badger_14

Thank you for saying so. I've been through a lot of shit in my life, with not a lot of support, and sometimes I've had to just dig in and fight everything, and it's good to hear supportive words. Like I said ,I had a few people this weekend actually surprised I've only been playing goal for a year and a half - and a couple people asking where I usually play. (It's all that hardcore Russian goalie training, right?) I wanted to do the best for my team, but it helped that they did a lot of scoring, of course, to keep things from getting too out of hand. ;)

I actually won something in hockey! \o/! Well, I'll chalk it up mainly to my team (tournament - a largely random assignment from the player pool) who played great, but we took home the silver and I'm pretty damn proud of how I played. (and four games in two days oh man.)

Tournament Recap, Day 2: Game 3: Green v. Black. Green won, and I am currently blanking on the score. It was at 9am, but we did quite well (though a few of our fellows dragged themselves in under the wire to get dressed). It took me a little while to get going - I was tired by virtue of being up at 6:30, but I woke up quickly enough and didn't let it any particularly dumb goals. I did let in one that I remember being stupid, I was caught off guard because I thought one of the Black skaters was off-sides and spent a second or two too long on him. I stonewalled absolutely everyone in the third. Black even pulled their goalie at the end to put on an extra skater, which just made me feel better because no one has ever considered me enough of a threat to need six skaters to score on me. ;) There was a two-hour break between this and our fourth and final game, so I had a donut and tried not to take root on the lobby benches. Was definitely starting to feel the sluggishness by 11:30 or so. Game 4: White v. Green. White won, 11-8. All of Green was tired by this point, and this was White's first game of the day. I started off okay, by the second my body recognized that we were playing the 4th hockey game in two days, and I let in several stupid goals that if I had been faster or thinking more clearly, I should've had. I woke up again in the third, mostly by sheer force of will, and only let in one. Three friends came to see me play, and I could not be more grateful. I had a lot of fun playing and met some super nice folks from all over - there was a team from Albany, from NYC, people from Montreal, Wisconsin, Denver, other parts of New England, and Atlanta. And Boston, of course. A good number of people complimented my goaltending, and the White team specifically addressed my tenacity and unwillingness to give up at any point. My team captain said he thought I just got better and better as the tournament went on. I think that was true - tired, of course, but tracking the puck well and moving well and making mostly good choices. Oh, and also: we medaled! Second place, which is a damn sight better than losing every game, and second out of five isn't bad at all. I feel like I did my best, and I feel like I earned it.

Tournament recap day 1: Game 1: Red v. Green (my team) - we won 14 to 4. I felt bad for the other goalie (professional courtesy) but also good about winning. I didn't see a lot of shots - defence was super tight and Red just couldn't get by them. I warmed up before the game (got to the rink nice and early) with some good stretching and some time bouncing a ball off a wall, or juggling it, or juggling it while standing on one foot. Focused on watching the puck. Made some good saves but like I said, didn't see many shots. One hour break between games. Ate smallest slice of pizza available. Drank Gatorade. Game 2: Green v. Grey - we lost 6 to 5. Grey (primarily players Albany's GLBT league - they even have a coach! And hats!) was strong on passing and aggressive, and they had had two hours after stomping on Black this morning, whereas Green was a bit tired. I saw a lot more shots in game 2, but still only let in 5 goals, so I feel really good about the game even though we lost. My team is super great and plays very well together. Ran on adrenaline for the last two periods. I smoked this one guy on a breakaway and was deeply pleased. There's five teams in the tournament, and it's a points system - at the end of each period, and the game overall, teams are awarded points (max of 8). If you win a period, you get 2, if you tie, each team gets 1. So because it was so close, we still came out of game 2 with 6 points. Tomorrow our games are at 9am and 12pm, so on the one hand I've got to get to the rink around 8 but on the other we have two hours between games, so I suppose it balances. Tonight is a tournament dinner at a nice restaurant and hopefully none of my teammates parties too hard at the club afterward. :)

Feeling a touch nervous about the tournament this weekend (which I am definitively playing in). Each team gets four games, and the three teams with the most points at the end will be awarded medals. (there are 5 teams). Two games Saturday and two Sunday, which shouldn't be too bad. Hopefully my luck as a goalie is better than my luck as a skater when it comes to tournaments. I know a few of the folks already.

