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This post comes from the relative unfamiliarity of New Jersey, but it follows a day of deja vu. I spent 22 hours of yesterday's allotted 24 on the bizarre sandbar I called home until I was 17. So much has changed, and yet so little.
It's weird, the mix of Veritable Institutions that have endured for 40-50 years with the successors and complete teardowns and signs of the coming diversity and ethnicities that the Greatest Generation, and much of mine, seem scared shitless of.
The hockey crowd was emblematic of that. Almost entirely white of skin and blue of collar- and, as my game bud![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
greenquotebook noted, maybe only one or two jerseys on fans for any team other than the hometown (for now) Isles. All of them in orange and blue. All standing for the patriotic songs (even O Canada, although one 7 p.m. drunk heckled THAT). All look just the same.
Not that it's much if any better where I am now, but it still comes at you hard when you havent seen it in awhile.
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I hadn't seen this place's insides since high school.
It doesn't look too bad for a 43-year-old! But it's light on luxury boxes and there's no surrounding Hockey Heaven like even the Sabres have, so come April (June, if theyre lucky), the Isles are going hipster and taking their pucks and organic groceries to Brooklyn.
But wow- what a place to see it all from: seven rows up from the glass for the price of plenty of nosebleed seats that were on offer:
I was also made teary when I saw, among all the Islander swag in the rafters, the still-hanging banners for the ABA Nets, who won two titles on that floor before going to the NBA, the Garden State, and eventually the County of Kings:
The barn was near full and way loud. After a scoreless first with the Isles shooting into our end, they switched for the second and we saw two quick Ottawa goals right below us. The home team whiffed on three straight power plays. The Ice Girls were lame. Then they switched back for the third and the place went nuts with the lone Islander goal with just under 10 minutes left. It wasn't enough, though, and my secret rooting for the Sens succeeded (they're still in the lottery;).
My friend's son got on the Jumbotron. Traffic to here was manageable. Two more friends await in Manhattan in a few hours, and then there will be pi. More about those, from somewhere, probably tomorrow.
It's weird, the mix of Veritable Institutions that have endured for 40-50 years with the successors and complete teardowns and signs of the coming diversity and ethnicities that the Greatest Generation, and much of mine, seem scared shitless of.
The hockey crowd was emblematic of that. Almost entirely white of skin and blue of collar- and, as my game bud
greenquotebook noted, maybe only one or two jerseys on fans for any team other than the hometown (for now) Isles. All of them in orange and blue. All standing for the patriotic songs (even O Canada, although one 7 p.m. drunk heckled THAT). All look just the same.Not that it's much if any better where I am now, but it still comes at you hard when you havent seen it in awhile.
----
I hadn't seen this place's insides since high school.
It doesn't look too bad for a 43-year-old! But it's light on luxury boxes and there's no surrounding Hockey Heaven like even the Sabres have, so come April (June, if theyre lucky), the Isles are going hipster and taking their pucks and organic groceries to Brooklyn.
But wow- what a place to see it all from: seven rows up from the glass for the price of plenty of nosebleed seats that were on offer:
I was also made teary when I saw, among all the Islander swag in the rafters, the still-hanging banners for the ABA Nets, who won two titles on that floor before going to the NBA, the Garden State, and eventually the County of Kings:
The barn was near full and way loud. After a scoreless first with the Isles shooting into our end, they switched for the second and we saw two quick Ottawa goals right below us. The home team whiffed on three straight power plays. The Ice Girls were lame. Then they switched back for the third and the place went nuts with the lone Islander goal with just under 10 minutes left. It wasn't enough, though, and my secret rooting for the Sens succeeded (they're still in the lottery;).
My friend's son got on the Jumbotron. Traffic to here was manageable. Two more friends await in Manhattan in a few hours, and then there will be pi. More about those, from somewhere, probably tomorrow.