Well, my 401k was in the toilet today and I’ll most likely be spending my retirement years eating macaroni and cheese out of a box but it doesn’t matter because it’s HOCKEY SEASON AGAIN!!!!111ONE ONE ELEVEN

It’s kind of a bummer that they had to go and lose the first game of the season… Against a team that’s ranked at the bottom of the league… On the day that they raise their cup banner - but!  I guess it’s a good reminder that it’s a new season and the cup from last year is completely behind them now.

A few highlights from the evening:

• Almost having a heart attack watching a player with a “1” and an “8” on their jersey laying on the ice after taking a puck to the leg… Until I realized it was Kurt Maltby.  PHEW.  I was ready to write a scathing post about how giving some young guys an opportunity to play with Maltby on injured reserve wouldn’t be such a bad thing, but he did give Jason Blake a good shove during the second period while Blake was slashing at Osgood, so I’ll cut him some slack FOR NOW.
  
• Watching Jiri Hudler jump into the middle of every scrum on the ice.  Jiri’s something like four feet tall and he cracks me up every time he skates up to give a guy a facewash for shoving Zetterburg.  I love it.  They clearly have no use for Aaron Downey as long as Hudler is on the ice.
  
• Wondering why Mike Babcock insists on splitting up Datsyuk and Zetterburg, especially when we have Marian Hossa now.  I understand breaking up the best line to make it tougher for the competition to match, but Zetterburg+Datsyuk+Holmstrom and Hossa+Franzen+whoever are two pretty friggin tough lines.  Datsyuk and Zetterburg play well together.  Put them together.  Please.
  
• Watching Osgood score an assist on that first Toronto goal.
  
• The Def Leppard pre-game show.  Those guys look older than Ted Lindsay.  Maybe it was ironic.
  

Holmstrom looked good with his two goals, he’s clearly healthy again.  I think Cleary played well too.  Our gang of superstar forwards all had one or two moments but no one really stood out.  Hossa had an opportunity to get the first goal of the season early on but couldn’t connect.  That would have been a nice story.  Had it happened.  Instead of a LOSS.  Did you see Ron Wilson and the rest of the coaching staff after the game?  They looked like they’d just won the stanley cup OMG #$@^%

Anyway

Check out this article in Maxim about why you should care about the NHL this year.  Reason number one made me feel better.  Did they use the “D” word?

Update:

Bruce shows why he’s a better blogger than me and points out the turnovers that I forgot to mention.