My hockey team faced-off with the third place team in the league on Wednesday night.   We had previously lost to this team 2-6 in the fifth week of the season.   Fortunately things have started to turn around for my team recently.   We were able to hang in this game, and we actually had more shots on goal than our opponents.   Unfortunately, with the score tied at two late in the game, one of the referees called in a goal.   Not only did the puck not cross the line, our goalie made an amazing save, he wasn’t even in position to make the call.   Instead of letting the game go to overtime, we were handed a 2-3 loss.   I assisted on one of our goals, though I wasn’t given credit.   My team can still make it to .500 as long as we win the last five games of the season.   Time to lower our goals.

Today has been a hectic day!   If you didn’t already know, I’m in the process of moving to a new position with my company.   My current position is actually being outsourced, so I consider myself lucky to have found another opportunity so quickly.   I’m in a transition phase with my current position, and haven’t started moving into my new role yet.   The project lead for my new position was in town today and he scheduled a meeting to welcome myself and two others into the group.   The problem was that I had planned to work from home today.   I didn’t find out about the meeting until half hour into my work day, with only about an hour and half notice.   So I had to rush to get down to the office in time to attend the meeting.   My work from home days may be numbered, but I’m excited for my new opportunity!

Today is Ash Wednesday, the start of the Lenten season.   Traditionally, it is the day to officially give something up for forty days.   Unfortunately I don’t have any good ideas for myself.   I can’t think of too many vices that I could easily do away with.   I don’t really snack or eat chocolate.   I’m not a big soda drinker and haven’t been drinking caffeine much at all recently.   I feel like those are the big items that most people usually fall back on, but none of them really apply.   A cousin of mine is giving up alcohol, but I’m already drinking much less than I had previously.   I don’t really want to cut it out completely, especially with my 30th birthday falling before Easter.   So, does anyone else have any good ideas or want to comment on what they are giving up?   I haven’t eaten meat today, which is not normally a tradition I take part in.   Maybe I’ll actually give up meat on Fridays for once, though that’s a bunch of pizza between now and Easter.

My Olympic addiction is back in full effect.   It’s been four years since I last filled up the DVR will so much sports recordings.   I’ve never really watched that much of the summer games, but I love the winter games.   I guess my years of playing hockey and my recent snowboard addiction help to fuel this.   So far I watched most of the opening ceremonies on our flight to KC on Friday.   We were tuned into speed skating, ski jumping, luge, and freestyle skiing during our KC pub crawl on Saturday.   Sunday was spent glued to the TV watching biathlon, nordic combined, and women’s hockey, along with more luge and freestyle skiing.

I stayed up to date on the events yesterday on nbcolympics.com and watched snowboard cross, men’s downhill, and figure skating pairs last night after work.   Today I’m working remote which allowed me to watch the USA curling match over lunch.   I also have the USA men’s hockey game on in the other room so I can listen to it for the rest of the day.   So far I have really enjoyed watching these games, and have been surprised by the curling action along with the freestyle skiing.   Not to mention the snowboard cross, which is something I’d love to try.   I can’t wait for more of the snowboard action to start up either.

Kim and I took a last-minute flight to Kansas City over the weekend.   We didn’t get in until after nine on Friday, and left yesterday evening, so our time was very limited, but I think we made the most of it.   We hadn’t seen our friends Phil and Doni for a while, and since they can’t make my upcoming birthday weekend trip, we decided to hang with them in KC for the weekend.   The excitement of the trip was primarily contained to Saturday, when we took an all day pub crawl throughout the city.   Phil put together a list of bars to hit this summer with other visitors and we decided to give it a trial run.   We ended up at a couple of spots I’ve never been to before as well as some old watering holes that we used to frequent when living in KC.   Check out Phil’s blog for a full recap of the events.   It was a great weekend trip!

