The other side of the coin...

So, we finally got the room situation worked out; thanks for your concerns, everybody. I did have a scrappy word brawl with the lady at the front desk, who didn't particularly care that we were out approximately $650 for the time being. The manager walked up just as I told the person that there was no way it was our problem that the hotel and Travelocity couldn't get their act together. Brian and I both work in customer-service-esque jobs, and there's no way either one of us would ever be allowed to double-charge a customer simply because our respective places of employment didn't receive payment from a third party. Ridiculous. Even more absurdly, this woman started yelling at us in the middle of the lobby. If I did that at my job, I would most likely be shit-canned.

The manager was super nice, though, and upgraded our room to a suite and gave us free lunch and dinner, so I'm pleased with the way it turned out on that end. She handled things very well once it all got out of hand. All in all, I guess what I learned for this experience is not to trust the people checking you in at hotels, even when you ask them specifically if your debit card is being swiped only for incidentals. Also, I learned that some people just suck at life. It was super cute--the woman who had the major attitude with us called our room after lunch (at 3:30) and said that she was supposed to get off work at 3:00, but she wanted to make sure we were settled in to our new room and that everything had worked out, and ordinarily, I would have felt bad putting someone out like that, but considering this entire ordeal wasted essentially our entire day, I didn't really give a fuck. We made sure to fold our clothes extra slowly.

***

The face transplant lady is on Oprah right now. I just upchucked my nachos.

***

And because this post is serving as the yin to my other post's angry yang, here are some things I did enjoy about the game last night:

1. Getting to see Jimmy Howard do what Brian and I call the "Beyonce Running Man" exercise in person. It's one thing that loses a little bit of its luster on television. We also have this really awesomely annoying habit of singing, "All the married Jimmys, all the married Jimmys" when he does it. Don't you feel just a teensy bit saddened that you didn't get to sit with us?

2. Dropping F-bombs ad nauseum and initiating all the children around me into the rough underworld of being scrappy. Hey, what can I say? Those little bastards got the Zamboni toys; maybe they should consider the evening a twofer: free gift AND free important life lesson. (Speaking of the Zamboni toy, I'm pleased that I was on so many people's minds last night; I really thought about snagging one, especially since the game was a wash. To be honest, I didn't see a lot of kids with them, which leads me to believe that maybe Mickey Redmond stole 2,497 of them to build a protective armada. Shhh, don't tell him they're not operative machines...)

3. Best moment ever: Brian and I left the game a little later, as we sat in our seats and waited for the crowd to dissipate a little bit before fighting our way out. Anyway, as we were leaving, we saw Murph up on his perch above the exit, so we yelled "Hey, Muuuuurph!" and he turned around and waved/pointed at us. I totally did the "We-Heart-You" (complete with the heart hand motion. Yes, TSO has mad love for Murph. And no, I am not in seventh grade.). It's in my top three most magical moments ever.

4. Second-best moment ever: Getting to chant, "Bullshit! Bullshit" after the non-goal. MUCH more cathartic than screaming it at my TV/dog/each other.

5. Henrik Zetterberg is amazing. We had really good seats last night, so it was awesome getting to watch him sorta up close. There's just no comparison between watching it in person and watching it on television. I'm not sure I'll be able to leave the Joe tomorrow night. They'll have to pry my cold, dead body away.

6. Todd Bertuzzi shaved, and it made me laugh when I saw him because I thought about how our buddies over at The Production Line prefer to call him Voldemort. Without the weird facial hair, he looks even more like someone from the otherworld.

7. I ran into a crazy St. Louis fan in the bathroom and told her I was in love with her blue wig. I need a red one.

8. I spent all my cash on beer at the game, and you would think that would be sad, but it's really not. It's the fulfillment of a goal: Last week, when I got part of my paycheck cashed, I said to my boss,"This is the money I'm going to get wasted on at the game next week." It really felt special, like all the hours and effort I had put into my job had finally amount to something. I think this is what some people may call "ambition".

9. I don't care that he's in St. Louis. I still love Ty Conklin, and I'm glad I got to see him play last night, although obviously, I'm unhappy with the outcome, and I wish he hadn't played nearly as well. I kept calling him "Conk Block", as I got drunker and drunker as the evening progressed, it kinda morphed into "Conk Blonck", which made me think of a conch shell, which made me wonder why I was talking about seashells, and then I got really confused and thought we were going to the beach.

10. We couldn't find anything to watch when we returned to the hotel room, so we turned FSD on and caught the replay of the game at the beginning of the third period. Here is a real conversation that transpired between Brian and me:

Me: "Wow, I can't believe I missed Kenny Rogers!"

[Moment of silence.]

