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Tonight’s theme is another request from my younger son who noted the release of the Michael Jackson biography in the theatres.

You might notice that the first set is a bit…abbreviated.

We noticed that as well!

The teams on the ice had apparently started about twenty or so minutes late which was a revelation that came as I was helping diagnose why the scoreboard was firing off the horn every minute (I noticed that the “auto horn” setting was off straightaway and put that back on and I suspect the “interval” setting was also activated which eventually got turned off so the scoreboard would get back to operating as it usually does).

It didn’t help matters that they were stopping the clock after every stoppage until the final five minutes when they finally decided to let the clock keep running no matter what was happening on ice.

What we weren’t expecting was that as a result of a delayed start we had absolutely nothing to do with or could do anything about was that our first game was played on a noticeably used ice surface.

I’ll admit that I was a bit disappointed because I had a couple of other tracks from “Off The Wall” I was hoping to spin but I pity whoever made the decision to punish our skaters because the amazing and somewhat diminutive lady I share the booth with on Fridays was to not put too fine a point on it…unpleased…and rightfully so.

Apparently the choice that was offered was shave an entire period’s worth of time off our game to keep the first Zamboni which is not only brutally unfair if not potentially unsafe to the players who are paying for the ride when the delayed puck drop was completely out of their control but also thoroughly impractical.

It’s a funny thing about people who are on the lower end of the altitude scale when they get unpleased. Just because they’re in a small package does not mean one would be wise to take them at all lightly.

After all, dynamite also comes in small packages… 🙂

I think it was fairly evident that they could see that she was very unpleased and that they’d better take the hint to move heaven and earth to make it so after after she’d made it it crystal clear that we’d better see a Zamboni out on that ice after the first game was finished.

This isn’t the first time we’ve lost the Zamboni due to circumstances beyond our control. The last time a couple of weeks ago was due to having the stop the clock for extended periods during the first game due to player injuries and as a result the staff member refused to resurface the ice between the games and so the second game was rather fraught with gouges and potholes in the ice.

Never mind that there were other staff on premises who didn’t have to rely on a ride home from their mum on a school night who could have taken care of it which didn’t exactly go unnoticed.

Anywho, between the Zamboni showing up at intermission as expected and the Utah Mammoth having their way against the Vegas Golden Knights, the balance to the universe was restored and I was able to finish off the Michael tribute tracks I was planning on playing anyway.

Which meant that the track after the final whistle was never in doubt… 😉

Game 1 Warm-Ups

Zamboni and Game 2 Warm-Ups

Post-Game