OK, just a little bit more

The driveway is almost clear, bicycling will be resuming here sometime fairly soon.  There is still too much snow which means that the streets are still pretty sloppy in lots of places so there won't be a ride today, for instance, but it is becoming increasingly evident that bicycling will be resuming.

Here is a look backward just because it was too much fun to let go of just yet.

Just a bunch of kids having a good time.

Undefeated national champions

Well, no more hockey for a while.

If you want to be undefeated you have to win all of your games.

Here then is the 41-0, undefeated and untied forever, National Champion Minnesota Gophers.

Minnesota 6, Boston University 3.

Close observers will note that we made this picture too.

One of the major reasons why our team won is this person, posed with her trophy as winner of the Patty Kazmaier award, the award given to the outstanding player in women's college hockey.

The alumni association had a reception before the game.  We went by and TOPWLH got a photo opportunity with Goldy.

TOPWLH is wearing her lucky jersey, an official game worn jersey from the 2003 Frozen Four worn by that year's team captain, a person who was also a Roseville resident.

Here's the opening face off for today's game.

Between periods there was some high quality entertainment featuring our beloved rodent.

He has changed into his hockey gear, as you can see.

So here's what I did today.  I have some Gopher paraphernalia, nothing as nice as TOPWLH's two jerseys, but I do have this cap commemorating the 2005 National Champions.  It is the cap that I have been wearing to the games this year.

Today at the alumni association reception they had an autograph session featuring Krissy Wendell and Laura Halldorson.  Wendell was one of the two best players on that 2005 team and won the Patty Kazmaier award that year.  Halldorson was the coach.

I went through the autograph line and instead of having the two of them sign the picture that the organizers had made available I had them sign my hat.  Pretty cool, I thought, the 2005 championship hat signed by coach of the national championship team and the Kazmaier award winner.  We were chatting very briefly with Coach Halldorson and I told her that the next time we saw the other superstar of that team, Natalie Darwitz, that I would ask her to sign the hat too.

I thought I was just making idle chit-chat.  Actually I was pretty happy about having a hat signed by the coach and by the Kazmaier award winner.

But . . .

About two hours later we were at the game.  After the first period I was lazily walking along the concourse and suddenly in front of me was none other than Natalie.  I was stunned but not overwhelmed.  I had taken the trouble of locating a Sharpie before I left the house to go to the reception and I had it with me in my pocket so I asked Natalie to sign my cap.  She most graciously did.  As she did I related to her the story of how Krissy and Coach had just signed the cap earlier in the day.  She didn't seem that impressed by that bit but as I said, she was very gracious and signed.

2005 championship hat signed by Wendell, Darwitz and Halldorson, the two star players and the coach.

That thing is now so valuable that I can no longer wear it, it probably should be stored in a safe deposit box.

40-0

So far.

The season is 41 games long.

Still daylight in the swamp

These first few days of DST are SO disorienting. I just don't know what to do when 6pm is still totally daylight.

I have spent lots of time over the dark season reading detective novels. I found a new guy that I like a bit for a few of his books but then he threw in a massive clunker with one of those the guy who did it isn't even mentioned as a person of interest until it turns out on the last page that he did it endings.

Pathetic.

That's not suspense, that's not mystery, that's a complete absence of imagination, that's B.S.

So of late I have been rereading the guy that I really DO like. Here's a first sentence from a chapter of the one that I am currently reading:

"The dawn came like a sheet of dull steel pushed over the eastern horizon, cold, sullen and stupid."

That sure enough is dawn in the winter in Minnesota.

They had a big snow storm in northern Europe yesterday. Here is a video posted by ParisDailyPhoto, it includes lots of recognizable landmarks blanketed by unrecognizable whiteness, I found it to be lots of fun:

I played outside today, it was almost warm with only a raw wind from the NW ruining the ambiance. The sun is high in the sky (comparatively) and even with temperatures only around freezing the snow and ice on the driveway is gradually giving up. It won't be long now.

Daylight saving time

DST arrives but unlike last year the bicycling season does not.

Instead we still have hockey. This year we are in the picture taken last night as our favorite team improved to 38-0 on the season (46 in a row dating to last year's national championship run) by winning the WCHA conference tournament.

Find Goldy (big head, goofy Gopher grin), count over 3 people and then the gap between that guy and the next guy, we are just above that gap. TOPWLH in her M jersey autographed by all of the members of the last year's championship team.

Next up for this group, NCAA tournament beginning next Saturday.

Andy

Train
Entering the city
I lost myself
And never came back
Took a trip 'round the world
And never came back
Black silhouettes, criss-crossed tracks
And never came back

Forever changed
Forever changed

You might think I'm frivolous, uncaring and cold
You might think I'm frivolous, depends on your point of view

Society Andy, who paints and records them
The high and the low

I left my old life behind
And never turned back

Forever changed
Forever changed
Forever changed
Forever changed

Got to get to the city, get a job
Got to get some work, to see me through
My old life's behind,
I see it receding
My life's disappearing, disappearing from view

Hong Kong and I was changed
Burma, Thailand and I was changed
A few good friends to see me through

Henry Geldzahler to see me through
Edie Sedgwick to see me through
Brigid Berlin to see me through

Only art can see me through
Only heart could see me through
My life's disappearing from view
My old life's disappearing from view

I was Forever changed
I was Forever changed

Broken hearts are for assholes

Let's get this right up front.

Some of you are going to find this to be offensive.

Really offensive.

Remember that it is just words. If the words offend you please don't watch.

This is one of my favorite tunes from one of my favorite albums of the late 70s, Sheik Yerbouti (probable phonetic pronounciation "shake your bootie") by Frank Zappa. The album features recordings of live performances. The video featured here is from the same series of shows that produced the album but is not the performance that is heard on the album.

Previous albums by Frank and his previous group, the Mothers of Invention, included "We're Only in it for the Money", "Cruising With Ruben and the Jets", and "Weasels Ripped My Flesh".

In his personal life Frank was twice married. He fathered four children in the union with his second wife. Many or perhaps most are aware of the two most famous of those children, Moon Unit and Dweezil. The other two children are also exotically yclept, Ahmet Emuukha Rodan and Diva Thin Muffin Pigeen.

Please keep in mind, if you have gotten this far, that it WAS the late 70s. This video is a scene from the Frank Zappa movie, "Baby Snakes". This performance was filmed in 1977 at NYC's Palladium Theater.

I learned this from the comments to the video: For this performance Frank is playing what appears to be a Gibson SG. According to Dweezil it's actually not a Gibson. The guitar was custom made for Frank, he had a Gibson logo put on it.

Thanks and chapeau to Guitar Guy for identifying the drummer as Terry Bozzio and the short haired guitarist in the nice gray lady's skirted suit as Adrian Belew.

Further warning and this is absolutely my last one, many will find lots of this pretty offensive for the first three minutes but even for those who find the first three minutes offensive the performance goes somewhat off the charts offensive after the three minute mark.

Here we go then, the inimitable and absolutely totally and completely unreplaceable Frank Zappa:

In a bold salute to pain.

I knew you'd be surprised.