Aug 31

Have you heard? Wayne Moorehead, VP of house league at MOHA, is running for town council in Ward 3. More on this later. I'm blogging from the kitchen right now.

Also . . .

I have been horribly negligent in not acknowledging the Oakville Buzz, the 2006 Canadian Jr. B Lacrosse Champions. I promise to wax poetic on this later, but it is a wonderful achievement. Read about them here. For readers of Oakville Today, check out the Jordan MacIntosh fan club (his uncle Shawn is the ruggedly handsome coach of the minor bantam AE Rangers -- Pad's coach last year -- assisted by Jordan's dad, Rick.) Jordan's mom Lil is the MOHA timekeeper scheduler. How they all found time to win a national championship is beyond me, but ....

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE 2006 OAKVILLE BUZZ, NATIONAL CHAMPIONS!!!! This team is a true Oakville squad, connected to the community, they participate in minor lacrosse clinics, and, well, this is just SO cool.

Well done guys. We're all proud of you.

Aug 31

File this one under "Things that Make You Say Hmmmmm"

Why is it that the Sunoco at Winston Churchill and Collegeway in Mississauga has gasoline for 73.4 cents a litre, and the PetroCanada in Oakville on Upper Middle at Eighth Line has it for 89.7 cents? I can live with a swing of a few cents one way or another.

But a 21 per cent price difference seems a little unusual. I guess it's just market forces, right?

Aug 31

Having been to the rink 10 times for more than 15 hours of ice in the last 14 days, we're not going to argue about there not being any ice time this weekend for the Rangers. But having said that, Pad won't shut up about all the things he's learning, the friends he's made and the fun he's having. The season is off to a great start.

Part of that is the legitimate buzz that comes with the start of a new season with a new group of kids. My theory is things will get a little tougher when he has to fit in guitar lessons, school band, and cross country training/competing too and he can't sleep in seven days a week.

First game of the year will be Sept 9 in Cambridge and we can't wait.

In the meantime, we have plans to trade hockey sticks for golf clubs not once, but twice this weekend. But the Tropical Depression Formerly Known as Ernesto would appear to be on a direct path with Oakville for Sunday (click here to see the map) so maybe I'll finally spend some time in the garage and get to work on that ark I've been promising Laura.

Otherwise, we're going to try to get to Pirates of the Caribbean 2, spend some time without MOHA, eat too much, enjoy the last long weekend of the summer and prepare for the launch of a new school year.

If all goes well, I won't be in the office tomorrow -- all that hockey has left me in deficit with Chris so I've got to hang with him a bit.

There's a lot of people I know who read this blog who give a lot of time to support hockey and our kids. I hope you can relax this weekend -- those dreaded 6a weekday practices are just around the corner.

PS -- we're told the new sheet of ice at Glen Abbey may not be ready for early September as was hoped (although they are apparently still shooting for Sept. 16). Last time I looked in (about two weeks ago) the boards were up on the rink and it was looking good. Here's hoping it's ready on time.

Aug 30

• There's an ad running on TV for some deodorant that shows some young dude walking through a busy street crowded with pretty women and him going into a club filled with pretty women. He is, in fact, the only guy in the world it seems. In the club, one of the women turns to him, catches his odour, and briskly turns away. The voiceover says something like, if you stink, it wouldn't matter if you were the last guy on Earth. Setting aside for the moment the fact that whatever happened to all those billions of other guys and the fact that wherever they are, it would appear they took all the women over 23, under 18 and larger than a size 2 with them, every time I see that ad, I think of what the Rangers smell like after practice. Brutal.

• An odd moment at the Milton pre-season camp yesterday. I was in the rink watching the workouts when about 15 middle-age men and women with southern US accents came into the arena and started watching. Some took out cameras and snapped photos. It was apparently a bus tour or tour group of some kind -- one of the gentlemen got on the phone and was telling the folks back home they were looking at a Canadian hockey rink, and there was a team practicing, and it was a lot like watching a football practice back home. I'm thinking that if the Rangers are going to be a tourist attraction, maybe we could make a buck on it? On second thought, probably not. But it was weird.

