Report from Vancouver, pt 4

These episodic titles are starting to remind me of Lethal Weapon and Die Hard.  With that in mind, WI and I are basically living the buddy picture (her aussie experience means she's Mel and I'm Danny Glover) and I think she would back me up with a little, "Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker."  Apologies to Duncan for interrupting his great stream of Olympic break posts with one of my own, but some seriously fun stuff is going on.  To start with, this is the "revised" the view of the cauldron:

I have been buying 50/50 tickets at all the games, because I don't think I've ever been luckier than the past few days.  Tuesday, we attended the Canada vs. Germany qualification match, and pretty much had the best time you could ever have at a hockey game.  The seats were spectacular, and if we haven't already beaten the point into the ground, our ticket angel rocks.  Every "Luuuuu..." was followed by a chorus of "Go Iggy" to cleanse the palette.  The beer was flowing and of course, we all know the outcome.  The Canadians sent the Germans home with a round of handshakes and "Good games", as you can see:

Post game, WI was lucky enough to be introduced to Jeremy Roenick while I was recycling some beer and embarrassing myself.  See, I was taking pictures in the bathroom, because I noticed something on the sponsor advertisement.  So, here is a picture of me with Jeremy Roenick:

The point is I'm an idiot. But still, if you count the provinces and territories on this poster, one of them is missing.  I'll let you figure it out, but for those who may be reading from Sackville, feel free to write your minister.  The even less interesting point in this photo is the duct tape covering the NewAd logos throughout the venue.

Yesterday, we holed up at the ANZA Club to watch the Canada vs. Russia game with a bunch of Calgarians, ex-Calgarians, one aussie, and one unfortunate Leafs fans. (Dan is awesome actually, but I needed an excuse to use the singular "fans").  We ordered in pizza, pounded some Coopers, and watched Canada beat up on Ovie and his boys.  I was kind of hoping for a "hot stick" celebration, but in its absence, I'll take the win.  WI loves Dan Boyle now more than ever, and Iggy wasn't really much of a factor.

After the Canada game, we made tracks down to Canada Hockey Place to attend the Sweden vs. Slovakia quarterfinal match.  Getting there early was a huge plus, as we got down close for the warm up.  I have a few photos to share, to start off with, its always the little things that make an experience worthwhile:

Nice touch, VANOC.  Later that night this was dubbed the, "inukpuck".  Love it.

WI digs swedes, and Foppa is her all time fave, so here you go:

I also was able to get in close on Zatta:

Not much to say about the game, both teams came out flat for the first half, then the Slovaks started to turn it on.  Halak looked solid, and a here's a little tip from watching Flames games... a 2 goal lead in the second is not enough to fall into the "shell".  At one point they actually lined up 5 across the blue line and practically linked arms.  As long as they stayed on the attack, they looked pretty effective.

We actually ran into Craig Button wandering the concourse between periods, WI was impressively restrained and all smiles in the pic I got with the two of them.  He appeared to be there with his daughter, so that probably helped keep the profanity in check.

The lineups for the skytrain were nuts, so we bailed out into a Yaletown bar for a beer just to get out of the rain and let things calm down.  Sometime after midnight, we headed into the station, and had one of the best random sightings of the whole trip (so far):

Clara Hughes was heading out with her husband and a couple of other friends.  We noticed her early on, but waited until the fan fest broke before I jumped in to take her photo.  She was really friendly and gracious to the passengers, showing off her medal and posing for people.  Someone asked her if she's retiring from competition, to which she responded, "I am soooo retired. Totally."  Still, what more is there for her to win?

Friday against the Slovaks, venue to be determined.  Can't wait.  And good luck to the Canadian Women's team in the final today, pound a few home for me.