SOPEL-tastic!!

That is the word to describe the game last night. SOPEL-tastic! 2 goals and a great block in the crease last night. Saved a Ranger shot from sneaking in the net behind Garon.

And then there's Garon. A little off on some of the shots, but he was right on when he needed to be. When it counted. Which is so much more than I can say for Cloutier.

Do you know how nice it was to quiet those Ranger fans last night?
I think the pedicure is working.......

Kings fans only......

Look what I found. Its an iron on transfer (I know, so 80's) made by Me and My Big Ideas - a scrapbook company. They're putting out several different iron-on transfers to make your own shirts. Do you see this? Were they thinking of hockey fans when they made this? Because I bought every one I could find. I'm going to make myself some shirts!!

And how cool is this? I'm the hockey fan in this family, not my husband. This SO fits. This is me. And it comes with a little bling. Who doesn't like a little bling on their clothes?

And yes, that crown is purple. :) Team LA Store - eat your heart out!!!

Go Kings Go! Beat Dallas!

More layouts......

A few more layouts from last weekends crop at the Oasis.

The Brown and Green one is a kit from a Michelle Hill class. Still cute. I didn't have a picture for it, but I found one. I love this photo. Its my dad walking with my cousins' son when they were out from NY. Too cute.

Want to see some of my loot? I won a few things at the crop. Good stuff. New Stuff. Stuff that hasn't been sent out to the stores yet. :) An SEI album, some new SEI papers (Boy and Girl) and the new Piggy Tales papers (Lil Red Riding Hood and another one which the name escapes me).

And who could resist the new Basic Grey papers? Yep, my trusty website for BG came through again. :) And they sell packs of the matching cardstock too.

Okay

So the ooutcome of yesterdays game wasn't what I was hoping for. At least they squeezed another point out of it. They had the game in the bag, but instead of trying to increase the lead, they just tried to defend it. Sad too, because they were playing like they deserved to win. The fact that it took 7 shooters in a Sudden Death Shootout to decide the game was enough for me. Next game, the Duckies are going down. Them and their stupid orange Cal-Trans looking shirt wearing fans of theirs. All 7 of them.
Garon was in net. Don't get me started on that other pice of poo the Kings picked up. Still trying to make sense of that move. If he'd been in goal, god knows how many Duck goals he would have let in...
On a bright note, my boy Labarbera is 3-1-1 in Manchester. I'm currently scheming, trying to find a way to get out to Manchester for the weekend to see some games......
I'm also scheming for a Kopitar jersey. Fo' shizzle Kopitizzle. :) I'm going to have his sign it "Hockey God".
Next season, I'll be scheming for a Patrick O'Sullivan jersey. Yep. And I'll have him sign it "Irish'. The Kings are giving away free St. Patty's day hats on St. Pattys day this year. the last time they had a hat promotion, Pavol Demitra scored a hat trick. Looks like everyone must tune in to the Kings game on March 17th to see Irish score a hat trick. :) Must see T.V. folks!

Oh, I was surprised when my husband got the cable bill this month and alerted me to the fact that I do indeed have Center Ice. Yes folks, that means everyone will be seeing a little less of me as I hibernate in front of the tv for the long winter months. Family who? Where? Holidays? Must have missed them. See, I was trying to be the 'good wife' and save a little money. I mean, Bryan was nice enough to let me renew my season seats again this year so I thought I'd give something back. :) I didn't renew my Center Ice package. Little did we know that they will continue to enroll you in it until you tell them to stop it. Ooops! So, I've been missing all of these great games thinking I don't have it when in reality, I did. I've started looking at the schedule now to see which games are a must see over the next month. :)

Anyone wondering how the crop went on Saturday - it was awesome. Won some new Piggy Tails paper thats not out yet and an SEI album - those cute, pre-made little albums. Those make great gifts. Lots of sneak peaks at the new stuff and as always, the Oasis was awesome. Karen and Wendy always put on a good show. I didn't make it the entire time though - but I hung on for 11 hours!! So many projects were finished including these:

I used the chipboard flower from MM. Covered them with the new Basic Grey and I can't remember what brand the green paper is. Paper Salon maybe? Added a few primas and HS bling.

More projects to follow shortly. I'm still scanning and stitching.....

Croppin'.....

... at the Oasis tomorrow. So excited. Lots of new product and previews from the Memory Trends show. Its an all day thing 10 am- 1 am. See link for Scrapbook Oasis at the right.

I just spent several hours packing my bag for tomorrow. Lots of goodies. I started some layouts a few weeks ago and have finally started scanning them in. With the hockey season started, there is going to be little time for scrapping.

I looked at the Kings schedule today and there is a home game every Saturday for the next 7 weeks! The first Saturday they have off is the one before Christmas. Crazy stuff.
Here is one of the layouts I completed. Still trying to perfect the stitch feature. Its a little lopsided.