Aug 29

It's almost time for the MOMS skate and equipment sale, coming up Saturday, Sept. 16, at the Frozen Ropes Baseball Training Centre at 2009 Wyecroft Road. You can see all the details here. By equipment, they mean hockey equipment. So if you thought you could unload the combine harvester from the garage, this would be the wrong place. But if you're in the market for good, previously enjoyed hockey equipment (excluding jocks/jills, helmets and presumably mouth guards) the MOMS sale is the place to be. Check out the link for details on dropping off items, etc. A word of warning -- parents from all over the GTA come to this event to score deals, so come early for best selection. Last year a plane full of hockey crazed Latvians even showed up. OK, I made that part up. But it will be busy. 

Aug 29

I'll be in Milton later today to watch some of Day 2 of the Minor Bantam A Rangers pre-season camp, because I just can't get enough of the inside of a rink in August.

Yesterday, the coach pulled Pad aside and officially gave him the word that he was on the team -- Pad was the final selection. That was a good moment for Pad, who has been worried about where he'd fit in every since he broke his leg last spring on the eve of the pee wee A Rangers deciding game in the Tri-County Finals.

Pad was actually a member of the peewee AE squad but had been called up for a bunch of games, including the finals after someone on the A team also broke his leg. You could hardly walk around Oakville for the sound of shattering limbs. . . . Anyway, after the cast came off the rehab and physio was done he trained hard, but worried about making a rep team, since he missed spring tryouts.

So, the A team roster is now complete.

From what I saw Saturday night (and Sunday morning, and Sunday afternoon) the kids on this team have connected very quickly and they're having a ball when they're not exhausted from wind sprints.

Younger son Chris continues to obsess over red house league vs. white vs. blue, which is really a waste of brain power since I'm convening atom white and coaching a team and he's going to be playing for me. But hanging around all those rep players has Chris wanting to achieve something more. He's getting closer all the time.

Regular readers will recall I got the biggest laugh of last year's house league draft when I declined to protect Chris in the draft even though I was coaching a team. The reason was he had a broken arm (our household isn't really as rough as it sounds -- honestly) and was on the shelf for awhile, so I welcomed anyone who wanted to draft a kid with a freshly broken arm to take him.

Not surprisingly no one did. And yes, I'm spinning the story a bit -- Chris was actually slotted into the draft on my team at the appropriate level, so there was no hanky-panky there.

Aug 28

Oh, by the way:

Amigo! Amigo!! Ammmmmmiiiigggoooooo!!!

(Really, you had to be there.)

Aug 28

It's been a while since I had a weekend with as little sleep as this past one gave me. But similarly, it's been a long time since I had the type of experience I had.

Pad (and me) camped out with his hockey team in Bronte park Saturday night. It was a team-building, get-to-know-the-guys sessions for the kids, and for me and the other parents who were able to either drop by or more bravely, spend the night.

It was a wildly successful effort.

Pad showed up knowing a small handful of guys. He ended up sleeping in a tent with three players he didn't even know when he arrived a few hours earlier and he never stopped smiling all night. The kids stayed up late -- really late in some cases -- and played (Manhunt was the popular choice) and talked. I was in a tent (I packed it in just before 2a) listening to them outside around the fire tell tall tales of bone crushing hits, cannonading drives from the point, spectacular end-to-end rushes and assorted other glories from yesteryear.

They also learned some things about their coach, Bob Langley -- he had them define their talents and their expectations. He put those in context with his own for the team and individuals. He said he would be the toughest coach they had.

I think it would be safe to say there won't be a lot of rules on this team, but the ones it has will be about discipline, respect, learning and effort. For example: be ready to hit the ice 15 minutes before practice. Those 15 minutes are teaching time.

I suspect the kids and parents are going to hear a lot on these points in the weeks ahead.

They hit the ice for a practice last night, already tired from the long night at Bronte. And they skated. And skated. And skated. And skated. There was a lot of skating.

Pad slept very, very well last night. As did his father.

Welcome to hockey season.