Brian: "Ummm...you didn't miss it. You started singing it at the game. And you even put it a weird way, like, 'Oh, here's KennyRogersTheGambler,' like it was all one word."

Yiiiiiikes.

So, last night's game was not the best. I'm still stoked for tomorrow night and the craziness that will ensue due to the Ducks coming to town. You know how I feel about the Ducks. Gross. It's going to be so fucking fun!

P.S. I'm kinda surprised: I thought for sure that this guy or that guy would pin the shutout and/or Cleary injury on TSO's presence at the game or in the city of Detroit in general. Whew, dodged a bullet on that one...

I am ready to murder something.

There is so much I'm pissed off about right now:

1. What's worse than seeing the Wings lose? Seeing them get shut out in person.

2. What's worse than seeing the Wings get shut out in person? Seeing Dan Cleary get injured in person and finding out the day after that he'll be out for up to four weeks with a separated shoulder (via Bruce MacLeod's Twitter). What. The. Fuck. This, of course, means that The Scrappy Octopus's new bonercrush, Ville Leino, returns gallantly to the lineup tomorrow night against the Anaheim Ducks. At least the booing of the opposing team will drown out my booing of Mr. Leino himself. Just kidding. I'll probably just throw my panties at him or something since I'm now so in love with him. (Ah, it really is just a distraction, typing this bullshit, from what really blows ass: Dan Cleary is the 927th Red Wing to be injured this season. At this rate, I expect to walk away from the game tomorrow night with a pickaxe shoved up my ass or something.)

3. This isn't necessarily worse than Items 1 and 2, but we're getting fucked over by our hotel; as of 11 a.m. today, when we were getting ready to leave to grab some lunch, we discovered that the hotel had charged us approximately 133% of the cost of our stay here, in addition to the charge we'd already incurred by Travelocity for booking the stay in the first place. The person at the front desk explained that the hotel hadn't gotten paid by Travelocity; how this is our fucking problem, I do not know. But it really is a great policy, isn't it? You can imagine that being double-charged for a six-night stay at a hotel in Detroit is not an inexpensive affair. Needless to say, we pitched a fit, and the person at the front desk has been "on the phone" with Travelocity, attempting to sort out the ordeal, for approximately two hours now. Fuck. This.

Oh, and if anybody's curious, we're staying at the Omni Riverfront. Would have highly recommended it until now.

Did that first period really just happen?

Did the Flames just score 30 seconds into the game, while Zetterberg, Leino, Lidstrom, and Rafalski were all just standing by, leaving half the net unguarded and essentially screening Ozzie from viewing the play?

Did Homer really just get a penalty for "retaliating" against bullshit from Giordano? The entire audience at Joe Louis Arena saw what happened, as evidenced from the booing. The Scrappy Octopi certainly saw what happened, as evidenced by the fact that we both screamed obscenties and/or barfed blood.

Did Brad Stuart's power play goal really just get disallowed because Dan Cleary was "preventing the goaltender from moving inside the crease" because the fucking heel of his left skate was inside the crease? The fucking left heel?! Did that really just fucking happen? I mean, I'm pretty sure that the laws of physics aren't suspended to the point at which Kiprusoff cannot move to his left if Cleary is standing directly in front of him. I feel like I'm huffing fucking paint here. Since when are we calling this rule into practice for screening in front of the goaltender? I'm at a fucking loss.

Did the referee, standing directly behind the fucking net, really not just call a penatly on Kiprusoff for slashing the back of Homer's calf, causing him to fall down? Again, the entire chorus of spectators saw this go down. We saw it go down on TV. What is happening?!

Did Pavel Datsyuk just inadvertedly redirect the puck into our own net?

Is Todd Bertuzzi trying to set a record for how many times one can go offsides during one period of play? Thanks a mil for breaking up that great rush midway through the first, Bert.

I will give 15 years off my life for the following to happen:

1. The Wings have to get back in this game. They simply have to. This is insanity. They had some decent chances during the power plays, but what happened during the first is just some crazy bullshit. They cannot let this prevent them from coming out swinging in the 2nd.

