...and now....the Larch...

Stealing the title from the Monty Python skit seems appropriate. A lot of work went into leveling the strongback....and it doesn't look that much different.

You've seen it before - now here it is perfectly level. (Ooooh and Aaaah at your leisure)

And here it is with a bunch of sticks on it - oh, the craftsmanship!

I am certainly hoping that this weekend gets to be a little more substantial as far as progress.

Al and Ez put on a new coat of varnish on Ezzie's "Redbird".

In the rink -

We had a break last week. A lot of the guys are out on the hunt, sounds like a good year so far.

I had 3 starts in net and won all 3, although there is plenty of room for improvement. A couple of late mistakes in the last game made it more interesting than it needed to be.

The most unpleasant outing I had in nets was this past week. I made all the saves off the first shots, but the rebounds were terrible. All the follow up shots I would get a piece of, but not enough to make the save (this becomes extremely aggravating). It was like that all night.

My league game last night still haunts me. I got the first goal on a decent enough backhand, but the puck was bouncing on everyone during the game. Transitioning from goal to wing is a bit of a challenge. Towards the end of the game, I was fed a beautiful pass that I couldn't (or didn't) adjust to fast enough to get a one time shot off. Instead, I took it in the skates and tried to set up off the kick up (yeah - didn't work so good).

Keeping up at the gym is helping quite a bit. I am usually able to keep my acceleration and speed up throughout the game, which is a good compensation for my lack-of-skill level.