The Blackhawks at Fairfax Ice Arena have been playing in the C2 division for a couple years now, after many previous years in the Novice league.  The Hawks have had a plaguing problem for longer than I have been playing on the team, which has been since the fall of 2002... The problem is that they will usually make it into the playoffs (it has been rare that we don't), and often make it to the championship round - but have always lost the championship series!  Sometimes these loses have been in dramatic fashion - like my favorite a few years ago when we met the Hurricanes in the finals.  The previous season we had the Mullet Man (Brian Rollins) playing on our team, but this year he was playing for the Canes.  We go to game 3 of the series (the final deciding game) and it goes to overtime and stays tied - so the championship will be decided by a shootout.  Who scores the championship winning goal for the Canes - the Mullet Man.  And to add insult to injury, he was already planning to come back to the Hawks the following season.  Ugh.

But finally, this past season which started in the fall of 2008 and ended in April of 2009 - The Blackhawks won a championship.  This was again done in fairly dramatic fashion.  We were not the best team in the league during the regular season.  The Flames seemed unstoppable from the start of the season.  In fact, they shut us out the first two times we met them... and in the third meeting, we finally scored one goal (I got the assist) - but still lost.  Then in the second half of the season things changed and we won our last two meetings against the Flames.  The only other game we lost was against Philly early in the season.  We faced them again in the playoffs... but we were victorious and we went on to meet the Flames in the finals.  We won the first game, but lost the second - which setup the deciding game three.  And once again, this game went to overtime.  Regulation ended with a score of 4-4.  Amazingly I scored two of these goals to keep us in the game.  I was playing on a line with Jamie Prime & Matt Dediana.  Our line had an awesome game as Matt scored one of the other goals.  In overtime it looked like the game would remain tied and we would be forced to another shootout for the championship, but with just around one minute to go in the game - Nathan Drevna scored a goal to secure the win and the Hawks' first championship.

I live in a rather small townhouse with a small front & back yard.  There is no grass in the back yard, but rather a cement patio surrounded by brick pavers.  Although plenty of grass and weeds pop up between the cracks of the pavers, this provides no natural habitat for plants.  Instead, I purchased several whiskey barrels that have been cut in half.  These make for wonderful planters, but they can be hard to find - unless you happen to live near the Jack Daniels distillery.

These planters have a distinguished, almost antique look and they are perfect for small gardening needs.  And if you are strong, they are even somewhat portable while in use - which can come in handy.  I've used them to plant herbs and flowers, but you could easily use them for small trees, bushes or even vegetables.