LET GO OILERS!!!!

WARNING--For all of you out there who are not hockey fans and don't give a rip about it you may want to move on from this post. You will most likely not know a single thing or any person of whom I speak, and that's okay. But who knows, since you love me so darn much you may stay and endure anyways.....

What I really want to do is sit here and talk about how awesome I think the Oilers are and how much I love that they are showing that they are much better of a hockey team than a lot of people give them credit for. But then I think how dumb I will look if I go on and on about them and then we lose this series. But then again who cares, I will ramble on about it anyways.

The Oilers finished this season as the 8th seed in the Western Conference. Some things never change I suppose. Or perhaps they should have, perhaps our coaching and management should have done something earlier in the season to address the NIGHTMARE that was our goaltending. I don't even know where to start when it comes to that. Mike Morrison who had flashes of brilliance in his few games he played for us this season was not given enough of a chance to prove whether he had what it takes to be a number 1 in the NHL. The way I see it is that you have to ride a guy for A LOT of games in a row to really see that. Playing him 2 games here and there and then sitting him for 5 games is not going to help anyone. Then there was Ty Conklin, what a complete nightmare this guy has been. He was given the chance to be the number 1 guy going into this season and he crapped the bed SO MANY TIMES. Jussi Markkanen who in my opinion is who I would have made my starter out of the three has shown that if he is played consistently on a day to day basis he gives you a decent chance to win. But we never gave him a chance this season. Why? I don't know.

All of this brings me to Dwayne Roloson who we acquired right before the trade deadline on March 9th for a first round draft pick. So many people questioned this move and I will admit that when I first heard it I couldn't believe it either. But then the more I saw him play I realized it was a good trade and I realized that he was going to play well down the stretch and give the Oilers a chance to win night after night. Sure he has had a few bad games and sure he has let in a few soft goals since being with the Oilers. But what goalie doesn't? Even Mikka Kiprusoff makes mistakes--hard to believe I know. Had we acquired Roli earlier in the season who knows what would have happened. But considering we lost a good handful of games because of goaltending I would feel safe in saying we would have finished much higher in the standings than where we did. Why we waited till March to get him I will never understand but he is here now and that makes me happy.

Finishing 8th meant that we would face the Detroit Red Wings in the first round of the playoffs. Noone gave the Oilers any chance going into this series. I read article after article about how the Red Wings would dominate every aspect of the game and that they would sweep the Oilers in 4 games. Now don't get me wrong, the Wings are good. In fact they are REALLY GOOD. In the regular season they scored 305 goals while only giving up 209 in 82 games. They won 58 games and ended the season wih 124 points. So lets look at the comparison...

Detroit - Goals for 305, Goals against 209, Wins 58, Points 124

Oilers - Goals for 256, Goals against 251, Wins 41, Points 95

So yes looking at that alone Detroit WAS the better team all season. In the playoffs however the Oilers have been the better team. Our goaltending has been FAR better than the Red Wings, our defense has been better and our offense has been better. Call me a bias Oilers fan if you want, but the bottom line is they have been the better team in all but 1 of the 5 games so far. The one thing I will give the Wings is their power play. Their power play is FRIGHTENING. They pass the puck better than any team in the NHL and it's just plain crazy how good they are when up a man. If the Oilers can manage to stay out of the penalty box the rest of this series I am pretty confident we will win it. I HOPE we win on Monday at home, how awesome would that be? First playoff series win in EIGHT years and having the chance to do it in front of your own fans. If we somehow screw this up and lose I will be sad....Very sad. But until then GO OILERS!!!

Game 6 Monday, May 1st Edmonton, Alberta

Oh yeah and just for Chris.....GO AVS!!

My mail or your mail?????

If you had people renting out your basement suite who shared the same addresses as you, would you not check mail before you open it to make sure it is YOURS? That it has YOUR name on it before you rip letters and bills open and look at peoples personal things before realizing "Oh this isn't mine." ??????? Yet AGAIN today another piece of mail was opened by someone other than Chris or myself. Every time we get the same apology...."I am sorry I thought it was mine." I just think it's retarded this has happened at least 10 times in the last 4 months or so. READ THE NAME ON THE ENVELOPE....It's not THAT hard.