So physical therapy is on hold because my insurance can't get its shit together. (story of my life). This is not so good, because something went wonky in my right knee during physical therapy, but that seems an acute matter, and on the other hand (leg) the left knee is significantly better. And I have exercises to work on in the meantime. (I think one of those patella straps will help with the right, it feels like that sort of thing.) I went to stick practice at Nearest Rink today. It's usually very quiet - I suspect it's not heavily advertised and no one thinks of a private school's rink as a place where open hockey will be held. Anyway, it was two hours, and the first half-hour or so I was by myself, stretching, skating, and doing assorted angling drills. Which is super boring, in case you were wondering. But then! A dad and two kids showed up. Me: *scurrying to put a net in place* *omg, friends, they will shoot pucks at me, yay!* But then he made his kids do skating drills for an hour at the other end of the ice. Ugh. But two other dads and their respective kids showed up so I did face some shots. The youngest kid seemed to be the only one aware of proper etiquette (one person shooting at a time, wait for the puck to clear, do not shoot at a goalie that is not ready) so go small fry. Not good shots from the kid, um, but well, hey, I'll take what I can get. The ice time will have to do to keep the rust off for the tournament, which is next weekend. (in the meantime, I am working, and the only other chance to play any hockey before the tournament is this upcoming Wednesday.) Ice packs for crispy joints, ice time to mitigate the fact that it is obscenely hot and humid here.

It's when people are provided towels at the gym, rather than having to bring their own.

A grown-ass man at the gym threw an actual, honest-to-god, screaming fit over his membership not including towel service. (or rather, being gently reminded that his membership did not include towel service.) He was so infuriated by the enforcement of a policy that he was already aware of, he cancelled his membership, and has dispatched his friend to complain to the higher-ups. Ambulance crazy has nothing on retail crazy, man.

It's truer than I want it to be.

I like to think that as long as I am working hard and trying my best, not giving up, I am doing the number enough justice that Mr. Tretiak would be okay with it. (I mean, I suppose I could write him a letter and ask...but my Russian isn't really that good yet.) I specifically told Lutch not to put the name on, just the number. That way I only have to burden myself with a couple of digits, rather than putting on airs with a name. (hey, we're goalies, we all have weird obscure rituals and reasons.) I like Collander over Sieve, as Collander (or Colander) is an actual name. (hockeydb has no one actually named Collander/Colander, which is a damn shame. My university had a goalie named Hatch, poor bastard!) Tricky. Boston may be unusually (compared to other parts of the US) um - ... angry. About hockey. (actually sports in general. Let us not speak of the Red Sox/Yankees thing. Ever.) But I have seen actual physical violence erupt at North Station during Habs/Bruins games (not even in the arena yet!) and players deliberately go after folks wearing a wrong jersey on the ice, so I'd rather err on the side of caution. On the other hand if they're just going to furiously shoot at the logo all day that could be to my advantage. But do you have an STFU jersey, that's the question. ;)

I felt so much better today even than last time (two weeks ago, just after the cortisone shot). Hooray for physical therapy. Still uncomfortable in some ways, but a far cry from being in such untenable pain every time I played. I did let in more goals than I wanted, but I think so did the opposite goalie (whose leg - he is recovering from a broken ankle - is also f*cked! So we're even, except he's much better than I am to start with). A lot of them were simply not being fast enough to keep up with some very skilled players. This opposite goalie hadn't seen my CSKA/Tretiak jersey, and had nice things to say about it. Always good. Sometimes I worry I am not doing the number justice. But I try. He noted that at one point he'd had a Soviet (CCCP) Tretiak jersey and every game his opponents would just whale the puck at the letters as hard as they could. I said that's why I got the CSKA jersey rather than the Soviet national one - I don't want to have some butthead who thinks it's still 1978 take me out. (for some reason, no one - besides the Russians, of course - seems to immediately recognize the CSKA jerseys as Russian or even non-Anglophone. CCCP, though, everybody knows that and you'll take your life in your own hands.)

Of course, consider that with tongue in cheek. :) I would like to win a game (to break my tournament track record of losing EVERY SINGLE GAME) but I will be happy to play.

Tournament news - it appears they've decided to go with a 5 team format, meaning there is a goalie space for me. Hooray. Again: it is appears this way from the missives sent out to everyone from the tournament organizer. The downside is that they were unable to form enough teams separate competitive and recreational divisions, meaning that it's five teams of mixed players. The guys that play for Boston I know are very good (*cough*sandbaggers*cough*) as are the Albany and Toronto players (at least, last time I played them, but that was a while ago). So that could mean goalies getting shelled and less-skilled players being miserable and possible jerks wanting to shorten the bench on them, or it could mean a friendly mix and - er - goalies still getting shelled. The Russian Embassy returns tomorrow.