Aug 24

Friday. The end of The First Week Back After Vacation.

On the one hand it was good to get back into a bit of routine. On the other hand, when the routine involves getting up at 6:30a every day and AFTER work being at a hockey camp till 9:30p every night, that's not jumping back into the deep end of the pool, that's swimming to Ireland.

Anyway Pad enjoyed the Mitron camp (his lacrosse team has ice time today too) and Chris has been just lazing about being a kid, which looks like a sweet deal to me from my spot on the GO Train.

A highlight of the week was the annual trek to get new skates for He Who Won't Stop Growing. At age 12, Pad is pushing 5 foot 10, and his shoe size matches his age. He has large, wide, flat feet which makes him an ideal candidate as a future bare-foot water ski champ, but, very difficult to buy skates for. And when you can look forward to spending probably something in the range of 120 hours in those skates in the months ahead, you'd better make sure they're comfortable.

When the bill was tallied for the skates, I almost fainted. It wasn't on the same degree as the Bell BlackBerry incident I chronicled a week ago (it won't surprise you to learn Bell has yet to reimburse my VISA, but they keep promising to), but they still cost more than the GDP of most Caribbean nations. Yikes.

And then he went through two nights of misery at Mitron breaking them in (we think we turned a corner last night, though.)

I remember my dad taking me to a sports store when I was a little older than Pad where I got my first (and only) pair of CCM Tacks. All kangaroo leather, with the Very Cool white T on the outside of each heel. I thought they were the cat's ass. I couldn't put them down.

They replaced my first pair of Bauer Supremes, which had replaced my old Bauer Black Panthers, none of which are on display at the hockey hall of fame.

Pad's skates aren't Tacks or Supremes and I don't think the Black Panther model even exist any more. And hockey skates aren't made of leather now (which may have had an impact on the kangaroo population somewhere, but not in Oakville so far as I can tell.)

All of which is to say, TGIF. The weekend holds the promise of fun and perhaps adventure -- shinny with the lacrosse team, an overnight camp out, a movie maybe, a decent meal, and perhaps a conversation with my partner that does not revolve around ice times and travel schedules.

But what else would we talk about? We can't remember.

Aug 23

Those monsters that were ripping up the tracks earlier this week were actually space aliens and they apparently came to our house.

Chris was having a sleepover with two buddies (Sean and Noah) -- as Pad preps for hockey season, Chris has been indulging in the time spent among pals.

So, at about 1 a.m. they all come charging up from the basement family room dragging their sleeping bags. Laura goes to investigate the commotion because I didn't wake up (parent-of-year forms are available at the door).

Anyway, the boys offered a generic "we got freaked out" as the reason for the sudden stampede. Laura eventually unfreaked them and got them back to the basement.

Upon closer questioning the next day from yours truly, it turns out the source of the freakiness was - - - an alien viewing.

I see, said I. More details please?

It turns out Sean said he saw "an alien finger." Where. "Not sure, dad. I didn't wait around to see."

OK. It's good to know Chris' survival instincts are solid.

But, what would stop an alien from coming upstairs? Now that you left the basement, there's no food down there?

Silence.

"Chris," said I, in my best Robert Young voice. "There are no aliens in our house."

"Could be, dad."

"No."

"Yes."

If we end up finding ET or ALF or some other acronym-appointed alien living in one of the old hockey bags in the laundry room, boy am I going to look bad.

Aug 22

• Well, you know you're back in Toronto when there's trouble on the GO Train. And I'm definitely back in Toronto. Last night's journey home was a little more adventurous than usual as the east bound Lakeshore line was tied up because of monsters emerging from Lake Ontario and eating the tracks (or something like that.) So all the people trying to go east were cluttering up every stairwell to every track getting in the way of people like me try to go west. And then the train to Oakville was assigned to Track 6B. 6B!!! If you don't take the train, this will mean nothing to you. But I've been taking the train since 1998 and I've never seen 6B. It's so far south, it's almost - - - 7A!!! I felt like I needed to pack a lunch. It was scary. It was crowded. It can only be reached via one stairwell, which means 2,000 people are trying to go up that stairwell at the same time. And it was annoying, what with the lake monsters eating the tracks and descending upon Union Station and the commuters from Ajax, Whitby, Pickering and all those other eastern bergs cluttering up the stairwells. Sorry. It was my first day back to work and I wanted to whine.The commute from Ben Eoin to Big Pond is much easier.