The 19th Hole

As mentioned earlier, yes I did go golfing today. I golfed at Newton Commonwealth Golf Course with some friends from other Starbucks stores. Now, I haven't golfed a real round in about 5 years...all the way back to 2001 which is when I broke my left elbow. After which I broke my right one. But I digress.

Basically, I didn't think that my game would be very good. Suprisingly enough, overall I played pretty well. In fact, tee to green I was somewhat solid. But my putter deserted me. Clearly in the 5 years since I've played a real round of golf, my touch and reads on the greens had left me. Yes, I did use Evey's bag (hers is nice and black and mine is a 10-year old red eyesore) and yes, I did use Evey's driver too (hers is nice and new with a graphite shaft and mine is old and ghetto). As it turned out, I really killed the ball with her driver! I shot a 48 on the front 9 with way too many putts, but putted a little better on the back 9 with a 43, so I carded a 91. I beat my buddies by at least 10 strokes, which I was not expecting to do. Heck, I wasn't even expecting to break 100. So I'll take it!

While I was out walking Maggie (our friends dog) this afternoon I saw a well dressed woman in her 70's spit as she was crossing the street. Now this was not like she was just spitting a piece of dust or bug that had flown into her mouth while she was walking. This was brought up from the depths. It gives new meaning to "hawking a lugee" when you see a woman of that age doing it. YUCK!

Chris went golfing today. Chris has his OWN golf clubs and his OWN golf bag. As he was getting ready this morning he informs he he needs to use my driver cause his "sucks" and my golf bag because "it has a stand." Not that I mind sharing, it's just that I haven't even been able to use my OWN stuff on a real golf course yet. Anywho....he is not home yet, I hope he golfed well or he will be mister grumpy pants tonight.

If any of you have ever done Tae Bo my hat goes off to you. IT WILL BE THE DEATH OF ME! Man is it hard, even the warmups. lol. But I will persevere........

Have a great weekend!

Today is a happy happy day in the McClees household. We now have OLN on top of our NHL Centre Ice package and we don't have to go to Applebees anymore to watch our hockey games. SWEET!

Speaking of hockey my Oilers won Tuesday night in the second overtime. THANK THE LORD!!! Game 4 is tonight in Edmonton. I sure hope we can take a 3-1 lead in this series. Chris is also very happy as his Colorado Avalanche have taken a HUGE 3-0 lead in their series against the Dallas Stars. And yes we are HUGE hockey fanatics and I love that we have that in common. Now if only I could turn him into an Oilers fan:)

Chris just stopped by the house for something and brought me some lunch. He had lunch with his boss today and brought me home the leftovers. A yummy pasta salad and half a chicken sandwich.

Back to my spring cleaning I go.......

Hope everyone had a great weekend, I am a little behind as usual but really what else did you expect!?!

Chris was on call this past weekend so we really didn't do a lot. Friday night we went out to watch the game at The Sports Depot, our friends Chris and Kellie came and met us there and we had a fun evening. Saturday Chris worked pretty much all day so I stayed home and got some stuff done around here. He worked on Sunday as well so again I stayed home. Sunday night we watched The Island which we both really enjoyed. Thanks to Andrea for recommending it:)

Last night we went to Applebees to sit in their bar to watch the Avs/Stars game and we will be back there this evening to watch the Oilers/Red Wings game. Lets go Oilers!! It sucks we can't watch it at home, but at least they have 2 dollar draft and half price appetizers after 9pm.

We have a serious mouse problem. I understand this is an old house but I just don't think our landlords are taking all measures to deal with this problem. Maybe they don't mind mice eating their dog food, walking on their stuff and POOPING on the floor. I however have a problem with it. We are going to pick up some more mice traps tonight, if that doesn't work we will be talking to them about it again because I am sick of it. And I am sick of Belle hearing them in the middle of the night and waking us up from a dead sleep barking at them. I am bound to have a freakin heart attack one of these times.

