WE MADE THE PLAYOFFS!!

So, I'm a little bit of a hockey fan. Well, maybe fan is too strong a word. I follow the sport from time to time, when I've nothing else to do. But far be it from me to let something like a professional sports team schedule dominate my life.

Seriously, though, I love hockey. When I was growing up so far north that we only got three television channels - the CBC, French CBC, and ITV if the wind was right - the whole world stopped for Hockey Night in Canada and the grocery store would actually close for the peewee hockey tournaments. When we would all pile into the family minivan for the ten hour drive to Edmonton, my brothers and I would quiz each other on team rosters and stats. So last night, the Ninja came to terms with being a hockey widower as I blatantly ignored him for the first half of our weekly Thursday night date to watch the end of the game against Anaheim. And oh, what an ending! As my brother said when he picked up the phone in answering my celebratory call, "Ales-in-Wonderland Fanclub, how may I be of service?"

I've been a little distraught with Hemsky's performance over the past few months. The kid has talent in unspeakable quantity; he's just been absolutely plagued by bad luck. I firmly believe that this is why he's had trouble with actually committing to shots on net, or rather, why he HAD been having troubles. In the last five or six games, he's really stepped it up and last night he had what I'm inclined to think of as one of the most important single goals in the Oilers' season. By securing the win for us last night, and then with a lot of luck and a little help from Cheechoo of San Jose, we finally clinched our berth in the Stanley Cup playoffs.

I'm a little excited.