Who Doesn’t Love a Graph With a Spike?

My Hockey Hotties post seems to have taken on a life of its own!  The first sign of this was when a whole bunch of people I didn’t recognize left comments on that posting. I mean, I know that there are always a lot of people who read a given blog regularly but don’t comment, but it seemed unlikely to me that all these lurkers were reading me for years, just waiting to comment on my opinions of the attractiveness of various hockey players.  Where were these people coming from?

The next sign was when I noticed a really drastic spike in my stats.  Like, I usually have 50-100 views per day, but on Sept 26, I had 460.  Wowsa!  Investigating further¹, I discovered that 237 of those came from “Puck Daddy” on sports.yahoo.com.  And I quote:

Drafting a fantasy hockey team by how good-looking the players are. Sadly, Yahoo! has yet to install “beefcake” as a scoring category. [Not To Be Trusted With Knives]

I have no idea how Puck Daddy found me, but I’m glad he did!

And the third and final sign that Hockey Hotties was some sort of breakthrough posting for me was when I discovered that I was listed on the WordPress “Blog of the Day” under “Growing Blogs” on September 27.

Of course, the problem with getting a spike like that is the inevitable crash. What goes up must come down and suchlike.  Today I logged into WordPress and noticed the pretty much linear decrease² since 26 Sept:

Oh, those heady days of last weekend – we knew they couldn’t last forever!

On the plus side, Hockey Hotties has now been viewed 761 times – topped only by my about page, which has been around since I first put my blog onto WordPress. Hockey Hotties  – Now With Photos! has only been viewed 106 times, which is a shame, because there are some damn fine photos on there.  But I digress.  Back on the whole stats thing for just a minute, I usually don’t pay too much attention to stats. I’m not into blogging for business³, so how many people come to my site isn’t a huge concern. It’s more like, “Cool! 100 people dropped by to hear about how often I wash my hair!”  But once you get a taste of the big numbers⁴, it’s sad to see those numbers drop. Discussion of hot boys is enough to bring the readers, but apparently videoclips of me shredding Canadian election brochures is not enough to keep them coming back for more.

Also, I should point out that the whole point of compiling a list of the hottest men in the NHL was to be able to draft a hockey pool team that I wouldn’t mind being trapped on a deserted island with.  The draft for this hockey pool was supposed to have taken place after BarCamp on Saturday but a bunch of the people who were going to take part bailed.  And thus, no draft.

But fear not, people who love hockey player hotness! Darren is now going to run a virtual draft for the hockey pool.  And so the team of hockey hotties will come to be!  And you can be sure that I’ll provide you with detailed info about which hotties end up on my team, and I’ll keep you appraised of their hot, goal scoring⁵ action all season long!

¹a.k.a., scrolling down on the WordPress Stats page
²I guess blog postings about decidedly boring historical British Columbian Premiers just isn’t as excited as blog postings about hawt men. Who knew?
³Which is a *really* good thing, because I’d be starving if I were.
⁴Those of you who get 460 views per minute may guffaw now.
⁵Or goal saving, in the case of my goalie. Who I really, really hope will be His Hotness, Mr. Rick DiPietro. Rawr!

Hockey Hotties – Now With Photos!

In preparation for this afternoon’s hockey pool draft, I decided I should figure out what position all the hotties on my list actually play, given that we need to have one goalie and to pick a certain number of defenseman. And then I thought I should have photos of these boys handy to help me to decide during the draft. Here is the result of that research!

