Thursday, August 25, 2011

ADAM McQUAID STANLEY CUP FESTIVAL ON PEI THIS WEEKEND!

The last time the Stanley Cup came to Prince Edward Island I missed seeing it by just a few hours. The year was 2004. The Tampa Bay Lightning won the Cup that Spring and PEI native Brad Richards brought the trophy home to Murray Harbour, where he shared it with the gathered masses for a precious afternoon. Alas, we arrived home on the Island just around the time it was being crated up to be shipped on to the next player on the Lightning roster who would have his turn showing it and sharing it.

This year I’m once again missing the chance to see it on PEI—but this time by 8 days as we returned last Saturday from our annual pilgrimage to the Island. This year’s Islander with his name etched in immortality is Adam McQuaid, who will be hosting and hoisting the Cup this coming Sunday in his hometown of Cornwall. From what I’ve heard, the celebration will be first-class all the way: a meandering parade will allow the expected crowd of 15,000 at least a glimpse of the Holy Grail and a well-organized lottery will give at least 54 families the opportunity to get up close and personal with McQuaid and the Cup. (McQuaid’s uniform number with the Boston Bruins is 54.) And a number of non-profit organizations will get a piece of the action through the sale of souvenir t-shirts, a raffle of memorabilia, and food and water concessions. The organizers of the Stanley Cup Festival have also scheduled live music and entertainment to keep the crowd happy throughout the afternoon.

Well, even though I’ll miss seeing the Stanley Cup on PEI, I didn’t miss seeing Adam McQuaid, who established himself during his rookie year as a vital member of the Bruins shut-down defensive corps. His +- rating of +30 was tops for rookies across the league and he proved himself repeatedly as what tv analyst Pierre Maguire referred to as a “tough hombre”: his willingness to the throw down the gloves and “oblige” opponents interested in fisticuffs quickly established him as a fan favorite in Boston. (Here’s a link to one of his bouts: his beat-down of a Dallas Stars player that added the exclamation point to a remarkable start to a game in February—3 fights in the first 4 seconds!) But by all accounts, McQuaid is a gentle and approachable guy off the ice, and I took that part of his reputation as my invitation to “approach” him last week as each of us prepared for the start of the annual Gold Cup and Saucer Parade in Charlottetown.

I wrote a little bit about the Parade last summer. This year, I chose to wear my Bruins colors as my “uniform” in the Charlottetown Community Clash. Believe me, I took my share of abuse from self-avowed Montreal fans (in particular) along the parade route: I ran the gauntlet for my beloved Bs! (For more on my love of the Bruins, click here.) I expect that as Parade Marshall, sharing that honor and a spot on a float with members of PEI’s bronze medal-winning Special Olympics softball team, Adam McQuaid got a somewhat warmer reception.

Anyway . . . just before the Parade got underway I had a chance to chat with McQuaid for a few minutes—to congratulate him and to thank him for his role in bringing the Cup “home to Boston.” And home to PEI. I was surprised that he is not bigger: he’s tall, obviously, but he’s not big-boned or even intimidatingly muscular. In person he looks pretty ordinary—and even his mullet fits in on PEI! (He has retained that classic hockey cut from a charitable event in Boston during the winter.) All he needs is a “Canadian tuxedo” (a denim jeans/jean jacket combo—I still wear mine sometimes!) and you might never guess that he has his name on the Stanley Cup!

Thursday, August 4, 2011

BAD HAIRCUT . . . AND OTHER STORIES

Alright, I’ll admit that Tom Perrotta used that title first for an engaging collection of short stories (the story “Thirteen” is a true classic of adolescence awakening). I hope he doesn’t mind my borrowing it as a heading for this blog post. It seems to be a good catch-all for what follows.

MOO
So, a couple of days ago I took our Springer Spaniel in for grooming. She got the worst haircut ever: she came home looking like a Holstein calf! In fact, the next morning when my wife was out walking her, a guy in a pickup truck slowed down and shouted out: “Hey, nice cow!” My wife called back: “Hey, she’s a dog!” The man revved his engine and said: “I was talking to the dog.” Ha-ha!

WALKOFF
Okay, that story was only partly true (the bit about the bad haircut). But this is all true: for the second time this baseball season, I had drop in my lap a ticket for a great seat at Fenway Park—this time almost directly behind homeplate, about 15 rows deep. The price on the ticket was $94: my friend Joe, who invited me to accompany him to the game, got a pair as a “perk” for something or other, and we ended up getting far more than face value out of them. The game was delayed almost an hour-and-a-half because of a passing thunderstorm, but it was well worth the wait and the resulting late night as the Red Sox walked off with a win over the Cleveland Indians when pinch-runner Jarrod Saltalammachia slid in headfirst to score on a close play at the plate after Jacoby Ellsbury lined a single into center field in the bottom on the ninth inning. Exciting! Joe summed up the evening nicely in an email the next day: “I’ll not soon forget the cheese steak, the usher’s bench wipe, the rain delay, the high-quality brews, the thrilling outcome, the packed Green Line car, and the last Red Line car back home. Last night was an eleven!!!”

THE LAST OF THE MOHEGANS
One more “story” that warrants telling involves the less-than-24-hour visit to Block Island, RI that my wife and I enjoyed over the weekend. We strapped our bikes onto the back of the Batmobile then ferried over from Pt. Judith for an overnight visit with my wife’s sister and her husband and their three daughters, who had rented a place with a breathtaking outlook on the Mohegan Bluffs. The weather was perfect—mid-80s—and we savored the whirlwind getaway. As we were ferrying back to the mainland, we caught sight of my sister-in-law running along the jetty waving to us. Was she a Siren attempting to lure us to our doom on the rocks? Or was she simply making sure that we left her and her family to enjoy, without visitors, their final day on that glorious spot?