A few weeks ago we noticed it started smelling like cigarette smoke in our bathroom. It is so odd. It doesn't smell like that anywhere else in our house, and there is not even a window or vent in that bathroom so it is not like it could be coming in from outside. It is SO weird. We don't smoke, our landlords don't smoke....Maybe it's the mice. lol

My mother in law left for Great Britain yesterday. As we speak she is in Edinburgh Scotland where she will be for 7 days before she heads to other destinations in England. I would explain exactly what she is doing over there but I am afraid I would get it wrong. So be sure to check her blog from time to time over the next month as she will be updating as she can while she is over there. Being that I was born in Scotland and have not been back since we moved to Canada when I was three I am slightly jealous she is there:)

The Quest for Lord Stanley

It's playoff time and I love it. Not just because my team is in it, I just love playoff hockey. We have the hockey package NHL Centre Ice, so normally we get most of the NHL games. But last night the Edmonton/Detroit game wasn't on there because it was on stupid OLN. Dish Network doesn't have an agreement with them so they can't air the games when they are on OLN....STUPID! So anyways of course I didn't want to miss game 1 between Edmonton and Detroit so we went to The Sports Depot to watch it. I am super glad I did, we ended up losing in double overtime but it was an exciting game. Dwayne Roloson (our goalie) was a monster and made 54 saves. WOWZERS! And 2 of the goals he did give up were totally flukey. Sure I am disappointed we lost, but it was only game 1. Lets go OILERS!! The Avalanche (Chris's team) take on the Dallas Stars this afternoon in game 1 of their series. Go Avs!

Going to Jamaica Mon!!!!

Some of you may remember a post I made way back in August about our trip to the Caribbean. If you need a reminder go here to read the post.

http://chrisandevey.blogspot.com/2005/08/chris-and-eveys-Caribbean-getaway.html

Due to immigration and my immigration interview which is scheduled for the same week we were supposed to go to St Lucia we had to change our vacation dates. At first we were not even sure we would be able to change it and thought we would lose out on going all together. However once I thought about it I realized that airlines always want to make money and having people change travel plans is just the way to do that. We attempted to make the changes over the phone but none of the operators we talked to over at US Airways spoke very good English and it made for a very frustrating and confusing time. We decided it would be easiest to just go down to the airport and speak directly to a US Airways rep.

Once we got to the airport and had the nice lady start to look dates up for us we realized that going to St Lucia wasn't going to be an option. You see, because the tickets we have were vouchers, only certain flights are available. She looked all the way out to December and there was only ONE flight in November available. That would have been great except for the fact there was no return flight. Now as much as Chris and I would love to live on a beautiful island, it's just not realistic. The other issue was that US Airways only flies to St Lucia on weekends which didn't really leave a lot of options. The lady suggested we fly to another location that they fly to more often. We didn't realize we could change the date and the location, but thank God we could. So we talked about it and decided on Jamaica, she found us flights in September which was ok with us. They charged us 200 bucks for the changes and we were on our way. It sucks we had to pay the extra but I am just thankful we were able to change things. We leave Sept 13 and return Sept 20th.

We are still staying at a Sandals All Inclusive Resort. We are staying at a place called Dunn's River. We officially booked our trip the other day through Chris's mom last week and we are so excited. Neither of us have ever been anywhere like this and this is really like a honeymoon for us. We moved to Boston almost immediately after we got married for Chris's job and really never had a chance to go anywhere. We have heard so many good things about the Sandals resorts and I can hardly wait. What we look forward to the most is not having to worry about money while we are there. The closest Sandals next to us has a beautiful 18 hole golf course which of course is included, we will be taking our golf clubs.

The great thing is that when you stay at one Sandals you get full access to all the others on that island. And it is adult only so we won't have to worry about rowdy teenagers getting in the way of our fun.

Pool bar HERE I COME!!!

For those of you who aren't ALIAS fans, SHAME on you:) For those of you who are I hope you enjoyed last nights episodes as much as I did. There were some predictable moments in last nights 2 hours special but it was great regardless. It made me even more excited for the coming episodes. And for those of you out there who actually thought that Vaughn was dead, come on was there really ever any doubt he was alive????

We watched Finding Neverland tonight. I never really had a desire to see this until I was finally convinced that it was a great and I should watch it. We have had it on netflix for a while and finally popped it in tonight. It was completely different than I expected it to be and I loved it. It was a really good movie.

Tuesday was our date (movie) night and this week we went to see The Benchwarmers. Sometimes stupid mindless comedy is important and good for the soul;) I think John Heder (Napoleon Dynamite) is absolutely hilarious. Definitely is not a movie I would pay full price to go see but it was funny.