Hottie	Position	Age	Jailbait?1
Rick DiPietro, NY Islanders	Goalie	27	No
Mikko Koivu, Minnesota Wild	Centre	25	No
Taylor Pyatt, Vancouver Canucks	Left Wing (note: scores points for his pretty blue eyes)	27	No
Zach Parise, NJ Devils	Left Wing	24	No
Scottie Upshall, Philadelphia Flyers	Right wingloses points for going by the name “Scottie”	24	No
Brendan Morrison, Anaheim Ducks	Centre	33	hell no
Sidney Crosby, Pittsburgh Penguins	Centre	21	hell yeah
Mattias Ohlund, Vancouver Canucks	Defense	32	No
Mike Comrie, NY Islanders	Centre	28	No
Benoit Pouliot, Minnesota Wild	Left Wing	21	Yup
Vincent Lecavalier, Tampa Bay Lightning	Centre	28	No
Mark Bell, Toronto Maple Leafs	Left Wing	28	No, but apparently he has recently been in jail
Jarome Iginla, Calgary Flames	Right Wing	31	No
Paul Gaustad, Buffalo Sabres	Centre	26	No
Martin St. Louis, Tampa Bay Lightning	Right Wing	33	No
Martin Biron, Philadelphia Flyers	Goalie	31	No
Joffrey Lupul, Philadelphia Flyers	Right Wing	25	No
Derek Roy, Buffalo Sabres	Centre	25	No
Brad Isbister, Ottawa Senators	Left Wing	31	No
Markus Naslund, New York Rangers	Left Wing	35	Nu uh
Georges Laraque, Montreal Canadiens	Right Wing	31	No
Kris Letang, Pittsburgh Penguins	Defense	21	Uh, yeah
Mike Komisarek, Montreal Canadiens	Defense	26	No
Josh Gorges, Montreal Canadiens	Defense	24	No
Jason Pominville, Buffalo Sabres	Right Wing	25	No
Jonathan Toews, Chicago Blackhawks	Centre	20	Indeed
Patrick Kane, Chicago Blackhawks	Right Wing	19	Yikes!
Dustin Brown, LA Kings	Left Wing	23	No. Just squeaks by the cutoff age!
Carey Price, Montreal Canadiens	Goalie	20	Yes
Sheldon Souray, Edmonton Oilers	Defense	32	No
Craig Rivet, Buffalo Sabres	Defense	34	No

Thanks to all the wonderful readers who suggested hockey hotties for me to consider.

I’ll be sure to let y’all know who ends up on my team o’hotties!

¹Where “jailbait” = below my cougar age
²Out of curiosity, given that all the suggesters were not my usual commenters – how did you find my blog?.

Image credits:

• Rick DiPietro photo by Francis Larrede.
• Taylor Pyatt photo by John Bollwitt
• Zach Parise photo by Jen Kang.
• Scottie Upshall photos by neat1235 and Alison B.
• Sidney Crosby photo by Teka England
• Mattias Ohlund photo by
• Mike Comrie photos both by MPR.
• Vincent Lacavalier photo by kaatiya.
• Jarome Ignila photo by Dinur Blum.
• Paul Gaustad photo by Maureen Landers.
• Martin Biron photo by Maureen Landers. And the other one is also by Maureen Landers.
• Joffrey Lupul photo by neat1325. And Joffrey Lupul is bringing sexy back is by Alison B.
• Derek Roy photo by alygirl20.
• Brad Isbister photo by John Bollwitt.
• Marcus Naslund photo by Richard Eriksson.
• Georges Laraque photo by Natalie Litz.
• Kris Letang photo by Dan4th Nicholas.
• Mike Komisarek photo by Fedayee.
• Josh Gorges photo by Robin Rodrigues and Elliot.
• Jonathan Toews photo by David Kindler.
• Dustin Brown photo by Nichole.
• Craig Rivet photo by Dinur Blum.

Hockey Hotties

This Saturday I’m going to be participating in a draft for a hockey pool.  Since I pay little to no attention to teams that aren’t the Canucks, I’m not overly familiar with non-Canuck players.  In fact, unless someone is a mega-star a la Sydney Crosby, I’ve probably not heard of them.  Thus, my draft strategy will be: draft the hottest players.  If I can’t win the most points, I may as well have the prettiest boys on my team, right?

Rick Dipietro. Rawr!