Last night Kim and I met up with our old friend MER.   He was passing through town and decided to get some friends together at Scruffy Murphy’s for open mic night.   He was first on the stage for the night and delivered a very solid five song performance.   There were many comments from the other performers that there was no way they could follow his act, and though they tried their hearts out, their earlier sentiments were the truth.   He played a couple of new songs that were nice to hear, as well as a couple of old favorites, and a cover of the Foo Fighter’s “Everlong.”   Besides the music, we were able to catch up and discuss this year’s Pig-Fest, though no details are available at this time.

It seems that my hockey team either loses a close game, or we complete dominate our opponents for the win, which doesn’t happen often enough.   Fortunately last night was one of those rare occurrences.   With a few key players at the Avalanche game, we were able to grab a couple of extra skaters who really helped us out.   Our opponents are one of the teams with the highest goals for all season, but our excellent defense and outstanding play from our goalie held them to only one goal.   We ended up with eight goals, one of which I had an assist on.   We still remain in last place, but don’t face any of the top teams for the rest of the season.   Hopefully we can get a few more big wins to pull out of last place as we look toward the playoffs in just over a month and a half.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had one of those moments where my online life mixed into my real-world life. I mentioned livingcraigslist.com a few weeks ago, and since then I have continued to follow the website. I later learned that the author had moved to the Denver area and figured that he was living somewhere in the downtown area of town, just like yours truly. On Saturday night, a group of us decided to head to an old favorite bar of ours, Ogden Street South.

It was karaoke night at the bar, and not long after entering the bar we were entertained by a rather good performance of “That Thing You Do.”   It wasn’t until I read livingcraigslist.com the other day, that I realized the singer was none other than the author of the site.   I wish I would have realized it at the time, as I’d love to chat with him about his experiences thus far.   Perhaps our paths will cross again.   A video of his performance can be viewed on his site.   Unfortunately, there is no video of my show closing performance of George Michael’s “Faith.”

On Saturday night, we did another thing that we’ve wanted to do, attend a roller derby bout.   The bout took place at the Fillmore Auditorium, which is normally a large concert hall.   Though a majority of the floor was occupied by the track, somehow the event sold-out.   Normally, the capacity of the Fillmore is 3,700 people, and though I’m sure there weren’t nearly that many attendees, it was still a pretty big crowd.   Much larger than I was anticipating.

The match-up for the night featured two Denver based teams, both part of the Rocky Mountain Rollergirls, The Sugar Kill Gang and The Dooms Daisies.   It all started around 7pm with Elvis singing the national anthem.   They provided a couple of rules over the loudspeakers, and also a very short general description inside of the program.   We had to figure out most of it as the bout proceeded.   One thing that was quickly apparent was that The Sugar Kill Gang was the far superior team.   After a close start between the two teams, they managed to build a double-digit lead rather quickly.

Overall, I was pretty entertained by the event, though I don’t think it was quite worth the $20 ticket price.   I would consider going again for a lower amount, but I’d much rather watch a concert for that price.   I can buy tickets for a professional lacrosse team for much less than the price for this amateur event.   though I have to admit that they must be doing something right if they can bring in a sellout crowd at the Fillmore.

Over the weekend, we finally went out and saw Avatar.   We tried to see it a couple of other times, but the IMAX 3D screening was always sold out.   So earlier last week, I bought tickets for us for the most popular Friday night screening.   Once the lights went down, the movie immediately started, without any previews.   I wasn’t aware that it was the movie and remarked after a few minutes that it was the longest preview I’d ever seen.   Once one of the characters said the word avatar, I realized that we were actually watching the movie.

The visual effects were pretty amazing, right from the start, but got even better when they started showing more of the outside world on the planet Pandora.   The creatures and landscape were so lifelike and the 3D images were superb.   I don’t think Kim was overly excited to see a sci-fi movie, but the underlying love story really helped her enjoyment.   Plus, the 3D has to appeal to nearly everyone.   I would definitely encourage anyone to see this movie, but you have to see it in 3D, and preferably at the IMAX.

Check us out in our stylish glasses!