First Blog-Hockey, IHOP, Scrabble, and Pop Culture Cranium

I've never kept a diary or journal before. There's been plenty of beginnings, but I've just never kept up with it. I am determined to keep this one active. Having viewed a few friends' blogs I think I have an idea of what to write about, although mine may not be as interesting or humorous as others, I'll do my best.

Yesterday was an eventful day, one of which consisted of an Austin Ice Bats game, a dinner at IHOP, Scrabble, and Pop Culture Cranium.

I was invited to my first hockey game by my friend Katie, who also happens to teach fourth grade with me. Accompanying us was Katie's close friends Jesse and Wendy. I was definitely excited to be going. The ice rink it took place at was one on which I had ice skated on before, so you would think I would have dressed more warmly than I did having experienced the frigid atmosphere before, but no. I brought only a light jacket and wore flip-flops. I was cold, but happily enjoying the game with occassional cheering and yelling. There were two 15 minute breaks in the middle of the game. During these breaks the Ice Bats' Mascot would come out onto the ice and try to entertain us. As Katie said, it was their way of trying to help us forget about having to sit for 15 minutes for the game to start back up again. The Ice Bat (i don't know if he had any particular name) would throw some shirts to cheering fans and it seemingly all depended on which section could cheer the loudest. Being my first game and all I cheering and shouted hoping to leave that rink with a free t-shirt. I did not leave with a t-shirt and on top of that the Ice Bats lost due to a penalty shot in overtime.

Afterwards, we hopped on over to the IHOP (notice my attempt at humor). My friends all had an evening breakfast and I had a grilled sandwich from the healthier choices section of the menu. How much healthier was it? I'm not sure, but knowing I ordered from that section gave me some peace of mind. I've always been a careful eater I must admit, but on top of that I'm training for a 5K run, in which my trainer thinks I will win, so-yeah-anyway. You can read more about the Mystery of the Blue Maple Syrup that took place there at Jesse Sosa's blog.

Following dinner and breakfast we traveled to Katie's apartment to play a game of Scrabble. I entered the game pretty confident. I'm usually a decent player and I had just beat Katie the night before at a game of online Scrabble (my score was in the 200's). Little did I know that playing an online game with Katie is much different than in person. You see Katie likes to carry on a conversation during the game with you and all the other players. Katie's conversation are also usually pretty animated and in this case included baby pictures, pictures on her computer and even a story of a sick little fish whose environment is being polluted. The game ended with Wendy as the winner, Jesse following closing behind, Katie in third, and me dead last "not even breaking a hundred" as Jesse kindly pointed out.

Alright, after my depressing defeat we moved on to a game of Pop Culture Cranium. I was fearing another defeat in this game, I don't consider myself very knowledgeable about Pop Culture. Jesse and I were a team competing against Wendy and Katie. The game was actually not that bad and much of it I was relatively familiar. I did have trouble with New Kids on the Block and Bono, both of which I attempted drawing to help Jesse guess. My illustration of Bono was a poor attempt. Jesse couldn't get passed his crappy hair cut and shades. In the end Jesse and I were victorious against Wendy and her ever chatty partner.

I learned that day that hockey is fun to watch, IHOP makes mistakes with their syrup, never to play a game of Scrabble with Katie in person, that axel is spelled axle, and that Jesse is a marvel at taking my pitiful clues and making them into something meaningful.