So far, the pretty boy hockey players that come to mind are: Taylor Pyatt (of course) Zach Parise Rick DiPietro Scottie Upshall Brendan Morrison Sidney Crosby Mattias Ohlund Mike Comrie Benoit Pouliot Vincent LeCalavier Mark Bell Jarome Iginla Paul Gaustad Martin St. Louis Martin Biron Joffrey Lupul Derek Roy Brad Isbister Marc Chiounard (although I don’t think he actually plays much in the NHL) Marcus Naslund Mikko Koivu (props to Ms. Conduct for bringing this mega-hottie to my attention!) Georges Laraque (props to Rebecca for pointing this one out!) Kris Letang(props to Bianca for suggesting the rest of the hotties on the list!) Mike Komisarek Josh Gorges Jason Pominville Jonathan Toews Patrick Kane Dustin Brown Carey Price (he’s no Rick DiPietro…) I want to add Sam Ganger, but he doesn’t appear to be playing in the NHL? My research, thus far, has been watching videos of the “10 or 20 or 30 or 50 or 62 Hottest Hockey Players” on YouTube. I’ve noticed that these videos all seem to have the following things in common: very poor production values a plethora of copyrighted images being used music that makes no sense (e.g., what does “I Kissed a Girl” have to do with hockey hotties??) each contains at least 2 of the Staals, none of whom are good looking each contains at least 4 fuglies for every decent looking player

Also, any “hottest hockey players” list that doesn’t include Taylor Pyatt and/or does include Evengi Malkin or Scott Gomez has some serious problems.

OK, blog readers, now help me out.  What hockey hotties are missing from my list?

Image Credit: Posted by Francis Larrede on Flickr.

Somehow, I don’t think Nonis is really “relieved”

This media release just appeared in my inbox:

NONIS RELIEVED OF GENERAL MANAGER & SR VICE-PRESIDENT DUTIES BY VANCOUVER CANUCKS

The Canucks didn’t make the playoffs and now the heads must roll, and it looks like Nonis was at the top of the head-rolling list.

It will be interesting to see what other moves the Canucks make in the next few months in response to this lackluster season. Over on Darren’s blog he mentions a prospect that is being looked at as a potential linemate for the Sedin twins – Fabian Brunnström. Darren mentions Brunnström’s recently career history and stats, as well as the suitability of Vancouver as a place for this young Swede.  But he neglects one important piece of the analysis that must be undertaken on all new Canucks prospects, especially one that will be playing with the Twins.  Hottie or non-hottie?

My extensive research into the topic comes to the following conclusion: Hottie.

Trevor Linden for Prime Minister!

When I was in Vegas last weekend, as we drove by “Wayne Newton Blvd.” on the way to the airport, I said, “I wonder if they will name a street in Vancouver after Trevor Linden?” You see, this season was Trevor’s last in the NHL and with the Canucks not making the playoffs, Vancouver had seen his last game on Saturday night.

Trevor is well recognized for being a great hockey player, an inspirational leader and a humanitarian. I even forgive him for being born in Alberta because although, like me, he may have been born and grew up elsewhere, he is truly a Vancouverite.

I have no doubt that his number will be retired by the Canucks and I hope that he will stay on with the team in some capacity now that his playing days are over. And, as both Darren and Rebecca suggest, I’d love to see a Trevor Linden street here in our city!

Sign the petition to name a street after Trev. You know you want to.

We are the champions!

Tonight, we won the championship game!

Some photos from the post-game celebration in the dressing room:

Next stop: Vegas tournament. And then it’s on to provincials in Kelowna in May!

Canucks game recap

My recap of last night’s Canucks game:

Taylor Pyatt scored after a beautiful shot by Brad Isbister hit the post, bounced off of Taylor and went into the net. A Pyatt–Isbister double team – it’s like my dream come true!

Then some other stuff happened, but we don’t need to talk about that.

In other Canucks news, I want these earrings, which I just saw over on http://www.miss604.com/. The thing is, I don’t $73.99-plus-tax-want them.

Seriously, 80 bucks? Seriously?

Sunday night, 11 pm seems to be the time when hot Vancouver boys do their grocery shopping. Safeway was positively crawling with them. It’s something I’ve been wondering about for a while, because I rarely see hot boys in the grocery store, yet I know they must acquire their sustenance at some point – you can’t build those muscles without protein!