I totally understand. It's hard not to feel like every goal is a personal insult. I think there's a difference, too, between "intense" and "tearing your teammates a new one every time they make a mistake". It's okay (and varying degrees of good) to be intense, it's not so much good to be the village lunatic. I am sure the puck sliding by while trying to take on a tangled mess of fallen player felt like the dumbest goal ever (well, maybe the dumbest goal that game), because let's face it, it is a pretty ludicrous situation and feels embarrassing. You seem to be doing alright, and it does sound like the skaters are happy to have you and not just as a warm body between the pipes either. :)

I don't think it's really unreasonable to be more worried about two players vs. two knees than the puck itself.

Paypal. Could make a case for it, but we'll see. Hopefully they'll go with the 10-and-1 option.

They ran one once before, a few years ago, but I don't know how that went over. The teams they put into the local senior league, and the two major GLBT tournaments on this side of the continent do have a reputation for playing dirty (elbows everywhere), but that really shouldn't affect their ability to organize. (the other two tournaments are long-standing and respected and the NYC one is great fun - naturally, I'd love for Boston to have one of its own.) The cynical side of me suggests that they'll subtly bump out players with less experience, as that's my experience with the organization's past leadership. But I'm not sure they had that many people signing up, either, since this isn't established the way the Chelsea Challenge or the Friendship/Eastern Canada Cup is. Either way, I'll be pretty ticked off if they email me later (the tournament's not til August 19th) to say that they're going with 4 teams of 13+goalie. I mean, honestly, 10 is plenty for a typical adult tournament. 5 on ice, 5 subs, that's reasonable. And 5 teams makes the round robin more interesting. ;)

The registration stated it was nonrefundable, but the registration was a bit of a mess anyway. Nowhere to indicate position or skill level... There are supposed to be two divisions, an upper division comprised of whole teams and a lower recreational drop-in format. (Free agents). And if you're already on a team I suppose there's no reason to indicate position, but that's not true for the rest of us plebian free agents. It's not like they haven't done this before, and not like they don't have a good many examples of how to make up a registration form. But honestly if I don't play I sure as hell want my money back. Other things I can do with $150...

Tournament coordinator emails me to say that depending on how they work the teams (four teams with 13 skaters or five with 10) they might only need me as an "alternate". C'mon. I paid for this tournament, it's non refundable, you had better have a spot for everybody who plunked down their cash on time. I didn't pay $150 to not play. Naturally, I hope they go with option 2. (Five teams of 10 skaters and one goalie.)

In fairness, you do seem to often be standing on your head for your team. :)

I forgot that you're on the opposite end of the world. It's the avatar. I do like Maria Mountain's stuff as well.

Oh, yes, for sure - that's what I meant, speak with a goalie coach in conjunction with the physical therapy. PT eval, and regular PT, is of primary concern. I've been to this PT office before and they are very good, but no one working there was particularly familiar with hockey or skating last time I saw them, so the goalie coach is an adjunct.

Knee was much, much better this time around, but I am gun-shy about the assorted motions of goal-tending (mainly the half-butterfly, and standing back up) so things were more awkward than I would've liked. But most things were much, much less painful than before. Or not painful at all. I have a PT eval scheduled for next Wednesday (woo), but I think what I will do after that is try and schedule a private goalie lesson. Specifically, in addition to PT exercises, I want to see if I can work with an actual goalie coach (thus, familiar with the requisite pretzeling) who might be able to help me compensate on the ice. @magnets, have you had any experience with that?

As of yesterday, I've been working as an EMT for one full year. (technically I began orientation on my birthday last year, but the 13th was the day of my first shift on a truck.)

I'm glad to hear it. The pushes are the worst thing for me right now, too - the past few weeks, it's just been so painful to drive off the left leg, I often lose my balance and splat forward in the process. Getting up has been pretty arduous as well, even when I rely on my right leg. I am hopeful that PT will allow me to strengthen the muscles around the knee, and in the core, so I can compensate better. I am actually able to move across the crease fairly quickly by shifting the weight through my hips while in a butterfly, but it's just not as efficient as actively pushing, and my teammates are crafty enough to notice every single one of my (many) weaknesses and exploit them. (however, I am steadily getting better at reading their intentions, so I minimize unnecessary movement. In theory, anyway. In practice - well, practicing.)