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Remember how I kind of described the process I used for coming up with a theme in the previous post?

That’s the bit where I’m usually thinking about the next session’s playlist and planning on how it’s going to go and so forth.

This isn’t going to be one of those nights, at least in terms of what’s being played prior to game 1.

Oh, I do know two songs I want to be in it and I guarantee you they’ll be heard at some point in the evening but I don’t know if I’ll have the time to play them before the puck drop.

You see, there was a bit of a last minute change to the ol’ itinerary before tonight’s game that involves collecting my younger son from his Chick Fil-A on Timber Drive in Garner several miles south of Raleigh when he gets off shift at 1900.

Warmups for Ironclad start at 1945 in Wake Forest which is even more miles north of Raleigh with occasionally nasty and congested roads like the I-87 and I-540 motorways that dump you on to an even worse road in Capital Blvd.

Assuming everyone keeps their wits about themselves and the traffic moves reasonably, I’m hoping to make it to Wake Forest about ten minutes before warm-ups in which case all will be well with a little creativity in handling the roster sign-in sheets.

I’ll confess to feeling more than a little sense of urgency and pressure.

Nothing close to what’ll be going on at Lenovo Centre shortly after I arrive in Wake Forest with the puck dropping on Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals between our Carolina Hurricanes and those pesky Golden Knights from Las Vegas which is why I’m thankful that the usual UCF Tervis I’m rocking won’t be going into the rink tonight! 😉

Fortunately, I was able to make it to the rink with about ten minutes before warm-ups so it was a very hectic bit of dropping off the roster clipboards to the respective locker rooms, setting up quickly in the booth and then letting fly with “Hurricane 2000” which gave me enough time to go to the far side of the other rink to our cupboard to collect the bag of pucks and schlep it back to our side with about a minute to go before the next track came on for warmups.

So here we go with a playlist made up on the fly.

See if you can pick out the two songs that came immediately to mind when I was figuring out the logistics of how tonight was going to go! And there’s a third one that just occurred to me that will be perfect… 🙂

Game 1 Warm-Ups

Meanwhile, I learned a new trick and finally got the mixer to accept the microphone that’s been in the booth in the Forest rink and put it to good use during the game to announce the goals that were occurring at Lenovo (sadly, no happy ending to the game but a couple of players were very happy that I was using the tannoy to keep them abreast of what was going on a few miles away from us).

The magic button was the 48v phantom voltage (to the right of that red light just under the Yamaha logo near the centre of the mixer).

We’ll be having more Ironclad hockey when game 4 is underway in Las Vegas and we’ll likely be on the Forest rink again so I do plan on giving the status updates as needed (go Canes!).

Zamboni and Game 2 Warm-Ups

Post-Game