Unfortunately, Sunday at 11 pm was also the time that I, being on the way home from my hockey game, decided to take advantage of the fact that I had a co-op car by stopping in at Safeway for some groceries.

On the way home from my hockey game. As in my hair is in pigtails, tied back with a bandana, no makeup, sweaty and disgusting.

Sigh. Sometimes you just can’t catch a break.

I’ve Got a New Love…

… or Taylor who?

Went to tonight’s Canucks v. Oilers pre-season game. A certain right-winger caught my eye all game. #27. “Who is #27?” I kept asking my friends all game, but they couldn’t read his name on the back of his jersey either, from our seats up in the nosebleeds.

But I got my answer when, with the scored tied 4-4 and only 2.5 seconds left in the game, my new beloved got a breakaway and snapped one past the goalie to win the game.

Isbister. Brad Isbister.

On my new hockey team, I’m #27. And I’m a right winger. It’s fate, right?

The only minor problem with this whole situation, which I just found out while searching for a pic of my new love, is that he happens to be inconveniently married to someone who is not me.

Thank goodness that 50% of marriages end in divorce! I’ll be waiting for you Bradley, I’ll be waiting for you.

Brainlessness

The other day I was chatting with my sister and she said “Boys only get their brains after 30.”

A few days later at work, I came across this quotation:

“...a second major phase of brain growth that parallels the hormonal changes at puberty and extends into the mid-twenties. This second spurt is especially prominent in the frontal lobes, an area associated with planning, reasoning, and impulse control. Until this occurs, adolescents are not yet capable of exercising these processes consistently. “

So she was literally correct about boys not getting their brains until they are 30. Of course, the same would hold true for girls… I now plan to use this excuse for any stupid decision I have made up until now in my life. If I’d known this, I would have listed “my frontal lobes weren’t fully developed and thus my planning, reasoning and impulse control was not operational when I got married” on my divorce papers. I think it would hold up in court.

So, based on this scientific evidence, I’m now supposed to include “anyone under 30” on my list of “qualities which, if you possess them, will preclude my dating you” list. This list, which is growing rapidly, now includes¹:

• anyone named Dave (my ex) or Chris (my sister’s ex)
• the British
• boys who still live with their moms
• Surrey trash
• pretty boys
• anyone under the age of 30

I have a rather hard time with those last two though.

So, does anyone know any ugly old guys that I can date?

¹but is not limited to. I swear there were way more things on this list when I was talking to my sister, but I can’t remember what they were now.

He’s Back!

CANUCKS RE-SIGN FORWARD TREVOR LINDEN

Vancouver, B.C. – Vancouver Canucks Senior Vice-President and General Manager Dave Nonis announced today that the Canucks have re-signed forward Trevor Linden to a new contract.

All I can say is: it’s about damn time!

In other Canucks news, I have four tickets to the launch of the new Canucks sweater at GM Place next Wednesday, but no one seems willing and able to skip work¹ to join me. Any one out there in the blogodome interested?

¹For the record, I’m not *actually* skipping work. I only work 4 days a week anyway, so I’ll take Wed off instead of my usual Friday.

My First Ever Sangeet!

Last night I attended my first ever Sangeet (or Ladies Party, as it is also called). And I must say that you have not partied until you have danced to a mash up of “My Humps” + Hindi music.

OK, maybe I should back up a little. Since this is my first ever Indian wedding, when Shalu gave me my invitation (which, by the way, is the most gorgeous invitation I’ve ever seen!), I had to have her walk me through what the heck everything was, since my invitation had FOUR invitations in it!¹ The invitation to the Sangeet indicated that there would be Appetizers, followed by Chunni & Tilak, then dinner & dancing. Appies, dinner & dancing I am familiar with, but chunni & tilak, not so much. Around about the time that we were waiting for our ride to pick us up, Shalu’s friend, Mina (who I met at the wedding shower last weekend and arranged to carpool with) and I decided to Wikipedia² those terms to see what we could expect. Chunni, as near as we could tell from Wikipedia, is a piece of red fabric the groom’s family puts on the bride’s head. Tilak is a mark on the forehead.