ALIAS is FINALLY back!!!

Two hours and counting!!!!! I am so excited. This is one of my all time favorite shows and it has been WAY too long since it was on. They went on an extra long hiatus for Jennifer Garner to have her baby. For those of you who don't know, this is the last season. I am so excited to see how it all unfolds and how the story ends.

I never got a chance yesterday to blog about our weekend since I was too busy spoiling my puppy:)

Our baseball team the Seattle Mariners were in town playing the Boston Red Sox. Chris and I didn't think we would end up going to any of the games since Red Sox tickets are pretty hard to get. But luckily our good friend David hooked us up with a couple for the game on Sunday. After church Sunday morning we left the car at the church and got a ride down to Fenway Park with David since he had to be the one to pick the tickets up. Sorry about the flat tire you got on the way home by the way....Oops! Anyways we had a really fun time at the game. Sadly we ended up losing 3-2, but it was a good game either way. We didn't see a lot of Mariners fans at the game, maybe a dozen or so. 2 of them that we did see ended up sitting in the 2 seats directly behind us. Everyone thought the 4 of us were there together. It was a beautiful day, a little windy at times but it helped cool things down. After the game we took the train back down to the church and over to David and Kellie's for a little turkey dinner. YUM! Thanks guys. I am so excited that my sister in law and brother in law have FINALLY got a blog. I have pestered Andrea for at LEAST a year and she finally gave into the way of blog. Please go on over to her blog-- Chock Full O' Nuts! --to say hello and to welcome her to the blogging world. Be sure to add her to your links so you won't miss out on any of their entertaining stories. Andrea is my good friend and is way more entertaining than I think she realizes....Ha! I should also point out that I am horrified that Katie Holmes has finally given birth to Tom Cruise's spawn!!!!

Happy Birthday Annabelle

My puppy turned 3 today! She is very much our kid and she is very much SPOILED rotten. We thought it would be fun tonight to get some bday stuff and take some funny pictures. We went and got a pink party hat that says birthday girl on it and a 3 candle. We got her a new squeaky toy and some new balls. We also got her a big compressed rawhide bone and when we got home we smothered it in peanut butter and put it in a pan so she wouldn't get peanut butter all over the place. On went her birthday hat and onto the bone went the candle. We took some fun pictures for the entertainment of all.

Please forgive how horrid I look in these pictures. lol. Doesn't Belle look excited to be wearing her pretty pink hat!?!

I must have said something super funny cause she totally looks like she is laughing here.

Please tell me why my dog looks SO weird and SO drunk in this picture. lol

I forgot to mention the other day that Chris and I got tickets to the baseball game tomorrow. The Seattle Mariners are in town playing the Boston Red Sox. We are so excited to have been able to get tickets to this game so we could see the M's.

Speaking of sports, I must say a big thank you to the Vancouver Canucks for being just a little more inconsistent and sucky than the Oilers were at times this year AND for helping us make the playoffs while you get to go golfing:)

Yesterday Chris and I were stopped at a red light. When our light turned green and had been so for a good 5 seconds or so Chris started to go, only to have to slam on his breaks for the 2 kids on bikes that decided not to see if there was a car coming but to go full speed ahead right in front of us. Luckily Chris saw them in time. Both of our hearts were in our throats. Never mind that he could have hit the first kid, but the other kid was going so fast he would have rode right into the side of Chris's van. SCARY! Stupid kids were laughing about it. Although I am sure that their hearts were also in their throats given that they came within a foot of being hit by a car.

Mary Poppins in the House.....

Chris and I decided to take Belle for her evening walk a little while ago even though it is raining. Off we went with our umbrella. Chris was holding the umbrella and I was holding the dog. I looked at Chris and said "you look like Mary Poppins!" He looked at me like "whatever." And then out of nowhere he starts skipping down the street, umbrella and all singing "just a spoonful of sugar" in an opera type voice. lol. Oh my gosh, it was SO freaking funny.

It's hard being a dog....

Yes that is Belle sound asleep under the covers with her head on the pillows just like a person. She usually starts off like this and eventually will wiggle her way all the way down under the covers. I took this picture last night cause it was just too cute. Chris is on her right and those are my pillows there on the left.

