Metalia Goes to a Hockey Game (Updated)

Yesterday, I attended my very first professional hockey game. It was a lot of fun, due in no small part to the Rangers' victory over the opposing team (I want to say it was the Panthers, but I was a tad too enthralled with my surroundings to say for sure), as well as the amazing seats provided to us via J's company. (Thanks, J's company!) The seats were located in the front row, right on what I believe is technically referred to as "the line in the middle of the rink where the ref drops the puck at the start of the game." (Note: I'm not trying to be all, "ooh, I'm a girl, I don't know sports," because that's simply not true. I just know shit about hockey, and I'm not ashamed to admit that.)

Anyway, because the seats were so awesome, I'd been anticipating certain things. Here is the list of things I'd been anticipating, but never happened:

* Getting hit in the head with an errant puck.

Or alternately:

* Avoiding getting hit by the wayward puck, and instead reaching up and catching said puck like a certain allegedly baboon-hearted star of an old favorite movie of mine. If you actually know to which movie I am referring, you have just become one of my new favorite people.

* A full-on hockey fight. Y'know, with gloves being pulled off, shirts being pulled over heads, and maybe, just maybe, some tooth loss? I desperately wanted to see that.

* Seeing some hockey-loving celebrities.

Now, here's the list of things I hadn't foreseen, but actually did happen:

*Coming across this unfortunately named store in Madison Square Garden:

Hee!

* In terms of celebrity sightings, all we got was....Tom Hanks' scruffily bearded son, Colin. Jealous? Yes, I thought so.

* We saw a hobo (I know; again...) talking to himself while we were in the car on the way home. Now, unfortunately, that in and of itself is not unusual for the city. However, a few seconds later, J starts freaking right the hell out. The rest of us ( i.e., me, my brother, his girlfriend, and friend) start looking around trying to figure out what was causing this. We quickly determined that our good friend Mr. Hobo had dropped his pants, bent over, and was showing everyone his hobo ass and hobo junk; just waving it around brazenly. Did I mention that we were stuck at a red light? A really long red light? And thus were sort of stuck there? Mmm hmmm.

My brother's immediate reaction was, inexplicably, "I thought I was looking at a basket of bread at first." Don't even ask me to explain what he meant, because I was laughing/horrified, and couldn't be bothered with trivial questions such as "what in the hell do you even mean?" We all lost a bit of our innocence, I must say. Poor J; when we all caught our breath and asked him what exactly he'd seen at first, he whispered in hushed tones, "I saw everything."

UPDATE: Ohmigod! I can't believe I forgot to mention these two things in the list of things I hadn't anticipated:

* We were seated directly behind the opposing team (and yes, it was the Panthers)...I could actually see their neck sweat. (Hott!!111) Anyway, as they first took to the ice to warm up (cool down?), one of the Panthers was totally hitting on me. And by "totally hitting on me," I of course mean "displaying ballerina-like feats of flexibility involving bringing his leg up by his head, such that his uh, ostensibly cup-protected area was directly in my eyeline, making uncomfortable eye contact with me all the while." I ask you, WHERE DOES ONE LOOK WHEN THIS IS HAPPENING?!

* Carmine (he had a nametag), the apparent Godfather of the arena, was policing our row to ensure that no unauthorized ticketholders attempted to cut through there to get at the Rangers as they returned to the locker room. People, he clotheslined two small children! I saw it with my own two eyes!

That is all.