Here’s a pic of the happy couple after the Chunni & Tilak part of the night. As you can see, Shalu bears both the chunni and the tilak. Wikipedia did not steer us wrong!

Don’t they look amazing??

OK, a few highlights of the night:

• the food. omg, so delish! I *love* Indian food. Plus, it was all vegetarian!
• everyone’s outfits – they were soooo beautiful! Shalu looked radiant in her beautiful green dress and Deepak was dashing in his blue outfit.
• <img src=”http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1035/922429146_cd16e84034_m.jpg” alt=”
• the music! As I mentioned at the start of the post, it was Hindi music mixed with pop. Billie Jean, plus Hindi. Sexy Back, plus Hindi. It went surprisingly well together and had a great beat, which made for great fun dancing.
• And speaking of dancing, I got a few compliments on my dancing abilities. Now, I’ve never danced to Indian music before, so I just sort of looked at what other people were doing and tried to imitate it… just feel the beat and go with it! I think people were surprised to see the only white girl there dancing to the Indian
• And speaking of dancing, the DJ told us that “this next song will be the last song of the night” about 6 times. At once point, they had turned the lights up for the “last song”, but we kept on dancing, so they turned the lights back down and kept playing music! After the actual last song, we decided we still needed to dance some more, so a bunch of us headed to Ginger Sixty-Two. Deepak told us it was Indian Night there, which we didn’t believe, as Deepak likes to make things up just to see if you will believe them. But he turned out to be telling the truth, because when we got there, they were, in fact, playing Indian music! Of course, Shalu & her “entourage” (as the DJ there called it) were the only ones wearing Indian outfits, which everyone there thought was very cool.
  <img src=”http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1348/922444750_d34beb6bc4_m.jpg” alt=”
  Here are Shalu & Deepak outside of Ginger Sixty-Two. Party like a rock star.

• We stayed ’til Ginger Sixty-Two closed (for those of you who are counting, that’s right, we stayed right to the end of *two* parties last night… ya, we are that hardcore!) By then, I was pretty much unable to walk due to my feet deforming shoes. In my defence, the shoes are very pretty. Some peeps headed off for pizza, but me, Andrea & Mina decided that it was time, since it was after 2 am and Andrea had to work in a few hours, to head home.

OK, that’s enough with the writing. But I’ll give you a few more pictures, what with them being worth a thousand words and all.

<img src=”http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1025/921577139_3dfa7fd769_m.jpg” alt=”

Me, Radha (sister of the groom) and Mina (friend of Shalu’s (and now my friend too!))

<img src=”http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1219/922427514_6648ddd72c_m.jpg” alt=”

Mina, me & Ritu in the back row. Deepak & Shalu in the middle. Meenu up front.

<img src=”http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1114/921585443_09f3dce059_m.jpg” alt=”

At Ginger Sixty-Two.

Stay tuned for more exciting wedding events next week. Next up, the wedding tradition of Mehndi on Wednesday!

¹See here for a brief description of the different events.

²I also discovered through Wikipedia that Shalu’s name is also the name of a “special type of sari.”

Another In-depth Canucks Trade Analysis

In this interests of keeping my Vancouverite friends living abroad apprised of the goings on of my beloved Canucks in the off season, I give you the Canucks’s newest hotties:

Ryan Shannon

This tasty morsel was picked up from the Anahiem Ducks as in exchange for Jason King and a conditional draft pick. He’s a centre, like me. And he’s 23, which happens to be my favourite age.

Jimmy Sharrow

This cutie was picked up in exchange for a cutie who was previously mentioned here in my corner of the blogosphere, Jesse Schultz. Jesse didn’t, however, appear to play much when he was called up and I assume he got sent back down to the Moose shortly thereafter. Hopefully Jimmy can do a little bit more than that next season.