Once Again - Matt Redman

Jesus Christ, I think upon Your sacrifice
You became nothing
Poured out to death
Many times, I've wondered at your gift of life
I'm in that place once again
I'm in that place once again

And once again I look upon the cross where You died
I'm humbled by Your mercy and I'm broken inside
Once again I thank You,
Once again I pour out my life

Now You are exhalted to the highest place
King of the Heavens, where one day I'll bow
But for now, I'll marvel at Your saving grace
I'm full of praise once again
Oh I'm full of praise once again

And once again I look upon the cross where You died
I'm humbled by Your mercy and I'm broken inside
Once again I thank You
Once again I pour out my life

Thank you for the cross
Thank you for the cross
Thank you for the cross, my friend

Being that today is Good Friday I thought the lyrics to this song were fitting. I hope everyone has a safe and happy Easter weekend. Hopefully we all take time to remember what Easter is really about.

As I was checking my email this morning, sipping coffee I heard something that made me laugh. I had The Ellen DeGeneres show on in the background and Ray Romano was on. They were talking about American Idol and how he loves it. He went on to say that he had a tape of Canadian Idol sent to him so he could watch it and that he really likes it. He then went on to say "it's like American Idol with a sweater on." Sure made me laugh, perhaps it's because I am from Canada.

Speaking of sipping coffee I burnt my tongue good this morning upon my first sip. My coffee is never scalding hot like that, I don't know what happened.

Last night was movie night, we went to see Lucky Number Slevin. I really wasn't sure if I was going to like this movie but I was pleasantly surprised. It turned out to be really good. The story is really good and the acting was great. I must admit I was confused for a while in this one, it definitely gets your mind turning. The plot twists in this movie were great. Here is a little write up about it I found on IMDB .....

"A twisted little film from beginning to end. The most fun you'll have playing with your mind. It will keep you constantly thinking and still you won't be able to solve the puzzle. Fantastic! A top notch script on the move, able directing, splendid performances, and a pitch perfect cast. This sure is this years Twisted little KISS KISS BANG BANG!. A hugely satisfying funny entertaining film. Josh Hartnett is a rising star and this film permits him a promising rise. Although, you don't get to see much of Bruce in the film but still it's a superb film. With an excellent supporting performance by Ben Kingsley and Morgan Freeman. A film worth watching for and a cast worth dying for. This really stunned me! "

Last night Chris went to get gas and his gas card was rejected. As most of you know he works for Starbucks and has a company gas card. Anyways he called the card issuer only to find out that his card had been reported lost on April 5th. Funny considering the card was sitting in his hand. The really retarded thing is that this happened to him once before last year, except in that case his card had been reported stolen. Gotta love incompetence, how the same mistake gets made twice is beyond me.

Yesterday afternoon Chris had a grandma (probably in her 60's) pull up beside him at a traffic light on her HOG. Too funny!!

That is all, have a great Wednesday!!

Happy Monday!!

Once again I come back from the weekend with no exciting stories to tell. Chris was glued to the TV most of the weekend watching The Masters and very happy that Phil Mickelson won, who happens to be his favorite golfer. I decided to tackle our kitchen cupboards and drawers this weekend. I have been putting organizing them off for way too long and they needed some serious attention. That was about it, EXCITING I know.

We did end up cracking open a bottle of Italian wine that we got from our landlords for Christmas. It was YUMMY! A little different from what I am used to, but good regardless.

I convinced my mother in law Linda to create a blog. She is headed over to the British Isles at the end of the month and I thought it would be great for her to have a place to share her pictures and tell her stories. I am so jealous that she is going and more so that she is spending SEVEN days in Edinburgh Scotland. In case you all forgot I was born in Scotland and I have never been back. Anyways she is still in the process of setting up her blog and figuring out all the inner workings of blogger, but head on over and say hello http://lindamactravel.blogspot.com/ . She is also a travel agent, so if you are ever thinking of a vacation check her out. You never know what deals she might be able to find for you.

Why doesn't blogger's spell check recognize the words blog and blogger?????

Spring Showers

Some of you know that I am not a big fan of rain. I don't hate it really, I just like it in moderation. I actually love the rain when it is warm enough that you can go and walk in it, I think that is refreshing. But just rain in general is not my favorite thing.

