Pro Puzzle 1

It’s Monday afternoon, you just ate lunch and you’re feeling lethargic. You need something to boost your spirits and I’ve got just the thing: Ice Age.

Sorry, I’m not talking about having a Rogers Arena viewing party of those amazingly good animated movies with Manny, Sid and Diego (and Scrat of course), I’m referring to Ice Age: The Official Magazine of the Vancouver Canucks.

You never know what you’ll find on the free table in the Canucks employee lunchroom and I recently stumbled upon a stack of Ice Age magazines from 1995. I flipped a few open and was mesmerized, an issue from November 3, 1995, featuring Corey Hirsch, was especially mesmerizing. I’d scan the entire issue for you if I had time, but I’ve got a lot of Facebooking things to do, so here’s a Pro Puzzle crossword to brighten your day.

First person to post a link to their finished puzzle wins Fort Nucks Bragging Rights (FNBR), which can be redeemed at the end of the summer for pride.

The 20 finalists

A few weeks ago I asked you, our lovely fans, to submit what you thought the top moments of the season were for the Vancouver Canucks. There were some exceptional responses and in the end the Top 20 Moments (Part 1 I Part 2) were chosen from the list and rearranged counting down from 20 to 1.

And now we’ve got 20 finalists for a Canucks team-signed flag and they are…

Karen Friesen, Ann-Kathrin Thiele, Bridget Womelduff, Muhammad Faateh Malik, Zachary Wyder, Matt Hastings, Kaeleigh Evans, Tinder Brar, Jeffrey Blayne Tommy, Lori Mustvedt-Garson, David Lobakgo, Lee Renée Siu, Allison Wright, Tina Berkenpas, Andrew Schroeder, Greg Dion, Karl Hohensee, Krystal Soong, Emma Tyler and Sal Sagev.

I’ll come clean right now and admit that Sal Sagev doesn’t exist. No one suggested Andrew Ebbett scoring the game-winner in his first game back from a broken collarbone as a moment, and I thought it was significant, so Sal Sagev was born. It’s Las Vegas backwards.

So the finalists each had a 1 in 19 chance of winning, you can thank Sal for that.

I wanted to determine a winner in the most creative way possible and my first thought was to buy 20 turtles, one linked to each contestant, and have a turtle race. I was told to tone it down a bit, so I thought having a wind-up toy race would be pretty cool. I went to two toy stores this morning and couldn’t find anything, so the toy race was cancelled.

On to Plan C: oh, right, I didn’t have a Plan C. So my officemate Mike and I set up a bracket with the 20 finalists (we included Sal Sagev to keep it even) and we spun quarters to determine the winner. Here’s the breakdown of how things went, the final round was Lori vs. Tinder vs. Emma in a three quarter battle royale and Emma Tyler (yes, spun by me) outlasted Lori and Tinder. (Thanks, I realize I have the worst writing ever…)

Thanks for everyone who submitted entries and congrats to Emma!

Behind the scenes Sedins

Who do the Sedins think they are?

Correct me if I’m wrong, but is there not a memo accompanying the package professional athletes receive after being drafted that outlines how to be a superstar?

Daniel and Henrik Sedin recently passed up the chance to go viral with the cameras rolling during a commercial shoot for the 25th annual BC Children’s Hospital Miracle Weekend at Global TV in Burnaby.

Wearing matching grey Canucks polos, seated in matching wooden director’s chairs in front of a green screen, Daniel and Henrik simply read the scrolling sentences on the teleprompter urging people to support Miracle Weekend instead of taking matters into their own hands and discussing their talents.

Read the full story

Here’s an exclusive behind the scenes look at the making of the Sedins Miracle Weekend commercial.

Click here to find out more about Miracle Weekend.

I’m baaaaaack

Hey everyone!

Sorry for the delay on the blog, but with the family coming in and getting back in the line-up, I’ve been a lot more busy.

The game yesterday was a lot of fun and the crowd was really amazing. They were chanting for the first half until we came back. It was a big game for us to beat the defending champs in front of their crowd. I felt good physically and feel good about my game.

It took me a little bit of time but I’m finally getting used to the new gear and skates that I’m using this tournament. My equipment was shipped from Vancouver to Montreal after the season, so when I got the call to come play for Team Canada it was somewhere on the prairies in a UPS truck. Therefore I had to get a new set of equipment from Canucks equipment man Pat O’Neill before leaving for Switzerland. It might sound silly, but working in new equipment takes time. Good thing I feel great in it now.

I hear it’s warming up in Vancouver right now, enjoy it because its pretty chilly here. Some days are nice with some sunshine, but for the most part it’s been similar to Vancouver in February. Brrrrr is right!

Jeff Vinnick took a shot of me with Big Z (Zdeno Chara) the other day and a lot of people are wondering what was said. After practice we crossed paths in the hallway leading to the practice rink and he was asking me how I was feeling after leaving the game against his team Slovakia. He is one of the toughest guys around the NHL, but I’ve only heard good things about Chara as a person and for him to check on me proves to me that he is a very genuine guy.