Brent Sopels hit on Scatchard

http://s26.photobucket.com/albums/c124/rascal1004/?action=view&current=061019_sopel_boynton.flv

If you are a Phoenix Coyote fan, you've been warned!

3 hard earned points

So the game against Minnesota could have gone either way. It didn't go the way I wanted it too, but the Kings did get a point out of it. Cloutier looked better in goal, except for a few mistakes. Avery coughed the puck up in OT - 25 seconds into OT. Personally, I would have had a different line up against Demitra and Gaborik, but Crawford went with Avery. Oh well, like I said, it was a point.
And I was there, with my JLB jersey pressed against the glass during warmups again. Yep. I'd like to take some credit for Cloutier's slight improvement. I think I pissed him off. :) Hey, if it forces him to play better, than why not? Just because we are in a rebuilding year doesn't mean they have to suck.

Speaking of suck, have you seen Jeremy Roenick lately? Invisible. The only reason I knew he was out there - because the Kings color guys mentioned him. Apparantly, Gretzky was quoted as saying that JR is an asset to the team, blah blah blah. And people wonder why I have little respect for Gretzky the man. Gretzky the player, fine, but the man - I wouldn't give you two cents for him. And to think the Kings payed him $5 million to suck last year. The Coyotes got him for the bargain price of $1 million.

So, one player that we acquired last year has really surprised me. Brent Sopel. Okay, so he was playing hurt at the end of last season, but I still didn't see any promise there. I kept asking myself why Dave Taylor would got out and acquire an injured player and another one who didn't really want to be here? Well, Mark Parrish (Mr. I'd rather play in Minnesota) got his wish and is playing in the hockey mecca while Brent Sopel is soaking up the attention here in LA. Freaky little dude fits in here too. And someone over at the Kings board just HAD to post this the other day. Too funny. But I can see how at times, he could be considered sexy. Whatever, he's a great defenseman. http://www.freewebs.com/sexysopel/index.htm

And his hit last night on Scatchard was priceless. Scatchard make the mistake of turning around to pick up a pass from a teammate. Brent skated out of the penalty box and just stood there, like one of the concrete pylons. Scatchard, who was busy looking over his shoulder, never knew what hit him. Completely clean and legal hit too. I love Sopel. Sexy Sopel.

Let Sleeping Dogs..........

...Sleep? Look at that face! He crawls up on the back of the couch and burrows a hole in the cushion. There is a permanent dent where he usually sleeps. After the busy weeks we've had, I don't blame him.
I'm looking forward to more sleep. The Kings home stand has finally ended. Don't get me wrong, I love the games, but they need to space them out a little more. This was the longest home stand of the year. Add to that, the free tickets to various Ducks games in my company's suite. I was going to games every night! Crazy! 4 games in 5 nights. AND I had to be at work by 6 am. Thats a 4 am wakeup call for me, people. Anyone who knows me, knows I'm not a morning person. I may be up, but I don't communicate any other way than short grunts and facial twitches. The snooze button is my friend. And I don't do people this early either. Recently, more people have started coming into the office earlier and its killing me. They want to talk, make conversation, sing, whistle and whatever else. This is my quiet time, where I get a lot of work done. Add to my usual non-morningness the fact that I'm averaging just a few hours of sleep a night and I become a serious grump.
But its HOCKEY season!

......we will return to our regularly scheduled program in June......

Much better...

I'm still exhausted, but at least the day started out better than the last one.

Want to see what made me feel better? I got to watch the pregame show from Monday's Kings game and guess what I saw? My jersey! On Fox Sports Warmup Show. Haha!!

See that slightly blurry '35' held up to the glass? That's my Jason Labarbera jersey. He was sent down to Manchester this season because Kings Brass decided to bring in a proven goaltender to be out #1. Well, that 'proven' goaltender was none other than Dan Cloutier from Vancouver.

Anyone who knows me, knows how I feel about Labarbera. He had some personal issues last year to deal with and let his game slip. He was still the best goalie we had and you could see that when he played. (My friend Brian will argue that Garon was the better goalie......).

So now we're stuck with the promise from Management and the coaching staff that Dan Cloutier is a 'proven' #1 goalie and that he is an upgrade from the Garon/Labarbera tandem we had last season. Whatever. Every once in a while, management does something that makes me seriously question them - this would be one of those things. Cloutier sucks. He just stands there. Never moves. I've even seen him duck. Yes, he actually ducked out of the way of a shot during the Dallas games. Sad.

So, Jason sits in Manchester now. I haven't given up. I wear his jersey to every game Cloutier starts. During warmups before the game on Monday, I had an idea. I should have made a sign (although there might be one at the game tonight......) to attach to my jersey that says "Someone in Manchester wants your job" and hang it right below the name on the back. For now, it was just a jersey hanging against the glass for the moron to see. It was all over the jumbotron during warmups but that is closed captioned video. I had no idea it would actually make it to the pre-game show, but there it was. A quick shot of it as Blake whizzed by. Thank God for Tivo and that awesome pause feature. I paused that puppy and took a picture for posterity. I think I might send it to him. My husband thought I was nuts as I danced around the room trying to think of the people I had to email this picture too.

