Hockey, Guam and a second shot at Lava?

At the moment I'm watching the Gophers play the Badgers (boo hiss!) in hockey. Today's broadcast is highlighting the 1979 NCAA Championship Gopher hockey team. Between periods they played highlights from the final game of the WCHA season and the WCHA Championship game, both between the Gophers and the ND Sioux (boo hiss!). The highlight reel is fantastic. I get the feeling this reel was made maybe 12 hours after the WCHA Championship game, as it appears to be born of 1979 as well. The late 70s (almost adult-movie-ish) background music, the black lines from flaws in the film, sub par lighting and the obligatory old-school voice over. (Think Keith Jackson.)

I love this footage: cheerleaders wearing outfits that actually cover their breasts, belly and butts, Gophers with hockey hair poking out from beneath their faceguard-less helmets, Herb Brooks rocking some mighty fine suits, and shots of the old Barn. Sigh. How I miss that place. I'm not knocking the new Mariucci arena. The old place just held a lot of memories for me.


Zac is en route to Guam as I type. Navy stuff for two weeks. He'll be 20 hours ahead of us when he lands. 20 hours??? I know. It made my brain hurt to figure it out as well. You see, Guam is only four time zones away from Hawaii. HOWEVER, it is on the other side of the date line, so . . . Actually, I'm not sure what that all means. I think there's a wormhole or some sort of tear in the time continuum. All I know is when he took off at 3:30 pm Hawaii time today (Saturday) it was 11:30 am Sunday in Guam. So I'm not sure if he can buy the Honolulu Advertiser before it's even printed or if he can bet on horse races like Biff did in Back to the Future.

While Zac is working/playing in Guam for two weeks, I'm going to be heading back to the Big Island with Bernadette for a few days. She wanted to try camping over there for a couple of nights. Her husband is also heading to Guam so we figured it was a good time to go explore the Big Island. While she and her husband have been here for 18 months, they haven't ventured over to the Big Isle yet so she's hoping to get a sense of the place so she and her hubby can head back at some point. We're planning on camping a couple nights and spending the last night in a hotel. As this is a trip primarily planned by Bernadette, there will be copious amounts of exercise involved. Hiking two days, kayaking another. I'm sure I'll either die there or come back looking like a rock star.

On the up side, it sounds like some of the lava flow might be back in Volcanoes National Park, so we might to get a little closer to it. Of course Zac was disappointed that he might be missing out on lava viewing. If it is, in fact, flowing in the park I suppose I'll be heading back to the Big Island again at some point in the future. Not that I mind. A 45 minute flight for $45 is a little easier to stomach than a five and a half hour $700 flight to California. I'll take my adventure where I can afford it for the moment.