• I managed to get home in time to take Pad to hockey camp, two and half fun-filled hours in a rink in August when sane people are in backyards barbequing dinner, in front yards gardening and chatting with neighbours or watching baseball. He had fun. I got cold.

• On the minor hockey front, in case you haven't heard, MOHA is moving to three tiers of house league for younger divisions -- the formerly red and white split will now add a third category, blue. My personal view is that it's a good thing that will not be without challenges. The biggest challenge will be cleaning up the mess from some of the parents' brains exploding because Johnny/Sally should be in white not blue, red not white, etc etc. I intend to hide in my basement until that part of the season passes, and then come out with a mop and bail and help clean up.

• How about that Ted Lilly and John Gibbons? Everyone hold hands and sing, Why Can't We Be Friends?

Aug 19

We lost 4-3 to Guelph today, ending our season. We led 2-0 at one point, outshot them 16-1 in the first period and 33-16 overall. We (for the most part, right John?) avoided the bad penalties and played tough defence. But we ran into a hot goalie and that's that.

The boys were disappointed because we knew we played well enough to win, but in lacrosse as in life, things don't always go your way.

It was a tough, gritty, sometimes nasty game and we gave as good as we got. There are icepacks out all over Oakville, I'm sure. I bought a t-shirt from the tournament, Chris enjoyed the waterslide next door to the pool and Pad moped around a bit until food was located. Laura and the Blue Binder were omnipresent as was the Blackberry glued to her ear with updated travel instructions.

We'll dissect the season tonight and remember all the laughs along the way, sleep late and then the team party is tomorrow. Monday, we turn our attention to hockey. Tryouts are less than a week away for kids who missed spring tryouts with a broken leg.

Enjoy the off season.

• Boastful traffic moment: last night after we got off the 401, I hit a green light at every intersection through Milton. Some guys win lotteries. I hit a dozen green lights in a row. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Aug 18 UPDATE

A good day for the Bantam 3 Hawks in Kitchener at the provincials. We beat Wallaceburg 10-2 and lost a close game to Sudbury 5-2. I'm told Sudbury -- who beat several C and some B teams this year -- was originally seeded as a C team but appealed to be moved to D for the provincials. Anyway, they're in our division and they beat us. They have a player with a beard. Enough said.

We return tomorrow, versus Guelph 2. One more loss and we're out.

The Hawks 2 team also split their games, so they'll be back Saturday as well.

Today was hot and sticky but Chris and the rest of the siblings were thrilled to find that one of the rinks had an outdoor pool next to it, so that was a bonus.

Aug 17-18, 2006

We're back in Oakville, having endured an uneventful commute from Ben Eoin, NS, to Toronto Pearson to Oakville. Ben Eoin is a lovely corner of Nova Scotia and if you ever find yourself hurtling down Highway 4 (no one ever hurtles there, they just don't move that fast) look for Ben Eoin as a sort of suburb of Big Pond.

Anyway, like I said, the day was uneventful -- at least until we got home.

I went out to grab a pizza for the kids who were famished and then I was going to get groceries because there was not much to eat in the house. While I was out, Laura started opening the usual utility bills and that's where the fun began.

Long story short, the bill for her Blackberry last month was $3800, which is about 38 times what I expected to see. I almost had an aneurysm on the spot.

Before Laura went away I had her BB upgraded to use EVdO, which allows a user to connect the BB to a laptop and use it as a modem. I was very careful to call Bell (three times, in fact) to make sure we had the appropriate bundle, etc., so we would not face a surprise bill.