That’s it. Gotta get ready for Kazakhstan!

Burr

*Photo credit to Jeff Vinnick, who is at the World Championships shooting for the IIHF.

Schneiderman

Mrs. Ross’ third grade students at Strawberry Vale Elementary School in Victoria, BC, recently took on an interesting project. In honour of Canucks goaltender Cory Schneider, they wrote ‘Schneiderman’ songs, to the tune of Spiderman, and sang them at school.

They then sent them over to Canucks Headquarters along with a sweet letter congratulating the team on the season and all the accomplishments. They even made three predictions for the 2013 season:

          1. CUP ALL THE WAY!!!!
          2. Norris trophy for Hamhuis!
          3. Vezina trophy for the goalie! (They actually put Venza, which is adorable)

Anyways, here’s a few of the Schneiderman songs that made me giggle a manly giggle.

Slow and steady

I better slow down, this blogging is becoming a daily thing!

I thought I’d get an entry in today before going to bed, not that I have much to talk about. I’m still feeling fine after bike ride day and skating on my own day, so today I practiced with the team in a “gold jersey” that meant no contact for me. I even had gold socks on to complete the package. It was kind of funny actually, I was in yellow and there were guys in white, red, blue and green jerseys, I’m sure we looked like a bag of Skittles that had burst.

I have skates scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday and hopefully everything will stay on course and I can play on Friday. The docs, coaches and I will decide later this week if I’m ready to play against the Finns. Slow and steady wins the race, unfortunately it looks like I will miss tomorrow’s game against Switzerland.

I’m trying to keep better track of what I do on a daily basis to be able to blog about it, but the truth is I haven’t been doing much other than resting, eating and playing poker. I’ve made sure to keep in touch with a lot of my Canucks teammates and I’ve been texting with Lou and Mace the last few days.

Someone asked me the other day who I am cheering for the NHL playoffs and I can honestly say no one, it is very difficult to watch any NHL games with the time difference and all, but I check the boxscores and highlights everyday.

You asked for a blog about nothing right? You’re welcome!

Until next time.

Oh and if you have any questions for me, let me know. I’ll try to answer some next time.

Burr

Keep on, keepin’ on

Hey everyone!

Good news is I feel better today than I did yesterday, bad news is I still couldn’t play today in our game against France. The boys played well and won 7-2, so it looks like they didn’t miss me too much!

I’m still following protocol, yesterday I did a 20 minute bike ride and everything went good, today I skated on my own for about 25 minutes and didn’t have any problems. Hopefully that stays the same and I can skate with the team tomorrow. Our next game is Wednesday against Switzerland.

I’ve been spending even more time with my roommate Vlasic than usual because he suffered a knee injury against the USA, so we both watched today from the press box. He’s a good guy, all the guys are actually. We had a nice team dinner last night at one of Helsinki’s best steakhouses and yesterday afternoon me and some of the guys had a few friendly games of poker. I did really good for myself - no poker pros like Roberto here…

I’m really starting to miss my wife Nancy and my 1 year old daughter Victoria. We’ve been doing quite a bit of visiting over Skype and FaceTime, but it’s difficult with the huge time difference. Thankfully they are both coming here in a few days, so I’m really looking forward to spending time with them.

Just like that, it’s time to say good night.

Burr

*Photo credit to Jeff Vinnick, who is at the World Championships shooting for the IIHF.

A little sightseeing

First things first, that’s a tough loss to take. It’s hard watching your team play without you and even harder watching a loss, you always think you could have done something to help them win.

I didn’t play today, the docs and I want to make sure I feel 100% before I get back on the ice. I was a little wobbly after the hit, like you probably saw, so that’s why I didn’t return against Slovakia. I’m feeling good today, no real concussion symptoms, so I’ll keep following the NHL protocol for these kind of injuries and if things stay the same, I hope to get back out there soon.

Thanks for all the kind words and support, I really appreciate it!

I can’t stop thinking about playing my first international game the other night, even though it didn’t end as planned for me. It was fun to see the team come up with a win, that’s all that really matters when you put on that jersey. The crowd was great, as I expected, and it was wild again today against the USA and it should be the same against Finland.

Today was weird for me. Knowing I wasn’t playing, I didn’t have the same game day routine. I wanted to let my roommate Vlasic nap this afternoon, so I walked around Helsinki and went to watch the movie American Reunion. It was very funny and I was able to relax while doing a little sightseeing, which was great.

I saw a question on my first blog about food and how different it is here. We have a great set up at the team hotel as far as food goes, we have a team buffet for every meal, so the food is very similar to North America. It’s pretty much the same as the NHL here, it’s the Never Hungry League…

That’s all I got for you!

Talk soon.

Burr

*Photo credit to Jeff Vinnick, who is at the World Championships shooting for the IIHF.