2 February 2001
Once again, I'm behind on my hockey entries. I had every intention of writing after last week's clinic, but it was late, and I was tired, so I figured I'd do it after my Thursday game. That didn't happen, and now I've had two more games since then. <sigh>

Last night's game was particularly frustrating. It was the first week of playoffs, and we were playing Teal, the 2nd place team. We SUCKED in the first quarter, improved marginally in the second, and finally kinda got our act together in the third. Didn't help any—we were shut out 4-0. The only bonus about losing in the first round is if you can keep the game close enough—or draw enough penalties—you can keep the other team out of the Stanley Keg game. No such luck for us; Teal is now in against Blue, and we'll play Red (yes, Al's team) in Consolation Game #2. I remember that last season in the first playoff game I didn't care if we won or lost as long as we got to play next week, but this season I cared more about *how* we were playing, and not just *that* we were playing.

Why are we all bunched up?

Monday's game against Excite1 was the most brutal to date. I'd come to expect a goonish game from Excite1, but this one was particularly chippy on both sides (some of our guys started retaliating after a while). Shaun gave both teams—and the referees—a talking to afterwards.

A cameraman from Channel 11 News in San Jose was there to interview Negin before the game and to follow her from the locker room to the ice and back. I got interviewed, too, and most of the game was taped. The cameraman asked me two big questions: (1) What was it like to be a girl...er, I mean woman playing with guys? Me: "The guys don't treat us any differently just because we're girls. And I'm bigger than a lot of the guys I play against anyway." (2) How does hockey compare to the tech world? I said it was a great stress reliever, a place to get your agressions out, but he said, "no, how does it *compare*?" Me: "Uh, it doesn't really.... [Long pause.] I suppose you could say that it's competitive, but friendly."

About halfway through the game, when it was obvious that things were out of control, I said to Dave, "fuck friendly, this is nuts!" I think Negin was out on the ice at that point, so luckily the mike she had stuffed in her pants didn't pick up that comment.