absolutely happens everywhere. For kids, talking to parents can be hard, especially if it's about things that upset them. Parents are the responsible party, but kids are egocentric little beings and interpret everything said as being personal. For example, if a parent says of something a child did in a game: "That was stupid." what the kid hears is: "I was stupid". When a parent is angry, the kid interprets the anger as being toward them. Younger kids (even bigger kids) often lack words to describe how they feel and rely on parents/trusted adults to help them find the vocabulary. If a kid slams their stick, you can tell them that's not an appropriate response, but also, "it seems like something made you very angry, that you slammed your stick like that. Can you tell me what it was?" and it sounds therapist-y as hell, I realize, but it's giving them a) concrete words for feelings b) a chance to acknowledge emotions instead of burying them and c) an opening to talk about it. adam14 and chk hrd make two good points: adam's dad offered options, not solutions (in this situation, what are some things you can do?) which is good coaching, and chk hrd waited to give them kid time to come down from the game, which is a great strategy for a lot of kids, especially ones who put themselves under a lot of pressure.
  22. It does, but I think that's just because on the screen the red looks more orange. I like the Darling option, but I'm not sure how I feel about the sock graphic being medial vs. lateral.
  23. My mom has been sick - well, it's been a series of medical crises on a loosely annual basis for about 6 years. This time, the cancer came back and chemo wasn't going to do anything. She took a sharp turn for the worse on Wednesday, and died sometime Saturday night (naturally, when neither my dad nor I were in the room). I don't know if it's quite hit me yet, it's a lot of emotions, and a lot of non-emotions at the same time. My brothers are coming in today, and my uncle is coming tomorrow. Things are odd without her.
  24. Giving a startling new meaning to the phrase "bag skate".
  25. Thank you! The official word posted on the NREMT yesterday. I am fortunate to already have a good therapist of my own. I know several of the medics at my current job and they're good folks. A nice mix of pleasantly nuts, which I think helps survive the job.
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