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Game 3

The West Coast Warriors are a team of big kids from British Columbia. The Devil Dogs had some trouble dealing with their size and speed. And the Warriors’ goalie played a great game.

Final Score: West Coast Warriors 2, Devil Dogs 0

The final round-robin games are scheduled for tomorrow. Depending on how things go, the Devil Dogs could be the top-seed for the single-elimination round or they could get knocked out of the tournament. Their game is against NorCal Riot Black, who are undefeated at 3-0.

• RT @capricecrane: A Canadian man climbed into a tiger pit and was mauled. The tiger, when reached for comment…mauled that guy, too. #

After a visit to the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, we stopped by a Subway where an Asian woman with a strange accent made our sandwiches.

“Have you been to the Hockey Hall of Fame up the street there?” I asked her.

No answer.

“It’s great!” I said. “We came all the way from California to see it.”

“I came from Buffalo,” she said.

“Really? Where’d you come from before Buffalo?” I asked.

“I saw Niagara Falls,” she said.

Downtown Toronto looks pretty much like downtown anywhere else, but it is the first place I’ve ever seen a street performer playing a set of bagpipes . . .

I already knew that, but one of the TV stations at the hotel seemed to be showing nothing but ball hockey — no skates, just guys running around with sticks trying to hit a ball into a net.

I asked a Canadian: “What’s up with all the ball hockey games on television?”

“It’s the playoffs!” he explained.

Our hotel room in Canada had a king-size bed, which I slept on, and a pull-out sofa that my son slept on. The first night we were there, I picked out my side of the bed and went to sleep.

It wasn’t until the second night that it occurred to me: Hey I could sleep right in the middle of this bed if I want to! There’s nobody else in it!

“I still slept on my side of the bed when you were gone,” my wife said later.

Our hotel room had a fridge, so we went to the market to stock up on a few drinks and snacks. We weren’t planning to buy a lot of stuff so instead of a cart we just put the items in a hand basket.

At the checkout line, the girl asked me, “Do you want bags for this?”

Am I missing something? “How else are we going to get it to the car?” I asked.

“I’m going to charge you for them,” she said, “so I have to ask you if you want them.”

Plastic grocery bags in Canada will set you back five cents apiece . . .

I handed the girl at the McDonalds drive-thru a Canadian 5-dollar bill and asked her, “Who is that guy?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I only came here three years ago and I’m not really into money.”

When we got back to the hotel, I asked the guy at the front desk the same question. He had no idea.

I was dumbfounded to discover that Canadians don’t know the people on their money!

By googling “canadian 5-dollar bill,” I learned that the gentleman is Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the seventh Prime Minister of Canada.

The prime minister is like the president in the United States, isn’t he? Wouldn’t this be like an American not recognizing Abraham Lincoln?

There’s a picture of kids playing hockey on the back of the 5-dollar bill:

Photo by Alfred Benway

The Devil Dogs played their first two round-robin games today. In the afternoon game, they beat the Motor City Moose from Detroit, 5-3. Devil Dogs scored the first three goals, but the Moose came back to 4-3 down before the Dogs scored a late goal for the final margin.

After the game, we came back to the hotel, barbequed some burgers and hot dogs, then drove back to the arena for a 9 p.m. game against the Mission Mayhem, a local team from here in Ontario.

Devil Dogs won, 3-2. My son had a nice goal. A teammate tried to saucer a pass to him as he skated to the front of the net, but the pass stayed airborne all the way. He took a short baseball swing at it and batted it in out of the air. When an NHL player does that, it’s a definite SportsCenter Top 10, but the boy said after the game that he had that one all the way.

Tomorrow, two more round-robin games against teams from Buffalo and Detroit. Everyone says the Detroit team, the Mission Stars 92, is a very good team, so the Buffalo game tomorrow morning may determine whether the Dogs are able to advance out of the round-robin . . .

Yesterday’s team bonding activities included miniature golf, pizza and a midnight screening of Brüno, all within walking distance of the hotel.

After the movie, the kids walked to McDonalds. It was closed. The drive-thru was still open, but they didn’t have a car.

Just then — in an amazing cross-continental coincidence — Eddie, the manager of our local rink in Irvine, pulled into the drive-thru, and the kids got him to buy them all ice cream cones . . .

• Niagara Falls is INSANE! #
• RT @paulandstorm: [P] "Listen to them. Children of the night. Christ, what a racket." #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @paulandstorm: [P] "First rule of Fight Club is — dues must be paid by the first of every month." #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @paulandstorm: [P] "I'm mad as hell, and I'm telling you, that's pretty damn mad. Mad, mad, mad! Hoo-boy, am I mad!" #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @paulandstorm: [P] "He's Spartacus!" #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @paulandstorm: "I'm sorry; did you say 'badgers' or 'badges?' Actually, we don't have either, so the point is moot." #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @ChipChantry: "Guys, guys, time out… this boat is WAY TOO SMALL." #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @ChipChantry: "If you build it, your wife will get angry with you." #1stdraftmovielines #
• RT @diablocody: "Make sure I get paid adequately." #1stdraftmovielines #
• Why isn't there a law against guys with sleep apnea taking redeye flights? #
• Just enjoyed a bottle of jus d'orange. That means "orange juice" in French. We're learning the language of the people up here. #

We’re off to Toronto for a week for NARCh. I wonder what the weather’s like in Toronto in July. At least there won’t be thunderstorms every day like the NARCh tournaments we went to in Florida.

Let me check the forecast . . .

My son and I are leaving Wednesday night for Toronto where his 16-and-under team, the Devil Dogs, is playing in the NARCh roller hockey tournament.

Do the Dogs have a chance to contend?

Short answer: I don’t know. That’s why they play the games.

Longer answer: They’re in a round-robin bracket with teams from New York, Canada and two teams from Michigan. If you get through the round-robin games and into the single-elimination rounds, anything can happen.

Let’s say Team A is good enough to beat Team B 9 games out of 10, or even 99 games out of 100. There’s still that one game that Team B wins, and in single elimination, that’s all you need.

Whether that’s good news or bad news depends on whether you’re Team A or Team B.

Credit: Paula Wirth

I saw my brother for the first time in years this past weekend. He’s been living in Utah but he’s now on his way to Alaska to escape the coming Armageddon.

Canada and Mexico will be invading the United States from the top and bottom . . . I’ve forgotten the details, but it’s going to be bad. I don’t know why he was informed about this and I wasn’t.

I’m not moving to Alaska though. I’m not a cold-weather person. They can kill me right here in a pair of shorts . . .

My son’s roller hockey team is going to Toronto in July for NARCh. We’re batting around fundraising ideas to help defray the cost of the trip.

How about an old-fashioned kissing booth? Kiss a hockey mom for $10!

Or a pie toss! Throw a pie in the face of a hockey mom for $10!

Better yet — dealer’s choice! Kiss a hockey mom or throw a pie in her face — $10. And we’ll throw in a package deal: A kiss and a pie — in either order! — for only $15!

Surprisingly, only one of the moms thinks this is a good idea . . .

My son’s roller hockey team is traveling to Mississauga this summer. One of the hockey moms found this video featuring the mayor, Hazel McCallion, an 88-year-old former professional women’s hockey player.

I loved it!