2. Sometime very soon, can Babcock please break up the abysmal 2nd power play unit of Cleary/Leino/Bertuzzi?! How is this a good idea? Dan Cleary, I get it. He's gritty, and he's the replacement Homer for screening. But Todd Bertuzzi and Ville Leino out there with him at the same time? Leino has the speed of an Amazonian three-toed sloth, and Bert just does absolutely nothing on the power play; the most he's ever going to do is be the 3rd best person on the team for doing what Homer does and Cleary kinda does, which is be the boss at disturbance in the crease. Leino and Bert have no business being on the ice together; the only time this should be allowed is if the Wings win a grueling game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. Then they can come out and celebrate together. I'll be ok with that. I'm not even comfortable with them coming out on the ice at the same time to congratulate the goalie after an ordinary win. It's just too much of a recipe for disaster. This unit needs speed and playmakers. Put another one of the youngsters out there and sit Leino and Bert. Jesus Christ, replace everyone with Helm/Draper/anybody young not named Ville Leino. Just give someone else another chance. I'm sick of seeing these three fumblefuck around out there on the power play; every time Datsyuk and Zetterberg vacate the ice, I give up all hope that something's going to get done, unless it comes from the blueline. Speaking of the blueline, why in the fuck is Derek Meech on the 2nd unit?!

Anybody game for taking some double shots?

Wings pass on the BJs.

What? At least I didn't incorporate the verb "swallowed". Just know that I thought about it.

Wings win in Columbus, 9-1.

Not a typo.

NINE to one.

Seven players on the Wings' squad accounted for the nine goals, including two apiece for Niklas Kronwall and Justin Abdelkader. The first six Wings' goals were scored by players earning their third goal each of the season. So this must be what it's like, watching teams play in the Matrix.

Dan Cleary, Pavel Datsyuk, Kris Draper, and Niklas Kronwall each scored in the first half of the first period, raising the score 4-0 before the first intermission.

Todd Bertuzzi and Ville Leino scored in the second period, and Niklas Kronwall's second goal and both of Justin Abdelkader's came in the third.

Keeping track of the awesomeness?

--Myriad goals, spread out throughout the entire 60 minutes of play, rather than a flurry of goals early or a weak sauce attempt to catch up at the end? Check.

--Consistent play by top players? Check. Few glaring defensive breakdowns, and fabulous play by Datsyuk and Zetterberg, especially.

--Did the Wings' depth show tonight? Check. Is the sky blue? Leino looked better than he has since before he was benched; his razzle-dazzle before shooting the puck upstairs is reminiscent of the best plays we've seen him achieve in the past. Bertuzzi sent one to the back of the net. Cleary continued his scoring success. Kronwall proved his offensive prowess with being one shy of a hat trick tonight.

--Did the Wings keep it together? Yes. Again, consistent scoring throughout all three periods and no excessive or stupid penalties. Not counting Brad May's fighting major, none of the Wings made it to the sin bin until the end of the second period.

--How about special teams? The Wings managed two penalty kills successfully, with no power play goals against. Conversely, the Wings' power play accomplished two goals (both by Kronwall).

Sweet.

I got nothing (remix).

The Wings lose to the Maple Leafs, 5-1. Fuck. Me. Sideways.

1. At least it wasn't a shutout.

2. At least Dan Cleary got goal #100.

3. You know how I was trying to be all cute in the last post, saying how entertaining it is to come up with verbs describing how the Wings destroy their opponents? Well, I had an awesome one ready for last night's game. And now I'm not going to get to use it because this is the only time the Wings play the Leafs all season. Boo. Me = overeager asshat.

4. Last night's plethora of games may have been the weirdest yet. Not only did the Leafs unexpectedly give the Wings the business, but the Pens got shut out by the Sharks, and the Ovie-less Caps scored 5(!) goals in the 3rd period against Florida to win, 7-4. Also, approximately 5,437 people got injured last night, including, but not limited to, Pittsburgh's Kris Letaint Letang, Carolina's Cam Ward, Toronto's Mike Komisarek, and our very own Jason Williams (broken fibula). At this point, Kris Newbury and/or Jeremy Williams get called up? Maybe Ken Holland stages a Snatch-inspired rendezvous to steal Jiri Hudler back by trapping him in a burlap sack in the middle of the night and returning him from Moscow? (Homer could reprise the role of Brad Pitt's Mickey. I mean, really: Have you heard him speak?)

Maybe this is the universe's way of paying it forward for my being such an asshole. Maybe I shouldn't have laughed as hard as I did while watching Tomas Kopecky (the self-appointed next Tomas Holmstrom) get the puck literally taken away from him by Craig Anderson's stick during Friday night's shootout. Maybe it's a sign from the universe, telling me that delighting in other people's misery and abject failure shouldn't be my favorite pastime. Perhaps I should revoke and renounce the scrappy nature of this blog. At this point, I'll do anything--almost anything, barring getting my face eaten--to ensure the Wings' success. What do you think: The Saintly Octopus?

Well. I guess it's to be expected.

Per Nightmare on Helm Street, per Ansar Kahn, Pasha will not play tonight.

Holy fuck on a stick. I knew this was going to happen.