I do welcome rain at this time of year however. Spring is one of my favorite times of the year. I love watching the grass and trees turn from an ugly brown to green. I love seeing the first bloom of flowers.

It has been rainy the last few days, yesterday it was super nice out all day and then it just started to rain. But I know it is so needed this time of year. So instead of complaining I just take it for what it is and look forward to summer when there will be more sunny than rainy days.

Movie Tuesday

Last night was our movie night. There wasn't really a lot playing this week so we ended up going to see Ice Age: The Meltdown. I wouldn't have paid full price for this one, but for 5 bucks you can't really go wrong. It was nothing special, but it was cute and funny.

Chris and I saw a couple get engaged at a Starbucks yesterday......Cute!!

We woke up this morning to a slushy wet mess outside. It snowed and rained for most of the day and it has been so darn gloomy the last few days. After such beautiful weather the last week or so it was disappointing. We sure felt the nip in the air when we took Belle for her evening walk tonight. Let's hope it clears up and the sun comes back out soon.

LOST was great tonight. I won't give anything away, I know a lot of you on the west coast etc have not seen it yet. I can't get enough of this show and I love how they leave you hanging every week, the suspense is exciting.

Let's Play Ball

As I counted down the months, weeks, days and finally hours to the start of the Mariners first game of the 2006 baseball season I couldn't help but laugh at myself. You see 4 1/2 years ago when I met Chris being that he was American, naturally he and his family were big baseball fans, especially his mom. Me on the other hand being from Canada was a hockey fan and only a hockey fan.

When I started spending weekends in Seattle I would always say I'm not watching baseball, baseball is stupid, I would rather stare at a wall than watch that stupid game for three hours. I swore I would NEVER become a baseball fan. But every weekend when I was there, it was on. And every weekend I fought it.......until one day there I was watching the Mariners with Chris's mom and found myself starting to ask questions. The more questions I asked and the more I learned the more I wanted to know. I finally realized that there is so much MORE to baseball than someone hitting a ball with a bat. When I started to understand the game, and the rules etc it was not boring anymore.

So here I am 4 1/2 years later and no longer can I say I hate baseball but rather I LOVE the game of baseball and I love the Seattle Mariners. Chris's mom helped convert me and I am so glad she did. Let's just hope the Mariners can put together a great year this year. I don't love it more than hockey and the Oilers but it is a very close second. And so yesterday began another season, and win or lose I will watch all 162 games of the Mariner season and enjoy every single one of them.

Seems to me that the weekends are flying by lately and I don't like that.

Friday after I walked Maggie I took the train downtown to meet Chris. We went and got some hot dogs from a vendor in the commons. There were SO many people out on Friday because it was such a beautiful day, probably the most people I have seen down there in months.

We were having dinner with Becca and Travis at 6:30 and meeting Becca at 6 so we headed into Cambridge around 4:30 and found a parking spot right down from Border Cafe where we were having dinner. Talk about lucky, finding parking spots in Cambridge doesn't come easy. We decided to take a walk around the Harvard Campus. We walked back and met up with Becca around 6 and because we are so awesome we even got her Starbucks.

We had a yummy dinner, we all got fajitas and they were gooood. After dinner we went back to B & T's house to watch a movie. We watched The Weather Man with Nicolas Cage. Not sure I would say this was a great movie, but it was good. I do like Nicolas Cage and he was funny in it. The story itself was good, but in the same light it was weird. If you don't like "dark" comedy then you most likely will not like this movie.

Saturday we pretty much did nothing, Chris was not feeling well when he woke up so we just stayed home. Saturday evening we watched Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit . If you haven't seen this movie you should, it was good and very funny.

Sunday Chris still wasn't feeling so great so again we didn't do much. We were both happy that the baseball season kicked off last night and even more happy that the Mariners first game of the season is today, let's hope it's a good one. For those of you out there who don't watch Grey's Anatomy you need to start watching. It is such a GOOD show. Chris is a hard one to get into tv shows but this and LOST he likes and we never miss it. Last night's episode was SO good.

Bath Time

Belle HATES baths. She is much better than she was when we first got her. Now she will actually get in the tub if you tell her firmly enough. She is sure though to give you the evil eye the whole time. Yesterday she had a bath and so we decided to take some pictures

For all you Flames fans out there.......