What to know the funniest thing? I think the lard ass goalie saw it. He played better than I've seen him play all season during the first two periods. Of course, once Detroit scored their first goal, he suddenly froze up again and sucked. And he'll probably get the start in goal again tonight so it looks as if the Labarbera jersey is going to this game too. Normally I switch out between my many jerseys and give them all a chance, but I might have to stick with this one for a while.

Speaking of jerseys, I've got my eye on a cool replica Road jersey for Anze Kopitar. I need one. I have to have one. I can't live without one. A nice, clean, shiny #11 jersey. Mine, mine, mine. (If you couldn't hear the Smiegel (Lord of the Rings) tone in my typing, it was there. My preciousssssssss.) I've got my eye on it. And I think I might want an O'Sullivan one too, but I might wait. I have a feeling they're going to be sending him to Manchester for 'conditioning'. I'll wait till next year to get the O'Sullivan jersey.

I have to include this picture. Its the full shot of the Labarbera jersey - won in a silent auction straight off his back. That was a good day. Autographed and everything. And here's a picture of my boy! I have to try and find the good one of us together at Tip a King last year.

Ever had one of those days......

....where nothing goes right?

Not only was I subjected to less than mediocre hockey last night, but I was so upset about it, sleep eluded me. I shouldn't care. Its just a team, right? No, I've seen better from these guys and to watch them play like crapola makes me sad. Well, we're supposed to be 'reloading' this season..... Not rebuilding, reloading. At least thats the current buzz word from Kings brass.

With little sleep, I drap my sorry butt out of bed this morning and get ready. For once, I'm on time for work, however fate has a different plan for me. The normal way I go to work in the morning was blocked with an accident. The road isn't a major one, so when there is an accident, its closed down completely. Nothing is getting through there. So, I have my one other option, the major highway that is so congested now, it takes me almost 2 hours to get to work. This is why I like the early shifts - less traffic. However, since no one could take the other road, we were all forced to shared the measly 3 lane highway. :(

Not a happy camper. So I try to call the office and let them know I'll be late, but there isn't a soul in the place. Funny, there should be someone in my office 24/7 since we need to monitor servers every minute of every day. Nope, no one.

Whatever. Not my problem. Four attempts at a phone call are more than adequate. Once I finally get there, I find that my boss beat me in. Normally she saunters in around 9 so to see her sitting there at 6:30 is a bit of a shock. She's cool, knows about the commute etc and knows that I put the time in to cover.

Now, lets add to this the pile of work that gets dumped on me. We're in the middle of a huge integration getting the processes documented and approved is very time consuming. Not what I want to look at today.

Yesterday, I spent 45 minutes at Target uploading photos. Why Target and why 45 minutes? Because the Savon by my office is semi closed this week as it turns into a CVS. Fine with me, I prefer CVS anyway. Of all of my options, Savon/CVS has always been the easiest, quickest, cheapest way to get my digital photos burned to CD, printed etc when I don't have time to do it. Lately, I don't have the time. I usually spend all of 5 minutes uploading in Savon, but Target's Kodak dealy took 45. For 100 measly photos. If my cousin wasn't begging for a CD of these pictures, I wouldn't really care. But I stood there and waited. I could have been driving to the Staples Center to see my team warm up......
So, I go back today at lunch to pick them up. Not only did they forget to burn the CD, but they ran out of paper. They tried to sell me the half pack of photos. What I really wanted was the CD. Sorry, the machine is down today. Yeah, I think it was on its last leg last night. Uploading my all of 106 pictures must have killed it. So now, i have no options. I have to find some other place. Some other picture dealy to upload and print from. I stopped going to Target two years ago - I'll never be able to explain what made me think I could go back there and be happy.
I miss Savon/CVS......

With the few minutes of my lunch left, I raced over to Carls Jr for a quick burger. I'm picky, so we're talking meat and a bun. I like to apply my own ketsup - I know, I'm odd.
Do you think the lasy could get the plain burger order right? Nope. Some cutsey little Brittney Spears wannabe in her daddys Mercedes in front of me orders a burger - that was a burger with no specification as to what was on it. They gave her a burger - with the stuff on it. She gives it back to them and they promptly give her my plain burger. What do I get left with? A burger with everything on it. Probably Brittneys burger that she fondled and is now rewrapped.
I just want a plain burger. I'm almost 2 hours late for lunch because of a crappy meeting.

Not my idea of a great day. Not my idea of a great post after nothing for the last 3 weeks right? Sorry. Maybe tomorrow will be a better day.........