Friday, Skating and Hockey - All's Good in the Frozen (Melting) Northlands

It's Friday, which is always a great day in my week. It's a day for making my next week's "Ogre Juice", a day for grocery shopping, cooking, and catching up on things that didn't get finished on Wednesday's "day off". The weather is turning colder for the next two weeks, but it should be dry, at least until the end of next week. We're actually going to drop into the "teens" for our temps on Sunday - rather shocking in this Non-Winter we've been experiencing. This year is going into the record books as one of the warmest winters on record, if not THE warmest winter on record. I'm totally behind our winter, even though our outdoor skating rinks never really had an opportunity to be used at all this year. 

We have neighborhood outdoor ice skating rinks throughout 
the Cities. I can think of at least three within two miles 
of my house, and there are probably several I'm not aware of . 
These rinks are maintained by the Parks and Recreation 
board, they all have ice houses so that you can switch from your 
boots to your skates easily, and most of them have lighting 
for the early winter nights. I've skated on several of them, 
and it's fun, if not quite as smooth as an indoor rink with 
a Zamboni machine. I doubt they've been used this year 
at all, though. We've been too warm for a good freeze. 

So today I'll go grocery shopping, blend my alkagizers for the upcoming week, clean house, work on the computer and roast/broil my salmon for dinner. There's only three more Fridays before Easter, then I probably won't have salmon again for dinner for another year. 

In the USA, everyone who earns money of any kind needs 
to file a form 1040 with the Internal (or Infernal) Revenue 
Service every year. It's a PITA, but necessary. I had all of the 
information the accountant needed for this year's taxes, 
though, so I was happy. I went through my donations, and 
donated more than $1000 to licensed charities last year - 
that makes my heart happy. 

We had our appointment with the Accountant on Wednesday, and actually had everything needed, so he's working on the tax forms, and we're busy with our lives. There's no activity with the ants - it's as if a magic wand came and wafted them away. The poison was supposed to follow them back to the nest where it would spread throughout the colony. It seems to have managed that within 24 hours. Phenomenal! We'll keep it up for a month or two, in case there are any stragglers, but I'm hopeful that they are now dead and our of my life. Nasty things indoors, absolutely amazing and wonderful critters in the outdoors. 

Marat Khusnutdinov is our new center, playing on our 
third line and wearing #22. In his first game he skated 
well, even scored a point. The team is on a road trip 
now, so he'll have a chance to bond with the guys. 
Having Karill Kaprizov around for translation help 
will also be a plus for the young man. Welcome to 
Minnesota, Marat! 

The Minnesota Wild have a new player - Marat Khusnutdinov. I suspect we're going to enjoy watching this young man on the ice. He just got signed and moved here from St Petersburg, and within two days was centering our third line. He and our star Kirill Kaprisov have bonded really well - I think it's helpful to have someone else who can speak the same language when you're coming from a new country and thrust into the limelight immediately. He's centering our third line, paired with Foligno and Gaudreau and played very well for his inaugural game. Now the team travels to St Louis, beginning a three-game road trip. That will give him time to settle in and start to feel really comfortable. There's nothing like a road trip to bond players - LOL. 

There's nothing like a road trip to bond hockey players. 
A lot of the season is spent on the road, going from 
one game and location to another. We have three road 
games in a row now - St Louis, Anaheim and Los Angeles. 
By the time the team returns in a week, Marat should be 
feeling pretty comfortable playing with his new team. 

So, that's all I know today. I have a pile of things I should do on my mental list, we'll see how many of those tasks actually get accomplished before I settle down for the evening. Have an excellent Friday and I'll be back tomorrow. Slava Ukraini and חיים למען ישראל.