But we got the surprise anyway. It took an hour on the phone, including getting cut off three times and the fostering of the urge to kill Emily The Automated Attendant (it has got to be the most irritating thing I've ever dealt with), but the matter was finally straightened out, the bill deleted and we went on with our lives. I can't help but think the stress of that hour shaved five years off my life because someone in a call centre didn't add a $30 option to our cell package.

But of course, nothing is ever simple -- the BB bill is charged automatically to a VISA card, so we still have to wait and make sure the good folks at Bell get that part right. Never a dull moment around here.

• Having successfully wrestled Bell Mobility to its knees, I headed out for groceries. Got to the store and discovered I had forgot my wallet. Returned home, started again.

• Went to get gas. Gas gauge on car not working. Fun!

• Went to get Laura funky wine glasses she wanted as a surprise present. Sold out.

• It was one of "those" days.

• Chris was thrilled to be home. Little boys were all over our driveway last night and sports equipment was strewn hither and yon.

• Pad had a two-hour workout with the Hawks last night, where me and other dads lamented the fact that hockey season starts next weekend.

• Came home, had a cold Corona and nice sleep. Today, we're off to Kitchener for the provincial lacrosse tournament. Team party Sunday, nicely scheduled to conflict with the final round of the PGA Championship. The party will be more fun anyway.

Aug 11, 2006

Greetings from Halifax. Aside from lots of seafood and the annual buskers festival and golf, nothing too exciting to report. Except . . .

I had an All-World dad moment on the golf course with Pad yesterday. We were playing Ashburn Golf Club's new course (new meaning it opened in 1970, as compared to the old course, which dates back to the 1920s). I'm a member there still -- I pay a nominal fee as an out-of-province resident to maintain my membership. Yesterday was my first round there in five or more years.

Anyway, it was fun to play it with Pad and show him where I was introduced to golf as a caddy more than 30 years ago. The round was unremarkable for me -- very uneven, blah blah blah. The new course is a tough track -- it has hosted the Canadian Amateur (men's and women's) the mid-amateur, etc. It's consistently ranked among the top courses in the country.

Pad loved the course, but nearing the end the hills and distance were taking a toll on all of us. Somehow I managed to birdie the par 5 17th triggering jokes that the Arnolds always finish strong.

We had no idea of what was to come next.

On the par 4 18th, Pad was lying two on the high side of the green, about 20 yards away from the hole between two traps, facing a slick downhill chip with a severe right to left break. In the shadow of the clubhouse deck, with his mom watching and several others too, Pad hit his shot with the softest touch you could imagine, deftly landing the ball in the fringe where it checked up to a crawl and then snaked down toward the hole, negotiating the break perfectly and rolling into the centre of the cup for his first ever birdie and it was on a true championship course to boot. Me and the two friends we were playing with -- CP's Halifax bureau chief and a life-long friend from Windsor Junction -- went nuts, as did his mom and the others watching from the deck.

I've never had a happier moment on a golf course. Pad has a golf story he can dine out on for the winter, and it's even true!

It was a glorious summer day with a perfect ending. We stood on the deck afterward, barbequed streaks, toasted the first birdie and described it over and over and over. The Hawks can expect to hear about it in excruciating detail at the team party.

A great day, a great memory.

And still with the Hawks, congrats to the team for a gritty 5-4 win last night over Orangeville. We wish we were there! the team is on a bit of a roll now with provincials only a week away. The kids and coaches deserve a lot of credit for working hard through the tough slogging early in the season. We have high hopes for Kitchener. Go Hawks!

Aug 5, 2006 UPDATE

OK, in my earlier post today I mentioned the waves today were big. So with that in mind, a couple of illustrations. These waves proved to be way too big to jump over, so the boys decided to jump through them instead -- dive into the wave as it crested.

Picture 1, right, shows Chris and Pad patiently waiting for the Big Wave to form.

They didn't have to wait long and once one wave hit, three or four more usually followed in quick succession.

