really?

amazing.

sky rink @ chelsea piers might be falling into the hudson.

more details to come, but…  we will shortly be on our way to chicago!  woo!

the blue bombers (d6) started out the fall season on the right foot taking out the wildmen 5-1.

it was a great team effort with a really long bench.  dom showed no rust in goal…

personally…  i scored the first goal from the low circle with a circus slash bad angle shot that dropped through the goalie’s pads.  and…  i scored the last goal on a breakaway — my first shot went directly to the goalie’s shoulder and dropped down in front where i poked it through on the same stick movement.  sweet!

wooo!!

after almost 6 years, 18 seasons and 5 teams at chelsea piers…  i am part of a winner!

the blue heroes took out the blights in the championship game with a shutout victory — 4-0.

the “heroes”?

jeremy…  with a natural hat trick!  and…  adam…  with yet another shutout!

on to the fall season…

the blue heroes breezed (and i HATE saying that) through the semi-final for the summer season winning 10-0.

the other team only iced 5 skaters and conceded after the first period which, technically, means we won 8-0.

either way, we are headed to the final.  nice!

i scored twice…  off the opening faceoff, i pushed forward and past one D to get a clear shot — straight and low to the corner of the net.  elapsed time?  ~5 seconds.  my second goal had me in the high slot and taking a nice feed off my skate, directly to my stick and whipped high corner.

my summer hockey team — a combination of my d5 and d6 teams at chelsea piers — finished the regular season…

undefeated, bay-bee!  8-0

i only had the chance to play in half the games, sadly, due to travel and illness, but i always enjoy the summer format — 4-on-4, two 25 minute running time periods, no icing…

we finished with the second best goals for (46) and the second lowest goals against (18), but with the best +/- (28).

the summer playoffs are one and done, so we will see what happens in the semi-finals…

it has been quite a while since i have had a brazilian meatfest, er, churrascaria! years, in fact, since i used to go with a large group of friends to churrascaria plataforma in midtown west — stuffing ourselves full of food and wine served in magnums and imperials.  (i love dining with josh!)

we decided to ring up tanya to go to churrascaria riodizio tribeca, which is just across town from us.

the most important thing i can tell you about the experience? none of us can eat like we used to.

this restaurant is a lot smaller than its bretheren — located in an oversized brownstone on west broadway. the bar is pushed to the right as you walk in with a small, controlled temp wine room on the left. the dining room expands as you walk forward with the misnamed “salad bar” tucked in all the way to the right and the dining area extending all the way to white street on the left.

alison and i got a bottle of wine — a flavourful pinoit noir from santa cruz, ca.

we all worked through the “salad bar” with asparagus risotto being at the top of my list of favourites and other dishes including: marinated mushrooms, cold asparagus salad, tortellini, cold seafood salad and a red bean and chorizo dish. yum!

then we hit the meat! we turned our coasters from “red” to “green” and were deluged by succulent meat variations. i really enjoyed the pork tenderloin and the flank steak.

too full for dessert… go figure.

in the first game of the summer 4-0n-4 season, the blue heroes (yes, yes…  my d5 and d6 teams combine in the summer — blue bombers + homer’s heroes = blue heroes!) took out pond hockey by a score of 9-1.

that’s right.  9-1.

i was uncharacteristically late for the game.  i try to take a small nap before weeknight hockey games because my adrenaline — post-game — is always so high and i have trouble getting to sleep.  unfortunately, my alarm did not go off as planned.  i arrived with 15 minutes to go in the first period…  and we were already up 5-0.  well done!

it was certainly not a good match up.  for the most part, we were skating in/around/over/through them the entire game.  if they had 5 shots on goal, i would be shocked.  their goalie was so exhausted, he actually took himself out of the game with 10 minutes to go in the final period.  i had never seen that before!

i thought we did quite well in the final period with puck movement — we did a lot of passing instead of trying to shoot on every play and i really like seeing that kind of discipline when one team is up by so many goals…

personally, i had a bunch of chances and connected on one that was a self-rebound off the boards behind the net and then slammed upstairs.

the best western seaport hotel was “recommended” by new york magazine this past week in an article on “ranking seven hotels under $200 in nyc“.

this is “cool” because alison and i have certainly recommended the hotel to others — it is very close to our home.  my parents have stayed there…  we like the place — especially its location.  the rooms are a bit on the small side, but the seaport area is really up and coming and there is access to almost every subway line within five blocks.  plus, it is q-u-i-e-t down here so it is certainly a respite from the “city”.

this is “not cool” because…

we pay for a subscription to new york magazine.  i really hate the business model where print subscribers subsidize free online content.

we always considered the hotel kind of “our secret” — although, i am sure we did not fully believe it.

c’est la vie!

alison and i saw the new harry potter flick on sunday — in IMAX 3D.

her firm rented out the entire IMAX theatre at lincoln center for two exclusive showings.  yes, IMAX.

the theater is HUGE.  HUGE, i tell you.  if i remember correctly, the screen is nearly 8 stories tall.

only part of the flick is in 3D — about 10-15 minutes at the end of the movie.  and it is SO worth it.  everything is flying toward you, near you, around you…  it is all encompassing.

as far as the content…

alison just finished reading book 5 so it was fresh in her mind.  i have not read it for years so some of the “missing detail” was lost on me.  i really looked at it as much more of a film and not a graphical representation of a book.

it was beautifully shot.  the colours were a bit muted — with an almost blue hue — which worked really well in setting the tone.  the scene at the beginning where harry is flying with the order of the phoenix through london on broomsticks is breathtaking and the 3D portion is nothing short of brilliant.

there were certainly elements of the book missing or changed, but that has to be expected with a book that comes in at almost 800 pages.  there was no quidditch — which was a bummer for ron, certainly, but did not take away from the story.  some of the other things i missed were…  rita skeeter, stuff related to percy and more stuff related to OWLs.

regardless, it was a truly cohesive flick.

i dug it.