The announcement of his injury followed the typical pattern:

1. Yesterday morning: He missed a morning skate, but it's no big deal.

2. Later yesterday: He's "day-to-day", but it's nothing significant.

3. This afternoon: He's not playing tonight.

I hate pessimism and taking things too seriously; that's why I try to look on the bright, or at least humorous, side of things on this blog, so I'm not going to freak out. But I want to light myself on fire. But I won't.

Here are things that need to happen tonight:

1. Henrik Zetterberg needs to score. Immediately.

2. Dan Cleary needs to produce more offensively. He and Z are on the top line together tonight; they need to light it up. Bertuzzi needs to stay consistent with the defensive pressure. If it's just Z doing all the work tonight on that line, I'm going to be super, duper pissed.

3. I feel good about Leino/Filppula/Williams back together on the 2nd line. I liked seeing these guys together during the game against Chicago last week.

4. So excited to see Darren Helm back finally (couldn't watch the game two days ago because DirecTV v. Versus fucking sucks my life away).

5. Homer, Draper and Maltby are together on the 4th line. In the grand scheme of things, I actually don't mind this, either; these guys have played hard, for the most part, and have produced more than people significantly younger. Draper's goal against Chicago the other night was fantastic.

6. Brett Lebda is back, Derek Meech is out. At this point, who gives a shit?

7. I hope the home crowd energizes Ozzie and that he can make a few stellar saves early enough in the game to set the pace.

I can't believe I'm most nervous about the top line. It's as if everything I've ever known and held true has been thrown askew. It's like finding out I'm adopted, Santa Claus isn't real, and Chris Kunitz actually isn't permanently dressed up as a hobgoblin for Halloween, all at the same time. What the hell?

So, last week, in preparation for the battle royale v. the Blackhawks, I used one of my favorite "get pumped" songs, courtesy of Bonecrusher, to set the tone for the game. I feel we need something different today, something a little less gangsta, but equally as hardcore.

I have just the thing:

Yippee! Wings win 3-2 over Caps.

To be honest, I wasn't feeling this game at first; I was far too nervous about the absence of Johan Franzen and the addition of Patrick Eaves and the presence (again) of Derek Meech. You know how the universe will implode if too much awesomeness occurs simultaneously? Yeah, the exact opposite of that is what I'm trying to say.

The Wings really got going during the 3rd period, though, after the 1st and 2nd periods being kinda flukey and weird, and ended up on top at the final buzzer.

Quick thoughts on tonight's game, in no particular order:

--Homer scored a GOOOOOOOOAL! His second of the season. This brought a huge smile on my face.

--The first Caps goal was complete junk, and I was mad at Ozzie for letting it in. I got over it eventually because he made some great saves tonight, but ugh. So goes the plight of every Wings fan--we all understand this.

--The Datsyuk/Zetterberg/Bertuzzi line seemed a little rusty at first, but ended up playing pretty well. The Twins had some great scoring chances, particularly in the 3rd period, and they had me out of my seat, jumping up and down, on more than one occasion. Bert is looking far better than I had anticipated, also; so far, he is my favorite of the new additions. Zetterberg skated much better tonight than on Thursday against the Hawks.

--I wish Dan Cleary would do more of what he did during the playoffs. This guy is so good at those gritty goals. We need some of that.

--Jason Williams reminds me of Mikael Samuelsson in that he has a strong slapshot that sometimes finds its way into the net. Jason Williams reminds me of Mikael Samuelsson in that he has a strong slapshot that sometimes finds its way into 4 or 5 people in front of the net. Tonight, it was the former; therefore, he does not receive any of my wrath.

--Valterri Filppula had a great hit on Alexander Ovechkin. It's gotta feel good to topple that guy.

--I wonder who woke up Tom Poti and Brian Pothier for the game.

--That whole dislodged net/lack of whistle thing irritated me. I guess it's negated by the questionable call on Mike Green for slashing Ville Leino in the 3rd period, but it still pissed me off.

--Ville Leino had another stellar game. His skating had stood out for me after each game so far this season; in fact, he is one of the most memorable skaters on the team. I'm glad he is proving wrong my initial worries about him.

--Still on the fence about Patrick Eaves. He skated well tonight, made some good passes, but overall, I feel pretty ambivalent toward him. Time will tell.

--I can't believe Derek Meech and the boarding penalty. I hate it when people on our team play this way. As a Wings fan, I'm spoiled by our team not having stereotypically dirty players, so I don't like it when one of our players commits a dirty penalty. Boo to Meech for this one.

--I miss Johan Franzen.

That's all for now. I'm pumped that we won the game tonight, but the Franzen news still = a dark cloud over the future. It's one of those things that can't be changed, and the best thing to do, as a fan, is just focus on the awesome members of the team who are making things happen. But it still sucks ass. Bleh.

Who wants a beer?