Draft Picks

Patrick White (picked 25th overall) & Taylor Ellington (picked 33rd overall)

When I first heard that we picked up another Taylor, my first thought was “Taylor sandwich! With a Dr. Beth filling!” But, alas, then I saw the pics. Now, I’m probably going to lose my cougar card for saying this – but Pat & Taylor look a wee bit too young for my liking. Maybe they just need a few years on the Moose to, um, develop. You know, time to fill out and work on their skills.

In the meantime, there is always Ryan and Jimmy….

New ‘do

For awhile, I’ve been talking about getting a new haircut. In fact, way back in November at the dinner after my graduation, I was talking about it. At that time I said I wanted to lightening my hair – sort of around the same colour as Danielle’s. Then a friend of mine suggested I get bangs: “you know, the sort of asymmetrical kind.” “What, like Danielle’s? What am I, Single White Female?”

Well, apparently I am SWF, because I went out yesterday and got a new hair cut, with the asymmetric kind of bangs. But I brought Danielle & Sarah as my advisers, so it’s sort of SWF with permission. Sarah also wanted a hair cut, so we figured we’d venture out to find a salon. When I get my hair trimmed, I usually go somewhere cheap, like Great Clips, but I thought I wanted something a little more advanced to actually get my hairstyle changed. Felt like an $8 hair cut place might not be ideal for changing my ‘do. So we went to this place instead. Because we are, in fact, hotties. Sadly, that sign has been removed from their window – apparently someone was “deeply offended” by it. Omg, get a grip people!!

Anyhoo, here are the “before” and “after” photos… what do y’all think?

“Before” photo at the Hotties Always Welcome Salon.

OK, another “before” photo, this time with funny hats.

After photos!!

You Can See The Clouds In Front of the Mountains From My Office!

Thoughts on my day:

• because there was a chance that I might have to stay late for a meeting this evening, I decided to get up early* to go for a run before work as I didn’t want to run in the dark after getting home late. Apparently someone is unfamiliar with the concept of “spring forward.” I got up at 6:30 a.m. and it was pitch fucking black. But, being the resourceful person that I am, I decided to have my breakfast/make my lunch/do the dishes/pack my bag for work before I ran, thus giving it time to get light out. And I got into work by 9:30 am, which is half an hour earlier than I had expected to.
• Apparently there is a reason that “free coffee” isn’t a listed benefit. I discovered today that apparently the kitchenette on my floor has a coffee maker that is just for show. My hallmates** informed me, when I inquired about the coffee making situation, that “it’s just for desperation” and the coffee maker in the main office, three floors below us, is much better… well, you would have to be quite desperate, not to mention very creative, to make coffee on our floor, as there are coffee filters, but no coffee***. So I went to the main office for my morning coffee, but their coffee maker is quite small and since I’m sure that satisfying my coffee dependency by continually making pots of it is not in any of the support staff’s job descriptions, when I required an afternoon caffeine jolt****, I made the trip to Timmy Ho’s. It’s a long, convoluted, subterranean route to the Timmy’s… a series of tubes, if you will, not unlike the internets.
• I’m hoping that walking through said series of tubes to Timmy’s, as well as taking the stairs up and down to my 6th floor office a few times a day will counteract the nonstop sitting and snacking that comes along with a computer-based office job, so that I won’t gain 50 lbs a minute.
• I’m listening to the Canucks game on the radio as I compose this posting and this brings up two things: (a) I saw on their website that the Canucks have called up relative cutie Nathan Smith from the Manitoba Moose, and (b) the Canucks are playing the Wild and I can’t hear Shorty or Larscheid say the name “Carney” without giggling. I keep picturing a carnie rather than Carney.
• while waiting for the bus this morning I learned that, apparently, Matt (whoever Matt may be) is ripped and has 3 nipples and someone else “luvs to spooge”:
• After two days at work, I’m interesting in learning how the hell anyone gets anything done when they are working 8 hours a day on things unrelated to blogging and emailing? Anyone have any idea?

*Yeah, I’m as surprised as you are.
**Is that a word?
***There’s instant, but I won’t dignify that by calling it coffee. Hey, does anyone remember the brief period when Tetley made instant tea? What was up with that?
****as my early afternoon diet Pepsi just wasn’t cutting it.