Picture 2 shows the wave coming in. Remember, Pad is about 5 foot 9, so that gives you some idea of the scale of the wave. It was big. A remember, a gallon of water weighs 8.5 pounds. There were a lot of gallons of water in that wave. So, you have to be smart out there because if the wave hits you flat against your back, you'll be eating sand and spitting seawater. The great thing about most kids is they have no idea when they are facing a learning experience and the risks that come with it. Invincible, they just embrace the day, take up the challenge and leave old foggies like me standing on the beach with a camera and an inflatable rubber dragon around my middle. OK, I'm kidding about the dragon, and I did in fact spend as much time in the surf as they did. But not with the same gusto. They out-gustoed me by a very wide margin.

Picture 3 shows the boys prepping to dive into the wave, and picture 4 shows them engulfed in water. A lot of water. What I could not take pictures of (because I'd have ruined the camera) is what it looked like when they came out the other side of the wave. It was very cool as they cut through the water with grace of a dolphin and the enthusiasm of youth.

They did this again and again to the point of exhaustion. It was a good day.

.

Aug 5, 2006

Our week on the beach is just about over. After a couple of nights back in Ben Eoin to do laundry and lay by the pool and explore East Bay by boat, we'll load up and head for Halifax.

The week here has been great. Pad and I played golf again yesterday and saw a moose. The day before we went to Cheticamp and back and saw four moose. This place teems with wildlife.

Laura's sister and her kids were up yesterday -- which was the iffiest day of the stay. Cool, grey, and not great for swimming. So we built a fire on the beach and made smores and waited for Chris to tell us ghost stories, which he never did.

It's sunny and warmer today and we'll be back in the water, walking the beach and picking up coloured rocks that are destined for a drawer beside Chris' bed. Slowly, he's moving Nova Scotia to Oakville, a few rocks at a time.

The breakers are big today -- the biggest of the week -- and the boys like waiting for the wave to crest and then futilely try to jump over it. Instead, they jump into it and get tossed and roiled and rubbed against the sand and rock to emerge spitting and laughing and disoriented and waiting for the next one to hit.

I'll miss the mornings when we leave here. I'm always the first one up and I sit on the verandah and read in the sun, toasting like an old toad on a rock while everyone else sleeps. The waves crash about 50 metres away, the gulls caw and squawk and further across the bay a fishing boat or two comes or goes.

I could sit here forever but of course, I can't. I do wonder sometimes if I lived here whether it would all become old hat.

When I ride the train into Toronto I don't stare at the CN Tower every day or marvel at the skyline. Neither, I suppose, do the residents of Ingonish gaze each day out at Middle Head, or Ingonish Island or just watch the waves crash on the beach over and over and over.

But they really should.

Aug 3, 2006

Greetings from North Bay beach. It's Laura's birthday today so there will be the usual parades and speeches, greetings from world leaders etc etc. She's 31. I know this because she was 29 a couple of years ago so she must be 31 now.

Anyway, the weather here could not be better. We were worried watching the long range forecasts over the past couple of weeks before we got here -- the prediction was temperatures in the high teens, several days of rain, etc. Well, it was 28 and sunny yesterday and it's going to be warmer today. So, don't put much stock in long range forecasts. They're a guess, and as it turns out, not a very good one.

I'm sitting on the deck of our cottage and I've put sun screen on my feet because it felt like they were going to burn off. Only four days into vacation I've already achieved one major goal -- tan lines on my feet. Tan lines on your feet, according to American author P.J. O'Rourke, is a good indication of of a successful summer spent doing nothing constructive.

I've supervised a couple of major sand castle construction sites. Played some golf, poorly (and will again tomorrow) and ate very, very well. I've been in and out of the ocean about 800 times, read The Catcher in the Rye for the fourth time in my life (I've moved on to The Grapes of Wrath) and played enough Nerf football to be drafted if and when Nerf football goes pro and there's a demand for over-45 white guys with bad knees.

Laura has been endlessly patient with the silliness of the three boys in her life and we'll be nice to her today, because she is getting on, you know.

We are reliably informed that the weather in Ontario is still VERY hot and sticky; that the Hawks lost a close one to Mississauga last night, and that the issues involving dogs with our house sitters and the neighbours have been resolved.

So, over and out from paradise. Hope you're all having fun. See you at the rink.